Cee’s FFC: Reflections and Shadows

Every week, Cee has a Fun Foto Challenge, and this time, the theme is ‘Reflections and Shadows’, so here are a few I was able to find.

On our visit to Belize in January, we saw some interesting reflections and shadows on our day trip to the Mayan ruins at Lamanai. The only way to get to this site is by river, and this pic not only has reflections, but also a well camouflaged crocodile.

Here’s a much prettier reflection of water lilies on the New River

Now for the shadows. Our long trek through the jungle was very shady and full of shadows.

In the trees were the shadowy figures of Howler monkeys.

I also found  couple of hammock pics for the theme. The first one in some welcome shade in Belize,

and this one taken at our villa at Round Hill, Jamaica. Can you think of a more pleasant way to babysit  a young grandson?

I hoe you’ve enjoyed my reflections and shadows. To see more entries, just click on Cee’s badge.

Sunday Stills: Shorelines from my travels.

Ed’s Sunday Stills challenge this week, is ‘Shorelines’, and the rules are that the pics must have the sea, ocean, lake or pond and land. Quite simple really, and of course there is always my blog header, which is the shoreline of the idyllic island of Bora Bora in French Polynesia. 🙂

Here are a few more shorelines that I’ve enjoyed on my travels. I’ve tried to include something interesting on each shoreline. You can click on the photos to get the bigger picture.

Elephants on the shoreline of lake Kariba in Zimbabwe.

Pelicans on the shoreline of San Diego.

The windswept shoreline of San Pedro, Belize.

Windmills on the shoreline of Kinderdijk, Holland.

The fabled Lorelei Rock on the shoreline of the Rhine River.

An Aloe ‘candelabra’ on my home shoreline in South Africa.

The Atlantic Ocean shoreline  viewed from the cliffs in Cornwall, England.

The New Jersey shoreline, as we flew home this week.

I hope you’ve enjoyed my take on Ed’s theme. To see more entries, just click here.

Ese’s Weekly Shoot & Quote Challenge – Loneliness

“I want to be alone, I just want to be alone.” 

This is one of the most memorable movie quotes of all time and was spoken by the Swedish actress, Greta Garbo in the film, ‘Grand Hotel’. The word “alone” features in many of her films, beginning with the caption cards in her silent movies. In 1927, “I like to be alone” appeared in her film ‘Love’, and in the 1929 movie ‘The Single Standard’, her character says, “I’m walking alone because I want to be alone.” She was said to be the most beautiful woman in the world, but wasn’t renowned for being sociable at all. She had an innate need for solitude, and was often reclusive, maintaining her elusive mystique right to the end, when she died in 1990 at the age of 84.

Jean Paul Sartre once said, “If you’re lonely when you’re alone, you’re in bad company.”  I leave it up to you to decide whether the subjects in my photos are lonely, or whether they are merely choosing solitude.

A juvenile heron strutting around the lake outside my house here in Florida.

A rather cross looking seagull on the road in the seaside town of Polperro, Cornwall.

A lone paraglider high above the beach in Perranporth, Cornwall.

A statue of a  deer stands alone, atop the towering cliffs at Hirschsprung ‘Deer’s Jump’ in the Black Forest, Germany.

A poor little captive Kinkajou in San Pedro, Belize. His owner was trying to get money out of tourists for having their photos taken with him. He really needed to be back with his mates in the rain forest. 😦

Lastly, but by no means least, here is a pic that my sister in South Africa sent me, with the caption, “Greta Garbo got nothing on Mom!” 🙂

I hope you’ve enjoyed my quotes and pics for Ese’s challenge. To join in, or to see what other entries there are, just click here.

WPC: The Sea

“The Sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever.”
~ Jacques Cousteau

In January we had to leave the USA for a few days in accordance with our visitors visa requirements, so we took a week’s vacation in San Pedro, a town on the southern part of the island of Ambergris Caye, Belize. As you will see from my pics of the sea and its lovely beach, it wasn’t such an imposition and gave me seven blissful days in paradise.

The first permanent settlers of San Pedro who arrived between 1848 and 1849, were farmers and fishermen. Here  is one of the original Mayan canoes carved from a single tree trunk.

Fishing isn’t only done by  the fishermen. These brown Pelicans are to be seen everywhere.

The fish here must have a really tough battle for survival.

Sun, sea and sand is the recipe for a really relaxing holiday.

Even when the sky isn’t so blue, at the seaside there is beauty all around.

At times it was really breezy and the palm trees waved most enthusiastically. My hair did the same. 🙂

It’s a veritable kite-surfer’s paradise.

Being at the seaside, offers so many recreational possibilities.

You can even dive down into it for a closer look.

At times the ocean can be rather treacherous,

but mostly, it’s calming influence has a wonderfully renewing effect on the soul.

Is it any wonder that we love to spend our summer holidays close to the sea?

To see more interpretations of the WordPress Photo Challenge, just click here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Word a week challenge: Metallic

Sue, of  ‘A word in your ear’ blog’, has a new challenge. This time the word is “Metallic”.

My first image, taken through a coach window, is of one of Spain’s most famous bulls, the ‘Osborne Veterano’. These enormous black metal bulls are named after the fiery Spanish brandy they were originally erected to advertise. Each bull weighs four tons, stands 38 feet high, and has a surface area of more than 150 square yards. In 1988, a law was passed banning advertising hoardings on public highways. When the government ordered that the bulls be removed, there was a public outcry, and a ‘Pardon the Osborne Bull’ campaign was put into action. The result was that the iconic bulls were allowed to stay in place, but with no advertising. Over time, the five hundred bulls have diminished to only ninety-seven, and are now considered to be part  of Spain’s cultural and artistic heritage.

In Bangkok is the ‘Wat Phra Chettuphon Wimon Mangklaram Ratchaworamahawihan’ temple which happily is more commonly known as ‘Wat Pho’. The temple which is home to a thousand Buddha images, is one of the largest and oldest in Bangkok, and is covered in gold. It’s a really spectacular sight.

Taking up most of the space inside the temple, is the statue of ‘The Reclining Buddha’ which is 46 metres long and 15 metres high, and is covered from head to toe in solid gold plate. He’s pretty impressive, but there isn’t enough space to step back in order to take a full-length photo, so this is the best shot I’ve got.

From the sublime to the ridiculous now. I couldn’t resist posting my pic of the blingy manicure which I spotted on a flight from Lamanai to San Pedro. The Belizean lady proudly informed me that the safety chains were necessary because her ‘pinky’ nails were crafted from solid gold. 🙂

I hope you’ve enjoyed my metallic photos. To see more bloggers’ interpretations of the theme, just click here.

Weekly Photo Challenge: In the Background……sort of

The latest Weekly Photo Challenge, ‘In the background,’ isn’t as straight forward as I at first thought. I looked out a few pics with something interesting in the background, like this one of Table Mountain in Cape Town,

and one taken from our hotel balcony in Rio, with Sugar Loaf Mountain in the distance,

and one taken across the Hudson River, with the Twin Towers rising above Lower Manhattan.

Then there is this one taken on our long-boat canal tour, showing Bangkok coming into view.

What about this one of a country market in Ecuador, with a giant yellow blow-up ‘Pilsener Light’ beer bottle and the smoke from a volcano in the background?

and this one taken on a boat off the coast of San Pedro in Belize, with hubby and his dive buddy bobbing around in the background.

I also love this smiley one of little Sienna, with a shark in the background.

Then as my teachers at school used to tell me, I thought, “Let me read the question again.”

In the Background: The places that we pass through day after day, or even once in a lifetime, leave in their small way, echoes and traces of themselves upon us. But so often when taking self portraits or pictures of friends, the places themselves become a soft blurred mush of indistinct semi-nothingness, the limelight stolen by our smiling faces. In today’s challenge, let’s turn the tables. Take a picture of yourself or someone else as a shadow, a reflection, or a lesser part of a scene, making the background, or — as in the example above — the foreground, the center of attention.

Well this was a different kettle of fish entirely, and all I could come up with, was this one taken by hubby during our kitchen renovations in Florida. 😀

I hope you’ve enjoyed my pics of foregrounds and backgrounds nevertheless, even if I didn’t keep strictly to Michael Pick’s guidelines. 😳

Wordless Wednesday in Belize

All Mod Cons in San Pedro. A nifty bit of plumbing too.

Note to self : “That which I take for granted every day, some people will never have.”

Lines of San Pedro, for Cee’s Challenge.

Cee’s Fun Foto challenge this week is all about lines, and I have chosen a few pics I took whilst in San Pedro earlier this year. Belize seems to be full of lines, whether it’s looking out towards the azure sea,

or walking around the back streets of the town.

Lines of washing are very plentiful,

as are the wooden picket fences of different hues.

There are extremely untidy power lines hanging around everywhere.

I even found ‘Paradise’ hiding behind some of them. 🙂

Hope you enjoyed my lines of San Pedro. To see Cee’s great lines, and links to other bloggers’ interpretations of the theme, just click here.

Wordless Wednesday: Washday in San Pedro

I’m often fascinated by people’s wash lines seen whilst on vacation; fascinated enough to take a photo. 🙂

To see more pics for Wordless Wednesday, just click here.

 

 

Window seat please.

Marianne’s CBBH Photo Challenge this month, is ‘View from an aircraft‘.  I always try to get a window seat, more for the view than any other reason. For me, the flying experience is enhanced when I can watch the sunrise, sunset, or just see the fluffy white clouds passing by. I guess some people don’t want the constant reminder that they’re sitting in a long metal tube, about 30,000 feet above the ground, or the sea, and would rather pretend they’re on a train or a bus, so sit in the middle, and there are those that have to keep getting up to use the toilet, so prefer to sit on the aisle. Not me though; I revel in the fact that I’m actually high above the earth, flying effortlessly and at great speed, towards my destination. Quite often, I forget to take the camera out of my cabin bag, and by the time we take off, it’s too late to get up and grab it, so some of my pics are taken with my iPhone. I guess if it’s on airplane mode, that’s permissible, but I’m never sure, so try not to do it when the stewards are close by.

Here are a few of my in flight pics:

Coming in to land at Suvarnabhumi Airport, Bangkok.

Taking off from Phuket International airport.

View from a helicopter over Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe.

Victoria falls in the distance.

Flying towards Belize.

Fluffy clouds.

Looking down at the swamps.

Smooth landing at Belize City.

First sighting of  San Pedro.

Getting closer to the ground.

This was only a 10-seater plane.

Miami next stop.

Coming in to land at Miami International.

Sometimes my attention is distracted from the view out of the window, and I’m more interested in what’s for dinner.

Very welcome view on the airplane.

Stop looking out of the window and eat.

Yummy raspberry chocolate mousse cake.

To see more views from airplanes, just click here.

According to the rules of Marianne’s challenge, I have to introduce you to two of the blogs that I’ve commented on in the past month.

First up is my South African blog friend, Adeeyoyo, who writes beautiful poetry which really touches one’s soul.

Then there’s the artistically talented Poppytump, who advertises her blog thus, “PhotographyBooksArtyStuffAndPlentyOfOtherNiffNaffAndTriviaToIgnore.”

Please pop over and visit them both. I promise that you won’t be disappointed.