Birds of a feather flock together

Starlings flocking at sunset in Aberystwyth, Wales.  I presume that is the Royal Pier that we can see at the bottom left.  As with many piers, it is now much shorter than its original length of 242 metres or 794 feet.

Ottawa from various angles

I've chosen Canadian postcards and stamps for this week as my theme because in a day or so I will be there visiting family in its broadest sense.  In-laws of in-laws in some cases.  Ottawa is where I'll be based, though with a few side trips I believe.

The first set of stamps illustrates games of Canadian invention.  I'm familiar with basketball and lacrosse, but ringette is a new one on me.  There was a fourth stamp in the series issued in 2009, illustrating five pin bowling.

The second set is a series showing beneficial insects, issued by Canada Post in 2007.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

.

Kölner Dom

Another view of the amazingly beautiful cathedral in Köln or Cologne, Germany.  I do have several different views of this UNESCO World Heritage Site, but I never tire of them.

Temple of Concordia, Sicily

The Temple of Concordia, pictured above and dating from the 5th century, is in Sicily's Valle dei Templi, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.  It was part of a Greek colony, Agrigento, and in its time one of the leading Mediterranean cities.

The stamp shows a letter speeding on its way.  This one did arrive relatively quickly but I often find the Italian postal service is less than speedy.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Heidelberg

On the reverse of the beautiful card showing Heidelberg Castle came this stamp celebrating - in song - 150 years of the German Choral Association!

I have several postcards of Heidelburg Schloss or Castle in Germany but this is by far the most attractive to date.  It looks as though it was taken in the setting sun.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Mediterranean sunset

Today there is a full moon, the third full moon in a season of four full moons, and for some reason it is called a blue moon.  I can't understand why they call it blue, nor why they pick on the third full moon rather than the second or the fourth.

I couldn't find a card of a blue moon, or a full moon, but here instead is a red setting sun from the south of France.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog, The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Land of the Midnight Sun

I can remember hearing about the land of the Midnight Sun at school, all those years ago, but I think this picture illustrates so well what it must be like living within the Arctic Circle, that the sun literally never sets during the summer months.

The postcard came from Finland, one of the eight countries having land inside the Arctic Circle. The others are Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Norway, Russia, Sweden, and the USA.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Dubai skyline

The tall building is the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, the tallest building in the world.  For the moment, anyway.  No doubt someone, somewhere is planning or has already started something taller.

The cathedral in Cologne

It is amazing to think that at one time there were plans to build a high rise building near this magnificent cathedral.  Fortunately the plans came to nothing and there are now restrictions on the height of any building anywhere nearby.

The building of the cathedral started in 1248 but stopped again in 1473.  It wasn't completely finished until 1880 and during the 400 intervening years it had a crane perched on top of the incomplete belfry.  It was hit many times during WWII but never collapsed.  Repairs were complete by 1956.

It is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site (though put on the danger list when the high rise building was a threat) because it is "an exceptional work of human creative genius, constructed over more than six centuries".

An earlier view.

New York, New York

Midtown Manhattan skyline (sent to me from Austria!)

The Valley of the Loire

The Loire Valley is understandably best known for the wonderful châteaux built along the banks, many of the most impressive ones dating from when the French kings started building their own here.  But the whole of the mid-section of the Loire Valley, between Sully sur Loire and Chalonnes sur Loire, is listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

As the committee said the area is made up of "historic cities and villages, great architectural monuments - the Châteaux - and lands that have been cultivated and shaped by centuries of interaction between local populations and their physical environment, in particular the Loire itself".

People tend to forget everything other than the most famous châteaux but there is far more to the area.  Here are three cards to celebrate the river itself which shaped the history of the Garden of France.

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Hartbeespoort Dam

From South Africa, just in time, came this lovely card of Hartbeespoort Dam.  It was built in 1925 and, apart from its primary use for collecting water for irrigation, it is also a popular resort for water sports of all types.

The stamp shows the West Wind Gladiator or Mantophasma zephyra, issued in 2008 for the International Congress of Entymology.  West Wind Gladiator is a lovely name for an insect I'd prefer not to meet.  I prefer not to meet very many insects at all.  Bees are OK.  Ladybirds.  That's about my lot.

Updated when I remembered my stamps from Egypt:

Blogger won't let me size the last one the way I want.  In fact it's much smaller than the others.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Contrasts

Two more cards sent to me by Emm of Emm in London. I've chosen to show the two together because they do show up the contrasts in South Africa.

First Johannesburg in the evening.  Johannesburg is in the smallest South African province of Gauteng, as is Pretoria.

"Lights of the glittering metropolis stretching from densely populated Hillbrow to the distant SABC Tower on Brixton Ridge"

Second, an informal settlement or shanty town.

"One of the many informal settlements which sprang up around South African cities after the ending of apartheid."

This is a post for Postcard Friendship Friday hosted on Beth Niquette's blog The Best Hearts are Crunchy.

Temple of Dawn at sunset

I know it's sunset rather than down because it says so on the card!  Presumably dawn would light the other side, and would be just as beautiful.  But not only is the card impressive, so are the stamps.

This is the entire width of the larger-than-average card and as you can see, the stamp almost covers it.  Sadly the circular stamp doesn't show up particularly well.  It should show a gold drawing of what I believe to be the seal of one of the 20 provinces of Thailand.

I was intending to link to a card showing the royal barges but while I was looking for it, I came across yet another unusually shaped stamp from Thailand.

The card itself shows the Wat (temple) Pratat Chaehaeng but almost more interesting is the stamp on the front.   It was issued as one of two stamps to commemorate the 60th Royal Wedding anniversary in 2010.  They were the first ever stamps to be issued with real diamonds, six on each.  All I can say is, someone has picked off my diamonds and replaced them with heart shaped pieces of silver paper.

This is a post for Sunday Stamps, now hosted by Violet Sky at "See it on a Postcard!"

Sedona

Cathedral Rock, near Red Rock Crossing, towers almost a thousand feet above the surrounding terrain,this prominent land form crests at an elevation of 4,964 feet above sea level.

I'm particularly interested in cathedrals, and this one is no exception, even if I can't go inside for a look around.  Although my scanner really hasn't done it any justice, I think you can still appreciate the beautiful colours.  They glow in the sunset.

Sedona or Red Rock Country, is named after the wife of the area's first postmaster, Sedona Arabella Miller Schnebly, so it seems very appropriate that I have a postcard from there.  This one, Cathedral Rock, is probably the most photographed of all the stunning rock formations in the area and was formed from sand dunes beside the ancient Pedregosa Sea.  Apparently the ripple marks left by the sea can still be seen in some places.

Gables

If you walk around Amsterdam, looking up at the roof line, You will see an interesting array of different styles to the gable ends.  They date back many years.  According to ArtNetherlands.com, the various styles can be classified as follows:

wooden houses (1200-1550)
houses with roll ornaments (1570-1600)
step-gables (1600-1665)
spout gables (1620-1720)
elevated neck gables (1640-1670)
neck gables (1640-1770)
bell gables (1660-1790)
elevated cornices (1700s)
'sobered' cornices (17th Century +)

I think the picture shows neck gables, bell gables, and elevated and straight cornices.  You can certainly see several hoist beams, used to lift the furniture up to the top of the house because stairways in these tall houses can be very narrow.

The two following cards I bought for myself the last time I was in Amsterdam.

A message from Malaysia

Clockwise, starting from the top left:

1. Secluded bay at Batu Ferringhi beach
2.  Malaysian fishing boats at Batu Ferringhi
3.  Stunning sunset at Tanjung Bungah
4.  Kek Lok Si Buddhist temple.

The card came through Postcrossing but the message, quite separate, came by email from Bree.  Bree has set up a new project and hopes to be able to collect mail from 24 countries by a year's time.  Mail can be a letter, a postcard, a bookmark, some stamps or other philatelic items.

Maybe you could help?  Pop over to her blog and read all about it.

Mount Fuji times two

Playing catch-up this week, so briefly:  here are two views of the same famous mountain, Mount Fuji in Japan.  The first is one of the very well known 36 views by the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai.  The second is Mount fuji taken from Mount Shichimen at dawn.

Poznań

A very atmospheric picture of the cathedral of St Peter and St Paul in Poznań, Poland.  It was built in the late 10th century inside the fortified settlement which is now called Cathedral Island.  The bridge is Bishop Jordan's Bridge, named after the missionary bishop who arrived in the city in 966.  I thought the bridge looked remarkabky modern, and it is.  It was opened in 2007.

If you are as curious as I am, you might like to know that the accent over the final n in Poznań gives it a ny sound.

Greetings from Poland

Two cards from different sources arrived within days of each other.  they are both from resorts on the Baltic coast and both clearly from the same series of cards.

The first  reads "Greetings from the sea" and the second "Holiday greetings".  Google Translate is a wonderful thing.