Up, close and personal

It has been some time since I posted pics of my nieces and nephew, so, since it is Xmas, here are my kiddies. Merry Xmas to all!

"In Sneffels Joculis craterem quem delibat Umbra Scartaris Julii intra calendas descende, Audax viator, et terrestre centrum attinges. Quod feci, Arne Saknussemm"
or, in plain english
"Descend, bold traveller, into the crater of the jokul of Sneffels, which the shadow of Scartaris touches before the kalends of July, and you will attain the centre of the earth; I have done this, Arne Saknussemm"
This is the beginning of Verne's famous book and a personal favorite of mine since I was like 6. Axel and professor Lidenbrock travel to Iceland to reach the Snaefell. They reach the volcano in late June only to find that is has not one but three craters. Rereading Saknussemm's message they conclude that the passage to the centre of the Earth is through the one crater the shadow of a nearby mountain peak touches at noon. However the text also states that this is only true for the last days of June and for the next days, with July rapidly approaching, the weather is too cloudy for any shadows.
Cloudy would be the word, as this is what I found at the summit of the crater in mid august:

No shadow and no crater (unless you were somehow careless while walking around). The best part was going all the way up with a snowbike, that turned out to be harder to control than expected, but fun, anyway, when you sped up.
The Snaefell is situated on the most western part of the Snæfellsnes peninsula in Iceland. Sometimes it may be seen from the city of Reykjavík over the bay of Faxaflói, at a distance of 120 km. People also think the volcano to be a culminating point of special powers. The area is also believed to be a frequent landing pad for visitors from outer space (which could not be seen in the mist either :P)

And future godson! :)
Isn't he sweet?

It has been commented that I do not dress up to the ocassion, so I'm proving with this post that, indeed, my guardrobe includes anything a proper lady needs to enjoy her summer holidays. Here we go ...




Ever ready for transportation and about to kiss the driver (fortunately, I was quicker than him) and proving I watched James Bond against Dr No when I was a kid-




Here, ready for a peaceful walk after tea, a short stroll in a more shadowy environment.

Ready for a row in the river and
two driving garments for well prepared ladies.

And, finally, comfortable model to go to the countryside and a sailing and swimming suit. It's summer, after all!

... back from the year I first read Harry Potter. I still think the characters look cute (for a rough sketch, at least), so I decided to post them here. Good reading!

I'm a fan of this guy from now on. Seriously, he improves the film! Watch the video in:
Weird Al Yankovic: The saga begins

I spent the first half of may in Australia and a wise use of time, planes and credit cards (ok, in this case, a reckless use of) gave me the chance to visit the Red Centre, Queensland, Melbourne and Sydney. All these places turned out to be quite different and charming in their own way. But first, I had to spent more than 24 hours in the sky and a good deal of time in the airports lobbies. Lucky me I was not alone. At least in the airports because somehow I managed to sleep most the way. Advantages of my low tension I guess.


My first stop was Uluru, in the middle of nowhere. The closest place minimally inhabited around was Alice Springs, 5 and odds hours away. After walking around Ayers Rock, realizing that there's nothing else around (but the Olgas, obviously) and thay everything is terribly expensive in the resorts, we hired a 4x4 and drove to the desert. Flies can be a real nuisance and we had to do with hat nets, but the weather was mostly okay and we even managed to walk the Kings Canyon. After that, we even had time for a camel ride, but just because I really, really asked to the person in charge of bookings. The swimming pool in the hotel was a nice detail, even though the water was dead cold. Spiders were not ...

Some plane hours afterwards, I was in Cairns, ready for a dive. We had a three dive-trip to the Great Coral Reef and a snorkeling escapade to the Green Island, a small chunk of tree covered land surrounded by turquoise waters. I met a bunch of tropical fishes and some turtles, but the winner of the day was an intense red mini-fish that tracked me all the way. Plus I'm not sure that Marlin found his son Memo...

We somehow found time as well to visit the rainforest in Kuranda. I found the skyrail a bit of a bluff, as it simply moves you from one point to another, but does not give entry to the forest. Anyway, it was a curious canopy. We also did a short travel in a vehicle that could go through water as well, a DUCK, they called it. And we learnt that some plants might be more dangerous than a great white!

Cairns is also a very interesting and lively little town, with lots of nice places to eat and activities at all times. It has a free huge swimming pool by the sea were people sing, dance and make shows. We did not, in fact, spent much time in the city, but it was well spent anyway.


Our next jump was all the way to Melbourne as we had work there. Melbourne is mostly a big city with a victorian, clean, nice center, a bit like New York, but much tidier and green. It has a load of modern architecture and amazing one, it is. I loved the main square, with all those beautiful and strange buildings that looked so different from day to night. We had not much free time there, but we managed to do part of the Great Ocean Road and had a first contact with koalas, that mostly looked all the time like I do when I've just woken up, the poor things. In the road, we dedicated some time to the London Bridge and the 12 Apostles, but, as usual, light had no mercy and we missed a large part of the landscape.



Our final stop was Sidney, a really lively city crowded with people looking for fun but tidy and clean at the same time. It was quite a surprise to find that XXX places were located close to conventional bars and pubs, for example. The opera house is far more impressing in person than in pictures. We did the boat trip around the bay at sunset (the last one) and we are pretty sure that was the best time to sail. We also visited the Aquarium, to safely see the sharks and pay a visit to Marlin and Dori. After our dose of city life, we drove to the Blue Mountains, practically a neighbourhood of Sydney, and hiked around the Three Sisters for a day. Finally, we drove to a Wildlife Park to hug koalas and pursue colored birds. All in all, a well spent time :)

Here's Hugo, my (thus far) only nephew. And he has Juan's big green eyes. If I ever have kids, I'll have to work hard to be up to the standard :P

Well, not exactly, but Rocamadour, in the centre of France, really does the trick. It only needs a few nazguls soaring above ...

Last weekend, the yearly comic convention at Granada was held. Leaving aside the usual guests (who probably come on their own to have tapas and go out at night in the city), like Kevin Taylor or Lance Took, the spanish friends of the organizers, like Cels Piñols or Kenny Ruiz, and the guys noone has ever heard about like Mike Collins, they only brought Purita Campos (you need to be older than 25 to know her work, but she is good, mind you) and, thanks God, Sergio Aragones and Stan Sakai, nice as ever, who compensated for the 2 EUR that you had to pay at the entrance just to be surrounded by mangakas dressed in strange clothes and yielding cardboard weapons that put your head in danger at every step. In mu humble opinion, the money of the convention is progressively going more and more to the organizers and less reflected in the activities, that this year were particularly poor. Special mention to the electronic dance contest -that game where people dance according to the steps on the screen- which was held probably in the hottest -and consequently foul smelling- part of the place.

Anyway, I got my sketch from Sergio and got to see this amazing Pacman, so all in all, it was a fine day ...

Little Luci has started to do unexpected things. Now, not only she smiles and babbles and basically is cute, but also surprises us from time to time.
Lately, whenever I give her something to eat or drink, she remembers and pays back when she gets her drop of milk or some food. Here you can see her feeding me a crust of bread in exchange for a previous crumb.

Last sunday, I went to the rugby FAR cup semifinals: Granada vs Malaga. It was sort of Celebrity Deathmatch, but without the celebrities, plus blood was quite real. I guess the doctor had the busiest day! And the best thing is that the girls still try to state that rugby is not really violent ...

I was in Bremen in January, and boy, it was cold! Sort of like visiting Narnia without thermal underwear!
Bremen is quite a nice place to visit, even though it was mostly destroyed during WWII. The oldest part of town has these nice, narrow gallows and pointy roofs that we associate with fairy tales and I found the most amazing shop with paper models of every plane you can imagine.
Food was not a bonus, though. Quite heavy and homogeneous. I enjoyed the typical raw meat and that was it. We also visited a Monet exhibition where we met a girl perfectly dressed as one of the pictures. And, of course, we touched the statue of the Bremen Musicians. Too bad they call that "an ass touching an ass" over there!

... and still does not trust her good ol' aunt! I wonder if she somehow speaks to her sister ...

I've been pretty busy since my last entry, being the only prominent event in my life since them a weekend trip to Bremen (Germany), where the weather was so cold that I had to double my underwear. I did nothing much in Xmas either, mostly playing PS2. January so far has consisted of reading Going Postal and Thump! (from Pratchett) and starting with Straczynki's Night of the Demons, plus watching Crusade, Supernatural and 24 (season 2). I expect things get better shortly, or I'll need a change of air ...