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posts about telephoto lens.

this year, we travelled to the nordseeküste for another time. we had a very nice time, and fortunately, it was much cooler than inland. just around 25—30 degrees instead of 30—40 degrees... we enjoyed the high water a lot (it started in the morning when we arrived, and ended in the late afternoon when we left ­— perfect!), but also the wadden sea.

we were also able to see this year's total lunar eclipse, though it took some time until it was possible to see the darkened moon through the clouds.

we visited dat otto huus, a museum dedicated to east frisian comedian otto waalkes.

afterwards, we continued to norden, where we visited the seehundstation norddeich, where abandoned harbor seal pups are raised until they can be released back into the wild.

brier island is the westernmost point of nova scotia, a place you can only reach by taking two ferries. it has a beautiful harbor and features whale wathching tours, where we were finally able to see some whales, in this case humbpack whales. humpback whales are so majestic, except that their blow stinks ;)

the topmost tip of nova scotia is cape breton island, connected to the mainland by the canso causeway. on it, the cape breton highlands national park can be found, which is crossed by the cabot trail. we spent some time in the town of bay st. lawrence at the northern tip of the island.

we tried a whale watching tour in bay st. lawrence, but unfortunately weren't able to see any whales. what we did see were some northern gannets and seals, though:

back on the mainland we visited arisaig northumberland shore, a provincial park with old stone formations and some fossils.

we also visited cape shore on the south-west tip of the avalon peninsula.

cape shore hosts the cape st. mary's ecological reserve with its bird rock, which at this time of the year mostly hosts a northern gannet colony. it is really impressive to stand there and see all these birds sitting on the rocks, and a lot of them flying around you all the time.

the next town is st. bride's, a small fishertown where we stayed and enjoyed a beautiful sunset at the beach.

south of st. john's is the town of witless bay, where we stayed and also enojyed a puffin watching tour in the witless bay ecological reserve. another highlight is the ferryland lighthouse picnic, located near ferryland, where you can order a gourmet picnic in the old lighthouse and then enjoy it on the great landscape surrounding the landscape.

another gem can be found next to deer lake: the newfoundland insectarium. you can see many beautiful butterflies, local and non-local insects, a beehive, tarantulas, and much more. here's a selection of some butterflies:

this year, we also visisted oslo. we were lucky, and the weather was superb! sun all the time, it was really beautiful.

we did some excursions, namely to ulvøya in the south-east part of oslo, …

… to nesoddtangen, …

… and to the norsk folkemuseum on bygdøy.

finally, some shots of tjuvholmen by night:

after more than two years, we returned to the beautiful val bregaglia for vacation. again, we were staying in hotel helvetia in vicosoprano on the swiss side of the valley.

we stayed during the first of the two “chestnut weeks”, dedicated to edible chestnuts which are growing all over the valley. except on the day we arrived on and the first half day, the weather was really good!

we visited sils and chiavenna:

we again visited the chestnut forest in castasegna:

and we walked another part of the via panoramica, this time from soglio, and then descending to stampa:

also, again, we enjoyed some great culinary specialities. in particular, we enjoyed several meals (again) at hotel corona, where we also had the opportunity to meet the goats producing the milk for the wonderful goat cheese, which is part of our favorite tomato goat cheese salad. also the different pasta and meat dishes we had were fantastic. yeah well. if it wouldn’t be so far from here (5-6 hours by public transport, depending on how often you want to change trains), i’d guess we’d go there more often ;-)

last weekend, we visisted the zoo in zürich. we met with some friends and enjoyed a wonderful sunny day!