ASTÉRIX E IL DUELLO DEI CAPI IN AUGUSTA TAURINORUM

Joseph de Ca'th Lon is enjoying the impressive Piedmontese capital while waiting to see the Northern Star, who has an important match this afternoon.

In Barcelona, ​​Claire Fontaine is taking care of her business while The Grandma is reading a new Astérix adventure, this time Astérix and the Big Fight.

Astérix and the Big Fight, also known as The Battle of the Chieftains, translated from French Le Combat des Chefs and Italian Il Duello dei Capi, is a French comic book story, written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo. 

It is the seventh story in the Astérix comic book series, and was originally published by Dargaud as a serial for Pilote magazine in 1964, before later being released as a comic album in 1966.

The story focuses on Astérix and Obélix attempting to get their village's druid cured of several conditions following an accident, all while their chief, Vitalstatistix, prepares to do battle with a rival chief allied to the Romans.

Astérix and the Big Fight received positive reviews following its publication. An animated miniseries adaptation of the story premiered on Netflix on April 30, 2025.

-In issue #260 of Pilote, Goscinny and Uderzo spoofed a small strip involving Vitalstatistix hosting a press conference announcing the story of Astérix and the Big Fight in upcoming issues. The entire conference parodied one held by French President Charles de Gaulle.

-The scenes of Vitalstatistix's fight with Ceramix features the character parodying both Muhammad Ali's boxing style, 'rope-a-dope', and his victory celebration, known as the Ali shuffle.

-A patient visiting Psychoanalytix parodies the posture and pose of Napoleon Bonaparte.

-The story features a line spoken by a Gallo-Roman stating Ceramix is inspecting Professor Berlix's school for modern languages. The name Professor Berlix is a parody of the real-life linguist Maximilian Berlitz.

-In a scene featuring the Gauls setting up an amusement park, one panel from this features a roller coaster, in which the French original had the ride called Slavic Mountain -a parody of the French words -montagnes (mountain) and russes (Russian) - which combined together are the French translation of roller coaster. In the immediate panel afterwards, a stall is set up called W. H. Smix, which is a parody of the retail chain W. H. Smith.

In 1967, following the production of the first Astérix animated film, Astérix the Gaul, publisher Dargaud commissioned two more films to Belgian studio Belvision, one adapting Astérix and the Golden Sickle and the other Astérix and the Big Fight. However, René Goscinny and Albert Uderzo, who had not been consulted for the first film and were unimpressed with the result, rejected those projects, whose production was halted.

In 1989, part of the story was adapted in the animated feature film Astérix and the Big Fight (known in French as Astérix et le Coup du Menhir). However, that film only used some plot elements from the book, primarily Getafix's insanity, and was for the most part an adaptation of another volume, Astérix and the Soothsayer.

In 2025, Netflix released a 3D animated miniseries, Astérix and Obélix: The Big Fight. This adaptation, which expanded the book's original story and altered several plot elements, started streaming on April 30, 2025.

Key Lessons From Astérix and The Big Fight

-Unity and teamwork. One of the main themes in Astérix and the Big Fight is the importance of unity and teamwork. Throughout the book, we see the Gauls coming together, putting aside their differences, and working towards a common goal. This highlights the idea that when people unite and work together, they can overcome any obstacle.

-Strength in diversity. Another lesson from the book is the strength that comes from embracing diversity. The Gauls are portrayed as a diverse group of individuals with different skills and abilities. Each character in the story brings something unique to the table, and it is their diversity that ultimately helps them succeed in their mission.

-Courage and bravery. The book emphasizes the importance of courage and bravery in the face of adversity. Astérix and his friends demonstrate remarkable courage throughout the story, standing up against the Roman soldiers and defending their village. This teaches readers the value of bravery and encourages them to face challenges head-on.

-The power of friendship. Friendship is another significant theme in the book. Astérix and Obélix share a strong bond, and their friendship plays a crucial role in their success. They support and rely on each other, showing readers the importance of having loyal friends by their side.

-Resilience and perseverance. Astérix and the Big Fight also teaches the lesson of resilience and perseverance. Despite facing numerous setbacks and challenges, the Gauls do not give up. They remain determined and keep fighting until they achieve their objective. This serves as a reminder that no matter how difficult the circumstances may be, perseverance and resilience are key to achieving success. 

Download Astérix and the Big Fight by R. Goscinny & A. Uderzo

I have a cunning plan, as always!

Psychoanalytix

ITALO CALVINO, 'TURIN IS A SERIOUS BUT SAD CITY'

Today, Joseph de Ca'th Lon and The Grandma have continued talking about writers who have a vital relationship with Turin and they have chosen Italo Calvino.

Italo Calvino (15 October 1923-19 September 1985) was an Italian novelist and short story writer. 

His best-known works include the Our Ancestors trilogy (1952-1959), the Cosmicomics collection of short stories (1965), and the novels Invisible Cities (1972) and If on a winter's night a traveler (1979).

Admired in Britain, Australia and the United States, Calvino was the most translated contemporary Italian writer at the time of his death. He is buried in the garden cemetery of Castiglione della Pescaia in Tuscany.

Italo Calvino was born in Santiago de las Vegas, a suburb of Havana, Cuba, in 1923.

A fan of Rudyard Kipling's The Jungle Book as a child, Calvino felt that his early interest in stories made him the black sheep of a family that held literature in less esteem than the sciences. Fascinated by American movies and cartoons, he was equally attracted to drawing, poetry, and theatre. On a darker note, Calvino recalled that his earliest memory was of a Marxist professor who had been brutally assaulted by Benito Mussolini's Blackshirts.

Other legacies include the parents' beliefs in Freemasonry, republicanism with elements of anarchism and Marxism. His parents refused to give their sons any education in the Catholic Faith or any other religion.

In 1941, Calvino enrolled at the University of Turin, choosing the Agriculture Faculty where his father had previously taught courses in agronomy. Concealing his literary ambitions to please his family, he passed four exams in his first year while reading anti-Fascist works by Elio Vittorini, Eugenio Montale, Cesare Pavese, Johan Huizinga, and Pisacane, and works by Max Planck, Werner Heisenberg, and Albert Einstein on physics. Calvino's real aspiration was to be a playwright. His letters to Eugenio Scalfari overflow with references to Italian and foreign plays, and with plots and characters of future theatrical projects.

Disdainful of Turin students, Calvino saw himself as enclosed in a provincial shell that offered the illusion of immunity from the Fascist nightmare.

In spring 1944, her mother encouraged her sons to enter the Italian Resistance in the name of natural justice and family virtues. Using the nom de guerre Santiago, Calvino joined the Garibaldi Brigades, a clandestine Communist group and, for twenty months, endured the fighting in the Maritime Alps until 1945 and the Liberation. As a result of his refusal to be a conscript, his parents were held hostage by the Nazis for an extended period at the Villa Meridiana.

Calvino settled in Turin in 1945, after a long hesitation over living there or in Milan. He often humorously belittled this choice, describing Turin as a city that is serious but sad. Returning to university, he abandoned Agriculture for the Arts Faculty. A year later, he was initiated into the literary world by Elio Vittorini, who published his short story Andato al comando (1945; Gone to Headquarters) in Il Politecnico, a Turin-based weekly magazine associated with the university.

His first novel, Il sentiero dei nidi di ragno (The Path to the Nest of Spiders) written with valuable editorial advice from Pavese, won the Premio Riccione on publication in 1947.

Ultimo viene il corvo (The Crow Comes Last), a collection of stories based on his wartime experiences, was published to acclaim in 1949.

Over a seven-year period, Calvino wrote three realist novels, The White Schooner (1947-1949), Youth in Turin (1950-1951), and The Queen's Necklace (1952-54), but all were deemed defective.

Calvino's first efforts as a fictionist were marked with his experience in the Italian resistance during the Second World War, however, his acclamation as a writer of fantastic stories came in the 1950s.

For two years, Calvino collated tales found in 19th century collections across Italy then translated 200 of the finest from various dialects into Italian.

In 1957, disillusioned by the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary, Calvino left the Italian Communist Party.

Despite severe restrictions in the US against foreigners holding communist views, Calvino was allowed to visit the United States, where he stayed six months from 1959 to 1960 (four of which he spent in New York), after an invitation by the Ford Foundation. Calvino was particularly impressed by the New World: Naturally I visited the South and also California, but I always felt a New Yorker. My city is New York. The letters he wrote to Einaudi describing this visit to the United States were first published as American Diary 1959-1960 in Hermit in Paris in 2003.

Amid the atmosphere that would evolve into 1968's cultural revolution (the French May), he and his family moved to Paris in 1967, taking up residence in a villa in the Square de Châtillon.

Calvino had more significant contact with the academic world, notably at the Sorbonne (with Barthes) and the University of Urbino. His literary interests spanned multiple periods, genres, and languages, including Honoré de Balzac, Ludovico Ariosto, Dante, Ignatius of Loyola, Cervantes, Shakespeare, Cyrano de Bergerac, and Giacomo Leopardi.

On 6 September 1985, Calvino suffered a stroke in his villa in Roccamare, where he was preparing for a lecture tour of the United States and he died during the night of 18/19 September.

More information: New York Public Library

It is not the voice that commands the story; 
it is the ear.

Italo Calvino

CESARE PAVESE, SOLITUDE BY CHOICE OR CIRCUMSTANCES

Today, The Grandma has received good news from her close friend, Joseph de Ca'th Lon who has just arrived in Turin, Piemont, where he plans to attend an important UWCL match on Wednesday.

Joseph wants to take advantage of these days to visit a city that he already knows well, where he has some excellent sporting memories, and a famous drama, precisely against the team that he will be cheering for this time. That is because life takes many turns and, as the Little Prince says, 'only what cannot be seen is essential'. He wants to spend some days in this beautiful city before travelling to Lyon next weekend.

Joseph loves Astronomy, History and Science, in general, but he also shares with The Grandma, his love for literature and visiting Piemont is talking about universal writers such as Italo Calvino, Umberto Eco, Primo Levi or Cesare Pavese.

It is the small pleasures that give meaning to life: family, friends, enjoying nature, listening to good music, building a Lego, watching an interesting football match, a good film, or enjoying reading a good literary work.

More information: Katherine Dolan Writes

Cesare Pavese (9 September 1908-27 August 1950) was an Italian novelist, poet, short story writer, translator, literary critic, and essayist. He is often referred to as one of the most influential Italian writers of his time.

Pavese was reportedly apolitical in the 1930s, but he was moving in antifascist circles. He served a short sentence as a political prisoner. Though eligible for drafting into the Italian Armed Forces during World War II, he did not see any active service. He spent part of the war hospitalized due to asthma. Many of his friends in Turin joined the partisans, but Pavese took no part in the armed struggle in the vicinity of the city. After the war, Pavese joined the Italian Communist Party and worked on the party's newspaper, L'Unità. Toward the end of his life, he was suffering from depression and political disillusionment. He committed suicide by an overdose of barbiturates.

Cesare Pavese was born in Santo Stefano Belbo, in the province of Cuneo. It was the village where his father was born and where the family returned for the summer holidays each year. He started primary school in Santo Stefano Belbo, but the rest of his education was in schools in Turin.

He attended Liceo Classico Massimo d'Azeglio in Turin for his sixth form/senior high school studies. His most important teacher at the time was Augusto Monti, writer and educator, whose writing style attempted to be devoid of all rhetoric.

As a young man of letters, Pavese had a particular interest in English-language literature, graduating from the University of Turin with a thesis on the poetry of Walt Whitman. Among his mentors at the university was Leone Ginzburg, an expert on Russian literature and literary critic, husband of the writer Natalia Ginzburg and father of the future historian Carlo Ginzburg. In those years, Pavese translated both classic and recent American and British authors that were then new to the Italian public.

Pavese, an apolitical person in highly politicized times, moved in antifascist circles. In 1935 he was arrested and convicted for having letters from a political prisoner. After a few months in prison, he was sent into confino, internal exile in Southern Italy, the commonly used sentence for those guilty of lesser political crimes. Carlo Levi and Leone Ginzburg, also from Turin, were similarly sent into confino. After a year spent in the Calabrian village of Brancaleone, Pavese returned to Turin, where he worked for the left-wing publisher Giulio Einaudi as editor and translator. Natalia Ginzburg also worked there.

Pavese was living in Rome when he was called up into the fascist army, but because of his asthma, he spent six months in a military hospital. When he returned to Turin, German troops occupied the streets and most of his friends had left to fight as partisans. Pavese fled to the hills around Serralunga di Crea, near Casale Monferrato. He took no part in the armed struggle taking place in that area. During his years in Turin, he was the mentor of the young writer and translator Fernanda Pivano, his former student at the Liceo D'Azeglio. Pavese gave her the American edition of Spoon River Anthology, which came out in Pivano's Italian translation in 1943.

After World War II Pavese joined the Italian Communist Party and worked on the party's newspaper, L'Unità. The bulk of his work was published during this time. Toward the end of his life, he would frequently visit Le Langhe, the area where he was born, where he found great solace. Depression, the failure of a brief love affair with the actress Constance Dowling, to whom his last novel and one of his last poems (Death will come and she'll have your eyes) were dedicated, and political disillusionment led him to his suicide by an overdose of barbiturates in 1950. That year he had won the Strega Prize for La Bella Estate, comprising three novellas: La tenda, written in 1940, Il diavolo sulle colline (1948) and Tra donne sole (1949).

Leslie Fiedler wrote of Pavese's death ...for the Italians, his death has come to have a weight like that of Hart Crane for us, a meaning that penetrates back into his own work and functions as a symbol in the literature of an age. The circumstances of his suicide, which took place in a hotel room, mimic the last scene of Tra Donne Sole (Among Single Women), his penultimate book. His last book was La Luna e i Falò, published in Italy in 1950 and translated into English as The Moon and the Bonfires by Louise Sinclair in 1952.

He was an atheist.

The typical protagonist in the works of Pavese is a loner, through choice or circumstances. Their relationships with men and women tend to be temporary and superficial. They may wish to have more solidarity with other people, but they often end up betraying their ideals and friends; for example, in The Prison, the political exile in a village in Southern Italy receives a note from another political confinato living nearby, who suggests a meeting. The protagonist rejects a show of solidarity and refuses to meet him. This short novel appeared in a collection entitled Before the Cock Crows referencing Peter's betrayal of Christ before his death.

The Langhe, the area where he spent his summer holidays as a boy, had a great hold on Pavese. It is a land of rolling hills covered in vineyards. It is an area where he felt at home, but he recognised the harsh and brutal lives that poor peasants had making a living from the land. Bitter struggles took place between Germans and partisans in this area. The land became part of Pavese's personal mythology.

In The Moon and the Bonfires, the protagonist tells a story of drinking beer in a bar in America. A man comes in whom he recognizes as being from the valleys of Le Langhe by his way of walking and his outlook. He speaks to him in dialect suggesting a bottle of their local wine would be better than the beer. After some years in America, the protagonist returns to his home village. He explores Le Langhe with a friend who had remained in the area. He finds out that so many of his contemporaries have died in sad circumstances, some as partisans shot by the Germans, while a notable local beauty had been executed by partisans as a fascist spy.

More information: Fondazione Cesare Pavese

 

He knows not his own strength

that hath not met adversity.

Cesare Pavese

FISGARD LIGHTHOUSE AT ESQUIMALT HARBOUR (CA-BC)

It has been a very warm day in Barcelona. After a rainy night, the sun has shined and it has been a fantastic Sunday for sailing before the storm arrives again, so Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have taken their boat and have made a crossing to see the coast from Barcelona to Cubelles.

It's one of their favourite crossings because at afternoon when they return, they can see the lights of the lighthouses that line this part of the Catalan coast: Sant Cristòfol in Vilanova i la Geltrú, Garraf in Sitges, l'Hospitalet, and Montjuïc and the Torre del Rellotge in Barcelona.

They love lighthouses and they remember the history of Fisgard Lighthouse, the lighthouse that first shone in the Colony of Vancouver Island on a day like today in 1860.

Fisgard Lighthouse National Historic Site, on Fisgard Island at the mouth of Esquimalt Harbour in Colwood, British Columbia, is the site of Fisgard Lighthouse, the first lighthouse on the west coast of Canada.

The lighthouse was constructed in 1859-60 by the British colonial government of the Colony of Vancouver Island, and it shone its first light on 16 November 1860. It was employed by twelve full-time lighthouse keepers, before being automated in 1929. It has remained in continuous operation, though a fire in 1957 put it out of commission for a year.

The light shows a white isophase light of 2 second period in a sector from 322° to 195° at 21.6 metres above mean sea level, and in other directions it shows red shutters. The white 14.6-metre tower is floodlit below balcony level.

It was formally recognized as a National Historic Site of Canada on 3 November 1958. An artificial causeway connecting it to Fort Rodd Hill National Historic Site was constructed in the 1950s, and the two sites are jointly administered by Parks Canada.

Fisgard Lighthouse and its sister station Race Rocks Light, were constructed in 1859–60, to ease the movement of naval ships into Esquimalt Harbour and merchant ships into Victoria Harbour. The light stations were also seen as a significant political and fiduciary commitment on the part of the British government to the Colony of Vancouver Island, partly in response to the American gold miners flooding into the region: some 25,000 arrived in 1858 for the Fraser Gold Rush.

Colonial Governor James Douglas petitioned the British government to build the lighthouse. Captain George Richards supported his position, recommending the construction of a lighthouse at the mouth of Esquimalt Harbour.  Fisgard Island, which had been named after HMS Fisgard, a British Navy ship that spent time in the Pacific and had surveyed the island in 1848, was chosen as the location for the new lighthouse.

Architects John Wright and Hermann Otto Tiedemann designed the lighthouse and the picturesque gothic red brick residence adjoining it. Colonial surveyor and engineer Joseph Despard Pemberton was awarded the contract for the construction of the lighthouse. Excavation on Fisgard Island began September or October of 1859.

Local legend claims that the brick and stone used in construction were sent out from Britain as ballast; in fact local brick yards and quarries supplied these materials. Construction of the buildings was complete by June 1860. The lens, lamp apparatus and lantern room were accompanied from England by the first keeper, Mr. George Davies, in 1859. The cast-iron spiral staircase in the tower was made in sections in San Francisco.

Fisgard first showed a light from the tower at sunset on 16 November 1860.

Permanent steel shutters were added to the landward side of the lantern room some time after 1897, when concussion from the 6-inch guns at newly built Fort Rodd Hill caused cracks to appear in the lantern windows. The last keeper to actually live full-time at Fisgard was George Johnson; Josiah Gosse, Fisgard's final keeper, had permission from the lighthouse authority to live ashore (nearby on Esquimalt Lagoon), and row out to Fisgard every evening.

A causeway from the adjacent Fort Rodd Hill National Historic Site provides access by land.

The former lighthouse keeper's residence is open to the public and contains displays and exhibits about the site's history. The attached tower is not open to the public as it is an operational aid to navigation.

The lighthouse was designated a National Historic Site of Canada in 1958. It is also a Classified Federal Heritage Building.

More information: Parks Canada

 Anything for the quick life, as the man said 
when he took the situation at the lighthouse.

Charles Dickens

'PHALACROCORACIDAE', THE SPECTACULAR CORMORANTS

Today, Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have continued birdwatching in the Llobregat Delta. 

It has been a very special day because they were able to watch different migratory species, such as the cormorant, that do not live in the Delta there all year round. 

Cormorants have long been the subject of folklore and fable, though not always good. In Norwegian tradition, it's believed spirits of loved ones lost at sea take the form of cormorants to visit living relatives, while in cosmic symbology the birds represent resourcefulness, courage and ingenuity. Besides, it is one of the birds that William Shakespeare refers to most often in his works as a symbol of avarice, greed and power.

There are different Phalacrocoracidae members and the species they have been able to see is the pygmy cormorant (Microcarbo pygmaeus), a member of the cormorant family of seabirds that breeds in south-eastern Europe and south-western Asia. It is partially migratory, with northern populations wintering further south, mostly within its breeding range. It is a rare migrant to western Europe.

Last year, Claire and The Grandma could watch some species of Gulosus aristotelis, another member of Phalacrocoracidae, in Torungen (Norway) and in Kirkjubøur (Faroe Islands). That is why it is so exciting to be able to watch this species again. 

The European shag or common shag (Gulosus aristotelis) is a species of cormorant. It is the only member of the monotypic genus Gulosus. It breeds around the rocky coasts of western and southern Europe, southwest Asia and north Africa, mainly wintering in its breeding range except for the northernmost birds. In Britain this seabird is usually referred to as simply the shag. The scientific genus name derives from the Latin for glutton. The species name aristotelis commemorates the Greek philosopher Aristotle.

The European shag was formerly classified within the genus Phalacrocorax, but a 2014 study found it to be significantly more diverged than the clade containing Phalacrocorax and Urile, but basal to the clade containing Nannopterum and Leucocarbo, and thus classified it in its own genus, Gulosus. 

The IOC followed this classification in 2021.

Gulosus is thought to have split from the Nannopterum-Leucocarbo clade between 9.0-11.2 million years ago.

There are three subspecies:

-G. a. aristotelis  (Linnaeus, 1761): Nominate, found in northwestern Europe (Atlantic Ocean coasts)

-G. a. desmarestii (Payraudeau, 1826): Found in southern Europe, southwest Asia (Mediterranean and Black Sea coasts)

-G. a. riggenbachi  (Hartert, 1923). Found in northwest African coast

The subspecies differ slightly in bill size and the breast and leg colour of young birds. Recent evidence suggests that birds on the Atlantic coast of southwest Europe are distinct from all three, and may be an as-yet undescribed subspecies.

The name shag is also used in the Southern Hemisphere for several additional species of cormorants.

This is a medium-large black bird, 68 to 78 cm long and with a 95-to-110-centimetre wingspan. It has a longish tail and a yellow throat patch. Adults have a small crest in the breeding season. It is distinguished from the great cormorant by its smaller size, lighter build, thinner bill, and, in breeding adults, by the crest and metallic green-tinged sheen on the feathers. Among those differences are that a shag is smaller and has a lighter, narrower beak, and the juvenile shag has darker underparts. The European shag's tail has 12 feathers, as do the great cormorant's 14 feathers. The green sheen on the feathers results in the alternative name green cormorant sometimes being given to the European shag.

It feeds in the sea, and, unlike the great cormorant, is rare inland. It will winter along any coast that is well-supplied with fish. The European shag is one of the deepest divers among the cormorant family. Using depth gauges, European shags recorded diving up to 61 m deep. European shags are preponderantly benthic zone feeders, i.e. they find their prey on the sea bottom. They will eat a wide range of fish but their commonest prey is the sand eel. Shags will travel many kilometres from their roosting sites in order to feed.

The shag is a pursuit-diving seabird that feeds predominantly in benthic habitats. Due to the relative ease with which diet samples can be collected from this species (regurgitated food or pellets) and the perceived conflict between the Phalacrocoracidae and fisheries, shag diet competition has been the subject of substantial scientific interest. Evidence collected at one colony, the Isle of May, Scotland, between 1985 and 2014, suggests that shag chick diet composition in this population has diversified in response to ocean warming. Shags also feed on fewer sandeel on windy days, presumably due to the strong effect of wind on flight in this species. The year-round diet of full-grown shags at this colony has also changed over the past 3 decades, from sandeel specialists to an increasingly diverse prey base.

The European shag can be readily seen among the following locations during the breeding season, between late April and mid-July: Saltee Islands, Ireland; Farne Islands and Isles of Scilly, England; Isle of May, Deerness and Fowlsheugh, Scotland; Runde, Norway; Iceland; Denmark; Faroe Islands; Galicia, Northern Spain; Dalmatia and Istria, Croatia. In April 2017, eight new European shags were born in Monaco.

More information: BTO

 The Cormorant is not easily induced to affability, nor I to flattery.
His best seruice is harsh and vnsociable, so is my style. 
His biting is sharpe and piercing, so is my phrase. 
His throat is wide and spacious, my subiect is spacious. 
His co­lour is blacke, I discouer deeds of darknesse. 
He grubs and spuddles for his prey in muddy holes and obscure cauerns, 
my Muse ferrits base debaushed wretches in their swinish dens.

John Taylor

WATCHING BIRDS AT THE LLOBREGAT DELTA'S RESERVES

Autumn is being very warm in Barcelona so Claire Fontaine and The Grandma have decided to visit one of their favourite spaces in search of peace and reflection, the nature reserves of El Remolar i les Filipines in the Llobregat Delta, unique and fascinating spaces that border the Barcelona-El Prat airport and the Mediterranean Sea, as well as the Baix Llobregat Agricultural Field.

These are fragile natural spaces that coexist with the maelstrom of planes, highways and, in summer, the massification of the beaches of this part of the Catalan coast, and the massive presence of mosquitoes. One of The Grandma's passions is ornithology and being able to contemplate unique species in this setting, also unique, is an indescribable pleasure for any human being. We are part of nature and being able to enjoy it in silence and only accompanied by the animal species that live in the Delta is an almost mystical experience.

The Llobregat Delta Natural Areas comprise a beautiful collection of landscapes which are protected due to their ecological value and straddle several towns in the Barcelona region: El Prat de Llobregat, Viladecans, Gavà and Sant Boi de Llobregat.

A large plain that is home to a huge diversity of ecosystems -rushes, wet meadows, pine forests, reed beds, beaches and coastal lagoons- coexisting alongside cultivated lands, the Delta is one of the three most important wetlands in Catalunya.

To put it into context: the Delta occupies an area of 98 km2 between the Garraf massif and Montjuïc hill in Barcelona, and the Sant Andreu de la Barca valley.

The Delta is relatively young, being formed in Roman times, which is pretty recent in geological terms. Its importance lies in its strategic location along the western Mediterranean route linking Europe and Africa that is used by migrating birds.

In the Delta, you can find 700 species of plants (including 22 types of orchid), 360 species of bird, 29 species of mammal, 13 species of reptile and 220 nocturnal butterflies.

Following a recent restoration project, this reserve has recovered its ecological value. Birds once more roost in the trees and marshlands, making it a birdwatcher's paradise.

The viewpoint at La Reguera Salabrosa offers the first glimpse of one of the Llobregat Delta's signature reserves. Before you stretches a varied landscape which is home to numerous species, with wet areas, reed beds, coastal sands and a forest of stone pine. Free-roaming horses graze the marshlands behind, completing the picture-postcard view. And if you like watching aquatic birds, you'll love it: you can see species such as the golden plover, cormorants, snipes, egrets, teal and more.

Les Filipines marshes are home to one of the largest concentrations and greatest diversity of orchids in the whole Llobregat Delta.

Located on the right bank of the final stretch of the Llobregat River, they occupy about 145 ha and there is a great diversity of flora and fauna. We can find the main landscapes of the Delta: rushes, wet meadows, pine forests, reed beds, beaches and coastal lakes, such as Cal Tet and Ca l'Arana. They have the old buildings of the Semàfor and Carrabiners, converted into viewpoints of the landscape around Bunyola and the protected beaches.

It is one of the most emblematic natural spaces, especially because it is easy to observe aquatic birds, such as kingfishers, cormorants, ducks, terns and egrets. In spring and summer, waders fill the marsh. This space occupies 188 ha and includes the Remolar pond and the Filipines marsh, the final stretch of the Sant Climent stream, the Remolar pine forest and beach and the Cal Francès pine forest and beach. Within the Remolar pine forest we find the modernist building of Ca la Pilar.

The 1,640 km interpretive trail is both flat and suitable for wheelchairs, making it very easy to follow. Informative panels along the route offer details and pictures of the flora and fauna you can find in the area.

More information: Catalunya

 

Delicious autumn! 
My very soul is wedded to it, 

and if I were a bird I would fly about 

the earth seeking the successive autumns.

George Eliot

THE LEONIDS & THE METEOR SHOWERS OF STORM OF 1833

It is believed that there are about forty sextillion stars in our universe. Some are visible to the naked eye, others belong to more distant galaxies, but sometimes wonderful phenomena occur when specific stars suddenly appear, shining more intensely than ever in different places with common meaning. It can be a Universal Star or a Northern Star and both have the same effect on those who see them: admiration, happiness and nostalgia.

Barcelona has received the impact of two stars in the same week. It has been very emotional, although it is not usual, nor was the Leonid shower that occurred in the American continent on a day like today in 1833.

The Leonids are a prolific annual meteor shower associated with the comet Tempel–Tuttle, and are also known for their spectacular meteor storms that occur about every 33 years.

The Leonids get their name from the location of their radiant in the constellation Leo: the meteors appear to radiate from that point in the sky. The name is derived from Greek and Latin with the prefix Leo- referring to the constellation and the suffix -ids signifying that the meteor shower is the offspring of, descendant of, the constellation Leo.

Earth moves through meteoroid streams left from passages of a comet. The streams consist of solid particles, known as meteoroids, normally ejected by the comet as its frozen gases evaporate under the heat of the Sun once within Jupiter's orbit. Due to the retrograde orbit of 55P/Tempel-Tuttle, the Leonids are fast moving streams which encounter the path of Earth and impact at 252,000 km/h. It is the fastest annual meteor shower. Larger Leonids which are about 1 cm across have a mass of 0.5 g and are known for generating bright (apparent magnitude -1.5) meteors. An annual Leonid shower may deposit 12-13 t of particles across the entire plant.

The meteoroids left by the comet are organized in trails in orbits similar to-though different from-that of the comet. They are differentially disturbed by the planets, in particular Jupiter, and to a lesser extent by radiation pressure from the Sun -the Poynting-Robertson effect and the Yarkovsky effect. These trails of meteoroids cause meteor showers when Earth encounters them. Old trails are spatially not dense and compose the meteor shower with a few meteors per minute. In the case of the Leonids, that tends to peak around 18 November, but some are spread through several days on either side and the specific peak changes every year. Conversely, young trails are spatially very dense and the cause of meteor outbursts when the Earth enters one.

The Leonids also produce meteor storms (very large outbursts) about every 33 years, during which activity exceeds 1,000 meteors per hour, with some events exceeding 100,000 meteors per hour, in contrast to the sporadic background (5 to 8 meteors per hour) and the shower background (several meteors per hour).

The Leonids are famous because their meteor showers, or storms, can be among the most spectacular. Because of the storm of 1833 and the developments in scientific thought of the time, the Leonids have had a major effect on the scientific study of meteors, which had previously been thought to be atmospheric phenomena. Although it has been suggested the Leonid meteor shower and storms have been noted in ancient times, was the meteor storm of November 12-13, 1833 that broke into people's modern-day awareness. One estimate of the peak rate is over one hundred thousand meteors an hour, while another, done as the storm abated, estimated in excess of 240,000 meteors during the nine hours of the storm, over the entire region of North America east of the Rocky Mountains.

The event was marked by several nations of Native Americans: the Cheyenne established a peace treaty and the Lakota calendar was reset. Many Native American birthdays were calculated by reference to the 1833 Leonid event. Abolitionists including Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass as well as slave-owners took note and others. 

The New York Evening Post carried a series of articles on the event including reports from Canada to Jamaica, it made news in several states beyond New York and, though it appeared in North America, was talked about in Europe. The journalism of the event tended to rise above the partisan debates of the time and reviewed facts as they could be sought out. 

Abraham Lincoln commented on it years later. Near Independence, Missouri, in Clay County, a refugee Mormon community watched the meteor shower on the banks of the Missouri River after having been driven from their homes by local settlers. Joseph Smith, the founder and first leader of Mormonism, afterwards noted in his journal for November 1833 his belief that this event was a litteral [sic] fulfillment of the word of God and a harbinger of the imminent second coming of Christ. Though it was noted in the midwest and eastern areas, it was also noted in Far West, Missouri.

Denison Olmsted explained the event most accurately. After spending the last weeks of 1833 collecting information, he presented his findings in January 1834 to the American Journal of Science and Arts, published in January-April 1834, and January 1836. He noted the shower was of short duration and was not seen in Europe, and that the meteors radiated from a point in the constellation of Leo and he speculated the meteors had originated from a cloud of particles in space. 

Accounts of the 1866 repeat of the Leonids counted hundreds per minute/a few thousand per hour in Europe. The Leonids were again seen in 1867, when moonlight reduced the rates to 1,000 meteors per hour. 

Another strong appearance of the Leonids in 1868 reached an intensity of 1,000 meteors per hour in dark skies. It was in 1866-67 that information on Comet Tempel-Tuttle was gathered, pointing it out as the source of the meteor shower and meteor storms. When the storms failed to return in 1899, it was generally thought that the dust had moved on and the storms were a thing of the past.

More information: Sky and Telescope

 The stars look the same from night to night. 
Nebulae and galaxies are dully immutable, 
maintaining the same overall appearance 
for thousands or millions of years. 
Indeed, only the sun, moon and planets 
-together with the occasional comet, 
asteroid or meteor- seem dynamic.

Seth Shostak