Old Singapore: Shutters,Window, Floors and Door Details

Singapore, the old parts,  those that are renovated into blandness, has a wealth of finely detailed doors,  a panetone panoply of shutters, floors to gaze upon, and windows, fanlight, coloured glass panels, French,, casement and double-hung, all these from temples and shop houses in Chinatown. Worth walking round, strolling or, here, scrolling.

 

A Morning Walk Up Mount Phusi in Luang Prabang

Go early, Luang Prabang will be quietly getting on with things, and it will only be small groups going up the variously reported three hundred and thirty three, or three hundred and twenty six stairs, if like me, you are not so keen on edges where the way down is sudden, take the inside path when passing.  The statues, the shrines, the lacquered carved doors, the view and finally right up the top the doubled fellow in his tiger stripped robes and hat, are well worth the stair count, but don’t rush, stare, and then look closer, before considering the Mekong River, the Nam Khan, and further off the green hills. 

 

Three Men and a Boat - to say nothing of the dogs

Preparing for Luang Prabang’s Lantern Festival takes some Monk power - and here with a little nod to Jerome K Jerome’s classic novel about river trips, and a numerical sleight of hand - there are really four men here,  who are taking their vessel for lantern travel to higher ground. The dogs,  delighted escorts,  seem to know the way, but that is the uncanniness of canines. 
 

Laotian Market Graphics at Luang Prabang Morning Market

For graphic layout the marketeers at the lovely Luang Prabang morning market have a sharp eye for colour and pattern, managing to make even two fish look stylish. And yes, those crabs parcelled up for an easy exit or- and here I veer into the silly, as neat evening purses. This is something of a scroll-a-t-on, but hey food for thought. And pure Treasure. 

 

Three Birds in the Hand - And One in a Tree

 Or should that be three birds on the shelf?  Or One Wooden bird meets two paper birds?  Or should a handy bird sit on the shelf? Like me these three insider birds have been waiting for the outside birds - see below - to hatch their eggs.  It seems that the incubation time has past and the eggs - with the sad exception of one that was blown off in a perfectly dreadful stormy night three weeks ago - and the dutiful tawny  frogmouth will not have chicks.  Still maybe next year. 

Reasons to Walk to The Twelve Apostles

Walking in September along the  Great Ocean Walk is an an up and down, rain coat on and off, up and over felled trees encounter with the drama of this coast, a push against headwinds, a sometimes ethereal float through forest paths, but always one is heading towards these stone pillars,  always the sea is wide  foam fo white water, the headlands limestone softened by distance and ascending sea spray.  What is wet and cold one hour, more than splendid the next.