Fleckchen

As you may remember, our lovely bunny Pünktchen died some weeks ago, and of course, the first thing my dad did when he returned from their holiday was to take the little one to the breeder to get a new one. The guy breeds bunnies for shows, so those who don’t fit his breeding needs are sold as pets, which shows again that those things are stupid as the new bunny is the cutest.

So here’s the first pics of the new family member. Let’s start with Molli, being very hot and not suspecting that life would change again.

 

Brown rabbit dozing in the shade

Effin’ heat wave when you’re wearing a fur coat.
©Giliell, all rights reserved

And here he is, Fleckchen.

Brown and white bunny

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Face of brown and white bunny

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Face of brown and white bunny

Isn’t he pretty?
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Translating his name got me thinking again. Now, first of all, in German we make things small by adding -chen, which doesn’t always work in English. While you get a baby and a kitty, you don’t have a “cary”, meaning a little toy car. Now, the former bunny was “Pünktchen”. A “Punkt” can be a dot, but also a spot, which would be the more usual term for describing an animal’s coat. A “Fleck” is something like a larger dot. It can be a spill on your clothing, but also the colouring of an animal, so now I have two rabbits named for their coat and they could both be translated as the same word in English. So I went with “Patches” because his coat looks more like a patchwork blanket.

Brown and brown and white rabbit, separated through a fence

Molli and Fleckchen
©Giliell, all rights reserved

Here you can see the first contact between the two, with Fleckchen being in his temporary enclosure, from which he escaped the next day. Thankfully he#s still too young for making baby rabbits.

Barcelona: the City 4: Streets

Wedged in between the mountains and the sea, Barcelona’s streets tend to be narrow and dark, and beautiful.

But it’s also a place where you can see the contrast between rich and poor, with people sleeping rough, begging for change and trying to make ends meet by selling knickknacks. When you come to the harbour you will have the multi-million dollar yachts next to poor immigrants selling cheap sunglases.

I will say one thing in favour of Barcelona and that is that they don’t seem to actively work against the homeless population. There was a spot at Catalunya where our bus arrived and left where a homeless guy had his place, with a small foam mattress and a few belongings. He usually wasn’t there when we arrived, but at least nobody destroyed his things and the police didn’t remove them.

My kids were wondering about the “junk”, not knowing that this was somebody’s home, and when I explained it to them they emptied their pockets and put all their change on the mattress. I was never prouder of them than in that moment.

Narrow street with decorated balconies

Narrow street just off the Rambla. ©Giliell, all rights reserved

Small balcony with many potted plants

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Jack’s Walk

Red Admiral butterfly, ©voyager, all rights reserved

Red Admiral, underside, ©voyager, all rights reserved

The weather here was a bit strange last week. We had very high humidity and bouts of rain, but it was cool making it feel more like late spring than the middle of July. I’m not really complaining, cool is definitely better than sweltering, but it was weird. Today, though, things seem to have reset. The humidity is mostly gone, there isn’t a cloud in the sky and the temp has climbed into the mid-twenties and seems to be staying there. This is what I call a perfect day. So does Jack, who had a welcome spring in his step this morning.

Barcelona: the City 3: El Mercado de la Boqueria

Just off the big Boulevard “La Rambla” is the big market hall Boqueria. The front is dominated by the stalls that mostly offer their goods to tourists, but in the back you can find the Barceloneses doing their shopping. Fresh fish and fruit and most delicious baked goods for prices that let you forget that you’re supposedly in a tourist attraction.

Colourful displays of sweets and marzip figures.

Marzipan and sweets in the market.
©Giliell, all rights reserved

What I interestingly couldn’t find were signs and comemorative plates of the terrorist attack that happened there last year.

Jack’s Walk

 

Pretty in Pink ©voyager, all rights reserved

Reach for the sky, ©voyager, all rights reserved

Does anyone know what kind of tree this is? I’m having difficulty figuring it out from my plant guide. It looks and smells a bit like hydrangea, but I’ve never seen a hydrangea tree. Whatever it is, I think it’s beautiful. It’s been in bloom for several weeks and the flowers move from a deep rose colour to the palest of pinks. It has a small, sweet scent and it attracts butterflies. I waited around for a bit hoping one would turn up to add to the photo, but Jack was restless and no doubt keeping them away.

Please let me know in the comments if you can give me any information about this tree. I think I might like one for my own garden. In the meantime, happy Saturday. I hope everyone has a good weekend.

 

Barcelona: The City 2: La Plaza Catalunya

The centre of Barcelona is the Plaza Catalunya. Lined on one side by the traditional Corte Inglés shopping centre and start of the Rambla, the main boulevard, there’s a snowball’s chance in hell you’ll miss it. Most tourist buses start and stop there (our shuttle bus from the camp site dropped us off there and picked us up, and so did most others), the hop on- hop off buses stop there, the metro lines do, the regional train station is under it.

Above it are the pigeons.

Water fountain by night, brightly lit.

The fountain by night.
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Water fountain in daylight.

The fountain by day.
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Pigeon bathing in a water fountain.

Did I say fountain? What I meant was “pigeon bath”.
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Pigeons in a tree.

How many pigeons can you count?
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Jack’s Walk

Naughty boy, ©voyager, all rights reserved

So, I’m trying to focus my camera when I see this. … Jack, no, stop, don’t pee on plants! Naughty boy!

I wish I could show you the grin he gave me when he turned around, but I was kerfuffled in the moment. It’s his way of telling me that I’m taking too long with my camera. Well, message received, Jack. Lets go home.

A Sunflower Constelation

Nobody told our sunflower it is supposed to follow the sun with its main flower, and then stop facing east. It did not follow the sun at all and chose to face its main flower north the whole time instead.

And now it has developed a whole head of little suns facing in all possible directions.

There will be some pictures of its inhabitants in due course. That is, if I do not forget. There is a very interesting inhabitant in this picture too.

©Charly, all rights reserved. Click for full size.

 

Barcelona: the City 1

Barcelona is home to 1.65 million people, the travel destination of 7 million people a year and one of the most densely populated areas in Europe, second only to Paris. I’ll start my series on the city as such with a few panoramic shots to give you an idea. They were either shot from the Parc Güell or the Tibidabo, both which will get their own posts in the future.

Panoramic view of Barcelona

The city in full
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Panoramic view of Barcelona

Shot from the ferris wheel in the Tibidabo.
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Panoramic view of Barcelona

You can see the big parallel boulevards running down to the harbour. © Giliell, all rights reserved.

Panoramic view of the zoo.

The Zoo, one of the few green spaces. ©Giliell, all rights reserved

Panoramic view, with the Sagrada Familia in the centre.

Panoramic view, with the torre de Agbar and the Sagrada Familia in the centre.
© Giliell, all rights reserved.

In the middle you can see the Torre Agbar or Torre Glóries. I never gave much of the interpretation that all towers are phallic symbols, but this one takes the cake.

Panoramic view of the Torre Agbar.

A PG 18 rated tower…
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The Sagrada Familia, Gaudí’s unfinished masterpiece. The Catalan architect is all over Barcelona and we will visit one of his works, Parc Güell, later. Be advised to book your tickets in advance if you want to visit the place.

Panoramic view of the Sagrada Familia

The Sagrada Familia
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