april '17: waking up.

peacockin' around.

visiting the animal park fasanerie is one of my absolute favourite things to do in this city, and if you invite me to check out animals you will always get a huge big fat YES out of me. i've written quite a lot about this animal park in the past, and clearly, i don't need to add any more words, describing how fun it always is to discover a new addition or to witness a new lovely thing around here.

this time around i've met up with a friend with kids ( which is something that is not ordinary for me, i rarely spend time around kids and it's always a little strange for me, until i realize it's actually pretty fun ). strangely, kids seem to love me & like following me around. i don't know why, probably because i just seem like the funny, quirky aunty, not the strict & uptight momma, but really, i have no clue about it, actually. my friend is not a very typical mother as well, she's rather laid back & let's her kids run free, as long as they don't bother anyone. she's pretty cool & i love spending time with her and her kids. she even managed to bring me to a level where i would pick up her 9 month old son & carry him around, playing games with him & just enjoying his little bright & happy face. her daughter is already 10 years old, but i know her since she was a 5 year old little cutiepie & seeing her grow up is such a strange thing to witness, albeit very enjoyable as she picks up on so many things & interactions, and started developing an interest in photography. most of these pictures were shot by her and i feel like she did a pretty good job on them :)

well enough gushing ( who would've thought i might enjoy being around kids so much? i mean, it's always been like the other way around, the kids clinging on to me and me being wary of them, lol ), now onto the pictures.

a little untypical plumage for a peacock, with white feathers thrown in.

they are such a treat, those feathers. those colours!

stork inside a field of flowers.

delightful spring blossoms.

there's a little creek running through the park, and while it is rather hidden, kids will find it, always. and the picture emerging out of that discovery is actually pretty decent, right?

the girl got a little stork crazy, i guess :D

shy violets.

owl taking a nap.

me being the really professional aunty that i am 😂.

we had to search a while until we discovered the lynxes. i love seeing these animals, big cats are just so mesmerizing & fascinating.

i had to include this picture, because i really love it. the little guy's face is just so delightfully cute! 😙

there were a lot of baby boars running around as well.

and of course, lambs! spring without lambs is no spring, right?

we had a small dinner after our visit, right next to the park inside the beer garden of the former hunting lodge.

old wine press.

a week or so later i met up with a colleague of mine who lives in the taunus mountains, mainly for doing a small hike & then feasting on a barbeque. it was a really beautiful day, filled with lots of conversations, so many in fact, that i almost forgot to take pictures of the surroundings.

our walk lead us around hohenstein-breithardt, a very idyllic little village in the western farther taunus.

bi-coloured goaties!

cuckoo flowers. did you know they are called like that because they arrive around the time when the cuckoos start to sing their songs?

it's always wonderful to see the blooming of the hawthorn bushes.

church in holzhausen.

lush green fields & filled daffodils.

view onto breithardt.

we passed by this modern cemetery chapel.

we also met some easter bunnies!

after our hike we filled our bellies with delicious meat & salads, and wrapped the day nourished & very content. days like this are basically what i live for, i feel most alive being in touch with nature, peaceful landscapes & good food.

may '20: seeking modernism.

super pink rhododendron buds emerging! i start off this post with some flower images to appreciate and praise the time of spring, especially the month of may, which is the most abundant spring month to me personally. all the blossoms, all the fresh greens amass during may, and my heart and mind are hardly ever able to not frolick & gush about it all! for this post i am returning to one walk i did with the sole purpose to find a special mid-century villa in königstein ( which would ultimately prove to be a failure - i did find it, but i couldn't approach it properly to have a good look at it and only ever saw a tiny bit of the garden/forest side ). the whole walk was not a letdown, though, as i did find some other mid-century & brutalism gems and thoroughly enjoyed walking through the old spa town in the taunus mountains. rhododendron shrubs yield all kinds of different blossoms in myriad colours, they are easy to breed, therefore a wide variety can be found all over the wor...

july '20: lake petersdorf discoveries and a plea against genocide.

the green wild meadows of malchow's sandfeld. in the west of malchow there is a big chunk of forest that spans towards plauer see, a widely 'uncultivated' area these days, but it hasn't always been this way. in my last post i mentioned the nazi munition factory that had been built in these woods, away from prying eyes of their enemies and where they also built an external subcamp for the concentration camp ravensbrück. exactly these woods we explored on a pretty sunny day, betraying the darkness that happened around these parts. isn't it weird that there are places in this world that were built or used by dark forces and horrible regimes and you vist them 80 years later and they are the most peaceful places you can imagine? sometimes my brain can't cope with the contrast of knowing what was in the past and what the present looks and feels like. it definitely leaves me with a strange impression often, kind of like a little sting in my heart and brain that is not ...

the america chronicles '22: austin I - city of the violet crown.

sighted on the way to austin: the texas colorado river . but beware, this is not the iconic colorado river ( 2.334 km long ) that has its source in the rocky mountains and confluences in the gulf of california, flowing through the grand canyon and other magnificent landscapes along the way, but this is texas' very own colorado river with a length of 1.387 km starting in the llano estacado plains in northwestern texas, and eventually ending up in the gulf of mexico at matagorda bay . why there are two colorado rivers in the US, i really don't know 😅 my guess is, that they were named by two people in different times, not knowing of the other's colorado river discovery. we'll meet the texas colorado river again in austin, so i will probably bestow more information on you eventually ;D a random road squirrel, also found on the way to austin. austin is about 187 miles ( 300 km ) away from baytown and is situated west from there in central texas. it sits at the foot of th...

ghost of nature.

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