@Night: Idyllwild

Idyllwild is a quaint, little mountain town less than 2 hours drive north of San Diego. Located in the San Bernardino National Forest at an elevation of around 6000 feet, Idyllwild offers the perfect getaway for one and all. Idyllwild boasts a nice creek running through the town, many hiking trails, art galleries and excellent restaurants for foodies.

For 2 days during the Labor day weekend, I enjoyed the pristine Idyllwild night skies. There was absolutely no light pollution and millions of stars were winking back at me. For the first time ever, I was able to see the Milky Way with my naked eyes :).

Of course, my camera saw better than me!  Enjoy these photos in full screen mode.

Bridge over the tall Pines!!!
The Summer Triangle, Brocchi's cluster, the Scutum Star Cloud, Messier 24, Delphinus and many other constellations
are visible in this single frame.  When you look at the right side bottom corner of this photo,
you are looking towards the center of our Galaxy.

The "Great Rift" of the milky Way is visible at the center of this shot.

Mysterious Stonehenge !!!

Is it a burial site, a place of worship, a healing site, an astronomy calendar to keep track of the Sun and the Moon or an alien landing site ???  Listed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, located in Wiltshire county, 90 miles west of London, Stonehenge draws millions of visitors from all over the world, every year. 

The stones in Stonehenge are arranged in 2 concentric circles  and 2 horseshoe shapes. The outermost  circle of stones is usually visible in all the ground level photos. The stones used are called Sarsen stones and Bluestones ranging in height from 13 feet to 24 feet, weighing from 25 tons to 50 tons. The stones are believed to have been transported from quarries 50 to 100 miles away. 

Information Brochure from "English Heritage", an organization which maintains the Stonehenge.

The larger outer circle is made up of  2 stone pillars and a lintel on the top.

Stonehenge has created lot of interest among archaeologists. Surrounding the Stonehenge many burial sites have been unearthed. In addition, Stonehenge is aligned with the exact direction of the Midsummer Sunrise and mid winter Sunset. Here are some funny interpretations of the Stonehenge:

Aliens visiting ???

One theory on how the Stonehenge might have been built :))

We may never learn the actual reason the Stonehenge was built and who built it. How did the builders move 50 ton stones from 100 miles away? With our recent (200 years of) advances in engineering and technology, we tend to think that our ancestors were incapable of building such super structures (like the Stonehenge, Machu Picchu,  the Easter Island statues and many ancient temples in India) and try to come up with theories on how they could have completed such engineering marvels. I think this is a mistake :) I am slowly but surely starting to believe that many cultures around the world were much more advanced in knowledge than we are today!!! 

Inferno !!!

Dan Brown, the master of "Symbolism" has written yet another scorching thriller, "Inferno".

Even though I absolutely enjoy his novels, I had always felt that Dan Brown has a formula:

• use one of the Italian cities as the backdrop for the story
• weave in in a famous Italian artist/painter and his paintings 
• come up with clever symbols and hidden meanings associated with these symbols
• add a villain out to do something really bad 
• throw in a beautiful female character as the heroine 
• of course, the hero, the Harvard Professor, Robert Langdon - who lives in Boston :)
• add some thrilling escapes through secret tunnels

This formula looks very simple and can become boring if repeated many times. Having read his previous bestsellers, "The Da Vinci Code" and "Angels and Demons" (which fit in to the above formula very well), I thought this novel may not be that interesting!!!

Dan Brown has proved me wrong and has cleverly spun a tale that hooks in the reader with plenty of twists and turns. I completed the big-size, 480 pages novel within 4 days. I simply can't put the book down.

The story starts in Florence, Italy and then moves to Venice, the 2 cities we absolutely enjoyed during our 2006 Europe trip.  The fact that we had visited the places and enjoyed the paintings in the story made me personally part of the story. Thanks to Dan Brown, as I was reading the novel, I pulled out the Florence and Venice photos and was referring to them.

In his first book, "The Da Vinci Code", of course, the associated artist was Leonardo Da Vinci. In this book it is the Italian Poet "Dante Alighieri, more famously known as Dante.  In Italian language, "Inferno" means "Hell" and is the first part of a 3 part poem in Dante's work "The Divine Comedy".

Hoping that you would read the book, I am not going to give away the story. Instead, I have included the photos I took in Florence and Venice, of places and paintings that play an important role in this novel.

Florence: "The Duomo", the one place no tourist to Florence would want to miss

Florence: The Duomo, The Tower and the octagon shaped Baptistery where a major breakthrough happens in the novel. 

Florence: The golden doors of the Baptistery. Something unthinkable happens at this door in the novel !!!

Florence: Vasari's fresco, "The Last Judgement" (started painting in 1568), inside the dome of the "The Duomo". 

Florence: The famous painting, "Purgatory, hell and Paradise" in side the Duomo.
Dante, with his poem "The Divine Comedy". His famous description of the hell is on the left side and
the city of Florence is on the right side.

Florence: Palazzo Vecchio (opened in 1299) at Piazza Della Signoria. Action packed part of the novel happens inside.

Florence: The entrance of Palazzo Vecchio  with a replica of Michelangelo's famous
David (of David & Goliath) statue on the left side.

Florence: The Ponte Vecchio bridge with Vasari's Corridor on the top! 

Venice: The Grand Canal

Venice: The historic and beautiful, Rialto bridge (earlier version built in 1181 and the current built in 1591)
over the Grand Canal.

Venice: Basilica at Piazza San Marco.

Venice: Close up view of the Basilica entrance. The horse statues at the top are part of  the symbolic clue in the novel!

Venice: Masks in a mask shop. The novel revolves around Dante's mask!!!

Thanks to Dan Brown, this novel has rekindled my passion and desire to visit Italy, again!!! The novel's climax happens in Istanbul, Turkey, making me wanting to visit Turkey too :))

Scenic San Diego !!!

Not a single day goes by without me thanking God for giving us the opportunity to live and enjoy life in beautiful and sunny San Diego! With multiple families visiting us over the last few weeks, it is such a joy to take them to these scenic places in San Diego.

Self-Realization Center's(established by Paramahamsa Yogananda in 1937)  "Meditation Gardens" at  Encinitas.

Pelicans returning home. Del Mar beach.

Julian, mountain town just an hour east of San Diego

Tidepool at Point Loma, San Diego.

Looking for marine life forms at the Tidepool.

Chiton at the Tidepool

Snails at Tidepool

Keyhole Limpet at Tidepool

What do you call a group of Pelicans? According to San Diego zoo, they are called a "pod " :))

My own little Planet !

If we have eyes at the back of our head also, may be, this is how we will see :))

My first attempt at 360 degree Panorama at Mission Bay, San Diego.
Fiesta Island is at the bottom, Mission Hills is on the left.
The building is part of Hilton Resort & Spa.

Lord Of the Rings!

As seen from the earth, Saturn appears to wobble with a period of approximately 14 years.  This is an illusion. Each planet's orbital plane around the Sun is different and is inclined at at various angles.Saturn takes around 30 "Earth years" to make one orbit around the Sun. Our own earth's orbit, crosses Saturn's orbit once every 14 years. During these "Ring plane crossings",  Saturn's rings just look like a thin line across Saturn.

                This graphic nicely illustrates how Saturn's rings appear from earth from 1993-2020.

The last 2 "Ring plane crossings" were in 1995 & 2009.

Here are my photos of Saturn at various times from 2005 to 2013,
taken through a camera attached to my telescope.

Jan. 15, 2005, Boston. The rings  appear wide open and reflect maximum Sun light.
Photo taken during the middle of a cold winter. My finger tips were frozen!!! :)

June 21, 2008, San Diego. 9 months before the 2009 Ring plane crossing.
The rings appear almost as a straight line.
In San Diego, I didn't have to worry about frozen fingers! :))

May 1, 2013, San Diego. Rings appear to be opening up!

More than 400 years ago, in 1610, when Galileo turned his primitive telescope towards Saturn, he thought he saw an object made of 3 stars and recorded it as shown in the image on the left.  Two years later, when Saturn's rings became thin, his telescope didn't show the rings and he recorded that the companions had vanished :))






Saturn is almost a billion miles from earth. Though I have seen Saturn countless times, I never get tired of viewing and enjoying it through my telescope.

Maui: Humpbacks & "Honu"s

Almost all the coastal cities in USA have "Whale Watching" rides where you get on a boat and go deep in to the ocean to watch the whales during their north-south-north migration every year. In Maui,  we were watching the whales everyday, right from the shores. It is an awesome sight to watch these 45 feet long mammals, weighing 45 tons, breach the water and fall back in to the ocean, making massive splashes.

Humpback Whales:

The North Pacific Humpback whales, start from Alaska around September, travel around 3000 miles in 2 months and call Hawaii as their home from December to May. A group of these whales visit California and Baja California (Mexico). The Humpbacks visit south mainly for breeding and birthing. It is interesting to know that they don't eat in the warm tropical waters and eat only the Krill fish in the icy cold waters of Alaska. Each year, thousands of whales make this 6000 miles round-trip! 

Breaching:  The whale leaps up from the water,
does a 180 degree turn andlands on its back
with a huge splash.

The Humpback doing a "Fluke up Dive"

The huge splash after a whale's breaching.

Honu:

The Hawaiian Sea Turtle is called as Honu by the natives. These turtles are 4 to 5 feet in length and stay close to the shores. Two of these turtles were always hovering near our condo and we were hoping they would get out of the waters - but they never did!

The Turtle picture you often see in a Hawaiian Shirt

Maui, India :))

Hawaii is closer to the "Tropic of Cancer" and I definitely expected Maui to be very tropical. But, in many, many ways Maui exceeded that expectation and took me closer to home! As we pulled out  of the airport with the rental car, the first thing that caught my attention was a chicken running across the road!  :))

Sugarcane fields

Sugarcane fields:
The flight from San Diego started its descent slowly with a beautiful view of long stretches and squares and squares of Sugarcane fields. Maui has a long history of Sugarcane farming and it is still a major activity.


Sugar Cane  Juice:
Everyday, we were drove by this juice stand/van at the side of the road. One day, I pulled over and ordered the Sugarcane juice.When the lady asked me if I would  like to have a dash of Ginger and Lime with it, I was instantly transported to our village, Kattalaicherry!!! Decades ago, one summer, Sekar, Shankar, Visu,Mani, Govinda, Selvi anni, Jamuna akka and Latha got in to bullock carts and made a trip to Kattalicherry village.

Waiting for Sugar Cane juice!

The workers in Chinna Thatha's farm were making அச்சு  வெல்லம், squeezing the Sugarcanes using a hand cranked machine, boiling the juice and pouring it over small rectangle wholes made in huge wooden planks. Chinna Thatha asked the workers to add lime juice and ginger juice to the freshly squeezed Sugarcane juice and we all drank it up. The Maui Sugarcane juice was good but in no way came closer to Kattalaicherry Sugarcane juice!!!

Shoe flowers:
The red, pink and yellow "shoe flowers" ( செம்பருத்தி ) in Maui reminded me of the செம்பருத்தி tree we had in the backyard of our old home in Koranad. As a kid, I used to pluck these flowers and bring them in and Thatha would use them for his daily pooja.

Banyan Tree:

Right in the center of the busy shopping area of the town of Lahaina, there is a huge Banyan tree. This Banyan tree is a gift from India to the "Lahaina Protestant Mission" and was planted by the local sheriff on April 24th, 1873. This tree, tagged as the biggest Banyan tree in USA,  has spread out with multiple roots and is a huge attraction to Maui visitors. It was really interesting to know that during Christmas holidays, the whole tree is decorated with colorful lights!

Mangoes:
 Mango tress were all over Maui.  Just like back home, we saw Mango trees in parking lots, in home gardens, while driving by and in the fields of the Buddhist,  Jodo mission in Lahaina.

Road side stalls selling Mangoes, Papayas and Sugarcane.

Banana Flower:
Who doesn't like the yummy Banana flower curry!!! Sheila was about to steal this...but she realized that Hawaii airport folks check for smuggled agricultural products before boarding the plane and dropped the idea :))

Coconut:
On our day on "The road to Hana", we passed through many small villages with road side stalls selling food, flowers, papayas, mangoes and coconuts. At one of the shops, we enjoyed sweet coconut water from fresh and huge tender coconuts. The guy selling the coconut said he never gives drinking straws and we drank it straight up!!!

With Sugarcane, Shoe flowers, Banyan tree, Mangoes, small Bananas, Banana flowers, Coconuts, Palm tress, Papayas, Pineapples and huge Croton plants we all felt at home at Maui!!!