We have two kinds of lizards here, both of which grow to about 15 cm long. The top shot is the blue-throated lizard, and the lower one the brown lizard. Like lizards everywhere, they’re cold-blooded, so they like to sun themselves first thing in the morning. After that, they move really fast, particularly when you point a camera at them. Even so, they’re a favourite snack for cats.
This is the Barranco de las Angustias the Ravine of Anguish. The name comes from the conquest of the island, back at the end of the fifteenth century. Most of the tribes on the island took one look at the heavily-armed Spanish, and gave up without a fight. Four tribes fought briefly, but soon surrendered. After all, the original inhabitants, the Benhoaristas, had only stick and stones to fight against…
The heart of the island is the Caldera de Taburiente. Caldera is a technical geological term for the crater at the top of a volcano. In fact the term comes from La Palma: all the volcanic calderas in the world were named after ours. So it’s really a pity that, since then, the scientists have found out that the Caldera de Taburiete isn’t a caldera. It was actually formed by…
I’ve been working hard on the new blog about La Palma. I’ve written fifteen posts, and friends say they’re good. It’s already getting more traffic than the other two sites combined, but I’m trying to publicize it. The catch is that I’ve never done anything of the sort before. Suggestions welcome! I’ve set up RSS feed and Blogrush, so similar blogs get a link on my site, and my site…
Today Norma came for lunch. And while my husband gave her car the once-over, the two of us gave me a Sci-Fi makeover. You see the photo on my main web page is perfectly adequate, it’s really rather bland. So we spent a happy afternoon trying to make me as un-bland as possible. We succeeded so well that I’m not going to post a photo of the results. I want…
Twinkling stars are pretty, but astronomers would much rather they didn’t. The twinkle is caused by movement in the air above you (the same as a mirage on very hot days) and it stops the astronomers getting a clear view. The Hubble Telescope gets such wonderfully clear images because it’s out of the atmosphere altogether. But there’s only one Hubble, and it cost a fortune. So they build ground-based…