Holiday pics!

[vilakins]

I've finally resized and loaded my holiday photos into a gallery. There are 44 pictures with explanations if you click on them; go have a look for:

• The Village where we stayed
  
• the nicest municipal logos :ive seen since Rome's wolf and SPQR
  
• the Craters of the Moon thermal area
  
• the cat who came to visit
  
• aerial shots of volcanoes, crater lakes, and lahar
  
• two boats and two retired eccentrics called Bate and Drake
  
• very cool Maori cliff carvings
  
• Greg and me on Segways
  
• huge corrugated iron animalsg
  
• cats back at home demonstrating two of their poses

Oh, all right, here's a very small sample.


Because people like cat pics and hafren wanted to see a photo. :-) This sweet and friendly Birman was sitting on our stairs one morning and came inside to visit for an hour or so. What a poser! She followed me round the place, then settled down till she suddenly decided she had other things to do. For the longest ear tufts I've seen on a cat, see the other photo I took of her.


Ruapehu's crater lake, about a week after the lahar burst from it. You can see the breach at about 11 o'clock. The yellow bits are sulphur.


Sunset on lake and volcanoes.


Retired judge Peter Bate enjoys his life as captain of the restored steamboat Alice. Here he is, complete with port and starboard socks, a pirate's headscarf, a knife in his teeth, and a steam cannon - a real-life Captain Flint! [/Ransome] The other member of the crew is called Michael Drake.


Maori cliff carvings which can only be seen from the water. This is the face; the taniwha (water monster) was my favourite.

OK, now go and look at the rest! :-)

Comments

[vjezkova.livejournal.com]

Ohhhhhhhhh, the CAT... And what a country, for me here in the centre of Europe something unbeliavable, exotic, paradise - like!
Of course I must see the rest but unfortunately my lunch break is over and must go back to my duty in our library ( mind you, I like it, it is British library!)

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

The cat was a charmer and had such amazing blue eyes.

Ah, but you have beautiful cities and architecture; people come here and sneer at our wooden houses and soulless cities.

[zoefruitcake.livejournal.com]

I'd love a go on the Segway! Love the municipal logo, that's great

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

It's excellent, isn't it? It's not often you see rubbish bins and drains that are worthy of a photo.

The Segways were huge fun. They're so strange they way they stay upright when you're stopped, and I love how intuitive they are: lean forward to go faster, back to slow down. After about 15 minutes, you can get quite adept at manoeuvring them through tight spots, though I'd need more practice to play polo on them.

[mistraltoes.livejournal.com]

What beautiful photos! And the Birman is so pretty.

[astrogirl2.livejournal.com]

Oooh, pretty cat! And pretty scenery. And pretty cat! :)

The Segways do look like fun.

[kerravonsen]

What a gorgeous cat!

Those cliff carvings are impressive.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

The crater lake is amazing!

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

Wow, fantastic pics. It looks like you & G were constantly on the go & had a great holiday!

I particularly loved the Phibian statue. :^)

[snowgrouse.livejournal.com]

*steals the cat*

[reapermum.livejournal.com]

That looks like a great holiday. There's no point in listing the pictures I liked best as it would end up as all of them. The Maori carvings were impressive.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Isn't she, and so well groomed! I bet she sheds a lot more than our smoothies though.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

She's a stunner with that fur and those blue eyes.

And they weren't even action shots!

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

She looks like a show cat--all perfection--but she was very friendly.

The carvings are amazing. I hadn't even heard of them before our holiday, but there's a short mention in the Wiki on the lake (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Taupo) (scroll to the bottom).

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Did you see the one with the sulphur beach?

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

We did, and we also spent a lot of time reading and mucking about too. You need a lot of that in a holiday. :-)

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Isn't she adorable!

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Thanks! There were a lot more but I selected the most interesting. The carvings are quite amazing and apparently were done to protect Taupo from another massive eruption (the lake is in one huge caldera).

[entropy-house.livejournal.com]

Sometimes long-hair cats shed *less* than shorthairs. I can comb Bonnie thoroughly and only get one tiny fluff of fur, but one swipe of the grooming tool *anywhere* on Tommy will bring up a handful.

[imhilien.livejournal.com]

Some nice photos there - I love the cliff carvings. :D

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Me too, and I didn't even know about them till I saw a brochure about them.

[linda-joyce.livejournal.com]

Haven't got time to do your pictures justice, my latest post will explain why. That cat looked very at home with you, obviously prides itself on being the local welcome wagon.

[kalypso-v.livejournal.com]

What are the crimson rocks?

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Maybe she visits everyone in turn; we only saw her that one day.

[vilakins.livejournal.com]

Scoria (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scoria), a sort of solidified froth. We have a lot of it here; a colleague broke her arm a few weeks ago slipping on some scoria gravel used on a path.

BTW the Mt Wellington mentioned in the Wiki article is the closest hill to the one we live one.