A visit to the zoo

I love visitng the zoo here in Zürich, it's so beautiful, and now they've added a new enclosure - Australia, with the koalas as main attraction.

The emus and wallabies are free to roam and mingle with the visitors. The wallabies were a bit shy, though, and prefared to keep their distance. The emus, on the other hand, were very interested in investigating...

The elephants enjoyed some quality family time.

The Masoala hall is always a special place to visit. You never quite know what you're going to see. It's something different every time. But there's always something to see. And this little mouse lemur was just the sweetest little creature!

Mouse Lemur from Nordljus on Vimeo.

That plant must be especially delicious, because on our way back, we saw this little fellow. Usually, they just sit motionless upside down on tree trunks.

Gecko from Nordljus on Vimeo.

One of the animals you pretty much always see, is the chameleon. This time, we saw four different ones. What characters they are. And their colours, patterns and textures are just amazing.

The end of another wonderful day at the zoo, and one last glimpse back in the later afternoon light, before the zoo shut it's gate, and the animals got some well deserved peace and quiet.

The end of the heat wave and a visit to the local wildlife park

Ice lollies. They're basically what gets me through summer... I'm not a summer person at all, it's my least favourite season, and anything beyond 25 degrees Celsius is far too hot for me. But I think I'm not the only one who's glad that this heat wave is finally coming to an end. And my bronchitis has cleared up as well, at long last, last weekend, and I've got some energy back.
I've made some more banana kiwi lollies, but I also have some shop bought ones in the freezer. These melon and strawberry ones have been around for decades. The only ones of my favourite ice lollies that are still around. And I've eaten a lot of these this summer....

Cooking is also not something I feel like doing when it's 30+ degrees, and I usually don't know what to get and make. But this cucumber salad is perfect. Delicious and refreshing. I used to make cucumber salad with a "normal" salad dressing with vinegar and oil, but no matter how much herbs and salt I added, it always ended up watery and tasteless. This one is my Mum's recipe, I meant to ask her about it for ages, and now that I finally have, I immediately added it into my illustration recipe book, so that I won't forget it anymore. It still gets a bit watery, but it keeps its taste, and I love it.

During our holiday, we went to the nearby Wildlife park, which is always worth a visit. We didn't really expect to see many animals, it was a hot summer afternoon, and I expected most of the animals to hide in the shade and sleep. The enclosures are large and built to imitate the animals natural habitat as closely as possible, which means that there's plenty of room for them to be out of sight. But we were so spoilt, in fact, I don't think I've ever seen so many different animals in a single visit!

Moose are one of my favourite animals, and I'm always happy to see them, and what a treat to see them so close up! A big one was resting right next to the fence, and a small one was nibbling at the trees a few metres away.

Of course there's plenty of wildlife in the woods and grass along the paths as well.

The mouse house is always worth a visit. They are just so sweet. But rather hard to capture, they are so quick.

The shy and beautiful wildcats were also strolling around right in front of your eyes. Such gorgeous animals.

We were so lucky to see the bears not only once, but twice! They came all the way down from the woods to the water, I guess they were hot too and wanted to cool down.

Junior had a splash in the water...

Splashing from Nordljus on Vimeo.

... while mummy bear was just staying cool and relaxed.

After we came back to the café for an ice lolly, the bears came back too. They too wanted a little snack.

Feeding time from Nordljus on Vimeo.

We also saw the foxes, the alpine marmots, the wild boars, the bisons, including a baby bison!, the wild horses, and of course, the deer. But I didn't get many good photos, my wideangle/macro zoom lens is not really suited for animals. But it was a wonderful afternoon. We also went to the zoo, and I hope to share some photos from there next time.

A walk in the (Tier)park

A visit to the nearby wildlife park is always a great way to spend an afternoon. Many years ago, the park started to rebuild the outdated enclosures of the past to make them bigger and resembling the animals' natural habitat. This means that you not always see the animals. Which in turn means that there's always a good reason to go back again and again. Because you never know what you are going to see. All of the animals are, or have once been, native to this country.

The horses are some of the few animals that you always see. They are part of a programme that re-introduces the wild horses in Mongolia, where the became extinct decades ago. We were lucky to get to the fox enclosure at feeding time. A family of five, two adults and their three youngsters. Seeing a bear is always a privilege. My favourite anmials, though, are the moose, which this time were too far away in the woods for my camera this time.

But even if you don't see that many animals, a walk in the park (and a hot chocolate in the café/restaurant) is always a pleasure. There is so much else to see, if you look closely, and for every season, nature has a special display. And autumn is certainly one of my favourite, even if it was a bit early yet for the full autumnal colours.

Happy New Year

Wishing you all a very happy, healthy, successful and creative new year. 

May 2017 be a good one.

A foggy walk in the wildlife park

Saturday was a day to my liking. Thick fog gave everything a beautifully mystical touch, a perfect afternoon for a walk in the nearby wildlife park. I love that wildlife park that is so close to my home, and which I don't visit enough. My favourite animals there are the moose. But unfortunately, we didn't see any of the at all this time. Many of the animals seem to have decided that a foggy day wasn't a good day to spend outside, so we didn't get to see as many of them as usual. 

Before I left home, I finally managed to get a sharp shot of a bird feeding in the little birdhouse outside my bedroom window. I've been hiding and freezing behind the open window several times, but never got a decent shot until today. A sweet little bluetit came to pick some food.

The deers are always out and always make for great photos, especially that stag, who posed so nicely for me.

To see one of the wildcats so close up also was a very special treat. They're usually hiding in the back, and when they move, are so fast that it is almost impossible to get a nice photo.

The wild horses where out as well.

No moose in sight in this eclosure either, but the beautiful reflections in the pond made up for it.

And of course the trees. I love trees. The more the merrier.

A wonderful holiday, and some hand drawings

I'm back from my holiday, and what a wonderful time we had! When I left two weeks ago, I expected it to be wet and miserable, but I couldn't have been more wrong. Almost two weeks of not a rain drop in sight, and more often than not, not a single cloud in the sky either. What a pleasant surprise. We made the best of it, exploring new places along the Dorset coast, re-visiting some old favourites, and even went up to London for a day. I was able to completely switch off and forget about everything. So much so, that I actually had to call my Mum to ask her to go to my home and look up the pin code for my banc card, as I couldn't for the life of me remember it. Completely gone. Unfortunately, after having returned back home on Tuesday, and back to work on Wednesday, the whole relaxing holiday feeling has already disappeared completely, and all the daily negative stuff, that I so successfully managed to forget about, has swept back in one single big wave.

But anyway. I took a sketchbook and some drawing materials with me (and visited the local art shop more than once). I took my sketchbook and pens with me a couple of times, but it was either too windy or we were too busy exploring for any sketching to be done. But I managed to do a few drawings some of the evenings, when I wasn't too exhausted (and a couple of watercolour sketches, which turned out so bad that no one will ever see them. Except N, who has already seen them, and wasn't impressed with them either). I've been wanting to practice some hand drawing, and with not much else on hand, that's what I did.

Of course I took loads of photos with my DSLR, and even some with my Polaroid SX-70, and I still have to go through them all. I'll probably post a few photo posts soon, but here's just a couple of shots, one from Brownsea Island, where we met some lovely red squirrels, and one from Charmouth, where I just couldn't get enough of the reflections in the low tide water on the beach.

Red Squirrel, Brownsea Island, Dorset

Charmouth Beach, West Dorset

As my happy holiday feeling quickly disappeared already the day after I got back from my holiday, I decided to keep the memories alive and fresh by posting the Polaroids I took over the next days. I have 30 photos, so it's going to be 30 days of happy holiday memories. I'll post them on Instagram and Twitter, and maybe Facebook too. Follow me, if you like (my new Twitter account is looking very sorry follower-wise, and I'm still waiting to finally reach the 100 likes milestone on my Facebook page). #30daysofholidaymemories.

I'm linking up again to the lovely Paint Party Friday. I'm afraid I posted my last post while I was already on holiday, and as I wasn't used to N's notebook/laptop with no mouse, I had to give up trying to visit and comment. But I hope to be better again this week.

A little spring lamb in my journal

This sweet little lamb will no doubt have grown a lot since I took its photo earlier this spring (I posted the photo in my last Photo Sunday May post). And I've been wanting to paint it ever since. This week I finally got down to it. I chose to paint in my art journal again. I just wanted to play a little, without thinking too much, using only three colours (Ultramarine Blue, Raw Umber and Titanium White). The art journal is just perfect for this. I might try and paint it on canvas too, so having this little exercise in my journal will be helpful for that. 

I drew the little bell because of a remark that N. made when he saw the sheep photos. Here in Switzerland, it is usual for cows to wear bells ("Treichle"), wether they're up in the alps roaming their summer pastures (and preferably standing in the middle of the hiking paths), or in a small field next to the farm. A cow and a bell belong together like strawberries and cream. When he saw the sheep photos, he said "What, even your sheep wear bells!". Maybe it's not quite as common as with cows, but yes, sheep (and goats) wearing bells is certainly not an uncommon sight here. His remark just made me smile. For me, it's just so normal.

Happy Paint Party Friday!

Photo Sunday May

Happy Sunday!

Photo Sunday May

There are those special places. Places where you feel at peace, relaxed, free to breathe, and just generally happy and content. One of those places isn't too far from where I live, just on the other side of the small mountain. In 1953, Robert Seleger, a master gardener, discovered, among the rich green fields and pastures, a patch of hill more and planted a first rhododendron there. In the following years, he travelled the world to find rhodondrons, crossing them to grow plants of different colours hardy enough to survive the cold winters. The place grew into a beautiful garden, beautiful azaleas, rhododendrons, ferns, peonies and many more plants and trees as well as rivers, ponds, a little lake, bridges, and lots of soft pathes. The water lily ponds are home to hundreds of frogs a well as dragon flies and water snakes. The air is filled with the scent of flowers and the song of birds. A truly magical place. I went there with my Mum at the beginning of the week, and we picked just the perfect day. Not only the last warm and sunny day before another series of cold and rainy days, but also when the rhododendrons, azaleas and peonies were in full bloom. Of course I took loads of photos, and so for today, it's a bit of a photo overload. (You can find more information about this beautiful garden on their website).

Happy Sunday!