NIGHT

Having the Yarra River course its way through our city is quite marvellous as it affords beautiful vistas along its length. By night, some magical reflections can be seen in the City as the lights come on. These views are taken from Southbank, an entertainment and residential precinct.

This post is part of the Wordless Wednesday meme,

and also part of the ABC Wednesday meme.

LUXENBOURG

Luxembourg (Luxembourgish: Lëtzebuerg; German: Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, is a landlocked country in western Europe. It is bordered by Belgium to the west and north, Germany to the east, and France to the south. Its capital Luxembourg City is together with Brussels and Strasbourg one of the three official capitals of the European Union and seat of the European Court of Justice, highest juridical instance in the EU.

Its culture, people and languages are highly intertwined with its neighbours, making it essentially a mixture of French and Germanic cultures. The repeated invasions by its neighbour countries, especially in World War II, resulted in the country’s strong will for mediation between France and Germany and led to the foundation of the European Union. It comprises two principal regions: The Oesling in the north as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland (“Good Land”) in the south.

With an area of 2,586 square kilometres it is one of the smallest sovereign states in Europe (about the same size as the state of Rhode Island or the English county of Northamptonshire). Luxembourg had a population of 524,853 in October 2012, ranking it the 8th least-populous country in Europe. As a representative democracy with a constitutional monarch, it is headed by a grand duke, Henri, Grand Duke of Luxembourg, and is the world’s only remaining grand duchy.

Luxembourg is a developed country, with an advanced economy and the world's highest GDP (PPP) per capita, according to the United Nations in 2014. Its central location has historically made it of great strategic importance to numerous powers, dating back to its founding as a Roman fortress, its hosting of a vital Frankish castle during the Early Middle Ages, and its role as a bastion for the Spanish Road between the 16th and 17th centuries.

Luxembourg is a founding member of the European Union, OECD, United Nations, NATO, and Benelux, reflecting its political consensus in favour of economic, political, and military integration. The city of Luxembourg, which is the country’s capital and largest city, is the seat of several institutions and agencies of the EU. Luxembourg served on the United Nations Security Council for the years 2013 and 2014, which was a first in the country’s history. In 2016, Luxembourgish citizens had visa-free or visa-on-arrival access to 172 countries and territories, ranking the Luxembourgian passport 6th in the world, tied with states like Canada or Switzerland.

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Travel Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

SEGOVIA, SPAIN

Segovia is a city in the autonomous region of Castile and León, Spain. The city is famous for its historical buildings and for three main landmarks: Its magnificent Roman aqueduct, its cathedral, one of the last Gothic temples to be built in Europe, and the castle, which was an influence for Walt Disney's Cinderella Castle. The city centre of Segovia was declared World Heritage by the Unesco in 1985. It is the capital of Province of Segovia.

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme,

and also part of the Blue Monday meme,

and also part of the Through my Lens meme,

and also part of the Seasons meme.

FED SQUARE, MELBOURNE

Federation Square in Melbourne's CBD, is a mixed-use development in the inner city, covering an area of 3.2 hectares and centred on two major public spaces: Open squares (St. Paul's Court and The Square) and one covered (The Atrium), built on top of a concrete deck above busy railway lines. It is located at the intersection between Flinders Street and Swanston Street/St Kilda Road in Melbourne's Central Business District, adjacent to Melbourne's busiest railway station.

The geometric shapes that make up the buildings of Fed Sq are not only an external decorative feature, but they figure prominently in the architectural construction of the buildings and covered spaces within.

This post is part of the My Sunday Best meme,

and also part of the Photo Sunday meme.

CAT

A neighbour's cat having a lazy day at home...

This post is part of the Saturday Critters meme,
and also part of the Camera Critters meme.

WERRIBEE WEATHER CHANGE

Autumn is a season with much variation in the day-to-day weather and quite sudden changes in temperature with sometimes a rain shower developing as skies darken with threatening clouds in a few minutes. This has given Melbourne a reputation for changeable weather, and the saying maligning it: "If you get all four seasons in one day, you must be in Melbourne."

This post is part of the Skywatch Friday meme,

and also part of the Friday Photo Journal meme.

ANTHURIUM

Anthurium (Schott, 1829), is a large genus of about 600–800 (possibly 1,000) species of flowering plants, belonging to the arum family (Araceae). Anthurium can also be called "flamingo flower" or "boy flower", both referring to the structure of the spathe and spadix.

Anthurium was discovered in 1876 in Colombia. TROPICOS lists 1901 types, although some of these are duplicates. It is one of the largest and probably the most complex genera of this family; certainly it is one of the most variable. Many species are undoubtedly not yet described and new ones are being found every year.

The genus has neotropical distribution; mostly in wet tropical mountain forest of Central and South America, but some in semi-arid environments. Most species occur in Panama, Colombia, Brazil, the Guiana Shield and Ecuador. According to the work of noted aroid botanist Dr. Tom Croat of the Missouri Botanical Garden, no members of this genus are indigenous to Asia. Deliberately or accidentally, however, some species have been introduced into Asian rain forests, and have become established there as aliens.

This post is part of the Floral Friday Fotos meme.

MEXICAN MARIONETTES

Mexican marionettes making mellow mariachi music & meditating mortality...

This post is part of the Wordless Wednesday meme,
and also part of the ABC Wednesday meme.

MYCENAE, GREECE

Mycenae (Greek: Μυκῆναι Mykēnai or Μυκήνη Mykēnē) is an archaeological site in Greece, located about 90 kilometres southwest of Athens, in the north-eastern Peloponnese. Argos is 11 kilometres to the south; Corinth, 48 kilometres to the north. From the hill on which the palace was located, one can see across the Argolid to the Saronic Gulf. In the second millennium BC, Mycenae was one of the major centres of Greek civilisation, a military stronghold which dominated much of southern Greece. The period of Greek history from about 1600 BC to about 1100 BC is called Mycenaean in reference to Mycenae. At its peak in 1350 BC, the citadel and lower town had a population of 30,000 and an area of 32 hectares.

The Lion Gate, shown below, was the main entrance of the Bronze Age citadel of Mycenae. It was erected during the 13th century BC in the northwest side of the acropolis and is named after the relief sculpture of two lionesses in a heraldic pose that stands above the entrance. The Lion Gate is the sole surviving monumental piece of Mycenaean sculpture, as well as the largest sculpture in the prehistoric Aegean.

The Lion Gate is a massive and imposing construction, standing 3.10 m  wide and 2.95 m  high at the threshold. It narrows as it rises, measuring 2.78 m below the lintel. The opening was closed by a double door mortised to a vertical beam that acted as a pivot around which the door revolved. The gate itself consists of two great monoliths capped with a huge lintel that measures 4.5×2.0×0.8 m. Above the lintel, the masonry courses form a corbelled arch, leaving an opening that lightens the weight carried by the lintel. This relieving triangle is a great limestone slab on which two confronted lionesses carved in high relief stand on either sides of a central pillar. The heads of the animals were fashioned separately and are missing. The pillar, specifically, is a Minoan-type column that is placed on top of an altar-like platform that the lionesses rest their front legs on.

Beyond the gate and inside the citadel was a covered court with a small chamber, which probably functioned as a guard post. On the right, adjacent to the wall, was a building that has been identified as a granary because of the pithoi (great earthenware jars) found there containing carbonised wheat.

This post is part of the Our World Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Travel Tuesday meme,

and also part of the Wordless Wednesday meme.

FESTIVE APRIL

This post is part of the Mosaic Monday meme,
and also part of the Through my Lens meme,
and also part of the Seasons meme,
and also part of the Blue Monday meme.