Here is a unique Photoshop manipulation of a graphic of a beautiful lady in a window (video at bottom), while in the background the music The Lighthouse’s Tale by Nickel Creek is playing. The photo being manipulated is shown on the left.
The Lighthouse’s Tale by Nickel Creek
I am a lighthouse, worn by the weather and the waves.
I keep my lamp lit, to warn the sailors on their way. Continue reading Lighthouse Photoshop Photomedia Manipulation
The new book by Paulette Jiles, Lighthouse Island, projects a bleak future for our piece of the planet.
According to Liz Cook in this Kansas City Star book review:
Paulette Jiles’ dystopic1 new novel, “Lighthouse Island,” projects a future that may hit a little close to home for area farmers and those dependent on their work: a Midwest racked by ceaseless drought. . . .
There’s the promise of a distant sanctuary untouched by war and drought as well: Lighthouse Island, a coastal Pacific colony lionized in anesthetic television commercials as a place of peace and plenty. – more
FOOTNOTE:
1 dystopic – A dystopia is a community or society, usually fictional, that is in some important way undesirable or frightening. It is the opposite of a utopia. – Wiki (I had top look this one up too!)
One other important note, the lighthouse depicted on the cover is the Canadian British Columbian lighthouse at Lennard Island!
[nggallery id=83]
In early 2010 I made my third trip to the Philippines, alone, and for six (6) weeks. One of my first stops, besides Manila, was Subic Bay. A friend I had never met, Dave Starr picked me up at my hotel in Manila and drove me to my hotel in Subic Bay – not the one mentioned here. Continue reading A Nice Lighthouse Hotel in Subic Bay
For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One.
A beautiful view of the Nazare lighthouse at Praia do Norte outside the Portuguese fishing village of Nazare, Portugal. It is back dropped by what may be the world’s highest surfing wave.Article and photos on the National Post Sports page.
*************************** Continue reading Mise Tales Twenty-Nine
Super Typhoon Haiyan (Yolanda in the Philippines) made morning landfall November 07, 2013 at Guiuan, a small city in Samar province in the eastern Philippines. The U.S. Navy’s Joint Typhoon Warning Center said maximum sustained winds were 195 mph, with gusts to 235 mph.
As many of you readers now know, I am living in the Philippines where a tsunami is NOT rare, but the biggest worry here are typhoons and earthquakes, the latter being what sparked this article.
On October 15 this year, 2013, we experienced the biggest earthquake1 I have ever felt in my life. The following data is taken from the Philippine Volcano website:
Date – Time Latitude Longitude Depth Magnitude Location
(Philippine Time) (ºN) (ºE) (km)
15 Oct 2013 – 08:12 AM 09.86 124.07 012 7.2 006 km S 24° W of Sagbayan (Borja) (Bohol)
This was approximately one hundred and twenty (120) kilometers (about 75 miles) northeast (NE) from us and they say we felt it like a magnitude 6.0 earthquake. I would hate to feel anything stronger! The house shook and rattled, and the ground rolled just like in the movies. For hours afterwards our sensory organs for balance were out of kilter – you felt like a drunk might feel heading home from an all night party!
Now this brings me back to the subject – How do you prepare for an earthquake or tsunami? As you never know where you will be at the time of the event, all you can do is prepare for BEFORE and AFTER the event. Continue reading Preparing for an Earthquake and/or a Tsunami
This photo above from Pacific Wild shows only a part of what is being protected
The title for this article comes from a news release by the Treehugger website on July 27, 2006.
Their article from 2006 said: “The government of British Columbia has agreed to protect more than 5 million acres of the Great Bear coastal rainforest. It is home to the world’s last white-colored Spirit Bears “
The Natural Resources Defence Council (NRDC) was also quoted in the article.
The thousand-year-old red cedars, Sitka spruce, western hemlock and balsam blanketing this swath of rugged coastline provide vital habitat for wolves, eagles, grizzlies and several hundred Spirit Bears. Found only in the Great Bear Rainforest, the Spirit Bear gets its white color from a recessive gene occurring in roughly one of every ten black bears born in the forest. The Spirit Bear figures prominently in the mythology and culture of several indigenous communities — known as First Nations in Canada — that have inhabited the Great Bear Rainforest for thousands of years.
The new conservation agreement, negotiated directly by the British Columbia government and the region’s First Nations, will protect an unspoiled area twice the size of Yellowstone National Park from logging and ensure the right of the First Nations to manage their traditional territories. In addition, the agreement establishes new, more stringent standards for logging in the rainforest outside of the protected area. “The accord will preserve this irreplaceable rainforest but still allow for controlled logging to sustain local economies,” said NRDC senior attorney Susan Casey-Lefkowitz. “It is a new model that shows we can save our most valuable wildlands and our communities at the same time.”
********************* Continue reading Bravo! Coastal Rainforest in British Columbia Now Protected!
As many of you will know CW is the acronym for clockwise and CCW for counterclockwise OR anti clockwise.
Which way does a lighthouse lens rotate?
Now please be careful in your thinking and terminology. The light is fixed in place and the lens rotates around the light which gives the light its characteristic flash. In this post we are talking about the lens, not the light. From outside the lighthouse (seaward) the beam of the light moving makes it appear that the light itself is rotating but it is not.
In ninety-nine percent (99%) of the cases the lighthouse lens rotates in the clockwise direction. Mainly I believe because the drive mechanisms are made from clockwork gearing designs and naturally clocks rotate clockwise!
(photo retlkpr – CW clockwork mechanism at Pachena Point lighthouse)
In Mise Tales Twenty-Eight I wrote “Has anyone seen the movie released in 2010 entitled The Lovely Bones“?
In the aforementioned movie there is a lighthouse and one strange thing about this lighthouse caught my eye – the beam of the light revolved counterclockwise! This is most unusual and there are only a few lighthouses in the world that revolve CCW, the majority revolving clockwise (CW). Why did the directors make the lens rotate counterclockwise?
I have no idea, so I consulted with my lighthouse friend and guru Chris Mills via Facebook. He said:
. . . those lens systems were always called “French lights” here in the Maritimes (Canada). I believe the BBT (Barbier, Benard et Turenne – original in French; translated to English here) systems rotated counter-clockwise, as opposed to the Chance lights, which rotated clockwise. Not sure why…perhaps the French (or English) just being contrary!
(above photos from http://skipjacksnauticalliving.blogspot.com )
I followed a couple of links on lighthouses from the site above that had BBT lighting but there is no mention of the direction in which the lens rotated.
I found a couple of lighthouses in Australia with CCW revolving lenses as mentioned on this Australian webpage.
Does anyone know the whys and wherefores of CW vs CCW rotation of the lens?
Does anyone have any knowledge of a lighthouse with a CCW rotating lens?
Please contact me. Thanks for any help.
*************************
April 10, 2014 – I just received the following comment from Ms. L. Newton:
Hi. I live in one of the Lowestoft Lighthouse Cottages, Suffolk (England) . This lighthouse rotates CCW.
Lowestoft is a town in the English county of Suffolk.The town is on the North Sea coast and is the most easterly point of the United Kingdom.
Lowestoft High Lighthouse, located to the north of the town centre, was built in 1874 and stands 16 metres tall, 37 metres above sea level. The light, which has a range of 23 nautical miles (43 km), was automated in 1975.[98]
The first two lighthouses in Lowestoft were built in 1609, on the foreshore and candlelit, to give warning of the dangerous sandbanks around the coast. By lining up the two lights, vessels could navigate the Stamford Channel, which no longer exists. They were rebuilt in 1628 and again in 1676. It was at this time that one light was moved up onto the cliffs above the Denes – the location of the present lighthouse – to assist vessels further out to sea.[98][99]
The remaining ‘Low Light’ was discontinued in 1706 following sea encroachment, but re-established in 1730 in a form that could be easily moved in response to further changes to the Stamford Channel and shoreline. It was finally discontinued in August 1923. The ‘High Light’ tower was rebuilt as the present lighthouse in 1874[99] with the intention of displaying an electric light, but when opened paraffin oil was used instead; it was not until 1936 that it was electrified. The lighthouse, along with two cottages originally used by lighthouse keepers, is a Grade II listed building. – Wikipedia
After my comment in Misc Tales Twenty-Eight about a movie with a lighthouse reference in it, I wondered aloud “How many more media sources have lighthouses in them?”
Well, off to Google and I started looking. There are many. I am going to list them by date, and if you know of more, please let me know.
As you will see, not much of the media uses a real lighthouse – mostly movie props.
New book, Supernatural Wales, reveals gateways to the underworld, bottomless lakes, UFO’s, werewolves and all manner of ghostly goings-on around Wales
Fairies, goblins, devils and demons are said to have haunted Wales for thousands of years.
Now ghost hunters keen to visit the land’s spookiest spots on Halloween can do just that, thanks to a new guidebook called Supernatural Wales.
Author Alvin Nicholas revealed “no other mountain has attracted as much lore as Cadair Idris.”
“Cadair Idris means Chair of Idris – a shadowy figure of the Dark Ages, sometimes associated with King Arthur,” he said.
The chair is thought to refer to the armchair like shape of Cwm Gadair.
“The mountain was thought to be a gateway to the underworld, frequented by dragons, troops of fairies and the much feared ‘cwn annwn’ – hounds of the underworld.
“A glacial lake called Llyn Cau is said to be bottomless, and according to tradition, is the abode of a man eating monster.
“To the present day, visitors report a peculiar presence on the summit and in the vicinity of the nearby stone shelter.”
In 1977, a corner of Pembrokeshire became known as the Broad Haven Triangle.
“The Coombs family of Ripperston Farm near St Brides were disproportionately affected by the odd events,” Alvin said.
“Their car was pursued by a rugby ball shaped craft that emitted powerful lights, a ‘giant faceless humanoid’ peered in through the windows of their farmhouse and a disc like object frightened their children in a nearby field.”
[nggallery id=82]
Ghostly Wales – eerie pictures of some of Wales’ supernatural hotspots
Fifteen Broad Haven primary school children claimed to have seen a cigar shaped UFO.
“Headmaster Ralph Llewellyn asked the children to sketch what they had seen and was impressed by the similarity of their drawings.”
Then there is the Skirrid Mountain Inn, in Monmouthshire.
“Resident ghosts include some of the many people allegedly held here over the years, from sheep stealers to rebels hanged following the Monmouth rebellion in 1685,” Alvin said.
Ghostly mists have appeared in photos at the pub.
“Beer glasses and other objects have been known to fly across the bar of their own accord and shadowy figures wander the corridors,” Alvin said.
Top ten terrifying tales from Wales
“Some visitors have reported feelings of panic and of a noose being tightened around their neck on the stairs.”
According to legend, South Stack lighthouse, on Anglesey, is haunted by the ghost of assistant lighthouse keeper Jack Jones. He died after he was hit on the head by a rock during a storm on October 25 and 26 in 1859.
That sunk ship Royal Charter with a loss of 500 lives. Jones died three weeks later.
“Jones makes his presence known by rattling doors, in a desperate attempt to get in, some say, and by tapping on windows,” Alvin said.
Denbigh moors lie to the north of the Cambrian mountains.
“A Roman centurion, said to be an omen of death, haunts a bridge on the road from Ruthin to Cerigydruidion,” Alvin said.
“The centurion appears in full Roman military uniform – complete with helmet, breastplate and sandals. He holds a short sword above his head.”
“Fishermen have suffered ill fortune after seeing the ghost.”
A werewolf was said to roam the moors in the 1700s.
“One full moon night a creature the size of a donkey attacked and overturned a coach travelling between Denbigh and Wrexham,” Alvin said.
“The following year an ‘enormous black beast’ mutilated livestock and killed a farm dog.”
* Supernatural Wales, by Alvin Nicholas, is published by Amberley priced £14.99.
I posted an article on a book that shows you what makes up beach sand, A Grain of Beach Sand, and a lot of it is shells and glass. The larger pieces of glass are collected and use in jewelry as in the story Nootka Sea Glass.
Now another company I have found called A Day at the Beach has an online page and also a Facebook page. They specialize in earrings, bracelets, pendants, and necklaces with also a chance to special order items.
Pictured here is a pair of cobalt blue sea glass earings from their earrings page.
There is also a page on necklaces and bracelets.
For their custom designs check out this page which shows off many different variations.
Next time you are at the beach keep an eye out for sea glass pieces which are rounded off and safe to handle. They come in many brilliant colours only limited by the colours of the glass bottles from which they are made. Glass is so much prettier than plastic on the beach don’t you think?
