New England

County Views.130

Barnstable County, Massachusetts this time: Audubon’s Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary.

Urban Garden.188


Small Wonders.218

 


Islands.48

 

Last year,  I proudly completed 367 days in a row of posting at least one entry on this blog per day on January 23rd while I was actually visiting our teams in Iraq, then took most of February and March off before resuming the daily-post pattern on March 29th, while I was in California on vacation. Today’s my 284th day in a row of at least one post per day since that resumption; it’s also the first weekend day in the new year, so I’ve decided to start posting larger, photo-heavier entries to wrap up any of the photos I took in 2023 that I’d still like to post. I suspect that I’ll find energy and time to keep up the daily posts until I’ve finished my stock of unposted but post-worthy photos from last year, and then take another break of undetermined length. Today’s entry is just about all the photos remaining from my restorative and beautiful week with my meditation group on Star Island, the last week of August last year. I’ve grouped some of the photos in galleries with a bit of a theme (above, rainier or foggier days; below, sunrises and sunsets), and then put the rest in a huge gallery that will shuffle the order randomly — all with the aim of sharing with you some that little island’s delightfully shifting energy, moods and views. Enjoy 🙂


From The Air.37

We’ll call these both Massachusetts, since I no longer recall what we might have been flying over when I took these last-remaining photos from the flight between A’dam and Boston late on the 18th of August.

Coasting.86

This weekend (with the shortest weekend days of the year for those of us here in the northern hemisphere – days also when many of my family and friends around the world are likely to be gathering in homes far and wide to enjoy each other’s company) seems a good moment to share my last coastal photos from that lovely August high-summer week in Provincetown, just before I hopped over to Star for the meditation week. Experienced readers will know already that the photos and gallery in this post will be viewed much better on a large screen. 😊

 


Village Views.66

More from our August outing to Star Island, which we’ve been sharing with you off and on since our first visit there (as an adult) in 2009. These photos were taken less than 75 minutes apart – above looking at the solar array around 7:48, below, gulls on the roof of the generator house around 9 the same morning, presumably as I was heading back for more sits after breakfast.

Islands.45

Some views of late-summer dawn over Gosport Harbor, taken from Star Island and showing both Cedar Island and a part of Smuttynose Island as well. A small celebration of the fact that at home in northern Europe, we’ve nearly reached that yearly solstice corner where the number of minutes each day on which the sun is above our horizon will start increasing again, for the next six months at least 🙂

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Small Wonders.215


Coasting.84

I’ve realized I’ll never find time to sort and post all my photos from this year unless I start doing more old-style gallery posts. Those of you viewing these on phones and small screens – apologies in advance that you’ll miss some photos most likely as the display for the galleries on small screens is pretty bad. These are all from my first morning walk around the dunes at Provincetown on the day after I took the ferry out – we showed you photos from that trip in a prior post.


Small Wonders.214

You’ve seen this water lily in a previous post with a different focus and frame 🙂

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Urban Entrances.114


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Small Wonders.213


Islands.42

As you’ll have deduced, I recently spent several days exploring a few corners of Ireland, which certainly lives up to its “Emerald Isle” handle based on what I’ve seen so far. This means my over-abundance of photos to share with you has grown more, so I’ve decided I need to post more of the shots left from that glorious late-summer week on Star Island nearly three months ago. For this post, I hope / think I’ve managed to include all the shots which include the island with the lighthouse, which the map tells me is White Island State Historic Site.

Village Views.62

We’re back on that August vacation, here back to the little seasonal village of Star Island.