Botanic Garden

Today I went to the botanical garden, it's been a while since I was there. And a lot had happened since last time, the flowers that bloomed last was almost completely gone now. but instead there is a lot of new species.
But it was a bit tricky to get the pictures today, partly because of the bright sunlight and then it blew a lot. And it did not help that I had the macro lens, because the slightest movement can create blurred images. But it was nice to go around there and see all the beautiful flowers and the quite squirrels. I saw something unusual today as well, namely the Water Boatman it's not in itself unusual, but I found it on dry land and it is a bit unusual for this insect is aquatic. They can fly, as they do usually at night when they travel between the waters. And this was pretty much about 15mm long, so it was nice to see one of those up close.

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Water boatman/buksimmare really funny name

buksimmare/Water boatman

Early morning at Redmires

Yesterday the clock woke me at 4:00 and it was time to take the bike to Redmires Reservoirs, I wanted to get there before the sun rises, which it does 0500. I wanted to be early on the spot to try to sneak me in the golden plower, but once in place it was only to find that they were not even there: (and also that there were 3 sheep farmers who went through all the fields and scare all the birds while they gathered all the sheep: ( So it was just move on, I decided to photograph morning dew and other things that were highlighted nicely by the rising sun. The morning was really hot around 20C and humidity, appeared to be a fine day. Went on down to the reservoirs to look for birds, middle pond had a whole flock of gulls nesting on the beach, also saw the typical species that tends to be there. On the way there as I passed the rabbits I took the opportunity to take some photos, got lucky that the white rabbit came up and ate, it's really cute. Then suddenly when I was down at reservoirs the fog came out of nowhere, then I decited to go home. It was now at: 08.30. The great day that was promised it disappeared completely in the fog.

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Weekend in Barcelona

It's been a while since I blogged, but unfortunately it has not been time to it. But last weekend me, my wife and couple of friends went to Barcelona to visit other friends who live there. We left a rainy, cold, Leeds on Friday morning and landed in a hot Barcelona. Since we were there quite early (15.00) so we had plenty of time to wander around the very first day, first we were and took a few drinks and then later in the evening we went to Montjuic (Montjuic is translated as "Jew Hill 'in medieval Catalan) and it is is a mountain and park area in Barcelona, ​​which is really nice especially at night when they start all the fountains. The second day so it was time to visit the Sagrada familia, a very large church and was designed by the famous Antoni Gaudi. Its construction began in 1882 and is scheduled to be completed by 2026, which many doubt. But as we got there rather late, we had little sleep;) so the queues was of course enormously long so we decided to skip that step in and those who wanted to go there on Sunday morning instead.
So we went down to the beach instead, to watch people and drink some beer. We guys had planned to visit the Camp nou which of course is FC Barcelona's home ground, so went there and got there in the last minute but we had half an hour for us to check out the museum and the stadium and that was enough. Camp Nou is Europe's largest stadium and the eleventh largest in the world. attendance record of 120000 people, but more normal UEFA matches will take them into 98 767 pers. On Sunday some of us went to Sagrada Familia, then we met at La Rambla, which is of course the famous pedestrian street, where we visited the other big fine church in the gothic quarters and little else round about and then go down to the harbor and eat paella, it was really good and it was very much, no one could eat them.

In the evening we were to visit Park Guell which was also designed by Antoni Gaudi, the park must be visited it is really cool with all the buildings and stunning tiling and mosaics. The view from here is amazing, with bacelona and the sea on the horizon

 

Click on the pictures to enlarge them ;)

 

Sagrad Familia

Montjuic

Montjuic

Montjuic

Montjuic

La Boqueria

La Boqueria

La Boqueria

Gothic Church

Santa claus on his way :)

Camp nou

Dragon

Nice ship





Park guell

view from the of park guell



Lavendel and Gaudi building

Gaudi art

Gaudi, Park guell

Entrance to park guell

Evening colours

 

A little walk at Lady Bower

Today I took the bus to Lady Bower, it's been a while I was there last. The goal was to take pictures of the beech forest, but once in place it looked so dull and dark so I tried to find something else to shoot instead. So I put on the macro lens and started looking for insects, but it was not so easy to find them either, found some bug.
 I dont know but today it was hard to find motivation and imagination was not the best either. : (
Then I went down to River Dervent because there I have seen a small waterfall, which I thought might be able to get a good picture off.
But it was not so good that either, the waterfall was very bright, compared with the rest of the surrounding environment. So I tried with gradient filters but it still was a bit over exposed. But so it can be when taking pictures in the middle of the day.
Now I had been out for 4 hours and the bus would come soon so I went to Lady Bower inn and took me a beer before I went home. But in between I walked through a field of flowers and there i tried to find some butterflies, find one that i had to chase after, because every time i came close it flew away.
After i while a came close enough, it was not the brightst colored butterfly i have seen but still nice :) :)

Click on the picture to enlarge them!!

Monster

Nice patterns

Some kind of fungal

The Water fall

The Butterfly

 

Camouflage

Yesterday I took with me camouflage to Redmires Reservoirs and the purpose was to lie down on the shore and take pics of wading birds. Went to the middle reservoir where the water starts to disappear a little more so that I could lie down on the sand and rock instead of the grassy bank, which would have made that I would have been higher up giving a weird angle. Because I want to have the bird and the camera at the same height, it tends to give a nice blurry foreground and background. Another reason that I chose it is that it was simply where wading birds were. ;) I lay down on a sleeping mat 5m from the water and put on my camouflage, then it was just wait for the birds to come closer. Which they did after half an hour, there was no unusual birds except little ringed plower which is somewhat unusual in the inland and so high on the moorland. I followed them from beneath camouflage for a few hours. Then my back started to hurt a little bit, for it is not so good laying down on a thin mattress with head up all the time. After that I went to the Golden plower but they are difficult to sneak up on, trying to stay a while in camouflage there too but if you have scared them once so they would not like to come back to the same place. So I gave up after an hour and then went  on a  6km walk but found nothing special. Had now been out since 15:00 and now it was close to 21:00 so I decided to go back to the bus.

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Some kind if Orchid



Young Swallow

Little ringed plower/Mindre strandpipare

Pied Wagtail/Sädesärla

Common Sandpiper/Drillsnäppa

Old spooky house

Lazy calf, with uncomfortable sleeping position

Common Sandpiper looking for food.