I went on an epic journey today.
Drove northwards and saw many amazing things. And all because of a small article in the local newspaper.
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It was about a remote Inuit village that appeared in the small port of Peroj, a place situated about thirty kilometers north of my hometown. The article had no photographs to show me how that Christmas attraction looks, so I started imagining expensive, spectacular stuff. Holograms. Wax - museum replicas. Stuff like that. The curiosity grew, and very soon got the best of me. The hope also played its part well, so after an hour of hesitation, I sat in my car and went chasing illusions.
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The plan was to drive directly to the sea but on the way there ...
... I got lost ...
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... in the enchanted forest.
Well, it wasn't really a forest, and I don't know enough about magic &
sorcery to be able to tell if a place is enchanted or not ...
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... but the trees definitively looked like something out of fairy tales.
These old, contorted olives are relatively rare nowadays in my area.
Small, traditional orchards surrounded by drystone walls built with stones taken from the ground in which the trees are planted ...
... are getting replaced with larger plantations.
New trees are trimmed and organized in a better way for the demands of bigger olive oil production ...
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... but they lost the power to transport you in strange, magic kingdoms.
When I zoomed on the small metal plate on the tree in the foreground of this photograph ...
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... I discovered that the property is for sale, so if you wanna buy a piece of land in this area ... well, here it is, olives included.
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I took a few more portraits of the old trees, and then ...
... when this truck passed by ...
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... I somehow remembered why I went on this quest in the first place, so I walked to the car, started the machine, and continued my journey.
I stopped only once while driving through the village Peroj, to photograph this old house, and then ...
... after a confusing drive through the labyrinth of narrow streets and unpaved roads, I finally reached the seashore ...
... but the port wasn't there, nor anywhere in sight.
I never visited this stretch of coastline before ...
... so I didn't know in which direction to continue.
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Although I passed through the nearby village, Peroj, many times before, this stretch of coastline was new to me. In absence of clear directions, I first thought about following my intuition, but after some more thinking, I decided to follow the stream of consciousness. In less than a minute, it brought me to this swing that looked great in the landscape. Besides being photogenic, the swing provided a bit of fun, excitement, and a great, swinging view of the sea & sky.
In the shallow water not far from there ...
... a cormorant was drying its plumage.
Further, on the horizon, there was an island that looked slightly surreal because of the vibrant illusion created by layers of cold and warm air. This island is relatively close to the shore, so its shape was only slightly distorted at the base ...
... but the very distant fragments of firm land north of this place looked more like clouds.
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In this enlargeable photograph, you can take a look at the line of seagulls in front of the mirage.
Here I took a look in the opposite direction. These are some industrial structures, part of the shipyard in the city of Pula, only ten kilometers from where I was standing.
More or less here, I decided that it was time to turn the switch in my mind on intuition. Very soon it will be revealed that this was a good idea. I passed by a concrete bunker mounted on the remains of a construction made of stones ...
... and after the bend, reached the point from which the small port was visible.
The concrete part of the fortification, the bunker, was built during World War Two. The part built in stone is older.
It was a part of the long coastal fortification built in the wake of the first World War.
Long ago, these rounded platforms hosted some big canons.
I crossed the narrow road and continued across the pebbles.
After some more walking along the shore, I took a look at the coast across the inlet ...
... and noticed some deciduous trees there.
The intricate shapes of the barren branches against the darker background made of prevalently evergreen vegetation looked pretty cool and photogenic, so I zoomed in even more and took a couple of shots.
A couple of minutes later ...
... I reached the port of Peroj.
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Boats were floating on the calm water ...
... and a local Inuit was fishing on the block of cardboard ice.
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The rest of the tribe was busy doing nothing around the flameless fire. The door of the igloo was closed. Maybe some of the Inuits were inside, maybe not.
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While sniffing around the village and its frozen, motionless inhabitants ...
... I stumbled upon a polar bear. Now, this was one hell of a scary encounter.
A bit further, a meter or two from the bear ...
... I found these beautiful arctic flowers.
I don't know the name of this exotic, northern plant. I'll call it the Arctic Star.
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I photographed these Hooded crows (Corvus cornix) ...
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... in the muddy inlet near the port.
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The birds were exploring the thick layer of algae in search of seafood uncovered by the low tide. A bit further, in the same inlet ...
... this seagull was floating on the shallow water.
The carpet made of algae looked pretty cool ...
... so I took a couple of shots from above. To show you the intricate pattern.
Meanwhile ...
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... back in the frozen village ...
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... that dude with the fishing equipment has caught some fish. It all looked pretty believable, I felt the arctic atmosphere on my hands and face ...
... until I saw this. Look people, I can believe in all kinds of silly stuff, but you can't put me a penguin in between the polar bear and the walrus! That breaks the immersion. The damn penguin it's a creature from the southern polar shores.
Once the spell was broken and I could see through the illusion ...
... my enthusiasm slowly faded. It was time to go home.
These birds were photographed on my walk back to the car. Crows and Jackdaws were hard to spot among the mud and stones.
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Here you can take a better, enlargeable look at the well-camouflaged Western jackdaw (Coloeus monedula)
Soon I passed by the remains of the same old fortification that you already saw in this post, sat in the car, and drove directly home.
AS ALWAYS HERE ON HIVE, THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK.
