Lovely Llamas

I love this photo. This was towards the end of the Bolivian outback adventure, in the wide open plains between the salt flats and the town of Uyuni. This baby llama had wandered a little way away from its mother, but as our car got closer the mother came running. You can see above that her head has turned, just moments before she came to protect her baby.

I love the sky, I love the baby's little shadow. I love this photo.

Cheeky Coati

I wasn't sure I would see anything as unusual as the Machu Picchu critter on the rest of my travels in South America, but that wasn't quite the case. After spending spent many hours on a bus, I made it to Puerto Iguazu, home to the mammoth Iguazu Falls. As I've mentioned before, the falls are breathtaking, and the national park is huge, so walking around and round and up and down really builds up an appetite.

I had a ham roll in my backpack and after spotting some picnic tables, my travel buddies and I took a seat. We'd seen the signs advising not the feed the coatis, and to tell the truth, I didn't know what a coati was (at this point, still not knowing what the Machu Picchu critter had been). I thought it was probably a bird, since there are so many signs at home advising not to feed the ibis. But the signs also proclaimed that coatis can carry rabies, but still, I wasn't sure what to be on the lookout for. As we sat under the shade of the big umbrella enjoying our sandwiches, we spotted something heading towards us. It was dark brown with white stripes and looked like a furry anteater. That was when we realised what a coati was. The critter changed its course and I grabbed my camera and chased after it, at a safe distance of course. I snapped a couple of shots and went back to the table to finish my lunch.

Suddenly, there were four coatis, circling the table like sharks. Now when a sign has told you to be wary of rabid creatures, you don't take that lightly. We'd pulled our feet up onto our chairs, and were waiting for them to get bored and go away.

Then this cute little one approached the table, so much lighter in colour than the others, and not menacing-looking at all. A couple of seconds after I caught this moment, it sprung up on the table, grabbed the remaining half of my sandwich, jumped off the table and sped off, the others hightailing behind it.

Greedy little thing!

Anise, Atrice and Twitchy

I'm much more of a dog person that a cat person, but this has slowly been changing, after my bonding experience with Mangy in the Philippines, and now in Lebanon. We'd seen a fluffy cat wandering around the work compound and eventually we discovered that she'd had three kittens. It took a while to discover this as she'd been hiding out on the roof of one of the prefab containers our offices are in, but finally she brought them down. And promptly disappeared. We started giving them powdered milk (for babies) and named them Anise (meaning the friendly one), Atrice (the chubby one) and Twitchy (the scared one) once their personalities became clearer.

Atrice and Twitchy (pictured in front) would have nothing to do with us, other than hang around in the mornings waiting to be fed. Anise (pictured behind) on the other hand, was very sociable, and would spend hours sleeping on people's laps, or giving cuddles. It was winter time and quite chilly, so they would all pile on top of each other, or wrap their tails around each other to share warmth, like in the picture above. If you tried to approach Anise at this time, the others would bolt off, hissing as they ran.

One tragic morning, we were told that Anise was dead. It took a long time to confirm this, with different guards giving different stories, but in the end it was discovered that she was found outside, and appeared unharmed. We guessed it must have been a snake bite, or the cold. It was a very sad day for those of us who knew and loved Anise.

A couple of days later, an incredible thing happened. Twitchy stepped up and let himself be patted. We were shocked. But even more so, when a couple of hours later he was found curled up on a colleague's lap, sleeping soundly. We summised that he knew his sister had been the family breadwinner, encouraging us to feed them with her cuddly charms, and now that she was gone, someone else would need to fill her shoes. Twitchy remains as cuddly as ever, but some three months on, Atrice still won't come near us.

Slithering snake

Just the other day I was telling a friend about the wildlife in Australia. We talked about possums (noisy critters), Tasmanian Devils (nasty critters), dingos (killer critters), koalas (you wouldn't want to meet a male koala in a dark bush alley), and basically came to the conclusion that almost all Australia critters are deadly.

This little green tree snake however is not deadly I'm by no means a fan of snakes, and have luckily only come across one or two in the wild, this being one of them. In a nature reserve not far from my house, the ocean and a creek are divided by a beautiful headland, which has a lush canopy that lowers the temperature down a few degrees...a welcome respite in the Australian summer. There is plenty of wildlife hiding in the headland, and when I took a friend there one Christmas we spotted scrub turkeys, kookaburras and lizards. And this snake. I was heading towards this hand rail, to look over and enjoy the view below, but luckily my brother spotted the little snake (he wouldn't have been a metre a length) slowly slithering its way along the wood.

I snapped this photo (using a moderate zoom) and he quietly went on his wriggling way into the wilderness.

Hard work

A very recent tail to share, but not much of a tale. Just 2 days ago a group of friends journeyed to the north east of Lebanon to go for a bit of a hike and a picnic. Along the way, we drove through lots of tiny villages, where life was being led on the streets. There were people sitting outside cafes drinking coffee, butchers cutting off sides of meat, men greeting each other outside mosques, and all of this taking place on the side of the road.

The strength of donkeys never ceases to amaze me, and this one was no exception. He lumbered remarkably up the slight incline, with his owner struggling to keep up. Amazing what you can notice from the window of a minivan!

The Cats of Constantinople

I spent a few glorious days in Istanbul last year, and was amazed at the sheer number of healthy, shiny-coated cats in the streets. In other places I've lived and visited, the cats are the most pathetic creatures wandering the streets, all skin and bones, but not in Istanbul.

My wonderful travel buddy and I both marveled over these gorgeous felines, parading down little alleys, sitting on discarded armchairs, or investigating large potted plants. On this particular day we'd set out to find some funky boutiques and antique stores but alas, being a Sunday, everything was closed. We found ourselves in a maze of tiny streets, with shuttered windows, washing hanging on lines, and cats. Endless cats.

These two black cats were hanging out in an empty lot beside an antique store, and I wish I had a panorama view to share, because to the left there was another beautiful cat curled up on an armchair (which may make an appearance here at a later stage) and more to the right. There's definitely a calendar to be made of the cats of Istanbul!

Chinchillas chillin

I had a wonderful time traipsing around the ruins of Machu Picchu; exploring tiny corners, stooping to avoid hitting my head on low hanging doorways, and marveling at the ability of humans to build a city on top of a mountain without modern machinery. As I was winding my way up and down and back and forth through the ruins I noticed a small tourist group looking up and snapping away.

Of course I walked over and looked up to see what they saw. At that point in time, there was a single chinchilla sunning itself on top of an entryway. I thought that was pretty cool, snapped a photo of my own and carried on. I passed by the same spot again and the solo chinchilla had been joined by two others; calmly checking out all the tourists snaking through the maze of corridors from their higher vantage point. I kept thinking that they'd dart back into their cosy nook at any second, but I must have stood there for at least five minutes, and they barely moved a muscle.