For this challenge I decided to post a photo I took while I was pretending to be a tourist in my own town. It was a fun experiment with some really cool finds like this one from the upper town which is very frequented by visitors all year around.
So here it is – my message or should I say “massage” from Zagreb 😀
For the last Thursday’s Special in 2017 I am offering you a challenge that IS NOT, and yet it might be the most challenging one so far 😀
I would like you to post again what you consider to be your best shot posted this year.
The end of this year has been a bit more stressful than usual for me, but I am hopeful that things will get better eventually. I would like to thank all my friends here for constant support and positive wishes.
#1 is the view I see every day getting out of my apartment
#2 I said recently that I would be focusing on happy faces around my town. It’s much needed with so many bad things going on.
#3 Prostrating is good – when you are exhausted you should prostrate and when you do, do it in a good company too.
#4 My everyday life isn’t glamorous. It’s mostly asphalt, concrete, steel and glass, but whenever I can, I visit a botanic garden and if I ‘m lucky I get to see this.
#5 My town is in the continent, but it doesn’t stop it from adopting a blue whale.
I hope you’ve enjoyed my selection of words and images. As usual for this theme, you can do one word, or more or all five. It’s up to you.
To join the Thursday’s Special photo challenge you are supposed to:
Make a photo post on today’s theme, before next Thursday.
Link to this challenge post, and tag your post #thursdaysspecial
Leave a comment under this post.
P.S. If you have missed the last week’s TS themed OVER please click on the link to check out the great entries to that challenge.
Lately I have been experiencing problems while logging on to WordPress and could not even access some of your blogs for days, and when I did I could not leave a comment or even a like. Let’s hope that WordPress team has finished introducing new improvements and upgrades so that I can resume normal communication with other bloggers.
If you can’t stop dancing, here are some bonus tracks for you. One for each image 🙂
It’s interesting to see what choices have fellow bloggers made for this challenge. Please, click on the links bellow:
Curves are nice, attractive and fun, aren’t they? I love them too, especially in nature. This image comes from Croatian National Park – Plitvice Lakes. If you want to visit it, just follow the snake.
Today you are invited to post a portrait and landscape format of the same scene. You may be surprised at how much different they look and what each one reveals. That’s the only requirement for this challenge. The subject is up to you. Have a great day!
Zagreb, Kamenita Vrata (Stone Gate)
Zagreb, Kamenita Vrata (Stone Gate)
Paula Borkovic
Not sure how to participate in Thursday’s Special photo challenge?
Follow these four simple steps:
Make a photo post on today’s theme before next Thursday;
Link to this challenge post;
Tag your post #thursdaysspecial;
Leave a comment under this post.
Optional:
You may, but are not obliged to, grab the widget above.
ATOP OF ALL MY STRESS AND BUSY SCHEDULE WORDPRESS IS GIVING ME HARD TIME TOO WITH POST EDITOR- I can’t do what I want to my fonts and when I want it. Please, don’t be offended if the links are not the right colour or in bold. I am spending too much time trying to fix something that is not up to me.
I like walking at dusk and after the dusk to see how different places look under artificial lights. Here are two captures of the same scene, one with and one without a passing tram.
EVANESCENT
Ball reflecting the new building of music academy with the building of Croatian National Theatre in the background
I thought it would be a good idea to take Jo for a night walk through the centre of Zagreb. This is linked to her Monday Walk, but also to EVANESCENT weekly photo theme.
Most visitors to Croatia go to Istria, our largest and westernmost peninsula, for its coast, for Roman amphitheatre in Pula, for Brijuni Islands, for beautiful Rovinj, or for Unesco-protected Basilica in Porec, but not everybody thinks that they should venture into hinterland, oblivious to all the beauty it hides.
Last December my husband and I went to Istria for a weekend, and once again we decided to stay at the coast overnight, but to focus our interest on the interior of the peninsula, on the sights and paths that we had missed on our previous trips. This time the route was to take us from Opatija to Rovinj via Svetvinčenat and Dvigrad.
Map of Istria with a drawn route we took that day
We are always happy to revist Istria for its colours, architecture, cuisine and its proximity and semblance with Italy, but this is the first time we got a chance to see it in winter time; its land dry, trees fruitless, branches swept by winds, but the warm sunshine that day painted the remaining leaves nice golden shade and we were happy leaving the smog of the capital behind.
Our first unplanned stop is by the road where I spotted a traditional shepherd’s hut, made of stone (drywall). Kazuni have been in use for centuries, once as shelters (for shepherds), later for storing agricultural tools, and reportedly the same type of structures were used as dwellings in prehistory.
KAZUN – typical shepherd’s shelter in Istria
On the other side of the road stands a small country church built in the same style as many Istrian sacral buildings. Still, it was unusual to see it placed along the road with no villages or houses nearby.
A little church I know nothing about near Svetvinčenat, Istria
Half an hour later we are already in Svetvinčenat, a fascinating little town featuring a regular, square piazza closed in by the Parish Church, city loggia, several Renaissance houses and the monumental Castle Morosini-Grimani. This Medieval jewel was built as a square fortification with round towers and simple façade. In the 15th ct it was owned by the Morosini family who enlarged it while adding it some Renaissance features. On the other side of the square the quaint Parish church of St Mary’s Assumption is decorated with a distinctive Renaissance trefoil façade.
A shooting star ornament on the church was signalling that Christmas was just two weeks apart, but the place was magically quiet, with no people (and much less tourists) in sight, and we felt as the only breathing people there.
Svetvinčenat, Istria
Svetvinčenat, detail
Castle Grimano in Svetvinčenat
The sunlight was harsh and glaring, contrasts too strong, and I knew that photos would be nothing to brag about, but I was excited to be finally exploring what seems to be one of the most scenic places in Istria.
I love winter, its quietness, crisp air and low-lying sun, but the day is getting too short and we have to move quickly to make time for other stops on our way.
On Sundays I normally publish a photo challenge in black and white that I call Black & White Sunday. I usually come up with a fresh theme for it, but once a month I publish a recurrent (monthly) theme: after and before where you are supposed to show the same photo, regardless of the subject, in both monochrome and colour.
This is a way of encouraging you not only to set your camera to black and white setting, but to shoot in colour and to convert it into black and white in post processing. Hopefully you will enjoy this exercise in seeing and editing. After all it is all about fun. Have a beautiful day!
Winter is harsh this year, and it seems to go on for ever. That’s why I decided to make wintry today’s challenge theme with apologies to those living in the Southern Hemisphere.
The bellow photo was captured in a secluded Istrian village, at the very beginning of winter, when snow was still non-existent, but the chill could be felt in the air, and the colours, light and scarce vegetation all screamed of winter.