ha ha ha fark that, i start panicking when we hit 25C here
@mindshadow no worries, i don't take my camera very often [or i'll look like a tourist]

Afghanistan gets a lot hotter than 35. We've been about 35-45 for most of the summer and it's been a pretty cool year here. But yeah, for a desert country it's reasonably cool (due to altitude probably). Sucks in the green because it's desert heat plus humidity!

Now the United Arab Emirates... You know it's hot when the thermometers no longer work because they only got up to 50°C... in the shade. Screw that place!

Fuuuuuck that. My father turned down a job in Oman not because of the political situation in the middle east, but because of the heat

One thing about rural areas, there are some epic views. And when it rains here, it pours.

This first picture is taken from a place called "Vaskikallio". An old local legend tells that there once lived a witch in a cave (unfortunately it has collapsed) which is located under the cliff from where this picture was taken. It is said that some men used to visit the witch and had sex with her. Every time the witch gave birth to a child, she killed the babies and made soap from their fat.
My grandfather has an old logger cabin about five kilo meters away from this cliff. Once a woman gave him a visit and told him that she was a witch and that she was going to summon the spirit of the Vaskikallio's witch under a fullmoon. She was going to use some kind of spell which included burying a bear claw in front of the cliff or something. We never heard from her again.
Very interesting stories in my opinon


This picture was taken near the Vaskikallio from a place called Porolampi. EDIT: You can actually see this pond from the first picture.

I don't know how people can live like this. It's pretty much tropical climate here but once it hits 30ºC shit gets intolerable. 40ºC would be the armaggedon.

@666Emperor666: Nice pics and cool story. Reverend Bizarre could write some songs about it

creepy story aye ha ha
we also have pine forests like that with small ponds dotted around them, i'm not sure what they are for, maybe for putting out fires?

Do you have lots of rainfall? Sometimes the ground can't absorb that much water so fast, so water can still be visible above ground.

@666Emperor666: Yeah, cool story.

dreadmeat lives in New Zealand, so asking if they get a lot of rainfall is like asking if the pope is catholic

heh, a popular saying in auckland is: if you don't like the weather in auckland, wait 10 minutes

Do you mean that you have ponds dug by people in your forests? The pond in my pictures is completely natural. A small stream flows to it. Some scientist found gold from that stream once. I'm not sure what kind of research he was doing in that area.

i don't know mate, i'd say a lot of them would be man made, they are joined by firebreaks [which double as roads]
over here the only gold you'd find in a pine forest is a goldcap...

Our favourite saying here is "Well, at least it's not Trona."

The presentation of the census data is comedy gold.

is that because it's in death valley or because there are no chicks there? they have an airport...
trona = wtf

Essentially, it used to be a nice place(it actually escaped the depression), but went downhill after the mine closed. More than half the town is abandoned and there's an overpowering stench of sulfur in the air year round. No airport(I think there may have been one in WWII but it's sense been abandoned), and it's about an hour away from Death Valley.

Plus it gets to 130 in the summer.

130 F = 54.44 C ha ha
america has ghost towns, i saw a documentary on it a while ago, i think trona may have even been in it

Bodie and Garlock are two famous ones around here. Places like Rhandsburg/ Johannesburg really try to market themselves as one as well, although there are still multiple families residing there.

yay, otters! they are funny animals, i've heard they make good pets too.

Cool photos, where did you take them mindshadow?

Yeah, we got some pretty trippy abandoned towns here in Idaho: places like Pearl City, Rocky Bar, Yellowjacket, Grasmere, Bayhorse, De Lamar, Cobalt, Forney, Stibnite, Dickey, and Thunder Mountain... combined population of all these towns= zero. Some of these places still make for interesting day trips, although a lot of them have been gradually torn down and the buildings have been leveled or burned down over the years. In a couple cases, like at Silver City here in Idaho and at Cornucopia over in Oregon, people have bought some of the old buildings and have been gradually renovating them into summer cabins, sort of bringing a wierd "Second life" back to these old ghost towns.

I've heard of Trona, but never really explored that part of California much. I've heard of a couple other cool old ghost towns in that part of the state, like Ballarat and Zyzix (I think that's how it's spelled)

Found this quite amusing for some reason

Ballarat is actually quite close to me, I haven't heard of the other though.There's a really neat abandoned military facility from world war ii a couple hours away that was used to trace possible missile attacks on the West Coast- I'll have to look up the name of the place again but an exact replica of it is used in Fallout: New Vegas.

I've been through Boise before. That town weirds me out.

Yes they are very fun and affectionate towards each other, there are also some giant otters, which make a very strange high pitch noise (haven't got a decent photo of them yet).





The New Forest Wildlife Park, UK.
We asked why the owls didn't have as much space as the other animals and it's because they're recovering from injuries and if they have big pens they'll fly into the sides of the cage at speed.




Ghost towns.. they would be awesome photographs

Speaking of the Mojave..

Is that some sort of old telescope?

or something

I'm pretty sure it's supposed to do something with the wind. Like make weird noises and shit because art.

Google reverse image search reveals:

Returned a about a week ago from A 10 days trip to the land of Graveland,veles and other legendary BM bands ( Yes, Poland)

Here are some photos:

Cool photos forestcorpse! Did you visit Białowieża Forest or Carpathian Mountains? Where are those pictures taken from?

Mount Rose, just South West of Reno Nevada.

I lost my camera today in a forest ! NOT FUCKING HAPPY RIGHT NOW!

Cool thread, cool landscapes

Giant Otter


found another stone to play with!

I love the noise they make
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4RHfnZ7-RU

Eagle Owl


Moth

Went to the town of Inari in Lapland for three nights with the extended family, courtesy of the in-laws. We had rooms in a rather cozy hotel next to the Lemmenjoki river, and this was the view 40 meters from the room door:









On the second day, we took a cruise to the old Sami people's sacred place, Ukonkivi. It's a rock in the middle of Lake Inari, and "Ukonkivi" means "The Rock of Ukko", which refers to the local main god in the pagan beliefs. It was nice. We spent 15 minutes on the top, and the weather turned from very nice and sunny to a mild storm of high winds and hail. That's, like, roughly equivalent to spontaneously bursting in flames in a cathedral, the long-dead gods lack the mana for much more than a few frozen droplets.

Nice pics, Nap, this is quite a gloomy and dreamy place.

I agree. Rather somber for all its wonderful expanse. Maybe it was just the weather ..

I wonder why they bury them on the islands as opposed to burning them there. ? Are Laplanders not a burning people?

No, I was not in any of those places. I was visiting a very good friend in Poland, and we were driving a lot around in the ''Polish Jura'' area, an area with a lot of castles and old ruins and stuff. Very cool!
But we have been talking about going for walks in the Carpathian Mountains, hopefully the next time I go to poland!
All the photos are taken in the ''Jura'' area.

And, lost your camera? :O
How did you manage that!?

Some more:

Hercules' Club in Ojców National Park:

holy shit forestcorpse, awesome pics. love the first two

forestcorpse, those are some great pictures. I hope to go out west into the Appalachian Mountains sometime soon, and if I do I should be able to get some great pictures.

Nice... looks like trout territory. Awesome pictures of the cemetery islands.

I have no idea. It just fell out of my pocket.
Amazing pictures once again! I feel an urge to go and do some photography myself... if I only could.