Personal favourites

The Palace-monastery from the Herreria Woods, Abantos behind. The Capital of Much of the Known World, circa 1590.

One of the happiest HFF shots I can remember posting for a few months! Now all we need to do is make it work!! Wild flowers near Valdemanco, Madrid, on the approach to La Sierra de La Cabrera.

Encina (holm oak), Canchos Largo y Gordo. And granite, granite and more granite! Look closely at the oak. It has been lopped. This is a 'managed' wild landscape! It is also my favourite walking country.

Part of my low tide walk between Porthcadjack and Greenbank Coves. This is not the lowest the tide gets. I normally walk across here further out to sea. I can only guess that the tide is on the way out as I would never attempt it if it were coming in! .

Some of you may remember, from Panoramio, this piece of land belonging to my girlfriend. She is still trying to sell it, if anyone is interested! In the foreground; Spanish lavender.

Calle de Barquillo. The white building at the end of the street is the Banco de Espana. Not much time left: www.generosity.com/community-fundraising/ipernity-members-association-a-non-profit-entity/x/16256307

Close to Madrid but centuries away. On Z please. Last chance to save this site. www.generosity.com/community-fundraising/ipernity-members-association-a-non-profit-entity/x/16256307

Portreath, Cornwall. Photo taken in July 2011. Exif says November 2011. I was in Spain in 11/2011. I am always puzzled by this sort of thing! Last chance to save this site. www.generosity.com/community-fundraising/ipernity-members-association-a-non-profit-entity/x/16256307

The sculpture: "A LA DIVERSIDAD HUMANA" Sculpture by Josep Capella and Clara Capo. I have Steve Drury to thank for finding the title from my Pano gallery when I thought Google had erased all notes and comments! Please give as generously as you can: www.generosity.com/community-fundraising/ipernity-members-association-a-non-profit-entity

The Convento Monasterio de San Julian y San Antonio, backed by the Sierra de La Cabrera and El Pico de La Miel.

HFF to all my ipernity and IMA friends. There is a fence in there somewhere; the horse has got it (almost) covered!

Typical of the granite scenery here.

Sierra de La Cabrera. Granite. Winter scenery but no snow that year. 'Z' please! Alternative title: Toque Rock!!!!

Buitres Leonidas. Griffon Vultures. I was fortunate to get this close. I was upwind and in the shade; it helped! El Cancho de La Bola, Sierra de La Cabrera. Photo taken in May 2013, regardless of the exif date!

They only open this fully on the hottest of days and when the sun is at its highest; an hour or two at most. And because Spain adheres to Central European time, this means between 3 and 5 pm! They really are quite small; miniature wild tulips!

Dawn, August 2014. St Day, Cornwall. Well, it's still my bedroom window even if I haven't spent more than 10 nights here in the past 5 years! The building in front is the annexe to my parents house. It comprises a good sized ground floor kitchen and on the upper floor bedrooms and a bathroom. This annexe used to be a temporary bedding down place for tin miners who had worked a late shift; the property being in the possession of a tin mine captain. Poldice Valley seen in the distance and with a chimney just visible, was a world centre of arsenic mining and production. Even today, 150 years later , nothing grows there and certainly no houses can be be built on the poisoned land. The life expectancy of the miners was horrendous! Not all Cornwall is romantic!!!

Rosa Daniel Gelin. I discovered, some time after posting this, that Daniel Gelin was a well-known French actor who died in the early 90s.