Word a Week Photo Challenge: Remote


Shivapuri Park

Shivapuri National Park, Kathmandu Valley, Nepal

During the rainy season which is now upon us, you can just sit and watch the clouds roll in and off the mountains. Such a romantic feeling of mystery and isolation.  Behind them, hidden in the rain and mist, are the mighty Himalayas.

This post participated in the Word a Week Photo Challenge: Remote.

A Word A Week Photo Challenge: Inside


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Near Didima, South of Athens, Greece are some strange holes in the mountainside.  They look like craters made by striking meteors, but are in fact sink holes in the side of the mountain. Tucked inside the sink holes are two tiny churches, built into the rock crevices.

 

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To make it inside the crater, you need to lower yourself down a precariously steep set of stairs hewn into the rock.  It feels like an adventure! And a treat too as the stairs have been whitewashed for extra Greek charm…

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…And once you’ve made it down and into the church, you’ll find it as charmingly rustic on the inside as the outside.          A beautiful place.

 

 

This post participated in the Weekly Photo Challenge: Inside

Weekly Photo Challenge: Extra, Extra


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A farmers wife heads home at the end of the day. Her cow’s red tika matching her dress. Unbelievably a seagull swooped down and arrived in my shot with perfect timing.  (Seagull? In Nepal? Well, maybe not, but do you know what it is?)

A beautiful pastoral Nepalese scene. For the full story see ‘Til the Cow’s Come Home.

This post participated in the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Extra, Extra

Happy!


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One of the most amazing memories of my time in the Philippines was the attitude of Filipinos, especially those that had little but somehow managed to be happy despite all the hardships. These two kids were having fun, playing chase in the mud and puddles in Tondo–a garbage dump city on the outskirts of Manila–shortly after a major hurricane had passed through. Somehow they had fun anyway.

The visit to Tondo was eye opening and heartbreaking.  Here’s the full story.

 

 

This post participated in A Word in Your Ear’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Happy

Carry!


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Moving stuff around in Nepal happens on the streets right in front of your face, all day.  Its not that it doesn’t happen in other places of course, but here there are less trucks and more individual sellers, all independently trying to get their goods from A to B any way they can.  If you can’t afford a truck or don’t even have a bike, then you get to carry things by foot….which is how most people get things done.  So, the traditional “dokos” or cone-shaped baskets are ubiquitous here.  Everywhere you look they are either being sold or used, secured to the carrier with a very painful looking headstrap.  I have watched tiny woman carry loads this way that look twice their size and three times their body weight.  They look like ants carrying impossibly large loads.

The  load-bearing cyclists are everywhere too.  I did an post a while back on the Nepalese trusty bicycle, and they still grab my attention on a daily basis today.

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the broom bike guy

Or there’s the head-basket method that I see in the rural areas, especially in the South.  Its mostly women carrying laundry loads or small items for sale on their heads with only a mat or straw for padding, which levels their loads and helps protects their heads from the strain of the heavy, precariously-balanced weight.  And they are very good at it!

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h too.  At Pashnupati temple, family pallbearers carry the deceased to tfuneral

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Life is always on display here…and death too. At Pashnupati temple, family pallbearers carry the deceased to the funeral pyre.

 

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..and last – but by no means least – had to include this little guy!   Carrying, monkey momma style!

 

 

 

 

This post participated in A Word in Your Ear’s,  A Word a Week Challenge: Carry

 

Weekly Photo Challenge: Twist


100 yr old Balete Tree

Rasta in a Dreadlock Tree!

Two twists with a twist for this post!  Firstly Bob Marley in a twisty banyan tree.

And then this fish who seems to be suspiciously eyeing a new camouflage spot…

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This post participated in the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Twist

Hitting the Trail: On the Move


This week’s photo challenge inspired me to look at my favourite way of moving…along trails. And what a lot of different trails, leading to beckoning destinations just over the horizon..! Suspiciously missing here are Nepalese mountain trails. I’ve yet to do any real Himalayan trekking.  Still working on that one….:

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Family hike on Spetses, Greece

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On the Coast to Coast in Northern England

The long haul across Lairigmor

The long haul across Lairigmor, West Highland Way, Scotland….

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…a couple of sheep friends join us on the trail…

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…with more of our sheep friends on the Ridgeway, Southern England

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Cliffside trail, Dumaguete, Philippines

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Trekking through the Himalayan hills, Namobuddha, Nepal

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Desert climb, Phoenix, Arizona

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And just for good measure, Southwark, an urban hike on the London end of the Thames Path. I guess I prefer it when I’m not on the move with others.

 

This post participated in the Daily Post’s Weekly Photo Challenge: On the Move.