Our newest adventure

Just yesterday we went for a walk around a high altitude Alpine lake of Ritom, and had a most fantastic time, though we managed to almost have a break-down, car-wise on the way to and from. See the photos here Photobox slideshow

What a day, we had a four hour walk in the Alps around the Ritom lake, we caught butterflies, took over 400 photos, laughed, sang, played Billy-goat-gruffs on the bridges, drank icy water from the glacier, watched marmots, whatever they are in English, saw some pretty amazing wildlife, enjoyed the air so fresh it makes you dizzy, collected a dozen tadpoles for our home pond, had so much fun...
We are coming back again, once our car has come back from the service and works better, we will take more photos, drink more water and watch more marmots. We will probably draw flowers and attract more butterflies, but that remains to be seen. As for now we will be dreaming of the meadows with the flowers the names of which we don't know because we have never seen them before, we will populate the lake and marshes with the creatures wild and beautiful in our dreams, & then come back to find them.

Bats are just about the coolest thing since sliced bread if you listen to our family, but I disagree, we have beautiful nature everywhere we look. Here are a few things. Если послушать членов моей семьи, то летучие мыши - самые чудесные животные на свете, но я не согласна, мы окружены восхитительной природой, куда не посмотри.
We are lucky to have fantastically rich wildlife surrounding us, we have it on the doorstep, above and even in, last year we had some kind of wood eating larvae, that made clicking noises and produced sawdust, in the walls we have mason solitary bees, ghiri (glis-glis) in the roofspace, and an occasional mink or a pine martin aspires to make a nest under the bonnet of your car. By night the garden at the moment has a fantabulous light show of the fireflies. For some reason the frogs are out of sinc, normally they appear about the same time so the fireflies come with sound effects. Мы очень избалованы фантастически богатой дикой природой вокруг нас, прямо на пороге нашего дома, над входной дверью и даже в самой двери в прошлом году жил какой-то жук древоед, издававший щелканье и производивший опилки, в стене у нас живет одиночная пчела-каменщик, сони в крыше, а отдельные куницы или норки так и норовят свить гнездо под капотом автомобиля. Ночью сад показывает нам магическое светопредставление из светлячков. В этом году почему-то лягушки опаздывают, обычно светлячки появляются со звуковыми эффектами.
And there is more, I will look for the other photos and then update.

Wildlife special #2.

On seeing the feces we looked up and between the door frame and the house we saw .... a cricket? a woodworm? a glis-glis?! I wish! We saw faces looking down at us, little cute, intelligent faces, small furry inquisitive faces, and we heard a small chattering... We saw BATS!!! I grabbed a camera and witha zoom and a flash took a snap of them, we could see about 8! They were not pleased with a disturbance, they squeaked and chirped in a protesting way. So my lovely dear husband did one better, he grabbed a camcoder and took a tiny film of them. Then he went in, got dressed in a way to protect himself from mosquitoes, and made himself comfortable in a chair right by the front door... Patience is a virtue, patience is a virtue, patience is a virtue.... I checked on him a few times... nothing... But! It got darker outside, we forgot of him stationed out there, I was wondering if he fell asleep or was just enjoying the silence after our usually noisy household. Suddenly the door burst open and in he ran wild and disshevelled with joy and excitement, he saw them all fly out! Woopee! We counted eleven. Today with a shining of a torch he said there are at least 14... Amazing. We have bats! Now where are we? On the pets' front? I think we are Ok! Don't you? Will that do for a future WWF panda warrior? It will for now I am sure.
This is the film of them flying out come evening time. Dinner, guys! Enjoy!

Ok, we do have pets now!

No, not the dull cats and dogs variety, but since Papa does not approve of dogs, and Mamma does not want any pets at all for the fear of making her allergy worse, the kids have to improvise, and improvise they do. Keeping in mind that the oldest wants to join WWF and go around the world saving the animals despite her fear of even the smallest representatives of wildlife, saying that, I must admit that for 4 days now she is not afraid of the ants, and that's a big deal for her! Anyway, recently we went out to the river and came back with a bottle of 6 tadpoles.
The girls were ecstatic, so much so that kind and wonderful Papa went to the shop, and bought them a little aquarium/terrarium, and made the new family members a comfortable home. Thanks to Google we have been reading on the habbits of tadpoles, necessary conditions for keeping them and feeding the poor beggars, since I for one had not had the foggiest idea of what to do with them otherwise. We feed them lettuce and burgers (!) and they seem to like it.

They seem to be quite happy and settled in their new habitat, and the kids love watching them float up to the top, take a gulp of air and go down again busying themselves with something around the stones or the bottom area. Since the first six their family has grown, as we went to the top of a mountain nearby, and the girls saw the alpine pond, or a tiny lake teeming with tadpoles,

...now we have about 22 of them altogether, they are not easy to count, too wriggly and eratic. But they are our very first pets, if you don't count the wounded sparrow that we nursed back to life back in UK, or the ducks that nested in our garden. So woo-hoo for us!

But!!!!
When we got back home we noticed something that looked like tiny bits of feces on the doorsteps, and discovered that a very different kind of wildlife lives -well- I suppose you could say right on our doorstep... More on the wildlife story tomorrow, as I can hear my bed calling my name. TTFN

Фото с прогулки

Оленька, фотографии с прогулки смотри здесь.

Плавцы и плавчихи

Сезон открыт, вода мокрая, плавцы готовы к бою!
Стала печатать слово плавцы и засомневалась, может быть "пловцы", но решила, что пловцы - это те, кто ест плов.

После плавания хорошо проветриться на велике или самокате! Желаем Вам веселого и здорового дня.

Настья на прогулке по Кароне

Сашенькипопс водил Настью по Кароне в стиле Ивана Сусанина, к счастью они вернулись.

Val Verzasca - adventure 2009

Сегодня мы плавали в холодной ледниковой воде, и, когда я говорю мы, это мы - очень королевское, но кто-то же должен был фотографировать. Это - моя отговорка, и я буду ее придерживаться. Дети оказались смелее меня и купались в больших прогретых лужах.

Красота Долины реки Верцаска заключается в великолепных камнях, прорезанных ежегодным потоком тающего снега, неукротимыми потоками сбегающего с близ-возвышающихся гор. Время от времени среди каменной долины реки, набредаешь на выемку, как будто ее кто-то ложкой выковырял, и видишь воочию отпечаток водоворота. Красота, да и только. Над рекой возвышается древняя конструкция двойного каменного римского моста, элегантного и грациозного. Красота пейзажа нарушается только изредка отдельной толстухой, бросающейся с моста "топлесс" в глубокую холодную воду. Деревушка недалеко от моста, под названием Вогорно, имеем свое необычное лицо благодаря серым каменным домикам, построенным пол-тысячи лет назад "насухую", т.е. без цемента. В этом году все ручейки и мелкие струйки переродились в потоки и водопады. Камни, на которых мы лазали и ползали регулярно вот уже 4 года, утонули в воде, а, где мы и не ждали, оказались косы из нанесенного песка. Вот тебе и погодка. Как она меняет наше окружение. Дети были рады новому неожиданному развлечению и строили песчаные вулканы. Мы еще вернемся сюда! Ждите нас камни, потоки и золотая руда!