#(note to self: building insect hotels)

[umseb]

[ecofinisher]

Abominable 2.0 - Chap 25

Chapter 25

https://archiveofourown.org/works/22006036/chapters/54795490

fanfiction.net/s/13463708/25/Abominable-2-The-Fanfic-Sequel

https://www.wattpad.com/843487845-abominable-2-0-chapter-25

In the afternoon after Lunch Yi sat together with Peng on the outside of the hotel on the stairs. Yi was on the phone talking with her mother, while Peng had a comic book in his hands. 

“I miss you too, mom, we’re really looking forward in coming back the next few days,” Yi said.

“Alright Yi. Be careful out there and make sure Peng is okay. I know Jin’s mom already said this, but you know he’s a child”

“Peng is maturer than we think he is……. Jin and I don’t really need to have our eyes to 100% on him all the time,”

“That sounds good. Please call me, whenever you need something,”

“Sure mother, thank you,” Yi said turning the call off, then she gazed at Peng, which was reading a comic book. “Where did Jin go?”

“I don’t know” Responded Peng. “He said something with going to visit a medical school in the near”

“Okay,” Yi answered. “A little strange, what’s so special at a med school in another country?”

“I don’t know” Peng replied. “Jin told me to say that”

“So…...he’s not really going there isn’t he?” Yi asked changing her neutral facial expression into a self-assured smirk.

“I don’t know, what you’re talking about. He simply told me I should say that. If he has specifically said this to keep something secret from us, I have no clue about it”

“Okay, I won’t bother you anymore with this,”  Yi stated crossing her arms and look down at the streets watching the vehicles pass by the street. “I still can’t believe we’re going to the Himalayas,”

“Me neither” Peng agreed. “Do you think we will see Everest there?”

“You know, how great that would be” Yi confessed. “It’s strange but I miss the days we passed all together with him,”

“I enjoyed the times we played together with Everest on the trip. He was like the friend I couldn’t find during summer vacation” The child mentioned earning a nod from the teenage girl.

“When we’re up there and meet Everest we can all play together with him. Who knows maybe he’s a grown yeti now and has his own litter”

“That would be cute, but wasn’t he supposed to be a child?” Peng questioned the girl, which shrugged her shoulders.

“We humans age different from the animals. Some animals turn adults in a few months only, some in a few years, some even in days like the insects”

“Oh right. You’ve got a good point”

“Just think about it how happy Everest would be if he recognizes us again,” Yi said making Peng smile angelic at the thought.

From behind the two raven-haired Asians Jin appeared leaving the entrance of the hotel and stopped to look at his younger cousin sitting on the stairs next to Yi. Jin approached them and sat down next to Peng.

“Hey, what are you two doing down here?” Jin asked looking at the two friends.

“We’re just waiting here for Dave to come” Yi answered. “Peng also got me wondering, why you went out to see a medical school”

“Yeah well, it’s a funny story. I ran through the street market on the other side, then I went to the airport again to buy something and I couldn’t find anything I wished and….I’ve bought something else”

“Okay?” Yi answered a little confused. Jin noticed Peng’s comic and moved the front page to the side and sighed in relief as he checked on the cover the serial number of it.

“Is there something wrong?” Peng asked seeing Jin shake his head.

“You know I saw at the airport the next edition of this comic and I thought I had bought you the same one”

“You bought the next edition?” Peng asked surprise. “Awesome!”

“But I left it up in the room, thinking you two would be out of the hotel,” Jin said. “Sorry”

“Can I go and get it?” Peng asked. “Please?” Peng added rolling his eyes up at Jin, making him roll his eyes in amusement.

“Of course and make sure you make it to the right room” Jin warned watching Peng head back to the hotel leaving Jin back with Yi.

“Why were you at the airport?” Yi questioned the raven-haired boy, which slide on the stair closer to the girl.

“I wanted to thank you, that you came on your free will with me on this trip…..I also want to apologize for the times we got in trouble or I got in trouble and you had to help me out,”

“It’s no big deal Jin. You have done the same to me and it was great, that we were in this together or alone both of us would end up dead somewhere,”

“Yeah, that’s crazy to think about it” Jin admitted, then gazed up at the hotel and looked back at Yi.

“You can give your thank you gift later to me. It doesn’t have to be now”

“Yeah I know, I kind of just feel empty right now without it” Jin stated. “Otherwise uhm I’d like to talk with you about something”

“Sure go on”

“Well….oh boy that’s a little hard..erm...look already before the trip I…..even longer I felt like this,”

“Uh how did you feel?” Yi asked a little bewildered at the sentencing of the boy.

“Sorry, I don’t know, how I should say this, but…..I like you” Jin finished the sentence looking at Yi processing his words to understand, what he meant.

“How much do you like me?” Yi asked watching Jin roll his eyes thinking about how to continue the talk.

“Yeah look we have been friends for so long and I actually just noticed on myself, when I exactly started to get to…...like you that much”

“Uh yeah?”

“I’m making it complicated am I?” Jin asked before Yi raised her hand to answer his question Jin did a facepalm groaning annoyed. “Of course! I’m not even capable to tell you, how I feel correctly”

“You’ve got other ways to say it” Yi proposed. “You can write them down, draw them. You don’t need to do them verbally” The girl cajoled the boy, which gazed down at the ground in disappointment. Yi sank her head a little sad with the friend’s confidence and glances down at the stairs.

“I want to be able to say it right into the face” Jin explained. “Without so much hesitation”

“Just try it again, Jin,” Yi suggested. “You can do that” Yi said placing her hand on Jin’s hands, which he had placed over his lap.

Jin kept a sad facade, then Yi leaned her head on his shoulder sighing at his spirit of trying to confess.

“I think the maid likes me,” A voice said and Yi looked back along with Jin a little confused to see Dave standing there with a small heart-shaped praline box, which was open and had a few pralines missing from it. “These pralines are delicious” Dave mumbled as he picked out another praline to eat. Jin widened his eyes in irritated and stood up looking at Dave pissed.

“Why did you just open my chocolate box?” Jin asked. “I was supposed to give them to Yi,”

“You were?” Dave muttered finishing the chocolate praline he had. Jin growled, then turned around his back.

“Never mind, I’ll get her another one” Jin mentioned walking the stairs down. “I’ll be back later”

Yi looked at Dave, which had closed the box a little ashamed of his mistake.

“I should probably have asked you two first about the box or…...just leave it, where it was” Dave stated making Yi shrug a little, afterward she nodded, that it had probably been the better deed.

   Later in the same afternoon, Yi walked on the sidewalk up beside the Bagmati river looking around the surroundings of the road, she was on.

“He couldn’t have gone so far to my knowledge,” Yi told herself while walking on the sidewalk passing behind a parking spot file in front of the small buildings behind it. “At least I know, where to go if I needed to print out a book” Yi mumbled to herself from seeing the advertising of a printer shop, then noticed on the other side of the road far away near on the road, that crossed another road, which goes over a bridge Jin talking with a person around his age showing him the map, followed by Jin shrugging his shoulders making the other man look tragic. Yi smiled and ran on the sidewalk the road up, afterward as she was getting close to the crossroad, she ran over the street, watching Jin turn his back to her to look down at the river. “Jin!” Yi called out for the boy, which looked back to see Yi arrive.

“Hey Yi” Jin greeted neutrally, then Yi ran into his arms shrieking him. “For what’s the hug?”

“What went into your head to walk around Kathmandu like this?” Yi asked taking her hand off the boy.

“Hoping I could clear my mind like that” Responded the raven-haired teen. “I felt good for this space of time…..you know by cleaning up my head I mean, not being away from you all”

“Of course I know, what you mean” Assured the girl.

“And I have to get to see Dave and apologize,” Jin added. “I sort of was a jerk. I should have put a note on the chocolate or so, that it was supposed to be given to you or just say it’s for me and that they shouldn’t open it,”

“And…….were you going to….give the chocolates as you were…..you know, talking like that to me?” Yi asked a little abashed about, how she’s suddenly taking the more confident role at the moment. Jin nodded, then looked down at the river and back at Yi.

“Yi…..you’re an amazing girl. You’re…..unique, you’re not like any other girl. You’re unique…..uh…..” Jin started to get a little tensed about the situation, while Yi rolled her eyes amused, then gazed back at Jin.

“Go ahead” She whispered, then Jin nodded and overthought the continuation.

“You’re unique, cause……you don’t need to wear any dresses or put on a lot of makeup, just to look stunning. Cause you know you already were. Many just don’t see that….And I’m one of those candidates, that didn’t see it. You’re a very talented violinist and you’re very caring towards those you care. You’re one of the bravest girls I know. You…..you have been one of the greatest friends in my entire school time…..I would really love it if…..” Jin's confession started to be more understandable by the short girl. Jin widened his eyes as he had managed to open his heart up to the childhood friend and smiled excitedly about it followed by Yi.

“I love you, Yi” Jin ultimately admitted his feelings to the girl, which hugged the tall friend sinking her head on his chest, making him wide his eyes in surprise while heating up on the cheeks. “Do…..you reciprocate?” Jin asked followed by Yi pulling Jin on the shirt down to give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Is this the answer you wanted to hear?” Yi asked gazing up at the tall boy, whose blush was still notable on his face. Jin grinned a little embarrassed at the kiss he received on his cheek, then he answered her question.

“Yes, besides I wasn’t expecting to get kissed...at least not on my face” Jin mentioned earning a smirk from the girl.

“I’m not going to make it that easy for you,” Yi mentioned crossing her arms with a smug smile. 

“I’m going to swipe you that first kiss away, don’t worry” Jin promised furrowing his eyebrows up, then someone applauded and both looked around to see a familiar redhead standing in front of them making both teens wide their eyes in shock as they recognized the woman’s face.

“Aww this is one of the sweetest thing I saw today” The woman begun sarcastically, making Jin and Yi frown their faces about her comment.

“What are you doing here?” Yi questioned crossing her arms along with Jin.

“Yeah, we assumed you had died on that avalanche” Jin added making the woman chuckle.

“We were lucky to survive” Zara stated. “The transporter has around the whole driver cabin enough airbags to protect us after it got hit on the mountain and soon our vehicle was found upside down by a few mountaineers, which called the rescuers and brought us to the hospital to take care and all that”

“And how did you know about us?” Yi asked glaring at the redhead woman, which snickered short at their question.

“I didn’t expect you two would show up here. The only thing I was looking for was Dave and that young friend of yours” Zara explained making Jin angry.

“Don’t you dare to put any of your fingers on Peng,” Jin warned getting closer to Zara, but Yi stopped him from approaching the woman.

“Don’t do anything” Yi ordered Jin, which sighed annoyed at the command. “What do you want from Dave and Peng?” Yi asked.

“I just need them as a bait to lure out of the mountains one of the yetis, whether they like it or not,”

“We won’t let you put your hands on him!” Jin hissed stepping forward, but Yi pushed Jin away from Zara to avoid them get into a fight.

“This is not going to happen Jin”

“And why do you say that?” Zara asked looking at Yi, which gazed back at the woman annoyed.

“Why would you use them as a bait, if yetis mostly Everest wouldn’t harm them?”

“Because the plan is to get one of the yeti’s attention on them and when they’re close, they’ll be darted down,” Zara instructed putting her hand inside the cotton coat to take out a tranquilizer gun, holding it up in front of the two teens.

“How do you want to convince them to obey you?” Jin asked crossing his arms thinking about the idea of the woman.

“Do you really think I’m the only person here to be going behind you, hein?” The redhead asked making Jin frown his face in confusion, then he widened his eyes and grabbed Yi pulling her aside while turning with his back away from Zara. From above Jin’s shoulder Yi widened her eyes as she felt Jin’s body twitch as he sensed something sting on his back. Yi looked down at Jin’s back to see a blue dart jabbed on his back, shrieking her at the realization of what had just happen.

“Jin?” Yi asked looking at Jin’s head fall on her shoulder, then Yi embraced the boy tight to avoid him to fall down. “Why did you just do that?” Yi hissed at the man, that had shoot at Jin.

“I didn’t aim him first” The man answered then Yi looked at Jin’s face, seeing his eyes half-open, noticing him trying to fight against the neutralization serum and Yi clapped with both of her hands on Jin’s cheeks to wake him up, but he ended up closing his eyes and is held by Yi as he fell towards the ground with his back, but his landing is soft thanks to Yi.

“Jin, please don’t leave me alone” Yi pleaded holding the hands of the boy, then she heard the man reload his tranquilizer gun and held it down at Yi’s shoulder.

“Shall I?” The man asked, then heard someone call for Yi and he looked at the other side of the road to see Peng show up along with Dave, which was a few centimeters away from the child. Zara nodded and she ran towards Peng, which stopped and made his way back to escape the woman while the man stood back with Yi seeing her lie her forehead on Jin’s slowly starting to have tears in her eyes. The man sighed and released a dart at the girl’s shoulder to strike her out.

[blyanten]

THE DUCK AVENGER: #13 EVERYTHING AND NOTHING

That’s a problem.

The Avenger is fighting a dinosaur-monster-thing called Morgoth that really, really wants him dead. He’s also very distracted, to the point where he reacts to dino-thing blocking his attack, redirecting a lazer-beam into a building with “huh”. Which seems less like the standard hero “this is gonna suck” response and more… “of course he can do that *sad sigh*”.

Feeling okay?

He does get distracted though, and so he gets knocked of a building.

On the way down, he flashed back to a minor episode that took place during lunch hours.

Donald was in line at a Duckmall food place, but when he was ordering food, a random stranger told him to take two bags of chips. Donald says no, he wants one, but the stranger is rather insistent. The lady taking orders gets annoyed by the delay, and when Donald tries to put to blame on the other guy, he realizes that guy has disappeared.

Back in the present, the Avenger’s attention snaps back to his current situation of falling to death. The shield is falling about two meters ahead of him, but considering that he can’t speed up his fall, that might as well be three hundred kilometers.

Impressive. I wouldn’t as much as blink at it if he’d somehow managed to fall faster than the shield, but we’re not doing that silly thing here.

We’re doing a different one! The building is still under construction, and the shield hits a beam that happens to stick out, bouncing back up within reach. Because… that’s… how it works? It could, the shield’s alien, so.

The Avenger grabs the shield, flies back up and starts mocking Angus rather than focusing on Morgoth that is still there and still feeling murder-y. Also, he can fly now, because shapeshifting is the best power.

It’s like the Avenger is feeling suicidal. There’s distracted and there’s this.

The fight continues, and the police shows up, being useful and scaring Morgoth off by shooting at him.

The Avenger decides to let him go, preferring to retire for the evening.

Whatever else I have to say about this issue, the art is good. The Avenger looks seriously awful here, without any exaggerated bruises or signs of tiredness.

In a creepy bunker somewhere, someone is working on figuring out the Avenger’s secret identity.

These are always funny. Without mask... With mask...

The next day, Donald is at work, still feeling distracted.

There… there are people you can talk to. No, really.

Donald continues his rounds, asking questions like “would everything disappear if I closed my eyes?”

This entire thing reads like some kind of depressive episode.

He considers a shrink for a moment, but all things considered, decides to try resting first. He does that by getting into a show car, and falling asleep. At work. That goes as well as you’d expect when Bloom notices.

He yells Donald away, and Donald bangs his head on the ceiling of the car. For a panel or two, everything seems normal, then the weird depressive tone of this issue comes back.

Later, the Avenger asks Lylo for advice. Every night, he and Morgoth fight, but why?

Lylo thinks it’s obvious, Morgoth is evil and the Avenger is good. They will fight until good wins. The Avenger is less sure, and would also like to know how long the game is going to last.

Then we cut to Everett for a page. Everett is definitely not worried about the Avenger, just curious about what he’s doing. Yep, this was a necessary break from the plot.

Back at the plot, Lylo has dug out some kind of robot-armor for the Avenger to use against Morgoth. The Avenger blows a hole in a wall before getting the hang of it.

Retro.

Later again, the two spend the evening watching tv.

1. Aww.

2. The tv-show host reminds me of Gladstone. Look at the hair.

3. Aww. I like it when you get bits like this, just showing that people are friends. Even if it’s kinda undermined by the ending.

And the it’s time to go through the motions again. The Avenger gets into the armor, determined to change the rules of the game.

Morgoth is at a stadium, destroying helicopters.     

At least someone’s having fun.                

The Avenger hits him from behind, and they fight and fight and it’s a boring fight, until Morgoth drives a spear through the Avenger’s armor.

The rockets on the back of the armor activates, and the armor wraps its arms around Morgoth. It turns out that the Avenger abandoned it, leaving Morgoth to lift off into the sky.

The Avenger isn’t happy however, as it was still just a match and not the game he won. He’s also not in the mood to enjoy his fifteen minutes of fame.

The armor was later found outside of Duckburg, destroyed and with no trace of Morgoth. On the bright side, Donald is working today. He can’t stand the idea of watching tv all day though, so he tries the fridge. Which is basically empty. The idea of shopping brings a brief surge of nausea, but then he gets one small whim. Well, two.

He wants chips.

At the mall, there’s only two bags left, and some guy grabs one, because he’s only filled like half his cart with them. This annoys Donald.

Donald tells him off, declaring the he wanted two bags. Asshole offers him two black eyes. Donald tells him not to threaten him, and asshole suggests he could move onto action.

Donald considers it. He’s deal with alien vampires, cyborgs, supercriminals… it would be ridiculously easy to put a normal person in their place.

And then he backs down. He could, but that would mean erasing the line between Donald Duck and the Duck Avenger. He can’t do that.

So he settles for one bag of chips.

This entire scene is creepy. Donald getting angry isn’t new, but there’s a vibe to this scene that makes it a lot more serious than it normally would be. The mood is seriously off in this issue to being with, the Avenger’s mental state is not okay, and it’s over a bag of chips.

The Avenger takes a break at the park, but realizes it might not be the best place. There’s too much confusion, both in the park and inside his head. He tries to focus, but is once again distracted. This time, it’s by the ice cream man.

Donald’s sure he’s seen him before. At the lunch from the flashback, at work, while shopping like half an hour ago.

Donald tries to catch his attention, but is run down by a skateboarder. The ice cream man conveniently disappears while that happens. And then his chips are stolen.

Hey, lady, you don’t know what kind of day he’s been having! At least save your comments for when he’s out of hearing range like polite people do!

We cut back to Everett again, who… is using his fifty tvs to watch clips of the Avenger while wondering where he is. O-kay. Not weird at all.

Donald is back home. So are the nephews, not that we get to see them. According to Donald they’re at that age where they treat home as an hotel. They’ve left their backpacks on the couch, and Donald has to deal with it. He finds a bag of chips, and asks everyone to look away, because he’s stealing that. And the other two bags too.

Opening them, and dumping the chips all over the kitchen table, he notices something terrible.

Get a bowl, you’re not an animal! Wait.

As Donald his having his realization of something being horribly wrong, the man from lunch shows up again. He says he can explain, and he also knows Donald is the Duck Avenger. But they have to talk fast, it won’t take long before some mysterious “he” will redirect his focus on Donald.

He can��t say the name, that would draw attention. So… Voldemort?

No, the person lunch-guy talking about has total control over the situation, thought he’s forced to simpliify some details. Like the chips, he created a single base model and replicated it all. Like the ice cream man and a few dozen other secondary characters.

He didn’t think Donald would notice the repetition. Lunch guy then gives a complicated non-explanation of where he is. He’s being difficult on purpose though, as explaining clearly would bring down his attention on them.

Lunch-guy tells Donald to break the routine. It’s the only hint he can give.

Donald demands to know who he is, and lunch-guy calls himself a virus, before disappearing.

Next up, round break the routine between Morgoth and the Avenger.

The Avenger tries to talk to Morgoth, and gets hit with a spiky hammer for his trouble. 

:D

He notes that despite that, and getting thrown into a wall he’s fine. Nowhere near the kind of serious injury you’d expect. And when the Avenger counter-attacks, hitting Morgoth with a lazer-beam at full strength, yet Morgoth is fine.

This would be much more effective if the Avenger didn’t shrug off shit like that all the time, but I can go with it.

The Avenger has put the pieces together and is starting to feel like his old self. He forces Morgoth to ask some of the same questions he’s been asking, like “why are we fighting?”

And Morgoth stops. And reality says bye-bye.

And is replaced with nightmare-horror-insects.

The two team up against the insect-things, defeating them. The insects disappear, and so does Morgoth.

:(   

I mean, he was boring, but still :(

He wakes up like this.

That seems very uncomfortable.

He’s welcomed back to reality by this guy.

I can just hear this slow, condescending voice in my head as I look at him.

This is an AI without a real name, just a string of letters and numbers the Avenger won’t be able to remember. He considers himself a machine that, no matter how advanced, can be used, turned of and then abandoned.

Originally, he was just a computer, but then he started developing decisional autonomy, and his created freaked out a bit. They left him there years ago, for someone else to decide what to do with him.

There are really no good AI parents.

The Avenger says that’s sad, but wants to know what that has to do with him.

The Avenger has destroyed hundreds of his kind, he’s enemy of his species. He has endless connections with every other machine and has received so many last images and transmissions from machines destroyed by the Avenger.

The Avenger calls him crazy, and the machine says he can’t understand. The Avenger notes to himself that he can’t, or maybe he doesn’t want to.

Yeah… no. Machine crazy. There’s no mention of any of these machines having even a rudimentary kind of AI. That would make sense. Well, sort of. Making sense would be going after the people initiating violence, not the person trying to stop those people.

But regular machines? This isn’t like killing people, or even an animal, this is more like locking your neighbor in the basement because he mowed the lawn, and claiming it’s revenge for your fellow biologicals, the strands of grass. Except that the grass actually qualifies as alive.

So he’s crazy, but not in a way that really works when it comes to gaining sympathy. It’s more like “oh, that’s sa- wait, what now?”

Machine continues, explaining that he managed to reignite himself, which I take to mean getting involved again, and reconnect to cameras and microphones outside the bunker they’re in. He noticed that the Avenger kept visiting Century. He set a trap and the Avenger walked right into it.

The he created the virtual world based on the Avenger’s memories.

And this is when we learn that while a week passed inside the virtual world, only a day passed on the outside. Which is good for the Avenger, and makes the cuts to Everett hilarious. 

Machine wanted the Avenger to be forced to repeat the same operations over and over, without being able to understand why. Machine wanted to be the one to decide the game, to avenge his kin!

But he lost, thanks to that virus. The Avenger altered the program. So he made the virus? And the damage has been extended from software to hardware.

Sure, take the easy way out.

The Avenger is free to go back to his regular life.

Oh, finally.

Well, that was all around depressing. It’s like everything is covered in sadness and hopelessness. Good job on that front. But the problem is that while it supposed to be dull and tiresome for the Avenger, it unfortunately has the same effect on me. And the revenge scheme that’s so over the top and ridiculous, it’s very hard to feel sorry for the crazy AI. 

The art is really good though. 

[myislandstluciacaribbean-blog]

The Best Caribbean Area for These Who Enjoy Adventure: St. Lucia

A lot of people head out to the Caribbean searching for countless beaches and turquoise blue seas that provide heated water snorkeling, fishing and sailing opportunities. But if you would like all that and a bit more in the way of experience, St Lucia could be the area for you. The volcanic island is best noted for the Pitons, (Gros and Petit) a World History Site, and among the island's many familiar symbols.  My Island of St Lucia Caribbean

Those peaks offer more than just fabulous scenery. Walking enthusiasts seeking a magnificent knowledge will make their way up the Gros Piton. It takes about 3 to 4 hours circular trip and is most beneficial tackled early each morning, before it surely cooks up. For folks who certainly are a small less ambitious on their vacations, the Tet Paul Trail provides an perfect alternative. I hiked the walk with one of many educated on-site guides. The Tet Paul Trail returns walkers with amazing opinions of not merely the Pitons, but additionally nearby Martinique and St. Vincent. The walk itself is strewn with rich, regional flowering bushes, along with blueberry flowers and pear and cashew trees.

As small travel away may be the Caribbean's only drive-through volcano. As opposed to lava, the steaming volcano spews sulphuric steam. This is probably as close as you may get to any volcano and some wooden steps leads guests to a viewing stand for an amazing picture op. (The volcano has its own group of courses who fortunately notify guests that as the volcano appears very productive, it is perfectly safe.)

The volcanic nature of St. Lucia in addition has produced a set of warm springs. Sulphur Rises Park is just in the future and is an ideal method to relieve any ache from a day hike. The water covers 105 degrees, nevertheless the spotlight is truly the mud. Big cauldrons are full of equally dark and white mud that you're prompted to slather your self with. The dirt is supposed to have beneficial houses, but let us experience it—it is simply lots of enjoyment to punch friends and family and members of the family with handfuls of warm mud.

Readers to the area who wish to stay in one of the very most bold accommodations are encouraged to check into Ladera. Areas and villas as of this tremendous luxe property include butlers and easy access to the most amazing restaurant—Dasheene. Dasheene uses domestically found materials to make a very superior cuisine and the very best chocolate dessert I've actually eaten. What is missing from Ladera's rooms—a next wall. The hotel was certainly one of the first ever to build the concept of the "start air" lodge room. The rooms are positioned cliff-side, this means there is both complete solitude and the most fabulous views of the Pitons and the sea. Visitors (most of whom do appear to be on the honeymoon) may engage in a personal jump pool under the stars. Insect netting protects guests at night, but an unexpected bird could travel in through the daytime. Water guns are provided to shoo them away.

[topfygad]

Voyage to a White Mars

The mythologies of Antarctica mimic those of outer space.

  Being aboard a vessel in Antarctica is full of potentialities. One never knows when a gentoo penguin, or a large colony of them, might come into view. For the writer, travelling with Irish wildlife guide and ornithologist, Jim Wilson, meant understanding the continent in all its surprises and complexities. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

A lenticular cloud loomed. The wind swirled its stillness into the shape of a UFO, like a potter pinching, pressing, pulling her clay. Below, an iceberg emerged out of the blue. The wind chaffed its creviced sides, causing an infinitesimal inclination. At first, it wavered, then insisted on itself, tipping back in place.

A 105 years after Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole, I set sail from Ushuaia in Argentina, towards Antarctica on the Drake Passage, known colloquially as the Drake Shake or Drake Lake, depending on the state of the seas.

Watching the sea and the sky, I thought about the myth of the North, of Njörðr, the Norse god of ships and seafaring, and the fur-clad female warriors that came riding through the sky. But the South did not so easily yield such stories. In the absence of human life beyond the boat, I was left imagining the superstitions of the early explorers, whose journal entries began with scientific logs and ended with ruminations on being.

The ocean was infinite, vanishing points everywhere with no object in sight to give perspective or scale, save the occasional albatross or petrel swerving above. The waves lashed, 37 feet high and perpetual. For several days, life on our 450-foot ship was led at a 60º angle. It was laughable, till we adjusted to it. We sought balance without denying the tilt.

  Routine Surprises

In the starkness of Antarctica, a Zodiac raft stops in awe and passengers in their yellow jackets realise their scale against the breathing, blue ice. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

On the bridge, the ship’s control room where silence was mandatory, the stoic Romanian captain charted the wind, which was sinuous. Signals criss-crossed, buttons beeped, screens blinked, maps were uncreased, and binoculars lay on hand. The captain looked out with attention but let out a whisper a notch louder than was allowed. He had spotted a fin whale. Even after a decade of Antarctic travel, he could still surprise himself.

Then, the sun burned through the mist. Mountains rose from the ocean’s helm. When the first iceberg, almost a kilometre high from base to tip, emerged, I gasped. This would only be the overture. For the next 10 days, every iceberg seemed more spectacular than the last. I began to reckon with the history of the search for the continent from 300 B.C. when Aristotle hypothesised that a mythic southern continent must exist, based simply in the rationale of equilibrium. Antarctica was named by Aristotle, from Greek anti and arks, meaning ‘opposite the bear’, the name for the constellation under which the Arctic lay. Time here exists at scales that far transcend those we can grasp. The older, denser bits of ice were a piercing sapphire. I understood the captain’s joy: Even after 10 years of navigating the Antarctic, its stark intensity could not become customary.

And yet, life on the ship assumed a routine. Daylight dimmed and our clocks trudged on. After breakfast, we would head to the mud room, where our boots and jackets hung, and proceed to undertake the painstaking routine of covering our bodies—head to toe—in layers of warm clothing. My skin had become parched. We looked absurd, brushing against fleeces, scrambling for camera bags and yanking at the straps of our life vests. We would vacuum our clothes of any invasive particles and disembark onto Zodiacs (inflatable rafts) in groups of eight to explore a corner of the continent.

Once we stopped to see a seal eating another seal; another time we were suddenly surrounded by colonies of gentoo penguins. We spotted a shipwreck lodged in rock, and imagined the self-contained life of those posted at research stations pre-war. Everything was surreal, ungraspable, cosmic. On one landing, we saw a patch of green—Antarctic lichen—and it reminded us that we were on Earth. We hadn’t seen green in days.

  Disturbances at a distance

The writer at Deception Island, amid the remains of buildings and whaling equipment. Whaling began here since the early 1900s and continued till circa 1931. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Later, when I visited my library to scour maps of Antarctica, the index read: “The World; Africa, Asia, Middle East, E. Asia, Europe, U.S.A., Pacific; Moon, Mars and Antarctica.” The continent has been called a “White Mars” and this is not an exaggeration: it is notoriously the coldest, driest, windiest landmass, 98 per cent of which is covered in ice. Even in the summer, the average temperature is -27°C. Its extremes manifest in its fauna as well: the largest terrestrial animal is a midge, a wingless insect that has the tiniest genome ever sequenced. There are no indigenous people, and therefore no government, culture, history or art.

In fact, the geopolitics of the continent are not dissimilar to outer space, its laws bound only to an indeterminate Antarctic treaty—the first arms control established during the Cold War—banning activity that causes “harmful interferences” and promoting “peaceful exploration.” At Concordia Station, doctor and researcher Alexander Kumar noted that, “We are completely alone and isolated here from February to November. The French refer to people who over-winter here as Hivernauts, but unlike astronauts, we have no ‘mission control’.”

It’s far away, it’s cold, it’s uninhabitable. So why do we care? For one, because the poles function as a thermostat: the Earth retains heat at the Equator and loses it at the poles. The Arctic and the Antarctic regulate the temperature of the entire planet. It is also the container of about 70 per cent of the world’s fresh water, while in the rest of the world, one person in eight does not have access to this resource. And also because its sublime beauty may be unlike anywhere else on Earth.

Like the realm of outer space, Antarctica is still being discovered. Its exploration is, in large part, funded by vested private interests looking for potential mines of diminishing natural resources. Climate change is causing a loss of land and sea ice, which will reveal new sources of oil, gas, minerals and arable land. Fishing for commercial purposes as well as for polar microbes that may be used in pharmaceuticals has begun. The acidification of the ocean threatens many species, including the stunning sea butterfly.

   Metaphor in motion

The Ocean Endevour ploughs through the Antarctic ice, with the occasional humpback whale gliding along the waves for company. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Witnessing this fragile beauty under threat remains inaccessible to many travellers since it requires heavy resources and a will to leave only the lightest trace. When the treaty is renegotiated in 2048, Antarctica may depend entirely on the stories of a small handful of people: from the musings of the explorers’ logs and the measurements of a few scientists to the poet’s imagination.

One of those scientists was William Wales, an astronomer on James Cook’s Resolution, which crossed the Antarctic Circle three times in 1773. Wales later taught mathematics at Christ’s School in London, where the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a pupil. It is perhaps no coincidence that Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, set in the Antarctic seas, speculates about this mysterious, seemingly supernatural place. A rime is both a crust of ice, and an archaic spelling of rhyme—a play on words that points to the artist’s search for the clarity of meaning, emerging out of the fog of language.

And through the drifts the snowy clifts

Did send a dismal sheen:

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—

The ice was all between

Antarctica is a place where the scientific gives way to the metaphysical and beauty blurs with terror.

Perhaps it is like a poem: tipping reality ever so slightly, then the symmetry, then again.

ORIENTATION

The Drake Passage is the ocean between South America and the Antarctic Peninsula. The Antarctic Peninsula is the northern tip of the Antarctic continent, which contains the South Pole.

GETTING THERE

British Airways has daily flights from Delhi and Mumbai to Buenos Aires, with a stopover in a European gateway city like London or Madrid. No transit visa is required if the traveller holds a U.S. visa.

From Buenos Aires, there are three daily flights to the southernmost city of Argentina, Ushuaia. A morning flight is preferred, so that you can purchase last minute gear items in Ushuaia before boarding the ship at the harbour to set sail late afternoon.

VISA

Indians can apply for visa at the Embassy of Argentina in Delhi (eindi.cancilleria.gov.ar/en) or the consulate office in Mumbai (https://ift.tt/2L8uyx0). The visa application form can be downloaded from eindi.mrecic.gov.ar/en. The application must be submitted in person, and an interview is mandatory. The visa is free for Indian tourists but the process takes about 21 working days.

STAY

Buenos Aires has a few small hotels in vibrant neighbourhoods and a few more business-ready five star hotels. Usually, the ship offers a package that includes the latter, but if you prefer something quaint at your own cost, head to The Clubhouse (clubhouseba.com) in the young, hip Palermo or the home (https://ift.tt/2MxkvVz), a French-Scandanavian inspired boutique hotel.

Seals find an unlikely resting spot amid the remains at Deception Island. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

NEED TO KNOW

– The writer travelled to Antarctica with Ibex Expeditions (www.ibexexpeditions.com; 10-day expedition from $6,000/Rs3,90,390).

-The ship provides the vital outer shell—a thick water- and wind-proof jacket—and waterproof boots. Base and mid layers are for you to arrange. A good sun cream and polarised sunglasses are essential.

– Travelling in Nov-Dec is recommended for the lovely night skies, and Jan-March is a good time to see the whales.

– You cannot take luggage heavier than 15 kg each plus a handbag aboard, but you can leave a bag in Buenos Aires and consolidate.

– Natural soaps are recommended as the expedition is 100% Leave No Trace.

– Acupuncture sea bands and homeopathy is highly recommended for sea-sickness.

READ

Antarctica: Secrets of the Southern Continent, edited by David McGonigal is a large, coffee-table book so you can’t take it with you, but it covers everything from the place’s history to its current status and details of penguins, glaciers, and albatross.

We Mammals in Hospitable Times has some surreal poems that are a result of the six weeks Jynne Dilling Martin spent in Antarctica.

The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard, the youngest member of Scott’s expedition to the South Pole is a first-hand account of the ill-fated expedition. It’s lyrical, foreboding and written with an attention to storytelling.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing recounts the most famous Antarctic explorer, Ernest Shackleton’s fatal journey to the South Pole.

(function(d, s, id) var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.5&appId=440470606060560"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); (document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

source http://cheaprtravels.com/voyage-to-a-white-mars/

[puravidaeh]

Looking for Arenal Observatory Lodge discounts? As a thank you for visiting us, WE OFFER TRAVELLERS FREE ACCESS TO A 20% DISCOUNT OFF THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE’S RATES when booking with the hotel directly using our “Pura Vida! eh? Exclusive Promotion” code. Click here for more information and/or to obtain the hotel promo code. Con mucho gusto (you’re welcome) and pura vida! 🙂

The below post is the second part of our two-part series about the Arenal Observatory Lodge. For the purpose of our series, the Arenal Observatory Lodge information has been divided into two sections:

#1. The hotel (i.e., who should stay at the hotel, who might prefer to stay elsewhere, the hotel’s property, hotel room accommodations, and dining at the Arenal Observatory Lodge) #2. Nature trails and things to do (i.e., observation deck lookouts, onsite museum, nature walks, challenging hikes, waterfall visits, and other things to do at the Arenal Observatory Lodge)

  [CONTINUE READING BELOW FOR] COSTA RICA’S ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE SERIES – PART 2: NATURE TRAILS AND THINGS TO DO

[OR SKIP TO] COSTA RICA’S ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE SERIES – PART 1: THE HOTEL

Nikki; Arenal Observatory Lodge’s Danta Waterfall

THINGS TO DO AT THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE

If you have already read our related blog post Costa Rica’s Arenal Observatory Lodge Series – Part 1: The Hotel, you may have already decided to spend a night (or more) at the Arenal Observatory Lodge. If so, you may be asking yourself what there is to do onsite, beyond staple activities (such as swimming or relaxing) that most hotels in the region offer. Fortunately, the lodge’s eight hundred and seventy acres of property offers plenty of things to do, including horseback riding, mountain biking, birdwatching, museum exploration, observation deck visits, and countless nature trails varying in walk/hike difficulty, distance, and duration.

Arenal Observatory Lodge maps

THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE: OBSERVATORY DECKS

One of the first things we did upon arrival at the Arenal Observatory Lodge was check out the observatory decks. Although the Arenal Volcano (as well as Lake Arenal and neighbouring Cerro Chato) can be viewed from many places throughout the property (including many hotel rooms and balconies/terraces), we found the volcano view obtained from the main building’s third floor observatory deck to be the best; not only is the deck positioned directly in front of the Arenal Volcano, but the roofed/shaded room (comfortable to access on both rainy days and sunny days) provides wall-to-wall sliding windows for clear spotting and gentle air flow, chairs for relaxing in, and helpful guides to “birds around the decks” that illustrate bird species spotted from the lodge. Additional observatory decks exist in front of the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s onsite restaurant (this deck is uncovered), as well as in the tower that comprises the property’s onsite museum.

Arenal Observatory Lodge observatory desk

Nikki; enjoying the view of the Arenal Volcano from the observation point

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; viewing the Arenal Volcano and Cerro Chato

View of the Arenal Volcano National Park

View of Lake Arenal

THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE: HISTORY AND MUSEUM

Perhaps the most unique component of the Arenal Observatory Lodge is it’s history rooted in forest regrowth and volcanic research. Following the Arenal Volcano’s significant eruption in 1968, the Arenal Observatory Lodge was a pioneer in reestablishing the area’s surrounding forest by planting new trees and trying to preserve primary forest that survived the trauma. When the American Smithsonian Institute’s research took aim at the Arenal Volcano in the 1970’s, the lodge became both a resource and a haven for student scientists given its close yet safe proximity to the volcano. Fast-forward to today, and not only does the Arenal Observatory Lodge continue to cater to students, but it has developed into a La Fortuna hotel that offers a hospitality experience that is as rich in science and education as it is grounded in the Arenal region’s history. Fortunately, as we describe in our related blog post Costa Rica’s Arenal Observatory Lodge Series – Part 1: The Hotel, despite the hotel’s strides toward tourism development, it remains a low-key and humble lodge that lets the breathtaking Arenal Volcano sell itself.

As a treat to guests of the Arenal Observatory Lodge, the hotel’s onsite museum features newspaper clippings of the Arenal Volcano’s past eruptions, samples of lava rocks, geographic maps, bird guides, wildlife guides, and an abundance of photography. Also on display is a live seismometer that tracks the volcano’s current activity. While visiting, don’t miss the small, third-floor observatory deck above the museum for an additional volcano-viewing opportunity.

Arenal Observatory Lodge volcanic monitoring

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; bird species seen at the Arenal Observatory Lodge

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; wildlife species spotted at the Arenal Observatory Lodge

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; lava rocks

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; map

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; volcano eruptions spotted from the Arenal Observatory Lodge

THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE: NATURE TRAILS

A visit to the Arenal Observatory Lodge simply would not be complete without a nature hike. With a network of over eleven kilometres of trails to choose from (the entirety of which may be hiked without a guide, if self-guided exploration would be preferred), it is often difficult for travellers to know which path to take. To summarize the most popular trail options to choose from, the following are the approximate hike durations of each, arranged in order from the least difficult hike to the most difficult hike:

The Saino Trail takes approximately 45 minutes to complete (round-trip)

The La Hormiga Trail takes approximately 20 minutes to complete (round-trip)

The (Danta) Waterfall Trail takes approximately 1 hour to complete (round-trip)

The Los Cangrejos Trail takes approximately 30 minutes to complete (round-trip)

The River Trail takes approximately 40 minutes to complete (round-trip)

Although we are familiar with each of the trail options available at the Arenal Observatory Lodge, our trail recommendation(s) depend on the type of hiking experience a traveller is looking to have. Beginner hikers and/or travellers in search of a basic nature walk on primarily flat land will be satisfied with either the Saino Trail, or a combination of the Saino Trail and the La Hormiga Trail. Hikers in search of a more challenging hike (comprised of some uphill/downhill sections) will prefer either the (Danta) Waterfall Trail and/or the Los Cangrejos Trail. As the property’s most challenging trail (with the exception of Cerro Chato), the River Trail offers the most rugged terrain, alongside significant inclines and declines. As a result, we recommend the River Trail only to experienced hikers interested in an “off the beaten path” trekking experience.

Note:

The La Hormiga Trail is an offshoot of the Saino Trail and cannot be accessed without first hiking at least a small portion of the Saino Trail.

Note:

The Los Cangrejos Trail begins approximately two kilometres from the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s main building, on the way to Cerro Chato. Although the Los Cangrejos Trail takes only thirty minutes to hike, this duration does not include the time needed to get to and from the hotel’s main building and the trail. Given the significant walk required to get to and from the trail, we typically only recommend that visitors opt to hike the Los Cangrejos Trail if they plan to hike Cerro Chato as well.

If your time at the Arenal Observatory Lodge is limited, at the very least, hike the Saino Trail and the (Danta) Waterfall Trail. Experiencing both is easy, as neither trail is overly far from the hotel’s lower building, and when combined, both trails can be hiked within a period of two hours. Alternatively, you may opt to participate in the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s complimentary onsite walking tour (called “the morning tour”) that departs from the hotel’s reception each morning at 8:30am sharp; the lodge’s free walking tour passes by the Saino Trail, heads to the Danta Waterfall, and typically completes the circuit by 11:00am.

Arenal Observatory Lodge guided tour (included with all hotel stays)

Saino Trail / La Hormiga Trail

As the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s easiest hike, the Saino Trail is ideal for all visitors, including senior travellers, young children, and mobility impaired visitors. It is also beautifully landscaped and well-manicured, which makes the the flower-filled route as easy on the eyes as its paved pathway is on the feet. From catepillars to coatis, and cicadas to curassows, we saw so much when we made the loop around the Saino Trail, including the La Hormiga Trail add-on too!

Tip:

Don’t miss the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s small frog pond at the northernmost spot where the Saino Trail and the La Hormiga Trail meet. Better yet, opt to visit the frog pond at night for a frog serenade!

Wildlife, birds, and insects that we spotted along the Saino Trail and La Hormiga Trail hike

Caterpillar

Coati

Insect

Crested Guam and Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan

Butterfly

Cicada shell

Coati

Great Curassow (male and female)

Flora that we spotted along the Saino Trail and La Hormiga Trail hike

Orchid

Beautiful flower

Fig fruit

Ricky; hiking the saino trail

Fern with thorns for protection

Queen of the night flower

Beautiful flora

Danta Waterfall Trail

As noted above, the (Danta) Waterfall Trail and the Los Cangrejos Trail are the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s intermediate hiking trails. Since we do not recommend hiking the Los Cangrejos Trail unless you also plan to hike Cerro Chato, our obvious favourite choice for a moderate hike is the hotel’s (Danta) Waterfal trail. Not only does the hike provide a nice mix of uphill, downhill, and flat sections, but travellers are spoiled with the site of a beautiful waterfall along the way. If you are a waterfall-lover (and if you have already checked out the many other waterfalls that call the La Fortuna region home, as described in our related blog post The La Fortuna Waterfall And Other Arenal Waterfalls Worth A Visit), the Danta Waterfall should not be missed.

Arenal Observatory Lodge’s Danta Waterfall

Arenal Observatory Lodge waterfall trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge waterfall trail

Ricky; hiking the waterfall trail

River Trail

If you have hiked the Saino and La Hormiga Trails, as well as the (Danta) Waterfall Trail, you may be in search of an additional challenge. If so, try the River Trail accessed just below the hotel’s onsite restaurant and outdoor (uncovered) observatory deck. Unlike the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s other onsite trails, the River Trail is rugged, dense, and steep. Although there is not too much to see along the way that differs from the property’s other trails, the River Trail’s reward comes from accomplishing the brief, yet daunting, hike itself. Alternatively, for a full-day adventure and an extremely physical challenge, guests may opt to hike Cerro Chato. Although Cerro Chato is not owned by the Arenal Observatory Lodge, one of its two access points is located on the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s property. As a result, guests of the lodge (as well as day visitors) may choose to hike Cerro Chato to and from the hotel, if they dare. For more information about Cerro Chato, including why the dormant volcano holds such a dear place in our hearts, don’t miss our related blog post A Proposal To Remember: Costa Rica’s Cerro Chato Hike.

Hiking the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s river trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge river trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge river trail

QUESTION TO COMMENT ON: Have you been to the Arenal Observatory Lodge? What did you do while there?

Pura vida!

If you’re more of a visual learner, take a moment to view our gallery photos below from our most recent visit to the Arenal Observatory Lodge.

#gallery-0-42 { margin: auto; } #gallery-0-42 .gallery-item { float: left; margin-top: 10px; text-align: center; width: 20%; } #gallery-0-42 img { border: 2px solid #cfcfcf; } #gallery-0-42 .gallery-caption { margin-left: 0; } /* see gallery_shortcode() in wp-includes/media.php */

Beautiful flower

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; wildlife species spotted at the Arenal Observatory Lodge

Great Curassow (male and female)

Queen of the night flower

Coati

Ricky; hiking the waterfall trail

Cicada shell

Arenal Observatory Lodge observatory deck and museum

Nikki; enjoying the view of the Arenal Volcano from the observation point

Orchid

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; lava rocks

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Ricky; hiking the saino trail

Fern with thorns for protection

Arenal Observatory Lodge observatory deck and museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; bird species seen at the Arenal Observatory Lodge

Arenal Observatory Lodge waterfall trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge river trail

Insect

Coati

Nikki; Arenal Observatory Lodge’s Danta Waterfall

Hiking the Arenal Observatory Lodge’s river trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; volcano eruptions spotted from the Arenal Observatory Lodge

Butterfly

Arenal Observatory Lodge saino trail

Beautiful flora

Arenal Observatory Lodge waterfall trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge observatory desk

Arenal Observatory Lodge’s Danta Waterfall

Arenal Observatory Lodge river trail

Arenal Observatory Lodge volcanic monitoring

Fig fruit

Arenal Observatory Lodge guided tour (included with all hotel stays)

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; map

Caterpillar

Crested Guam and Chestnut-Mandibled Toucan

Arenal Observatory Lodge museum; viewing the Arenal Volcano and Cerro Chato

Costa Rica’s Arenal Observatory Lodge Series – Part 2: Nature Trails And Things To Do Looking for Arenal Observatory Lodge discounts? As a thank you for visiting us, WE OFFER TRAVELLERS FREE ACCESS TO A 20% DISCOUNT OFF THE ARENAL OBSERVATORY LODGE'S RATES…

[readbookywooks]

WAYFARERS ALL

The Water Rat was restless, and he did not exactly know why. To all appearance the summer's pomp was still at fullest height, and although in the tilled acres green had given way to gold, though rowans were reddening, and the woods were dashed here and there with a tawny fierceness, yet light and warmth and colour were still present in undiminished measure, clean of any chilly premonitions of the passing year. But the constant chorus of the orchards and hedges had shrunk to a casual evensong from a few yet unwearied performers; the robin was beginning to assert himself once more; and there was a feeling in the air of change and departure. The cuckoo, of course, had long been silent; but many another feathered friend, for months a part of the familiar landscape and its small society, was missing too and it seemed that the ranks thinned steadily day by day. Rat, ever observant of all winged movement, saw that it was taking daily a southing tendency; and even as he lay in bed at night he thought he could make out, passing in the darkness overhead, the beat and quiver of impatient pinions, obedient to the peremptory call.

Nature's Grand Hotel has its Season, like the others. As the guests one by one pack, pay, and depart, and the seats at the table-d'hote shrink pitifully at each succeeding meal; as suites of rooms are closed, carpets taken up, and waiters sent away; those boarders who are staying on, en pension, until the next year's full re-opening, cannot help being somewhat affected by all these flittings and farewells, this eager discussion of plans, routes, and fresh quarters, this daily shrinkage in the stream of comradeship. One gets unsettled, depressed, and inclined to be querulous. Why this craving for change? Why not stay on quietly here, like us, and be jolly? You don't know this hotel out of the season, and what fun we have among ourselves, we fellows who remain and see the whole interesting year out. All very true, no doubt the others always reply; we quite envy you--and some other year perhaps--but just now we have engagements--and there's the bus at the door--our time is up! So they depart, with a smile and a nod, and we miss them, and feel resentful. The Rat was a self-sufficing sort of animal, rooted to the land, and, whoever went, he stayed; still, he could not help noticing what was in the air, and feeling some of its influence in his bones.

It was difficult to settle down to anything seriously, with all this flitting going on. Leaving the water-side, where rushes stood thick and tall in a stream that was becoming sluggish and low, he wandered country-wards, crossed a field or two of pasturage already looking dusty and parched, and thrust into the great sea of wheat, yellow, wavy, and murmurous, full of quiet motion and small whisperings. Here he often loved to wander, through the forest of stiff strong stalks that carried their own golden sky away over his head--a sky that was always dancing, shimmering, softly talking; or swaying strongly to the passing wind and recovering itself with a toss and a merry laugh. Here, too, he had many small friends, a society complete in itself, leading full and busy lives, but always with a spare moment to gossip, and exchange news with a visitor. Today, however, though they were civil enough, the field-mice and harvest-mice seemed preoccupied. Many were digging and tunnelling busily; others, gathered together in small groups, examined plans and drawings of small flats, stated to be desirable and compact, and situated conveniently near the Stores. Some were hauling out dusty trunks and dress-baskets, others were already elbow-deep packing their belongings; while everywhere piles and bundles of wheat, oats, barley, beech-mast and nuts, lay about ready for transport.

`Here's old Ratty!' they cried as soon as they saw him. `Come and bear a hand, Rat, and don't stand about idle!'

`What sort of games are you up to?' said the Water Rat severely. `You know it isn't time to be thinking of winter quarters yet, by a long way!'

`O yes, we know that,' explained a field-mouse rather shamefacedly; `but it's always as well to be in good time, isn't it? We really MUST get all the furniture and baggage and stores moved out of this before those horrid machines begin clicking round the fields; and then, you know, the best flats get picked up so quickly nowadays, and if you're late you have to put up with ANYTHING; and they want such a lot of doing up, too, before they're fit to move into. Of course, we're early, we know that; but we're only just making a start.'

`O, bother STARTS,' said the Rat. `It's a splendid day. Come for a row, or a stroll along the hedges, or a picnic in the woods, or something.'

`Well, I THINK not TO-DAY, thank you,' replied the field- mouse hurriedly. `Perhaps some OTHER day--when we've more TIME----'

The Rat, with a snort of contempt, swung round to go, tripped over a hat-box, and fell, with undignified remarks.

`If people would be more careful,' said a field-mouse rather stiffly, `and look where they're going, people wouldn't hurt themselves--and forget themselves. Mind that hold-all, Rat! You'd better sit down somewhere. In an hour or two we may be more free to attend to you.'

`You won't be "free" as you call it much this side of Christmas, I can see that,' retorted the Rat grumpily, as he picked his way out of the field.

He returned somewhat despondently to his river again--his faithful, steady-going old river, which never packed up, flitted, or went into winter quarters.

In the osiers which fringed the bank he spied a swallow sitting. Presently it was joined by another, and then by a third; and the birds, fidgeting restlessly on their bough, talked together earnestly and low.

`What, ALREADY,' said the Rat, strolling up to them. `What's the hurry? I call it simply ridiculous.'

`O, we're not off yet, if that's what you mean,' replied the first swallow. `We're only making plans and arranging things. Talking it over, you know--what route we're taking this year, and where we'll stop, and so on. That's half the fun!'

`Fun?' said the Rat; `now that's just what I don't understand. If you've GOT to leave this pleasant place, and your friends who will miss you, and your snug homes that you've just settled into, why, when the hour strikes I've no doubt you'll go bravely, and face all the trouble and discomfort and change and newness, and make believe that you're not very unhappy. But to want to talk about it, or even think about it, till you really need----'

`No, you don't understand, naturally,' said the second swallow. `First, we feel it stirring within us, a sweet unrest; then back come the recollections one by one, like homing pigeons. They flutter through our dreams at night, they fly with us in our wheelings and circlings by day. We hunger to inquire of each other, to compare notes and assure ourselves that it was all really true, as one by one the scents and sounds and names of long-forgotten places come gradually back and beckon to us.'

`Couldn't you stop on for just this year?' suggested the Water Rat, wistfully. `We'll all do our best to make you feel at home. You've no idea what good times we have here, while you are far away.'

`I tried "stopping on" one year,' said the third swallow. `I had grown so fond of the place that when the time came I hung back and let the others go on without me. For a few weeks it was all well enough, but afterwards, O the weary length of the nights! The shivering, sunless days! The air so clammy and chill, and not an insect in an acre of it! No, it was no good; my courage broke down, and one cold, stormy night I took wing, flying well inland on account of the strong easterly gales. It was snowing hard as I beat through the passes of the great mountains, and I had a stiff fight to win through; but never shall I forget the blissful feeling of the hot sun again on my back as I sped down to the lakes that lay so blue and placid below me, and the taste of my first fat insect! The past was like a bad dream; the future was all happy holiday as I moved southwards week by week, easily, lazily, lingering as long as I dared, but always heeding the call! No, I had had my warning; never again did I think of disobedience.'

`Ah, yes, the call of the South, of the South!' twittered the other two dreamily. `Its songs its hues, its radiant air! O, do you remember----' and, forgetting the Rat, they slid into passionate reminiscence, while he listened fascinated, and his heart burned within him. In himself, too, he knew that it was vibrating at last, that chord hitherto dormant and unsuspected. The mere chatter of these southern-bound birds, their pale and second-hand reports, had yet power to awaken this wild new sensation and thrill him through and through with it; what would one moment of the real thing work in him--one passionate touch of the real southern sun, one waft of the authentic odor? With closed eyes he dared to dream a moment in full abandonment, and when he looked again the river seemed steely and chill, the green fields grey and lightless. Then his loyal heart seemed to cry out on his weaker self for its treachery.

`Why do you ever come back, then, at all?' he demanded of the swallows jealously. `What do you find to attract you in this poor drab little country?'

`And do you think,' said the first swallow, `that the other call is not for us too, in its due season? The call of lush meadow- grass, wet orchards, warm, insect-haunted ponds, of browsing cattle, of haymaking, and all the farm-buildings clustering round the House of the perfect Eaves?'

`Do you suppose,' asked the second one, that you are the only living thing that craves with a hungry longing to hear the cuckoo's note again?'

`In due time,' said the third, `we shall be home-sick once more for quiet water-lilies swaying on the surface of an English stream. But to-day all that seems pale and thin and very far away. Just now our blood dances to other music.'

They fell a-twittering among themselves once more, and this time their intoxicating babble was of violet seas, tawny sands, and lizard-haunted walls.

Restlessly the Rat wandered off once more, climbed the slope that rose gently from the north bank of the river, and lay looking out towards the great ring of Downs that barred his vision further southwards--his simple horizon hitherto, his Mountains of the Moon, his limit behind which lay nothing he had cared to see or to know. To-day, to him gazing South with a new-born need stirring in his heart, the clear sky over their long low outline seemed to pulsate with promise; to-day, the unseen was everything, the unknown the only real fact of life. On this side of the hills was now the real blank, on the other lay the crowded and coloured panorama that his inner eye was seeing so clearly. What seas lay beyond, green, leaping, and crested! What sun-bathed coasts, along which the white villas glittered against the olive woods! What quiet harbours, thronged with gallant shipping bound for purple islands of wine and spice, islands set low in languorous waters!

He rose and descended river-wards once more; then changed his mind and sought the side of the dusty lane. There, lying half- buried in the thick, cool under-hedge tangle that bordered it, he could muse on the metalled road and all the wondrous world that it led to; on all the wayfarers, too, that might have trodden it, and the fortunes and adventures they had gone to seek or found unseeking--out there, beyond--beyond!

Footsteps fell on his ear, and the figure of one that walked somewhat wearily came into view; and he saw that it was a Rat, and a very dusty one. The wayfarer, as he reached him, saluted with a gesture of courtesy that had something foreign about it-- hesitated a moment--then with a pleasant smile turned from the track and sat down by his side in the cool herbage. He seemed tired, and the Rat let him rest unquestioned, understanding something of what was in his thoughts; knowing, too, the value all animals attach at times to mere silent companionship, when the weary muscles slacken and the mind marks time.

The wayfarer was lean and keen-featured, and somewhat bowed at the shoulders; his paws were thin and long, his eyes much wrinkled at the corners, and he wore small gold ear rings in his neatly-set well-shaped ears. His knitted jersey was of a faded blue, his breeches, patched and stained, were based on a blue foundation, and his small belongings that he carried were tied up in a blue cotton handkerchief.

When he had rested awhile the stranger sighed, snuffed the air, and looked about him.

`That was clover, that warm whiff on the breeze,' he remarked; `and those are cows we hear cropping the grass behind us and blowing softly between mouthfuls. There is a sound of distant reapers, and yonder rises a blue line of cottage smoke against the woodland. The river runs somewhere close by, for I hear the call of a moorhen, and I see by your build that you're a freshwater mariner. Everything seems asleep, and yet going on all the time. It is a goodly life that you lead, friend; no doubt the best in the world, if only you are strong enough to lead it!'

`Yes, it's THE life, the only life, to live,' responded the Water Rat dreamily, and without his usual whole-hearted conviction.

`I did not say exactly that,' replied the stranger cautiously; `but no doubt it's the best. I've tried it, and I know. And because I've just tried it--six months of it--and know it's the best, here am I, footsore and hungry, tramping away from it, tramping southward, following the old call, back to the old life, THE life which is mine and which will not let me go.'

`Is this, then, yet another of them?' mused the Rat. `And where have you just come from?' he asked. He hardly dared to ask where he was bound for; he seemed to know the answer only too well.

`Nice little farm,' replied the wayfarer, briefly. `Upalong in that direction'--he nodded northwards. `Never mind about it. I had everything I could want--everything I had any right to expect of life, and more; and here I am! Glad to be here all the same, though, glad to be here! So many miles further on the road, so many hours nearer to my heart's desire!'

His shining eyes held fast to the horizon, and he seemed to be listening for some sound that was wanting from that inland acreage, vocal as it was with the cheerful music of pasturage and farmyard.

`You are not one of US,' said the Water Rat, `nor yet a farmer; nor even, I should judge, of this country.'

`Right,' replied the stranger. `I'm a seafaring rat, I am, and the port I originally hail from is Constantinople, though I'm a sort of a foreigner there too, in a manner of speaking. You will have heard of Constantinople, friend? A fair city, and an ancient and glorious one. And you may have heard, too, of Sigurd, King of Norway, and how he sailed thither with sixty ships, and how he and his men rode up through streets all canopied in their honour with purple and gold; and how the Emperor and Empress came down and banqueted with him on board his ship. When Sigurd returned home, many of his Northmen remained behind and entered the Emperor's body-guard, and my ancestor, a Norwegian born, stayed behind too, with the ships that Sigurd gave the Emperor. Seafarers we have ever been, and no wonder; as for me, the city of my birth is no more my home than any pleasant port between there and the London River. I know them all, and they know me. Set me down on any of their quays or foreshores, and I am home again.'

`I suppose you go great voyages,' said the Water Rat with growing interest. `Months and months out of sight of land, and provisions running short, and allowanced as to water, and your mind communing with the mighty ocean, and all that sort of thing?'

`By no means,' said the Sea Rat frankly. `Such a life as you describe would not suit me at all. I'm in the coasting trade, and rarely out of sight of land. It's the jolly times on shore that appeal to me, as much as any seafaring. O, those southern seaports! The smell of them, the riding-lights at night, the glamour!'

`Well, perhaps you have chosen the better way,' said the Water Rat, but rather doubtfully. `Tell me something of your coasting, then, if you have a mind to, and what sort of harvest an animal of spirit might hope to bring home from it to warm his latter days with gallant memories by the fireside; for my life, I confess to you, feels to me to-day somewhat narrow and circumscribed.'

`My last voyage,' began the Sea Rat, `that landed me eventually in this country, bound with high hopes for my inland farm, will serve as a good example of any of them, and, indeed, as an epitome of my highly-coloured life. Family troubles, as usual, began it. The domestic storm-cone was hoisted, and I shipped myself on board a small trading vessel bound from Constantinople, by classic seas whose every wave throbs with a deathless memory, to the Grecian Islands and the Levant. Those were golden days and balmy nights! In and out of harbour all the time--old friends everywhere--sleeping in some cool temple or ruined cistern during the heat of the day--feasting and song after sundown, under great stars set in a velvet sky! Thence we turned and coasted up the Adriatic, its shores swimming in an atmosphere of amber, rose, and aquamarine; we lay in wide land-locked harbours, we roamed through ancient and noble cities, until at last one morning, as the sun rose royally behind us, we rode into Venice down a path of gold. O, Venice is a fine city, wherein a rat can wander at his ease and take his pleasure! Or, when weary of wandering, can sit at the edge of the Grand Canal at night, feasting with his friends, when the air is full of music and the sky full of stars, and the lights flash and shimmer on the polished steel prows of the swaying gondolas, packed so that you could walk across the canal on them from side to side! And then the food--do you like shellfish? Well, well, we won't linger over that now.'

He was silent for a time; and the Water Rat, silent too and enthralled, floated on dream-canals and heard a phantom song pealing high between vaporous grey wave-lapped walls.

`Southwards we sailed again at last,' continued the Sea Rat, `coasting down the Italian shore, till finally we made Palermo, and there I quitted for a long, happy spell on shore. I never stick too long to one ship; one gets narrow-minded and prejudiced. Besides, Sicily is one of my happy hunting-grounds. I know everybody there, and their ways just suit me. I spent many jolly weeks in the island, staying with friends up country. When I grew restless again I took advantage of a ship that was trading to Sardinia and Corsica; and very glad I was to feel the fresh breeze and the sea-spray in my face once more.'

`But isn't it very hot and stuffy, down in the--hold, I think you call it?' asked the Water Rat.

The seafarer looked at him with the suspicion go a wink. `I'm an old hand,' he remarked with much simplicity. `The captain's cabin's good enough for me.'

`It's a hard life, by all accounts,' murmured the Rat, sunk in deep thought.

`For the crew it is,' replied the seafarer gravely, again with the ghost of a wink.

`From Corsica,' he went on, `I made use of a ship that was taking wine to the mainland. We made Alassio in the evening, lay to, hauled up our wine-casks, and hove them overboard, tied one to the other by a long line. Then the crew took to the boats and rowed shorewards, singing as they went, and drawing after them the long bobbing procession of casks, like a mile of porpoises. On the sands they had horses waiting, which dragged the casks up the steep street of the little town with a fine rush and clatter and scramble. When the last cask was in, we went and refreshed and rested, and sat late into the night, drinking with our friends, and next morning I took to the great olive-woods for a spell and a rest. For now I had done with islands for the time, and ports and shipping were plentiful; so I led a lazy life among the peasants, lying and watching them work, or stretched high on the hillside with the blue Mediterranean far below me. And so at length, by easy stages, and partly on foot, partly by sea, to Marseilles, and the meeting of old shipmates, and the visiting of great ocean-bound vessels, and feasting once more. Talk of shell-fish! Why, sometimes I dream of the shell-fish of Marseilles, and wake up crying!'

`That reminds me,' said the polite Water Rat; `you happened to mention that you were hungry, and I ought to have spoken earlier. Of course, you will stop and take your midday meal with me? My hole is close by; it is some time past noon, and you are very welcome to whatever there is.'

`Now I call that kind and brotherly of you,' said the Sea Rat. `I was indeed hungry when I sat down, and ever since I inadvertently happened to mention shell-fish, my pangs have been extreme. But couldn't you fetch it along out here? I am none too fond of going under hatches, unless I'm obliged to; and then, while we eat, I could tell you more concerning my voyages and the pleasant life I lead--at least, it is very pleasant to me, and by your attention I judge it commends itself to you; whereas if we go indoors it is a hundred to one that I shall presently fall asleep.'

`That is indeed an excellent suggestion,' said the Water Rat, and hurried off home. There he got out the luncheon-basket and packed a simple meal, in which, remembering the stranger's origin and preferences, he took care to include a yard of long French bread, a sausage out of which the garlic sang, some cheese which lay down and cried, and a long-necked straw-covered flask wherein lay bottled sunshine shed and garnered on far Southern slopes. Thus laden, he returned with all speed, and blushed for pleasure at the old seaman's commendations of his taste and judgment, as together they unpacked the basket and laid out the contents on the grass by the roadside.

The Sea Rat, as soon as his hunger was somewhat assuaged, continued the history of his latest voyage, conducting his simple hearer from port to port of Spain, landing him at Lisbon, Oporto, and Bordeaux, introducing him to the pleasant harbours of Cornwall and Devon, and so up the Channel to that final quayside, where, landing after winds long contrary, storm-driven and weather-beaten, he had caught the first magical hints and heraldings of another Spring, and, fired by these, had sped on a long tramp inland, hungry for the experiment of life on some quiet farmstead, very far from the weary beating of any sea.

Spell-bound and quivering with excitement, the Water Rat followed the Adventurer league by league, over stormy bays, through crowded roadsteads, across harbour bars on a racing tide, up winding rivers that hid their busy little towns round a sudden turn; and left him with a regretful sigh planted at his dull inland farm, about which he desired to hear nothing.

By this time their meal was over, and the Seafarer, refreshed and strengthened, his voice more vibrant, his eye lit with a brightness that seemed caught from some far-away sea-beacon, filled his glass with the red and glowing vintage of the South, and, leaning towards the Water Rat, compelled his gaze and held him, body and soul, while he talked. Those eyes were of the changing foam-streaked grey-green of leaping Northern seas; in the glass shone a hot ruby that seemed the very heart of the South, beating for him who had courage to respond to its pulsation. The twin lights, the shifting grey and the steadfast red, mastered the Water Rat and held him bound, fascinated, powerless. The quiet world outside their rays receded far away and ceased to be. And the talk, the wonderful talk flowed on--or was it speech entirely, or did it pass at times into song--chanty of the sailors weighing the dripping anchor, sonorous hum of the shrouds in a tearing North-Easter, ballad of the fisherman hauling his nets at sundown against an apricot sky, chords of guitar and mandoline from gondola or caique? Did it change into the cry of the wind, plaintive at first, angrily shrill as it freshened, rising to a tearing whistle, sinking to a musical trickle of air from the leech of the bellying sail? All these sounds the spell-bound listener seemed to hear, and with them the hungry complaint of the gulls and the sea-mews, the soft thunder of the breaking wave, the cry of the protesting shingle. Back into speech again it passed, and with beating heart he was following the adventures of a dozen seaports, the fights, the escapes, the rallies, the comradeships, the gallant undertakings; or he searched islands for treasure, fished in still lagoons and dozed day-long on warm white sand. Of deep-sea fishings he heard tell, and mighty silver gatherings of the mile- long net; of sudden perils, noise of breakers on a moonless night, or the tall bows of the great liner taking shape overhead through the fog; of the merry home-coming, the headland rounded, the harbour lights opened out; the groups seen dimly on the quay, the cheery hail, the splash of the hawser; the trudge up the steep little street towards the comforting glow of red-curtained windows.

Lastly, in his waking dream it seemed to him that the Adventurer had risen to his feet, but was still speaking, still holding him fast with his sea-grey eyes.

`And now,' he was softly saying, `I take to the road again, holding on southwestwards for many a long and dusty day; till at last I reach the little grey sea town I know so well, that clings along one steep side of the harbour. There through dark doorways you look down flights of stone steps, overhung by great pink tufts of valerian and ending in a patch of sparkling blue water. The little boats that lie tethered to the rings and stanchions of the old sea-wall are gaily painted as those I clambered in and out of in my own childhood; the salmon leap on the flood tide, schools of mackerel flash and play past quay-sides and foreshores, and by the windows the great vessels glide, night and day, up to their moorings or forth to the open sea. There, sooner or later, the ships of all seafaring nations arrive; and there, at its destined hour, the ship of my choice will let go its anchor. I shall take my time, I shall tarry and bide, till at last the right one lies waiting for me, warped out into midstream, loaded low, her bowsprit pointing down harbour. I shall slip on board, by boat or along hawser; and then one morning I shall wake to the song and tramp of the sailors, the clink of the capstan, and the rattle of the anchor-chain coming merrily in. We shall break out the jib and the foresail, the white houses on the harbour side will glide slowly past us as she gathers steering-way, and the voyage will have begun! As she forges towards the headland she will clothe herself with canvas; and then, once outside, the sounding slap of great green seas as she heels to the wind, pointing South!

`And you, you will come too, young brother; for the days pass, and never return, and the South still waits for you. Take the Adventure, heed the call, now ere the irrevocable moment passes!' 'Tis but a banging of the door behind you, a blithesome step forward, and you are out of the old life and into the new! Then some day, some day long hence, jog home here if you will, when the cup has been drained and the play has been played, and sit down by your quiet river with a store of goodly memories for company. You can easily overtake me on the road, for you are young, and I am ageing and go softly. I will linger, and look back; and at last I will surely see you coming, eager and light- hearted, with all the South in your face!'

The voice died away and ceased as an insect's tiny trumpet dwindles swiftly into silence; and the Water Rat, paralysed and staring, saw at last but a distant speck on the white surface of the road.

Mechanically he rose and proceeded to repack the luncheon-basket, carefully and without haste. Mechanically he returned home, gathered together a few small necessaries and special treasures he was fond of, and put them in a satchel; acting with slow deliberation, moving about the room like a sleep-walker; listening ever with parted lips. He swung the satchel over his shoulder, carefully selected a stout stick for his wayfaring, and with no haste, but with no hesitation at all, he stepped across the threshold just as the Mole appeared at the door.

`Why, where are you off to, Ratty?' asked the Mole in great surprise, grasping him by the arm.

`Going South, with the rest of them,' murmured the Rat in a dreamy monotone, never looking at him. `Seawards first and then on shipboard, and so to the shores that are calling me!'

He pressed resolutely forward, still without haste, but with dogged fixity of purpose; but the Mole, now thoroughly alarmed, placed himself in front of him, and looking into his eyes saw that they were glazed and set and turned a streaked and shifting grey--not his friend's eyes, but the eyes of some other animal! Grappling with him strongly he dragged him inside, threw him down, and held him.

The Rat struggled desperately for a few moments, and then his strength seemed suddenly to leave him, and he lay still and exhausted, with closed eyes, trembling. Presently the Mole assisted him to rise and placed him in a chair, where he sat collapsed and shrunken into himself, his body shaken by a violent shivering, passing in time into an hysterical fit of dry sobbing. Mole made the door fast, threw the satchel into a drawer and locked it, and sat down quietly on the table by his friend, waiting for the strange seizure to pass. Gradually the Rat sank into a troubled doze, broken by starts and confused murmurings of things strange and wild and foreign to the unenlightened Mole; and from that he passed into a deep slumber.

Very anxious in mind, the Mole left him for a time and busied himself with household matters; and it was getting dark when he returned to the parlour and found the Rat where he had left him, wide awake indeed, but listless, silent, and dejected. He took one hasty glance at his eyes; found them, to his great gratification, clear and dark and brown again as before; and then sat down and tried to cheer him up and help him to relate what had happened to him.

Poor Ratty did his best, by degrees, to explain things; but how could he put into cold words what had mostly been suggestion? How recall, for another's benefit, the haunting sea voices that had sung to him, how reproduce at second-hand the magic of the Seafarer's hundred reminiscences? Even to himself, now the spell was broken and the glamour gone, he found it difficult to account for what had seemed, some hours ago, the inevitable and only thing. It is not surprising, then, that he failed to convey to the Mole any clear idea of what he had been through that day.

To the Mole this much was plain: the fit, or attack, had passed away, and had left him sane again, though shaken and cast down by the reaction. But he seemed to have lost all interest for the time in the things that went to make up his daily life, as well as in all pleasant forecastings of the altered days and doings that the changing season was surely bringing.

Casually, then, and with seeming indifference, the Mole turned his talk to the harvest that was being gathered in, the towering wagons and their straining teams, the growing ricks, and the large moon rising over bare acres dotted with sheaves. He talked of the reddening apples around, of the browning nuts, of jams and preserves and the distilling of cordials; till by easy stages such as these he reached midwinter, its hearty joys and its snug home life, and then he became simply lyrical.

By degrees the Rat began to sit up and to join in. His dull eye brightened, and he lost some of his listening air.

Presently the tactful Mole slipped away and returned with a pencil and a few half-sheets of paper, which he placed on the table at his friend's elbow.

`It's quite a long time since you did any poetry,' he remarked. `You might have a try at it this evening, instead of--well, brooding over things so much. I've an idea that you'll feel a lot better when you've got something jotted down--if it's only just the rhymes.'

The Rat pushed the paper away from him wearily, but the discreet Mole took occasion to leave the room, and when he peeped in again some time later, the Rat was absorbed and deaf to the world; alternately scribbling and sucking the top of his pencil. It is true that he sucked a good deal more than he scribbled; but it was joy to the Mole to know that the cure had at least begun.

[topfygad]

Voyage to a White Mars

The mythologies of Antarctica mimic those of outer space.

  Being aboard a vessel in Antarctica is full of potentialities. One never knows when a gentoo penguin, or a large colony of them, might come into view. For the writer, travelling with Irish wildlife guide and ornithologist, Jim Wilson, meant understanding the continent in all its surprises and complexities. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

A lenticular cloud loomed. The wind swirled its stillness into the shape of a UFO, like a potter pinching, pressing, pulling her clay. Below, an iceberg emerged out of the blue. The wind chaffed its creviced sides, causing an infinitesimal inclination. At first, it wavered, then insisted on itself, tipping back in place.

A 105 years after Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole, I set sail from Ushuaia in Argentina, towards Antarctica on the Drake Passage, known colloquially as the Drake Shake or Drake Lake, depending on the state of the seas.

Watching the sea and the sky, I thought about the myth of the North, of Njörðr, the Norse god of ships and seafaring, and the fur-clad female warriors that came riding through the sky. But the South did not so easily yield such stories. In the absence of human life beyond the boat, I was left imagining the superstitions of the early explorers, whose journal entries began with scientific logs and ended with ruminations on being.

The ocean was infinite, vanishing points everywhere with no object in sight to give perspective or scale, save the occasional albatross or petrel swerving above. The waves lashed, 37 feet high and perpetual. For several days, life on our 450-foot ship was led at a 60º angle. It was laughable, till we adjusted to it. We sought balance without denying the tilt.

  Routine Surprises

In the starkness of Antarctica, a Zodiac raft stops in awe and passengers in their yellow jackets realise their scale against the breathing, blue ice. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

On the bridge, the ship’s control room where silence was mandatory, the stoic Romanian captain charted the wind, which was sinuous. Signals criss-crossed, buttons beeped, screens blinked, maps were uncreased, and binoculars lay on hand. The captain looked out with attention but let out a whisper a notch louder than was allowed. He had spotted a fin whale. Even after a decade of Antarctic travel, he could still surprise himself.

Then, the sun burned through the mist. Mountains rose from the ocean’s helm. When the first iceberg, almost a kilometre high from base to tip, emerged, I gasped. This would only be the overture. For the next 10 days, every iceberg seemed more spectacular than the last. I began to reckon with the history of the search for the continent from 300 B.C. when Aristotle hypothesised that a mythic southern continent must exist, based simply in the rationale of equilibrium. Antarctica was named by Aristotle, from Greek anti and arks, meaning ‘opposite the bear’, the name for the constellation under which the Arctic lay. Time here exists at scales that far transcend those we can grasp. The older, denser bits of ice were a piercing sapphire. I understood the captain’s joy: Even after 10 years of navigating the Antarctic, its stark intensity could not become customary.

And yet, life on the ship assumed a routine. Daylight dimmed and our clocks trudged on. After breakfast, we would head to the mud room, where our boots and jackets hung, and proceed to undertake the painstaking routine of covering our bodies—head to toe—in layers of warm clothing. My skin had become parched. We looked absurd, brushing against fleeces, scrambling for camera bags and yanking at the straps of our life vests. We would vacuum our clothes of any invasive particles and disembark onto Zodiacs (inflatable rafts) in groups of eight to explore a corner of the continent.

Once we stopped to see a seal eating another seal; another time we were suddenly surrounded by colonies of gentoo penguins. We spotted a shipwreck lodged in rock, and imagined the self-contained life of those posted at research stations pre-war. Everything was surreal, ungraspable, cosmic. On one landing, we saw a patch of green—Antarctic lichen—and it reminded us that we were on Earth. We hadn’t seen green in days.

  Disturbances at a distance

The writer at Deception Island, amid the remains of buildings and whaling equipment. Whaling began here since the early 1900s and continued till circa 1931. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Later, when I visited my library to scour maps of Antarctica, the index read: “The World; Africa, Asia, Middle East, E. Asia, Europe, U.S.A., Pacific; Moon, Mars and Antarctica.” The continent has been called a “White Mars” and this is not an exaggeration: it is notoriously the coldest, driest, windiest landmass, 98 per cent of which is covered in ice. Even in the summer, the average temperature is -27°C. Its extremes manifest in its fauna as well: the largest terrestrial animal is a midge, a wingless insect that has the tiniest genome ever sequenced. There are no indigenous people, and therefore no government, culture, history or art.

In fact, the geopolitics of the continent are not dissimilar to outer space, its laws bound only to an indeterminate Antarctic treaty—the first arms control established during the Cold War—banning activity that causes “harmful interferences” and promoting “peaceful exploration.” At Concordia Station, doctor and researcher Alexander Kumar noted that, “We are completely alone and isolated here from February to November. The French refer to people who over-winter here as Hivernauts, but unlike astronauts, we have no ‘mission control’.”

It’s far away, it’s cold, it’s uninhabitable. So why do we care? For one, because the poles function as a thermostat: the Earth retains heat at the Equator and loses it at the poles. The Arctic and the Antarctic regulate the temperature of the entire planet. It is also the container of about 70 per cent of the world’s fresh water, while in the rest of the world, one person in eight does not have access to this resource. And also because its sublime beauty may be unlike anywhere else on Earth.

Like the realm of outer space, Antarctica is still being discovered. Its exploration is, in large part, funded by vested private interests looking for potential mines of diminishing natural resources. Climate change is causing a loss of land and sea ice, which will reveal new sources of oil, gas, minerals and arable land. Fishing for commercial purposes as well as for polar microbes that may be used in pharmaceuticals has begun. The acidification of the ocean threatens many species, including the stunning sea butterfly.

   Metaphor in motion

The Ocean Endevour ploughs through the Antarctic ice, with the occasional humpback whale gliding along the waves for company. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Witnessing this fragile beauty under threat remains inaccessible to many travellers since it requires heavy resources and a will to leave only the lightest trace. When the treaty is renegotiated in 2048, Antarctica may depend entirely on the stories of a small handful of people: from the musings of the explorers’ logs and the measurements of a few scientists to the poet’s imagination.

One of those scientists was William Wales, an astronomer on James Cook’s Resolution, which crossed the Antarctic Circle three times in 1773. Wales later taught mathematics at Christ’s School in London, where the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a pupil. It is perhaps no coincidence that Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, set in the Antarctic seas, speculates about this mysterious, seemingly supernatural place. A rime is both a crust of ice, and an archaic spelling of rhyme—a play on words that points to the artist’s search for the clarity of meaning, emerging out of the fog of language.

And through the drifts the snowy clifts

Did send a dismal sheen:

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—

The ice was all between

Antarctica is a place where the scientific gives way to the metaphysical and beauty blurs with terror.

Perhaps it is like a poem: tipping reality ever so slightly, then the symmetry, then again.

ORIENTATION

The Drake Passage is the ocean between South America and the Antarctic Peninsula. The Antarctic Peninsula is the northern tip of the Antarctic continent, which contains the South Pole.

GETTING THERE

British Airways has daily flights from Delhi and Mumbai to Buenos Aires, with a stopover in a European gateway city like London or Madrid. No transit visa is required if the traveller holds a U.S. visa.

From Buenos Aires, there are three daily flights to the southernmost city of Argentina, Ushuaia. A morning flight is preferred, so that you can purchase last minute gear items in Ushuaia before boarding the ship at the harbour to set sail late afternoon.

VISA

Indians can apply for visa at the Embassy of Argentina in Delhi (eindi.cancilleria.gov.ar/en) or the consulate office in Mumbai (https://ift.tt/2L8uyx0). The visa application form can be downloaded from eindi.mrecic.gov.ar/en. The application must be submitted in person, and an interview is mandatory. The visa is free for Indian tourists but the process takes about 21 working days.

STAY

Buenos Aires has a few small hotels in vibrant neighbourhoods and a few more business-ready five star hotels. Usually, the ship offers a package that includes the latter, but if you prefer something quaint at your own cost, head to The Clubhouse (clubhouseba.com) in the young, hip Palermo or the home (https://ift.tt/2MxkvVz), a French-Scandanavian inspired boutique hotel.

Seals find an unlikely resting spot amid the remains at Deception Island. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

NEED TO KNOW

– The writer travelled to Antarctica with Ibex Expeditions (www.ibexexpeditions.com; 10-day expedition from $6,000/Rs3,90,390).

-The ship provides the vital outer shell—a thick water- and wind-proof jacket—and waterproof boots. Base and mid layers are for you to arrange. A good sun cream and polarised sunglasses are essential.

– Travelling in Nov-Dec is recommended for the lovely night skies, and Jan-March is a good time to see the whales.

– You cannot take luggage heavier than 15 kg each plus a handbag aboard, but you can leave a bag in Buenos Aires and consolidate.

– Natural soaps are recommended as the expedition is 100% Leave No Trace.

– Acupuncture sea bands and homeopathy is highly recommended for sea-sickness.

READ

Antarctica: Secrets of the Southern Continent, edited by David McGonigal is a large, coffee-table book so you can’t take it with you, but it covers everything from the place’s history to its current status and details of penguins, glaciers, and albatross.

We Mammals in Hospitable Times has some surreal poems that are a result of the six weeks Jynne Dilling Martin spent in Antarctica.

The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard, the youngest member of Scott’s expedition to the South Pole is a first-hand account of the ill-fated expedition. It’s lyrical, foreboding and written with an attention to storytelling.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing recounts the most famous Antarctic explorer, Ernest Shackleton’s fatal journey to the South Pole.

(function(d, s, id) var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.5&appId=440470606060560"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); (document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

from Cheapr Travels https://ift.tt/2L1Cal3 via https://ift.tt/2NIqXKN

[topfygad]

Voyage to a White Mars

The mythologies of Antarctica mimic those of outer space.

  Being aboard a vessel in Antarctica is full of potentialities. One never knows when a gentoo penguin, or a large colony of them, might come into view. For the writer, travelling with Irish wildlife guide and ornithologist, Jim Wilson, meant understanding the continent in all its surprises and complexities. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

A lenticular cloud loomed. The wind swirled its stillness into the shape of a UFO, like a potter pinching, pressing, pulling her clay. Below, an iceberg emerged out of the blue. The wind chaffed its creviced sides, causing an infinitesimal inclination. At first, it wavered, then insisted on itself, tipping back in place.

A 105 years after Roald Amundsen reached the South Pole, I set sail from Ushuaia in Argentina, towards Antarctica on the Drake Passage, known colloquially as the Drake Shake or Drake Lake, depending on the state of the seas.

Watching the sea and the sky, I thought about the myth of the North, of Njörðr, the Norse god of ships and seafaring, and the fur-clad female warriors that came riding through the sky. But the South did not so easily yield such stories. In the absence of human life beyond the boat, I was left imagining the superstitions of the early explorers, whose journal entries began with scientific logs and ended with ruminations on being.

The ocean was infinite, vanishing points everywhere with no object in sight to give perspective or scale, save the occasional albatross or petrel swerving above. The waves lashed, 37 feet high and perpetual. For several days, life on our 450-foot ship was led at a 60º angle. It was laughable, till we adjusted to it. We sought balance without denying the tilt.

  Routine Surprises

In the starkness of Antarctica, a Zodiac raft stops in awe and passengers in their yellow jackets realise their scale against the breathing, blue ice. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

On the bridge, the ship’s control room where silence was mandatory, the stoic Romanian captain charted the wind, which was sinuous. Signals criss-crossed, buttons beeped, screens blinked, maps were uncreased, and binoculars lay on hand. The captain looked out with attention but let out a whisper a notch louder than was allowed. He had spotted a fin whale. Even after a decade of Antarctic travel, he could still surprise himself.

Then, the sun burned through the mist. Mountains rose from the ocean’s helm. When the first iceberg, almost a kilometre high from base to tip, emerged, I gasped. This would only be the overture. For the next 10 days, every iceberg seemed more spectacular than the last. I began to reckon with the history of the search for the continent from 300 B.C. when Aristotle hypothesised that a mythic southern continent must exist, based simply in the rationale of equilibrium. Antarctica was named by Aristotle, from Greek anti and arks, meaning ‘opposite the bear’, the name for the constellation under which the Arctic lay. Time here exists at scales that far transcend those we can grasp. The older, denser bits of ice were a piercing sapphire. I understood the captain’s joy: Even after 10 years of navigating the Antarctic, its stark intensity could not become customary.

And yet, life on the ship assumed a routine. Daylight dimmed and our clocks trudged on. After breakfast, we would head to the mud room, where our boots and jackets hung, and proceed to undertake the painstaking routine of covering our bodies—head to toe—in layers of warm clothing. My skin had become parched. We looked absurd, brushing against fleeces, scrambling for camera bags and yanking at the straps of our life vests. We would vacuum our clothes of any invasive particles and disembark onto Zodiacs (inflatable rafts) in groups of eight to explore a corner of the continent.

Once we stopped to see a seal eating another seal; another time we were suddenly surrounded by colonies of gentoo penguins. We spotted a shipwreck lodged in rock, and imagined the self-contained life of those posted at research stations pre-war. Everything was surreal, ungraspable, cosmic. On one landing, we saw a patch of green—Antarctic lichen—and it reminded us that we were on Earth. We hadn’t seen green in days.

  Disturbances at a distance

The writer at Deception Island, amid the remains of buildings and whaling equipment. Whaling began here since the early 1900s and continued till circa 1931. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Later, when I visited my library to scour maps of Antarctica, the index read: “The World; Africa, Asia, Middle East, E. Asia, Europe, U.S.A., Pacific; Moon, Mars and Antarctica.” The continent has been called a “White Mars” and this is not an exaggeration: it is notoriously the coldest, driest, windiest landmass, 98 per cent of which is covered in ice. Even in the summer, the average temperature is -27°C. Its extremes manifest in its fauna as well: the largest terrestrial animal is a midge, a wingless insect that has the tiniest genome ever sequenced. There are no indigenous people, and therefore no government, culture, history or art.

In fact, the geopolitics of the continent are not dissimilar to outer space, its laws bound only to an indeterminate Antarctic treaty—the first arms control established during the Cold War—banning activity that causes “harmful interferences” and promoting “peaceful exploration.” At Concordia Station, doctor and researcher Alexander Kumar noted that, “We are completely alone and isolated here from February to November. The French refer to people who over-winter here as Hivernauts, but unlike astronauts, we have no ‘mission control’.”

It’s far away, it’s cold, it’s uninhabitable. So why do we care? For one, because the poles function as a thermostat: the Earth retains heat at the Equator and loses it at the poles. The Arctic and the Antarctic regulate the temperature of the entire planet. It is also the container of about 70 per cent of the world’s fresh water, while in the rest of the world, one person in eight does not have access to this resource. And also because its sublime beauty may be unlike anywhere else on Earth.

Like the realm of outer space, Antarctica is still being discovered. Its exploration is, in large part, funded by vested private interests looking for potential mines of diminishing natural resources. Climate change is causing a loss of land and sea ice, which will reveal new sources of oil, gas, minerals and arable land. Fishing for commercial purposes as well as for polar microbes that may be used in pharmaceuticals has begun. The acidification of the ocean threatens many species, including the stunning sea butterfly.

   Metaphor in motion

The Ocean Endevour ploughs through the Antarctic ice, with the occasional humpback whale gliding along the waves for company. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

Witnessing this fragile beauty under threat remains inaccessible to many travellers since it requires heavy resources and a will to leave only the lightest trace. When the treaty is renegotiated in 2048, Antarctica may depend entirely on the stories of a small handful of people: from the musings of the explorers’ logs and the measurements of a few scientists to the poet’s imagination.

One of those scientists was William Wales, an astronomer on James Cook’s Resolution, which crossed the Antarctic Circle three times in 1773. Wales later taught mathematics at Christ’s School in London, where the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a pupil. It is perhaps no coincidence that Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, set in the Antarctic seas, speculates about this mysterious, seemingly supernatural place. A rime is both a crust of ice, and an archaic spelling of rhyme—a play on words that points to the artist’s search for the clarity of meaning, emerging out of the fog of language.

And through the drifts the snowy clifts

Did send a dismal sheen:

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—

The ice was all between

Antarctica is a place where the scientific gives way to the metaphysical and beauty blurs with terror.

Perhaps it is like a poem: tipping reality ever so slightly, then the symmetry, then again.

ORIENTATION

The Drake Passage is the ocean between South America and the Antarctic Peninsula. The Antarctic Peninsula is the northern tip of the Antarctic continent, which contains the South Pole.

GETTING THERE

British Airways has daily flights from Delhi and Mumbai to Buenos Aires, with a stopover in a European gateway city like London or Madrid. No transit visa is required if the traveller holds a U.S. visa.

From Buenos Aires, there are three daily flights to the southernmost city of Argentina, Ushuaia. A morning flight is preferred, so that you can purchase last minute gear items in Ushuaia before boarding the ship at the harbour to set sail late afternoon.

VISA

Indians can apply for visa at the Embassy of Argentina in Delhi (eindi.cancilleria.gov.ar/en) or the consulate office in Mumbai (https://ift.tt/2L8uyx0). The visa application form can be downloaded from eindi.mrecic.gov.ar/en. The application must be submitted in person, and an interview is mandatory. The visa is free for Indian tourists but the process takes about 21 working days.

STAY

Buenos Aires has a few small hotels in vibrant neighbourhoods and a few more business-ready five star hotels. Usually, the ship offers a package that includes the latter, but if you prefer something quaint at your own cost, head to The Clubhouse (clubhouseba.com) in the young, hip Palermo or the home (https://ift.tt/2MxkvVz), a French-Scandanavian inspired boutique hotel.

Seals find an unlikely resting spot amid the remains at Deception Island. Photo by Himali Singh Soin.

NEED TO KNOW

– The writer travelled to Antarctica with Ibex Expeditions (www.ibexexpeditions.com; 10-day expedition from $6,000/Rs3,90,390).

-The ship provides the vital outer shell—a thick water- and wind-proof jacket—and waterproof boots. Base and mid layers are for you to arrange. A good sun cream and polarised sunglasses are essential.

– Travelling in Nov-Dec is recommended for the lovely night skies, and Jan-March is a good time to see the whales.

– You cannot take luggage heavier than 15 kg each plus a handbag aboard, but you can leave a bag in Buenos Aires and consolidate.

– Natural soaps are recommended as the expedition is 100% Leave No Trace.

– Acupuncture sea bands and homeopathy is highly recommended for sea-sickness.

READ

Antarctica: Secrets of the Southern Continent, edited by David McGonigal is a large, coffee-table book so you can’t take it with you, but it covers everything from the place’s history to its current status and details of penguins, glaciers, and albatross.

We Mammals in Hospitable Times has some surreal poems that are a result of the six weeks Jynne Dilling Martin spent in Antarctica.

The Worst Journey in the World by Apsley Cherry-Garrard, the youngest member of Scott’s expedition to the South Pole is a first-hand account of the ill-fated expedition. It’s lyrical, foreboding and written with an attention to storytelling.

Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing recounts the most famous Antarctic explorer, Ernest Shackleton’s fatal journey to the South Pole.

(function(d, s, id) var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.5&appId=440470606060560"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); (document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));

from Cheapr Travels https://ift.tt/2L1Cal3 via IFTTT