It's fascinating to watch the houses and buildings turn into little glittering beads lying on a large patchwork quilt of greens, browns and blues; stitched with veins of silvery grey roads. Then the view becomes gradually obscured by wisps of feathery white and is replaced by the hills, mountains and moving rivers and waterfalls of the clouds' own landscape. They can be dense shapes formed from smoke -- colored, shadowed and highlighted by the sun's rays. The texture is that of freshly fallen snow blanketing the ground. It looks so dense and solid but if a hand were to reach out and try to grab a chunk, it would simply pass through and be left with a semi-sticky dampness -- as though it had tried to touch a ghost. Or it can be slushy like a car had driven through it one too many times.

While I was in Dubrovnik, I walked the castle walls and looked over the sea, which really does sparkle beneath the sunlight. I also had the opportunity to climb up to Napolean's old fort and look down upon the entire city. It was so tiny I could hold up my forefinger and thumb and squish it. During another time, a few people and I rented a car and found an area that overlooked the mountains to watch the sunset. There wasn't a house anywhere; only variations of light, shadow, greenery and levels.

I took pictures of each sight but film did not do any of the visions justice. They were you-had-to-be-there-to-see-them-in-their-full-beauty moments.

~* May 22, 2003 @ 5:43 pm *~