A collection of butterflies from North Michigan (Mackinac Island)

Weekend Photo Upload : Small Video of Meteora,Greece

On The way to Meteora

We went to a short trip to Meteora last weekend. We started enjoying Greece again after coming back to Athens. But the main difference this time is the scorching heat. This is one of the hottest summers and temperature almost touched 50C some days. It’s unbelievable and unbearable. Almost 100 people died here due to this consequence of Global warming. The worst effect of the warming is massive flood in Indian subcontinent, another catastrophe but different in nature. What I heard from one of my Greek colleague is, if the summer continues like this way, part of Greece will be desert in few years, but I really don’t know the authenticity of it.

Well, keeping aside the Global warming, what I observed this time is nature lost its color here in Greece, its bit shabby but still enchanting. The sky is not that blue (so as the water as it’s the reelection of the sky), but very natural. See the original version of the picture below on the way to Meteora.

Meteora is wonderful, formed by many big meteors it’s a true gift of nature. The nearest town from his place is Kalambaka, almost 400km away from Athens. Passing through lovely crowded beaches to small gray mountains it took almost four and half hour to reach Meteora. I was the only driver and it was tough for me to drive 800km in a day, especially in hilly highways. This is my longest drive as a driver and enjoyed every moment of it with Hindi songs, witty comments with co-passengers and cokes.

The first view of the place is very impressive; the fascinating rocks bewildered me in first glance .Greek: Μετέωρα, "suspended rocks", "suspended in the air" or "in the heavens above", however there are many theories for the rocks creation, like meteors, dropped from sky; nothing is full proven. But it looks amazing, soothing heavenly, very unique and absolutely natural. That’s the reason it is considered to be one of the best tourist attractions of Greece.

We were hungry and not wasting any time started searching for restaurants. But in the mountains there was hardly any house or restaurants. We found one board “Eagel Restaurant – 8 km from here” and followed the path. It took us to the top of the mountain and driving there would have been extremely difficult if not the infrastructures are so good. Scenic beauty was fascinating and so the Lunch. Very tasty traditional Greek Lunch in cheap price (compared to islands).

Meteora is not only famous for the natural beauty of rocks, mainly because of the world-famous monasteries. I am going to write about them in my next post.

Weekend Photo Upload 8, Naxos : an island of Greece

Naxos : is a Greek island, the largest island (428 km²) in the Cyclades island group in the Aegean. It was the centre of archaic Cycladic culture. (from Wikipedia)

Temple entrance landmark or the "Portara" - an archaeological site in Mediterranean sea

Nominations for Seven Natural Wonders

Please nominate some Indian treasures for new seven natural wonders . My nominations are Sundarbans and Himalayas.
One can very well ask why so, these are wonderful creatures but not that special to be listed in 7 wonders. My answer is why NOT. I have not seen such unique natural creation like these two in my lifetime, one is typical mangrove forest(largest in world) with wonder creature of nature - The Royal Bengal Tiger and another the best among mountains, highest pick of the World, lovely natural beauty with green valleys.
I have to find some pics of these trip and soon modify this post.

Weekend Photo Upload 4: Oslo port - Norway

I posted some collage pics of Myrdal, a small city of Norway last weekend, and I am glad most of the viewers liked it. I took the trip to Norway 2 years back but still cherish the memories of that trip.

Here go some original shots of the sky in Port of Oslo, in April. Norway is known as “Land of midnight Sun”; so even in April, the light remains quite late in the day. The sky was very colourful, may not be like Aurora Borealis usually happens in winter, but it was captivating.

The series of lights in the port mesmerized me. So I didn’t miss to take the snap. Next to the port the famous Nobel peace Hall is situated, where the peace award is given. I will post the pics of that hall next week.

Weekend Photo Upload 3: Norway - Some pics of Myrdal

Myrdal : It is a small town in the Oslo-Bergen railway. This is one of the scenic places I have seen so far two years before in April 2005, while visiting Norway.

If I have to mention five things about this place, I will write the following.

1)This is the highest mountainous station I have ever gone in any train. I wonder how the station is built in such a high altitude. Its one of the major station of the Bergen Railway from Oslo to Bergen which is recognized to be one of the 20 best railway experiences in the World.

2)This is a remote mountain station in Norway often shrouded in mysterious fog or molded with ice. When I was there, the platform was covered by ice sheet and the nearby houses were covered by thick layers of ice. I felt as if I am in North Pole.

3)Flamsbana – The Flåm railway, which starts here, is the most thrilling railway line in Scandinavia with its 20-kilomtre long track and an altitude difference of 865 meters. This is considered to be the highest gradient railway in the world.

4)Myrdal is famous for skiing and there is a beautiful water false nearby. I was able to capture one skier in my camera.

5)The breath taking landscape attracts many tourists, specially in spring. I have not entered the town, but taken all the snaps from the platform, which I have put up. (The night shot if of Bergen – and some places are between Bergen and Myrdal)

Skayen - Denmark; A Journey to remember

One can have many problems while traveling, starting from health problem, robbery to inadvertently violating rules (I was going through Cuckoo’s blog , and found an interesting story about her inadvertent stupidity). Health hazards are not new to me, happened many time while traveling in India, but fortunately not here in Europe. But once we experienced a scary incidence, while going to Skayen, from Arhus in Denmark.One new guy (A Sardar without turban) came from US in our project and was approached me to join a trip to Skayen. It was a typical Sardar, an over-smart underdog resource, behaves as if born and brought up in US. The reason for that is he has green card. But he has a nice charming personality and can easily mix with unknown people.

From the very first he started driving rashly, not caring anybody(we were 4 in the car) and scaring me, as I am a typical bong and used to get frightened easily. Yes, I am little more conservative and hardly take any additional risks. So he took the opportunity to create a heroic impression (don’t take it otherwise, that guy was married and had a child) but that never means we have to drive in 160 kph. I asked him to slow down, but he was not bothered about anything and pressed the accelerator to its maximum, almost reaching towards 200. We didn’t know the speed limit.

All of a sudden we hear police sirens and were not sure it’s for us. But one of the police cars asked us to stop. What have we done? I was puzzled, bit scared, and thought of all possible scenarios except the real one. The police told the max limit was 130kph, which we violated by far (Later we came to know that the speed limits can be tracked by the hidden cameras in highway) and he asked the CPR card (Residence Card) to fine directly in the official bank account. But that guy was in business visa and didn’t have CPR number; so I had to give my card. The policeman was already going to fine me 5000DKK, which is equivalent of almost 40,000/- (INR). It would have been a heavy fine for me if not they grace us.

We escaped luckily, and I thanked God (That time I used to believe in God); but the sardar was cool like a cucumber, casually teasing as usual, Dor gaya kaya!! Dekho dekho Dor gaya!!, as if he was successful in his intentions. Later I handled this psycho differently not reacting to his every rubbish words. I do not have anything against Punjabis, but that guy was exceptional, has pissed off everyone in the project, specially the south Indians. I like Sardars in general, but somehow could not manage with this guy.
Finally we visited the Kanyakumarika of Denmark, Skayen. This is the North most point of Denmark, in North Sea. [According to Wikipedia, Skagen takes its name from the region, which projects into the waters between the North Sea and the straits of Denmark. Skagen is considered the boundary between the Skagerrak (named after Skagen) and the Kattegat. At its very tip is a sandy, shifting headland known as Grenen.]

The landscape of this place was stunning and magnificent; specially the cost is very different from the conventional beaches. The light house is something worth to watch. The smooth serene breeze and amazing beauty helped us to forget the unfortunate incident quickly.

Weekend Photo Upload 2 - Sea and Sky of Greece

Some of my Blog readers have asked many times, how blue is the Sky and Sea of Greece? Is it so BLUE because I play with colours ? I guess now they can find the answers in this post. All the pictures are uploaded, as these have been captured.

I am just back from a short wellness tour from my project (The details I will write in Random Thoughts). The whole client and project team went to a Sea Beach just after Glyfada on the way to Sunion, not that far from Athens. It was really an enjoyable day and First time I took a bath in Mediterranean, never taken before because I don’t know swimming.

The photos are taken in small aperture because of two reasons, to make the DOF larger, so that the landscape comes prominent, and it was a sunny day, so no need for high aperture. If I have used high aperture, the picture would be more glowing and brighter, the color of sky and sea would be different.

Have a nice weekend and will keep posting after a short trip to Sunion.

Picasa Edit of Photos

This is the picture taken next to the earlier one, from closed window of my car, on the way to Delphi from Athens. Since it was from the car, the brightness is not very good. However, I think the Sun makes the basic difference of any picture. The picture in cloudy weather can be made better by filling light through Picasa, but the brightness can not be enhanced.

Coming back to the picture, I have edited this one in 3 Steps. First one is Normal (Original), Second one is Auto adjustment by the software (I am feeling lucky), and finally achieved the third one after little Saturations of colours . These are very basic edit I do. There are many special effects that can give complete different look to a picture.

Many of my friends like editing pictures, but some of them do not like it, because it distorts the originality. Well, I have some counter logic like why we paint house, decorate wedding hall, do make up before going out, put spices in cooking etc. Its mainly because we want better look and different taste. This is again relative choice, varies person to person. So, I appreciate the logic of the people who want to keep the pics as it is, but like to edit my pics to enrich them.

Cultivation and Nature in Greece

I have thought many times about rating pictures, as David explained in his blog. In the current blogging system the visitors can only provide comments; but most of the viewers do not like to post any comment. In addition, it’s hard to make out precise ratings of the pictures from the comments.
It’s really nice that www.spotback.com came up with such a nice solution of this demand. Now the individual rating is possible and it calculates the cumulative average of all ratings. Thanks David for introducing me with this one.

So I am uploading one picture from Greece - to be rated by you :-)

This one is taken from the moving car on the way to Delphi from Athens.