MTC Info

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Moscow Center by Sergey Semenov from his website

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Front center is the State Historical Museum between Menage Square in front and Red Square behind. In front of the Museum is the Zhukov statue. To the left connecting the Museum to the former Moscow City Hall and connecting the two squares is the Iberian Gate, and in front of it is the Iveron Chapel. Beyond the Gate, all lit up, is GUM Department Store. Just visible between GUM and City Hall is the dome of the Kazan Cathedral.  

To the right of the Museum is the Kremlin, extending back to the river, which you can just glimpse, and with Red Square to the left.  The Kremlin has twenty towers along its triangular perimeter.  The one at the apex closest to us is the Corner Arsenal Tower, named for the big Arsenal building occupying that apex.  The next tower along the Kremlin perimeter leading to the river is the Middle Arsenal Tower, and the third tower, illuminated, is the Trinity Tower, the tallest of the towers at 80 m, and the main tourist entrance to the Kremlin.  Along the perimeter next to Red Square, the first tower visible, just beyond the Museum, is St Nicholas.  Behind it is the Kremlin Senate building, with the dome.  Continuing on, the tower almost to St Basil's that is illuminated is the Spasskaya Tower.  

In the distance beyond and to the right of St Nicholas Tower and the Kremlin Senate building is Cathedral Square, with all the gold domes.  The tallest structure is Ivan the Great Bell Tower.  To the right is the Cathedral of the Archangel, and further to the right, the church with three (apparently - actually five) large domes is the Dormition Cathedral.

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The buoyant acrobatic flights of the Alpine Choughs by B℮n on Flickr

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The Jenner mountain is located in the extreme southeast of the German state of Bavaria, near the border with Austria. High up on Mount Jenner above Lake Königssee, you begin to appreciate the magic and adventure of the mountains. It's all part of the Berchtesgaden National Park. Due to its picturesque setting, the mountain top is very popular with tourists and hikers. On the top at 1.874 m you can view over 100 German, Austrian peaks and the Königssee. Gazing into the distance as far as the eye can see: a royal experience. Treat yourself to this unique view of an enchanting alpine landscape. Well sign-posted trails invite hikers to discover nature's beauty on foot, there are walks for every level of difficulty. From the outdoor terrace at the top station you can watch the para-gliders and hang-gliders taking off, as well as feed the cheeky Alpine Choughs that circle around just a few feet away. The clough has a buoyant acrobatic flight with widely spread flight feathers. The Alpine Chough pairs for life and displays fidelity to its breeding site, which is usually crevice in a cliff face. It feeds, usually in flocks, on short grazed grassland, taking mainly invertebrate prey in summer and fruit in winter; it will readily approach tourist sites to find supplementary food. At the edge of the hiking trails edelweiss and gentian grow. The protected area of the national park covers 210 km². Its nature is left to its own resource. The National Park demonstrates all levels of vegetation of alpine habitat. Alpine roses, edelweiss and gentian blossom on the ridges, together with the hundreds of other extremely rare flowering plants that have established themselves here. Rare golden eagles and ibex, the kings of the mountains, have also found a home here. Black grouse and wood grouse, snow hares and marmots, deer and chamois are also indigenous to the area.

A view from the Jenner plateau over the alpine mountains in the county of Berchtesgaden - Germany. What could be more beautiful? From here you can watch, hanggliders, paragliders and Alpine Cloughs. The flight of the Alpine Chough is swift and acrobatic with loose deep wing beats. Its high manoeuvrability is accomplished by fanning the tail, folding its wings, and soaring in the updraughts at cliff faces. A sentinel chough on the lookout. They circle around just a few feet away. It's pleasure to watch these buoyant acrobatic flyers high up in the mountains. Photo taken from the Jenner mountain top at the height of 1,874 meters where the beauty of the Berchtesgaden valley can be viewed. The weather can change very rapidly in the mountains with all of its magnificence by the up and downdraughts of clouds above the green meadows, past cliffy rocks into the mountain tops.

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Ice Fall by werner boehm * on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"Partnach Gorge, German: Partnachklamm, is a "don't miss" attraction on any visit to the Bavarian alpine resort of Garmisch-Partenkirchen. The gorge, which acts as a natural conduit for the Partnach River, runs 700 meters or 2,305 feet between limestone walls that reach 80 meters (262 feet) high. A series of galleries and tunnels has been carved out of the rock along one side, allowing visitors to walk along the rushing river and duck behind waterfalls.

"The gorge is open year-round except for a short time in the spring when melting snow makes the route impassable.

"Summer. In July and August, the Partnachklamm offers a refreshing break from summer heat. If you're ambitious and in good shape, you can continue on for another eight or nine hours to the glacier near the top of the Zugspitze, Germany's highest mountain. (Follow these directions, and plan to spend the night at an alpine hut along the way.)

"Winter. In the cold months, the Partnach Gorge is a magical place of ice and snow formations. You can bundle up in your warmest clothes for a guided torchlight tour through the gorge, followed by a short climb up to the top for a glass of hot spiced wine or a fondue dinner at the Forsthaus Graseck.

"Afterwards, you descend to the valley by the hotel's private gondola."

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In step by gerdavs on Flickr (by permission)

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“Lion cubs photographed in the wild in the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park.

“After our return from Kalagadi I read Hunters of the dunes, an account of Prof Fritz Eloff’s research on the lions in the Kalahari Gemsbok Park, the present day Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park. Among others he found that mortality among lion cubs in the Kalahari is very high. Prof Eloff writes that of the 17 cubs he followed over a period of three years, only one lived longer than 12 months. Starvation is a major cause of death among cubs, largely due to the Kalahari lion’s dependence on small mammals as a source of food. Other important mortality factors are neglect or abandonment of the cubs by the mother - they often leave their cubs for days while they go in search of food and cubs are entirely dependent on their mother’s milk for the first three months, diseases, attacks by other predators and the harsh desert environment. In other parts of Africa between two-thirds and three-quarters of all lion cubs do not survive the first year of their lives.”

© Gerda van Schalkwyk. All rights reserved. This photograph and all others on my photostream are protected by copyright and may not be used on any site, blog or forum, nor linked to without my written permission.

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Rainbow from the Moonlight - Yosemite Falls Moonbow by Darvin Atkeson on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"Neatly packaged with a multi-colored bow and all and presented to you, a portrait of a Yosemite Falls under the magical light of a full moon. To see this is truly one of the most wondrous sights Yosemite National Park has to offer. You stand in the sheer darkness of towering cliffs of Glacier Point as moonlight illuminates the north face of Yosemite Valley like some spectacular motion picture show. A massive cascade of water pours over the cliffs above the grassy meadows and thunders to the rocks below and in the process turns to a fine mist. Illuminated by the pale moonlight the mist separates each of the colors of light in to a soft pale rainbow known affectionately by park visitors as a "moonbow". Each full moon photographers and tourist stay up in to the wee hours of the morning and line up along the meadow across from Yosemite Chapel to witness and capture the glowing, constantly shimmering and ever changing show of rainbow light that forms at the base of the falls on any brightly moonlight night. Of course a full moon is best and the effect is easily seen to the naked eye. Late at night, sound travels much better and you can really hear the roar, thunder and slap of the mighty Yosemite Falls as the water pounds against the solid granite rocks.

"The image you see here is the result of a long exposure and not what your eye will see. The actual effect is much more subtle. I set the camera to an ISO of 200 in part to minimize noise. I could have set it to 400 or possibly even 800 ISO and still had a low amount of noise but the longer exposure time of a lower ISO allowed me to capture as much of the continually moving rainbow as it danced in the winds caused by the steepcliffs of Yosemite Valley. Finding the best exposure time took a bit of trial and error but with a few shots established an exposure of between 50 and 60 seconds would do the trick nicely. Unfortunately this meant there would be an ever so slight blurring of the stars just above Yosemite Falls and that I would have to wait an additional 60 seconds before I could takeanother shot. When I arrived there were a number of photographers shooting the falls and I thought perhaps I had missed the show as many of the photographers packed up and left. But the longer I shot, the larger and clearer the rainbow became . This shot was taken at the largest and brightest point during my shoot. I figure that the best time to visit is when the full moon is lowest in the sky and directly opposite the falls which made it about 1:00 AM to 2:00 AM or so. The lower the moon (to the south) the bigger the rainbow effect. The canyon where the mist forms is best viewed from the meadow across the street from Yosemite Chapel. However the moonbow can be seen at various times from a number of places within the park."

Darv

© Darvin Atkeson

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Boom boom by Christophe Kiciak on Flickr

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The photographer says:

“2 droplets of milk colliding in a cup of coffee. “This was shot in a dark room, using a 0.6 second exposure time, along with a flash in stroboscopic mode. This is why you can see the evolution of the collision. In fact, the droplets on the upper part of the photo are not different ones, but the very same one falling down, and captured by the flash burst at various positions.”

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Male Pin-tailed Manakin (Ilicura militaris) by Bertrando Campos on 500px

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The photographer says:

"The beautiful and highly distinctive Pin-tailed Manakin is endemic to the Atlantic Forest of eastern Brazil, where it is not rare but the species is nonetheless highly prized by birdwatchers, especially as its unusually quiet vocalisations can render it unobtrusive, making encounters much less frequent than with other manakins that occur in the same region. The male Pin-tailed Manakin is one of the most unmistakable and prettiest of manakins, and even the female is difficult to confuse given that it shares the male’s ‘unusual’ head shape and ‘pin-tail’ central rectrices. The species prefers humid forest, woodlots and mature second growth, perhaps most frequently in valleys. Its systematic relationships have only recently been elucidated, although its uniqueness has long been recognised by taxonomists. However, some facets of the Pin-tailed Manakin’s life history, especially its breeding biology and diet, are still relatively poorly known."

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Midnight Lupine by orvaratli on Flickr

  The photographer says:

“From mid June to mid July every year the lupine flower blossoms here in Iceland. These large fields of flower can now be seen in numerous places around Iceland. An introduced species the lupine is spreading fast around Iceland. In many places it´s positive as it converts lifeless soils and lava sands into fertile ones. In other places though, it is out-competing the low lying vegetation for sunlight and changing the flora of large areas. "This image was taken just after midnight as the sun set behind the glaciated volcano of Eyjafjallajökull. The unusually humid air over Iceland that day had formed thick fog in places as the air cooled."

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Curves by antonsrkn on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"Another photo of the Drab Lightbulb lizard (Riama unicolor). I don’t usually like photos that show the animal from directly above, but this photo shows the long body and tail of the lizard. I also like the curve it was making with its body+tail and on top of that the shot shows how iridescent the scales were, so I decided to put it up. The small legs in relation to the body hint at its lifestyle; it spends all of its life underneath debris and below ground. You can also see exactly where it lost a bit of its tail before and where it regenerated; at least that is what I think the color/pattern change signifies."

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Dormant Giant - Öræfajökull reflected in Jökulsárlón, Iceland by orvaratli on Flickr

The photographer says:

"Öræfajökull is the highest mountain and volcano in Iceland. One of the most feared as well, as it has violently erupted twice in historical times. Prior to the first eruption the area around it was called Hérað which means shire, being green and lush. After the eruption the area was flooded and covered in ash and volcanic debris. For decades after the eruption the area was uninhabited and since has been called Öræfi which means badlands."

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Dance of Light I by T.-C on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"During the middle of the day, observing the light/shadow pattern created by passing clouds can be fun and exciting. Sometimes the landscape provides a pristine canvas to be painted, sometimes the light/shadow pattern overlays the patterns created by the rolling hills or the textures of the rocky surfaces.

"Coming back from a five day trip in the Silverton/Ridgway/Telluride area, this is one of those places that I really want to go back, like, immediately, after scanning through all the images. But then I am afraid that I'd again bring back images that can't even show one percent of the sheer beauty of this paradise.

"We spent a day shooting all the wildflowers exploding in the lower basin, and another day camping at the outlet of Ice Lake in the upper basin. This is one of the few lakes I've seen that have the dreamy turquoise color (Moraine Lake, Peyto Lake in Banff NP and Grinnell Lake in Glacier NP among them). The turquoise color is a result of the backscattering of light from the calcium carbonate suspended in the water and the reflective properties of the almost-white colored lakebed."

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Steamed Lava - Fimmvörðurháls eruption, Iceland by orvaratli on Flickr

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The photographer says: "...The sun just peered over a ridge in front of me making this interesting contrast of front-lit steam and dark lava. "The lava was actually flowing over thick snow. The lowest layer of lava quickly cooled down isolating the hot lava inside. Asd the lava field slowly melted the snow underneath it constantly released steam through it."

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Lava Blast and Electric Lightning Bolt Within a Lava Plume ~ Island of Hawaii by SparkyLeigh on Flickr

The photographer says:

"Rare and surreal static electric lightning flashes through a massive column of steam, sulfur dioxide, glass particles, ash, rock and instantly created black sand – all generated from a huge volume of molten lava dumping out of a single lava tube that carried it from magma chambers under the flanks of Mauna Loa’s Kilauea volcano further upslope - here on the Big Island.

"I first recorded this electric bolt phenomenon here with this photo

"I have been asked if all these lava explosions and lightning flashes are loud. Oddly enough, even when I was nervously close to this event the night I took these photos, there was not a single sound to be heard! – That felt strange to me. In the past, when the lava flowing into the sea was tamer, we could hear the crackling and hissing as molten lava met ocean water… but I was not going to get that close to the exploding lava monster in these photos!

"Digital downloads and prints of this lava shot and many others can also be found here"

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One of several Towers - Rothenburg ob der Tauber, Bavaria Germany by Batikart on Flickr

The photographer says:

"On the fifth photo of my series from Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a town in Middle Franconia (Germany, Bavaria), I want to show you the Röder Bow and the Markus Tower. They are surrounded by beautiful half-timbered houses.

"The Markus Tower was built about 1200, the roof was attached later. The tower has a height of 27 m and was used as a prison until 1844.  The Roeder Bow is the excessive proceeding of the guard's walkway, probably the rest for a stronger building of the gate and portcullis. Under the current pavement are still remnants of an ancient bridge. The construction period was around 1560. "It is nice to View Large On Black"

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Moments of Eternity by www.lichtjahre.eu on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"This weird and unearthly landscape could have existed somewhere on Jupiter's volcanic moon Io. Who can tell if this hostile nighttime eruption of this volcanic geyser took place million or even billion years before now. The red Triffid- and the Lagoon nebula of the Sagittarius constellation within the center of our galaxy radiates in a distance of about 5000 light years. The bright band of the Milky Way seems oddly familiar. It is new moon. We are on Earth, within the desert of Nevada, and indeed a geyser is spouting. Such unearthly landscapes are rare on Earth, but they exist. Maybe this helps to imagine how Earth might have looked like at its very beginning. Heat and sulphur resistant bacteria feed on the boiling water of the geyser. Just like in the beginning of life on Earth."

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Lac de Chesery by torichter on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"This is a photo of a perfect reflection of the Mont Blanc Massif in the ‘Lac de Chérsery”. On that evening in October, the water of the lake only remained completely calm for a few minutes offering me this tremendous photo opportunity. Starting from left to right, the photo allows one’s gaze to wander from the Auigelle Verte to the Grande Jurasse and main peak of the Mont Blanc."

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Eucharitid wasp by j_aubz on Flickr

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The photographer says:

"Eucharitid wasps are specialized parasitoids of ants. Larvae develop inside ant nests feeding on ant brood. Adult wasps sometimes form large mating swarms in meadows, where the females oviposit in plant material. Young larvae attach themselves to passing ants, or to ant prey items, to be carried into the ant nest.

"*Thanks to Mark O'Brien for identifying this insect. "All insects / arachnids are photographed in their natural habitat."