Bellapais Abbey

My friend Merja sent me this nice card about the Bellapais Abbey in Cyprus. Now, Bellapais is a small village in the Turkish-controlled Northern Cyprus, about four miles from the town of Kyrenia. The village was the home for some years ofLawrence Durrell, who wrote about life in Cyprus in his book Bitter Lemons. He mentions passing the time drinking coffee under the Tree of Idleness in the village and there are two places which lay claim to being the spot. Unfortunately his book did not identify it completely, or perhaps fortunately, because two establishments can now profit from the name. His house, up a very steep climb, has a plaque on it and one can have the pleasure of returning by a not-quite-so-perpendicular way that passes by old olive presses.

The jewel of the village is Bellapais Abbey or "The Abbey of Peace”. Built by canons  regular of the Premonstratensian Order in the 13th century, it is a most imposing ruin in a wonderful position commanding a long view down to Kyrenia and the Mediterranean Sea.

Most of the monastic buildings surround the cloister. In Britain these would normally be built on the south side of the church so to some extent protect the living quarters from the cold air from the north. At Bellapais, the monastic buildings are on the north, probably to be cooler, although occasionally the lay of the land dictated position.

Today the site is a museum, which also hosts a restaurant and a cafe.

Suomenlinna - World Heritage Site

In 1991, the Suomenlinna fortress was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List as a unique monument of military architecture. Other World Heritage Sites include the pyramids of Giza and the Great Wall of China. Suomenlinna is one of Finland’s most popular tourist attractions. At the same time it is a suburb of Helsinki, with 850 people living in the renovated ramparts and barracks.

Suomenlinna is unique in that although it is a bastian fortress, it is irregular in shape as a result of being built on a cluster of rocky islands with highly variable terrain, requiring a very free adaptation of the theory of fortifications developed in central Europe. The Suomenlinna World Heritage Site currently includes seven islands.

Another special feature of the fortress is that in the course of its history it has served in the defence of three realms: Sweden, Russia and Finland. Moreover, it continues to be a living, tended and inhabited district of the city of Helsinki.

Suomenlinna is to a large extent historically authentic, i.e. consisting of original structures. Several significant layers of historical development in fortifications and shipyards may be seen on Suomenlinna. The dry dock  at the heart of the fortress, with galley basin, lock gates and paternoster device, was the state of the art in 18th-century technology. There are also dozens of historical underwater sites around the fortress.

Thank you Ella for this nice card.

Illinois

Far from the hustle and bustle of the third largest city in the USA, Illinois small towns and rural areas beckon visitors with their changing seasons, prairie lands, and crops. The round silo for farm storage was first constructed on a farm in Spring Grove, IL. Corn, soyabeans, wheat, oats, barley, rye and sorghum are the leading crops. Cattle is a major industry in Illinois.

Thank you Frank for sending me this lovely card.

The Rhur

This card showing different scenes in the Ruhr region of Germany was sent to me by Katija. The Rhur is an urban area in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.

With a population density of 2,800/km² and a population of some five million, it is the largest urban agglomeration in Germany. It consists of several large, industrial cities bordered by the rivers Ruhr to the south, Rhine to the west, and Lippe to the north. In the Southwest it borders the Bergisches Land. It is considered part of the larger Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region of more than 12 million people.

From west to east, the region includes the cities of Duisburg, Oberhausen, Bottrop, Mülheim an der Ruhr, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, Bochum, Herne, Hagen, Dortmund, and Hamm, as well as parts of the more "rural" districts of Wesel, Recklinghausen, Unna and Ennepe-Ruhr-Kreis. Historically, the western Ruhr towns, such as Duisburg and Essen, belonged to the historic region of the Rhineland, whereas the eastern part of the Ruhr, including Gelsenkirchen, Bochum, Dortmund and Hamm, were part of the region of Westphalia. Since the 19th century, these districts have grown together into a large complex with a vast industrial landscape, inhabited by some 7.3 million people  (including Düsseldorf and Wuppertal).

It is the fifth largest urban area in Europe after Istanbul, Moscow, London and Paris.

For 2010, the Ruhr region was one of the European Capitals of Culture.

Glen Helen Gorge

Glen Helen (including Ormiston Gorge and Pound National Park). One of the most beautiful gorges in Central Australia. Glen Helen is located 133 km west of Alice Springs at the end of the sealed section of road known as Namatjira Drive. No one knows who named the region but it was one of the first pastoral leases in Central Australia. The first owner, Alan Braeden, overlanded stock over 2000 km and built a house, Munga Munga, on the bank of Ormiston Creek. It is now nothing more than a pile of rubble.

Today the term Glen Helen is applied to the lodge, the gorge near the lodge and the surrounding 368 hectare Nature Park controlled by the Conservation Commission of the Northern Territory. The Glen Helen Gorge is formed from quartzite. Sandstone was deposited in the area some 500 million years ago when it was a huge inland sea. It was subsequently tilted and uplifted. As this uplift was occurring the Finke River slowly eroded its way through the mountain range. Glen Helen is known to local Aborigines as Yapalpe and the Finke River is Larapinta which means 'serpent'. It was a favourite meeting place for the Aboriginal people from the West and Central MacDonnell Ranges. The rocky slopes around the gorge are home to a colony of black-footed rock wallabies which sometimes appear in the late afternoon and early evening to feed on grass, herbs, leaves and fruits.

The Finke River, which was named by John McDouall Stuart after the Adelaide financier William Finke, rises in the MacDonnell Ranges and flows over 1000 km until it disappears into Lake Eyre. Over the years the Finke has acquired its own mythology. Rumours about it abound. It is claimed, even in the Conservation Commission literature, that the Finke is the oldest river in the world - no one quite explains what such a claim actually means. It certainly isn't recorded as such in the Guinness Book of Records. It is said that the Finke only ever runs for the entire length of its course about twice every century. Glen Helen is one of only six permanent waterholes on the Finke River. A tributary of the Finke, the Ormiston Creek, runs through Ormiston Gorge and Pound National Park. The park consists of the spectacular Pound and the narrow gorge which is regarded by many as one of the most beautiful gorges in Central Australia. The subject of a number of paintings by Albert Namatjira the gorge rises to over 300 metres at points and is characterised by the beautiful river red gums and the euros and rock wallabies which abound in the park.

The area was explored by Peter Egerton Warburton on his epic 1873-74 journey from Alice Springs to the Western Australian coast which traversed the Great Sandy Desert. He named the Ormiston Creek which runs through the area and joins the Finke River.

Thank you Dear Heather for this lovely card and the wonderful stamps on it.

Diamond Shoals,

Diamond Shoals, which extend many miles out from Cape Hatteras, is considered to be one of the most dangerous spots on the Atlantic seaboard. While a light was exhibited from the cape itself from 1804, its range was insufficient, and a lightship was stationed on the shoal itself in 1824. It was driven off station numerous times, eventually being wrecked near Ocracoke Inlet in 1827. Various buoys were placed beginning in 1852, but all were short-lived.  lightship, LV 69, was the first of six lightships employed at Diamond Shoals in the twentieth century. Prior to World War I, lightships were assigned in pairs at this station, which each relieving the other; after LV 71 was sunk by the German submarineU-104, a single ship was assigned, relieved as needed. During World War II the lightship was replaced by a lighted buoy. The last lightship stationed here, WLV 189, was the first lightship built after the Coast Guard took over the Lighthouse Service, and the first all-welded lightship; it was expressly built for service at this station, and remained in service there until 1966.

The card shows a watercolour painting of the “Diamond” Shoal by Winslow Homer.

Winslow Homer (February 24, 1836 – September 29, 1910) was an American landscape painter and printmaker, best known for his marine subjects. He is considered one of the foremost painters in 19th-century America and a preeminent figure in American art. Largely self-taught, Homer began his career working as a commercial illustrator. He subsequently took up oil painting and produced major studio works characterized by the weight and density he exploited from the medium. He also worked extensively in watercolor, creating a fluid and prolific oeuvre, primarily chronicling his working vacations.

Carol who sent me this card also affixed some very historic stamps on it. They relate to the US Civil Rights, Fort Sumter in South Carolina and was the scene of the First Battle of the war. The stamp regarding the Emancipation Proclamation which freed slaves from their bondage. Rosa Parks was a Civil Rights pioneer and activist.

Rotterdam

Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam constructed in 1270 on the Rotte River, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre. Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam constructed in 1270 on the Rotte River, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre. Its strategic location at the Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta on the North Sea and at the heart of a massive rail, road, air and inland waterway distribution system extending throughout Europe is the reason that Rotterdam is often called the "Gateway to Europe". In the province of South Holland, Rotterdam is in the west of Netherlands and the south of the Randstad. The population of the city was 616,250 on February 1, 2012. The population of the greater Rotterdam area, called "Rotterdam-Rijnmond" or just "Rijnmond", is approximately 1.3 million. The combined urban area of Rotterdam and The Hague is the 206th largest urban area in the world. One of Europe's most vibrant, multicultural cities, Rotterdam is known for its university (Erasmus), cutting-edge architecture, lively cultural life, striking riverside setting and maritime heritage. It is also known for the Rotterdam Blitz. The largest port in Europe and one of the busiest ports in the world, the port of Rotterdam was the world's busiest port from 1962 to 2004, when it was surpassed by Shanghai. Rotterdam's commercial and strategic importance is based on its location near the mouth of the Niew Meuse (New Meuse), a channel in the delta formed by the Rhine and Meuse on the North Sea. These rivers lead directly into the centre of Europe, including the industrial Ruhrregion.

Also seen on the card is the Erasmus Bridge which is a cable-stayed bridge across the Nieuwe Maas, linking the northern and southern regions of Rotterdam.  The Erasmus Bridge was designed by Ben van Berkel and completed in 1996. The 802-metre-long (2,631 ft) bridge has a 139-metre-high (456 ft) asymmetrical pylon, earning the bridge its nickname of "The Swan". The southern span of the bridge has an 89-metre-long (292 ft) bascule bridge for ships that cannot pass under the bridge. The bascule bridge is the largest and heaviest in West Europe and has the largest panel of its type in the world. After costing more than 163 million euros to construct, the bridge was officially opened by Queen Beatrix on September 6, 1996.^[1] Shortly after the bridge opened to traffic in October 1996, it was discovered the bridge would swing under particularly strong wind conditions. To reduce the trembling, stronger shock dampers were installed.

The Bridge has been used during many memorable events. The bridge featured in the 1998Jackie Chan film "Who Am I?" In 2005, several planes flew underneath the bridge as part of the "Red Bull Air Race". In 2005, the bridge served as the backdrop for a performance by DJ Tiësto titled "Tiësto @ The Bridge, Rotterdam". The performance featured fire-fighting ships spraying jets of water into the air in front of the bridge, a fireworks barge launching fireworks beside the bridge, and multi coloured spot/search lights attached to the bridge itself. The bridge was crossed during the prologue and the opening stage of the 2010 Tour de France.

Thank you Marco for this nice card.