Hi there my Hivean friends and followers!
Welcome to the 111th round of my special weekly photo challenge known as Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun :)
I know a lot of photo contests with nature as the main theme were/are/will be hosted by various people on the Hive blockchain but I wanted to come up with something more than just another photo contest where participants would submit their best natural photos. Therefore, I decided to go for quite an unusual concept that I am going to introduce in the following lines.
The aim of the Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun photo challenge is not to make you dig up your photo archives and submit the best pictures of nature that you have ever taken. Instead, I want you guys to go out and appreciate the beauty of our nature right now.
The internet (and the Hive blockchain as well) is flooded with picture perfect shots of landscapes, mountains, forests, beaches etc. taken years ago. But this is not what I want to see in this challenge. I want to see shots that may not be necessarily stunning but they must be fresh, proving that you have just physically spent some time outdoors in the fresh air. But remember that nature comes in many forms. It doesn´t have to be a pristine jungle or a deep remote forest. An urban park, a botanical garden, a little grove on the outskirts of your town - pretty much any place with some trees, plants, rocks, bodies of water or any other natural features would be just as fine ;)
Obviously, there is no way for me to verify whether the photo that you submit in the challenge is really fresh or if it was even taken by you so I am relying on your honesty guys. The prizes for the winners (as described below) are more symbolical than overly motivating so I don´t expect too much fraudulent behavior in this challenge anyway.
I want to keep the rules of this challenge as simple and benevolent as possible so let´s agree on just this:
Only one entry (photo) per person per round.
The photo must be yours and not older than one week.
Add a few words about the photo, at least where and when you took it.
You can start submitting your entries to this round in the comment section below from now until the next round.
Prior to publishing the next round post, I will pick 3 winners, give my full upvote on their entries and feature them in the next round of the challenge. As long as the response is not too overwhelming, I will also try to give some smaller upvotes on all of the other entries to reward all participants.
I might change the concept and/or the rules of the photo challenge later on, depending on how things go. I usually host the challenge on Thursday but when needed for some reason, I can host it on some other day so better check my blog regularly not to miss out on it ;)
To keep up with you guys, I submit my own fresh natural photo to every round´s post too :) Here is my contribution to start out this round:
After showing you some of the beautiful blooming flowers that we have here in Krakow, Poland in the previous rounds of the challenge, I am coming with this close up of a sprouting tree bud today. While the ground in local parks is already littered with countless colorful flowers basking in the spring sun, the trees are yet to turn green with foliage again but as you can see, they are already working on it :) I took the photo in an alley leading to the park surrounding the WKS Wawel Sport Complex in the northwestern part of the city yesterday when on my way home from an outdoor workout training.
In the last round, we had 8 participants. After some thorough consideration, I decided to pick these 3 winners:
@mrprofessor with this entry from Brazil:
Hah! It's been a long time that I'm owning you a sunset photo. Here it is. Not the greatest, but it's something. A big ass plasma ball. Sunset taken on March 20th at the Cassino Beach in Southern Brazil.
@bossel with this entry from Greece:
Almost forgot to post. Enchanted forest.Well, OK, just an olive orchard to the east of Patras, Greece & the clearing in the background belies the enchanted part. But still, quite nice. Taken last week on Wednesday. Nice sunny day, albeit still quite cool. But finally it's getting warmer, so I'll probably go out (& post) more often. Have been cycling today again, so next time I'll definitely have something to go as well (I only have to remember to post).
@kohsamui99 with this entry from Australia:
I keep missing this contest sorry @phortun well I hope I am on time with this one last weekend I was visiting a friend in the city of Wollongong in NSW, Australia on the Sunday last been just a beautiful day we took a walk along one of the beaches on the coastline of Wollongong and I can't be sure of the name of this particular beach, I do think it was Wattamolla Beach, there are 17 beautiful beaches like this one on this beautiful coastline of Wollongong which is known for its great beaches and developing culture great place to visit.
Congratulations guys! It was my pleasure to give you 100% upvotes on your entries :)
I am looking forward to what you will come up with in this round.
Have fun and appreciate the beauty of nature!
I post this series in the Amazing Nature community, a great community for all nature lovers. Feel free to check it out ;)
This post was created by me for the Hive blockchain exclusively. All rights reserved.
Congratulations to all the winners! All of the shots were stellar examples of nature from different parts of the globe. How amazing that we can do this, yes? @mrprofessor - the color just took my breath away, warm and inviting! @bossel I love the fact that it is an olive orchard in the off-season. I love it and giving me the ability to see the branches in their glory. Nice! Nice!
@kohsamui99
Le sigh... You know how relaxed that makes me feel!
@phortun Thank you for hosting this challenge! It is always fun to get out and share a piece of Mother Nature with you! This was taken in the Washington, DC Metro area at one of the wooded parks today, March 31st! The purple trees in bloom are called Redbuds, even though they are purple when they are budding, they are red. :)
Wow, that´s some epic fresh spring lushness right here! Beautiful capture, thank you :) And thank you also for the comments and lovely engagement with the winners from the last round, it always makes me happy to see the participants of the challenge engaging with each other, so nice :)
Thank you so much! Spring is certainly beautiful, even if this year has been a challenge! I love interacting with your winners and people. They are the best!
Thank you @dswigle that one was just for you 😊
Glorious!! You are so good to me!! Thank you! 😁
😊😊😊 Hehe...have a lovely evening my friend 😊😊😊
Yeee thank you, those were the last days of summer. Autumn has just arrived.
Last and First... Always the Best!
Thank you! & congrats to @mrprofessor & @kohsamui99!
This time I post timely:
Was cycling in the olive orchards south of Patras, Greece, on Wednesday. Close to the coast I found a tree stump swarming with huge ants which had their nest in there. Usually it's almost impossible for me to get good close-ups of ants, since they are too busy & quick. But there was one spot where they threw out the garbage, so I could just focus & wait. Still only a few good shots, but better than ever.
Don't know which species it is, but probably some kind of carpenter ant (genus Camponotus), perhaps Camponotus schulzi.
Wow, that´s a very impressive close up! I know how difficult it is to capture ants, I tried this only with the largest tropical ants in Latin America, those guys were really massive but the photos were still poor as they were moving too fast :D You really did a great job with this one, congrats :) And thanks for sharing it with us in this challenge!
Thanks! This species is big as well. Pretty much the biggest I have seen here in Patras.
Thank you @bossel and congrats to you 👍
This is another photo of my walk along the coastline of Wollongong, NSW last weekend it was on the side of Wattamolla Beach, the beauty and the vibes of this beautiful clean white sand beach almost made me feel like I was back on the tropical island of Koh Samui, it was like a hidden beach no one was here at the time I was walking along this beach front I felt like the castaway movie but enjoying it for the fact that I had all this beauty in front of me all to myself.
Travel catalogue stuff. Awesome shot, thanks man! :)
Thanks man 👍
Back from my roadtrip and ready to share all the awesome spots I´ve been to. This one was very special and we had it to our own. Beautiful waterfall with ice cold pool near Oudtshoorn in South Africa. Very refreshing as it was above 30 degree.
The shade of the water is incredible, so emerald! Thanks for this amazing entry. Just to be sure though, the photo is not older than 7 days, right? :)
It was amazing. One of the best swimming spots I´ve been to. No, its not, its from tuesday this week and its called the Meiringspoort Waterfall. They have just realised how beautiful it is and built a big car parking and tourist information about the place. Will make a post soon with many more photos
I had a nice walk on Saturday in the small seaside village of Ula in Norway. The beach there is one of the best along this coast but my photo is from the rocks just east of the beach. The rock was rounded by the glacier from the last ice age but the crack is much more recent
Interesting entry, thank you :) The monochrome fits this picture nicely.
Last Saturday, I climbed up the mountain Mravenečník (1343m) in the Jeseník mountains (Czechia), lay down, and enjoyed warm weather and cool views.
Bez těch noh by to nešlo? :D I tak ale pěkná, dík...
to je právě účel, že jsem pro to i něco udělal, vyškrábal se nahoru a ocenil tu krásnou přírodou😂
Hello, this is a photo I took yesterday morning at Nha Trang beach, Vietnam, where I just moved to work. While walking on the beach I saw a small piece of dead coral broken off on the shore. It is worth noting that this city is very popular with diving tours to see coral. This sea is the meeting place between two hot and cold sea currents, so the rich biodiversity here is very appreciated.
I chose this picture because I feel it is beautiful, not because of its beauty (on the contrary, it is a bit creepy because of the small holes). I think it's beautiful because it makes me think and ask questions.
Good to see you here again, thanks for this interesting entry :)
All the photos are beautiful this time. Hard to say which is 1st.
Congrats to the winners!
Right, this was a very successful round, a lot of great entries :) You might have also noticed that I added the countries of the winning shots next to their authors´ names, this should make it easier for the readers to see where the winning shots were taken :)
Yea, so we can see where it is from.
Nature is great. The Australian photos are so nice. All are winners !
Thanks for checking out the winning collection, feel free to join the new round ;)
Whooaaaaaaaaaah! It's awesome to be among such great photos. Thanks for picking me. And congrats everyone.
My pleasure buddy, that was a fantastic shot :) I hope to see you here more often. Cheers!
Will see. I just gotta go out there more hah
trying to find a day just to photograph outside
Thank you @phortun and congrats to the other winners see you again soon 👍
Cool, I will see you here :)