Whats that coming over the hill?

today i wanted to start off writing about my little journey to the chilly island of England

but i have something better to write about

much better

having bought the missus a brand spanking new fancy zoomy dslr camera we decided to 'take that baby for a test drive' and headed down to the beach

we got LOADS of aces photos
i recommend you check out flickr/thepinkjellybaby shortly for some really good photos

but as we walked in to some garden to try and get some 'flowery' macro shots the missus spotted this guy having a rest on a plant


a goddamn praying mantis (with the missus elbow in the background, she was too scared to get close :D ha)
-and check out the bigger pictures for much better detail-

how many levels of awesome is that?

and i am so pleased that the camera not only has a great macro mode but is aces at capturing fantastic colours

but now i'm not sure whether this or the octopus is the best thing i've seen EVER!

[update]
here are some of my favourite photos of the praying mantis




Are you looking at me?


I spy...

Watching you watching them

i spotted these guys on a walk about before
they've been doing a lot of hard work
but if you look closer you might see they have some unfriendly neighbours keeping a keen eye on them

Plink plink fizz

I'd thought I'd let you know about some headaches I have been getting and no it's not the French.

Although I have a huge liking of all things fishy, lizardy and insecty there is one little critter that gives me huge headaches.

For weeks we kept hearing a loud noise. It sounded almost like a buzz saw. When I first heard it I thought it was the mechanical temporary lifts the painter had erected at the top of our apartment block.
I got around to recording it, but the sound doesn't do it justice. Neither does the volume. Imagine this sound, a little more bass and cranked up to setting 13 on your volume dial.



Just a constant noise. From when you wake up until in the evening. Very litle breaks aswell.

After many random lookings in trees, walls and bushes I finally found out what it was making the noise.
That really, REALLY loud noise comes from this tiny little guy. A cicada.

"Noise noise noise noise"

Look at him! He's smaller then a little leaf. How does something SO small make such a racket?
They have to be native to France. That's the only explanation. Why else would something so small need to make so much noise unless it had to speak over another lound living thing in order to attract mates?

Walk in the Hills

It's been annoying not being able to take a proper walk in the hills right behind our house ever since the fall.

Hiking has been a favourite hobby ever since my dad got me practising for our walk across England. So when I injured my feet and could hardly walk it was annoying that I couldn't get up the mountains.

Fortunately my feet have been feeling pretty normal the last few weekends and last weekend I took the chance to go for a Walk in the Hills around what I belive is called Cerro Tragalamocha.

You can follow my walk by heading over here
Link to Sportstracker route or using this on Google Earth yourself


I only had a slight idea of where I was going. The smaller set of hills that the new part of Nerja is being built on. I thought I'd take things easy. I mean I didn't want to get lost or injured on my first walk now.

I managed, without realising, to take my walk on the weekly boot sale day. It's a pretty crazy bootsale they have here. Things range from VHS tapes to SEGA Master Systems. I haven't seen one of them since I was a kid.
I'll be heading back there with some cash another day.

After setting off it didn't take long for me to get lost. But I did have on my a GPS enabled phone and a decent explorer map of the area.
My first hurdle come when I realised that my phone only has the regular international coordinates and Spain has it's own local grid reference. This meant that although I could tell you exactly where I was on Earth, I couldn't find that anywhere on the map.
So straight away the map became pretty useless.
My next job is to see if there is a way of converting GPS coordinates in to Spanish Local map grid references?

So I ended up getting lost.
And heading up the wrong hill.
I wanted to be here.


But it worked out in my favour as I spotted plenty of wildlife

This I think is an Egyptian Grasshopper.

Although there wasn't much in scenary.


But I did get some good views of home.

It looks quite big from up here.

So I headed back. But spotted another route around the side of the Hill I wanted to be up.

So I decided to take this route and see where it went?

The dirt track wasn't terribly wide for most of the walk. And there wasn't much too see.


But when I got to the top I got to see where I will be heading next time!

But first I better get the GPS and map problem sorted out.

But I did have a very enjoyable Walk in the Hills. I got 4 hours walk out of it and climb to 470 metres.

But more importantly I spotted some lizards. And I'll have more on them soon.

I promise. There is a lizard there. ;)

But until then, check out some of my other photos.

Link

Lizard Spot: FAIL!

Lizard Spot sure is a fail.

The last few days I have been spotting quite a few lizards. But I am still far far too slow to photograph them (Cat if you ever get that gecko out from hiding I want some tips on how to trick them)

Although the other day, as I walked home from work, I spotted a cheeky little lizard down the centre hole of a brick. I got a few steps passed before I realised what I had spotted so I sneaked back and readied my phone/camera.

Except he/she was also too fast for me.

I did take a photograph of the said hole in a desperate attempt to see if I might accidentally snap a pic of said lizard, but I don't think it worked out.


All I can see is an empty packet of cigs and some rubbish.

This is what Lizard Spot is starting to become. Desperate Lizard Hunt.

What a shame! And after all my Good Luck in the first few days here. I though it would be a regular thing.

But if you do spot the lizard in the above picture, please point him out.

Although I am spotting other weird creatures. For instance on the way home from a meal or football watching with the missus I spotted a MASSIVE cockerrocha!

He was rather still for me and I got a few good shots. Luckily neither me or him got knocked over by any cars while messing about in the roads.


Look at how big he is! And shiney! And the size of his feely thingies! Crickey.

So Lizard Spot has been a bit of a FAIL lately, not that I'm not spotting them, I'm just not getting to photograph them.
Luckily there are other insects that are a bit more socialiting.