Mt. Bruce and Te Papa

When we arrived at the Mt. Bruce National Wildlife Centre in the morning, a light rain was falling. We pulled on some rain jackets and pressed on. Just out the back doors of the visitor's center is the enclosure for the Takahe. These colorful, turkey sized birds were long thought extinct until 1948. They look like corpulent relatives of New Zealands far more common Pukekos. Unfortunately, we could barely glimps him among the grass and bushes where he was hiding.

We then turned into the dark kiwi house, for another look at the adept foragers, with a comical wobbling gait. Outside the Kiwi house, they also have tuatara. Throughout the park, the birds are kept in open air enclosures, set within the forest edge, so that wild birds, like the native pigeon mingle closely with the captive ones. Among the several bird species that they have here, one of my favorites was the kokako. This gray bird has blue wattles and a black eye mask, and a peculiar song.

We left Mount Bruce and headed south for Wellington, and the Te Papa Museum. Te Papa contains a wide variety of exhibits, but the main attractants for us where the natural history exhibits and Maori art and culture exhibits.




The Maori artwork and architecture is focused on elaborate carving. Their homes and meetinghouses are spectacular. They also make a wide variety of objects from the plentiful jade on the island. The natural history museum covers the animals that are part of New Zealand's ecology, both on land and in the sea. They even have a life size replicas of the extinct moa and a great blue whale's heart. Beyond this, the museum has a myriad of exhibits, from an earthquake house to an area on immigrants, and even a statue of bull made of corned beef tins.

Falls on ice

It is not too terribly common in Middle Tennessee for cold spells to last very long. For the temperatures to remain, not only below freezing, but in the 10's and 20's for several continuous weeks is nearly unheard of. I knew by the ice flows that formed and persisted along all the rock cuts along the interstate on my daily commute that my favorite waterfalls were freezing.

When a Saturday arrived, with a dusting of snow the night before, we bundled into warm layers for the day's 19 degree high, donned hiking boots to manage the ice and climbed into the car. Some of Tennessee's best waterfalls are located in Fall Creek Falls State Park. Just behind the visitors center lies the Cascades.When we climbed down the last few steps to the rock slab which, in summer months is a jumping of point for swimmers, we were rewarded with the site of an icy wonderland. The water had frozen into a milky white flow stone, with a steady stream of water still passing down over the rocks, and continuing down stream for the trip over Cane Creek Falls.

We quickly headed to the overlook for Cane Creek Falls. We Grinned like giddy children from ear to ear to look down on this 85 foot drop and it's plunge pool. The very large pool was completely covered over in a solid and smooth layer of ice, iced with the recent snow. There is a quick but not easy trail to the base of the falls, know affectionately as the "cable trail" due to the steel cable which helps the adventurous down to the bottom. We made our way carefully down, minding the ice that covered the rocks in places, me fascinated by my freezing gloves sticking to the steel cable, which robbed me of bits of material with every fresh handhold. At the bottom, we were greeted by an amazing overhang of blue and white ice at the fall's edge. The wall behind the falls feathered with icicles. Some tree branches overhanging the falls were encrusted with ice as well, an effect of the freezing mist given off by the still flowing water. It was everything we hoped for, and who knows if the weather will grace us with such amazing sites again this year. There is another small waterfall, which flows in just to the left of Cane Creek Falls, where the water lands and splashed on rocks, rather than into the plunge pool. With the freezing weather, this had formed a giant mound of ice, easily six feet tall, and ten feet in diameter. This was a totally unexpected formation, and if not for the water actively splashing down over it, and the long daggers of ice hanging above, I would very much have climbed all over it.

A quick drive or a pleasant hike away was the main event, Fall Creek Falls itself. Reputedly the highest waterfall east of the Mississippi, the Fall's falling water, feathered by the air in its long fall had sprayed the canyon walls, trees and rocks at its base with a halo of white, contrasting sharply with the dark water directly under the falls, where the water moved to quickly to freeze.
We hurried down the trail from the overlook to the base of the falls, anticipating wonder. As we rounded the last curve and pushed aside a ice encrusted branch, we entered the halo ring, delighted to find that the artificial snow being generated by the fall's mist had layered a foot deep, with a hard crusted surface we could walk on. Fall Creek Falls also has a companion falls, and as with Cane Creek, this one had formed a large stalagmite of ice. The falling misty ice had also clung to every plant within the ring, turning twigs into snowy branches, and reeds into thick white fun noodles, protruding from the snowy earth like some strange white play-doh hair.

Italy Picture Bonus round

here an odd assortment of photos that I missed when adding pics to various Italy blogs.


Michelangelo's Christ the Redeemer at Santa Maria Sopra Minerva

Inside Santa Maria Sopra Minerva

Wood inlay at the church with the leaning tower of Pisa

ceiling in same church

Ceiling of Santa Croce Florence

Raphael rooms at the Vatican

View from the Necropoli at Tarquinia

Marble floot at Trajan's market

Me and my partner in worldly travels, in front of the Coliseum.

Capitol Hill, Roman Style

It was late morning as we headed into the Roman Forum, this time, not merely to traverse it, but to explore its many ruins. In contrast to Trajan's market, which was still mostly empty when we left it, the forum was filling with clusters of tourists. Where we left off from the paved Roman roads, the earth was hard baked and dusty. We explored through the ruins, reading from our printed information about the ruins, listening to the snippets of information we caught from English speaking tour guides, whose colorful, antenna mounted scarves hung in the heat.

Despite being in the heart of such a phenomenal city, the forum fell into serious disuse and disrepair. Earth from Rome's surrounding seven hills filled in and debris covered much. It was not until the start of the 1800's that real excavation of the site began. Today, most of the buildings are merely bits and pieces still standing. Here several columns stand together, there a crumbling wall. But the forum is fascinating to me because of it's density. This was an urban landscape, a real city center. Full of temples, from that of Venus, to the Temple of Castor and Pollux the forum also housed arches commemorating various military victories, buildings used for various governmental purposes, the house of the Vestal Virgins, and the site where Caesar's ashes are believed to have been spread.

From the Forum, where Rome's Emperors ruled, we traveled to the Palatine Hill, where they lived. This place, whose name, if Wikipedia is to be believed is the origin of the very word palace, is a vast hilltop, covered with the scattered remains of gardens, multiple emperor's palaces, and perhaps a few temples. Also on the hill is the museum, housing finds from the surrounding palaces. Not only is the hill's history to be appreciated, but it's views. On one side, it overlooks the forum, on the other, Circus Maximus.

Foot weary and hot from our long day, we sought refuge in the cool darkness of San Francesco a Ripa. Our main reason for visiting was to see the Beata Ludovica Albertoni sculpture by Bernini. This heavily detailed sculpture was definitely worth our short visit.

The next morning, after two amazing weeks, we flew home.

Trevi and Trajan

The next day we got up very early, well before any self respecting Italian would think of setting his alarm, and headed down to visit the iconic Trevi Fountain. In Rome in September, in the hours after dawn, the air is pleasant and fresh, but still, neither very cool or warm. The city smells of the cobbled streets, and the only sounds are the cooing of doves, and the occasional car. The fountain lies about a mile north of the ancient and heavily trafficked sites of the Colosseum and the Roman Forum, but the fountains manage to attract their fair share of the tourists anyway, despite being a relatively modern attraction. In a city whose history is best measured by millennia, the fountain was completed in 1762, less than 250 years ago.

The fountain draws the tourists for a few reasons, not least of which is that it is rather impressive. The large pool, and the sort of stone waterfall, ensconced with figures of Neptune, his horses and accompanying riders. All of this before a grand white roman styled palace. But there is also the various movies that have feature the fountain, perhaps most famously, La Dolce Vita. And on top of all that, there's the idea that throwing a coin in the fountain guarantees your return to the city, and who would want to miss out on that? But this early in the morning, there was no one else around. It was quiet and calm, and there was no one there but us to see us toss our coins in

From the fountain of Trevi, we traveled on to Trajan's Market. The site had just opened up for the day, and we were the first to get out and explore the streets and buildings of this former downtown Rome. The buildings are bare walled and empty floored. Unlike Pompeii, there are no relics to indicate whether this might have been a bakery, that a shop, here a tavern. But, there are discoveries to be made. This stairwell leads from a set of shops on a round plaza, up and behind, to a second level street, also lined with buildings. Here, a stone cover conceals the drainage below the street. Over it all are remnants of residences. Prime real estate then, as it would be now.

Now with the day in full progress, we turned from the business of Rome to it's governance, as we made the short walk to the forum.

What Lies Below: Capuchin Monks and Necropoli of Tarquinia

After spending time in the beautiful Protestant Cemetery we headed to a different corner of the city to see how the Capuchin monks are interred at Santa Maria della Concezione. Here grotesque art lines the walls and ceilings. Human bones, those of devout former Capuchin monks, form the mosaics. But the effect, despite the material of their construction, while austere and solemnifying, is not at all repulsive. It was with great interest that we peered at each room, inside a rather unassuming looking building. They asked us not to take pictures, and we obliged, but you really have to see it for yourself anyway.

We then headed north out of Rome to visit the Necropoli of Tarquinia. We arrived in the late afternoon, and had the place nearly to ourselves. Tarquinia is the site of an Etruscan cemetery, where each of the tombs date from around the 6th and 7th centuries BC. Each tomb consists of a room carved out of the rock of the hill. a winding path leads from tomb to tomb, descend a set of steps through a little stucco entryway, and peer through glass into the rooms painted with nearly Roman figures. The quality and complexity of the murals vary with the rooms age, and show a variety of scenes from Etruscan life.

Before leaving we picked up a small bronze replica statue, like those many Etruscan works we had seen at museums throughout our trip, a memento of yet another culture which once inhabited this country. We returned to Rome for an early start on our last day in Italy.