Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun: round 197

Hey there my Hive friends and followers!

Welcome to the 197th round of my special weekly photo challenge known as Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun :)

Important note: I have been hosting this challenge in the same format for almost 4 years but I recently decided to introduce some major changes to it so please read all the updates below. The essence of this challenge stays the same though so the intro part will be the same as it was before.

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 ;)

HERE COME THE UPDATES

Originally, the prizes for the winners were just my full upvotes given to their entries but since, unfortunately, I lately had to power down significantly, my upvotes are not that big and motivating anymore so I decided to reward the winners of each round with additional 1.5 Hive each. So now, the winners get my full upvotes on their entries plus 1.5 Hive each. All of the other valid entries will be rewarded with some smaller (usually 50%) upvotes too so that all participants get rewarded for their engagement in this challenge.

In the past, I usually hosted this challenge on Thursday but because of the reasons described below, I cannot guarantee that anymore so now, I may roll out the new round on Thursday, Friday or even Saturday so if you guys don´t want to miss out on the fun here, please check out my blog regularly.

Also, in the past, I always tried to lead by example and thus open each new round with my own fresh natural photo taken during the previous 7 days. However, as you might now from my recent posts, me and my wife are now taking care of our newborn baby and it takes just so much time and energy that I simply don´t have the time to go out and take fresh natural photos anymore (btw late autumn and winter here in Central Europe are not favorable seasons for natural photography anyway) so instead, I will be using my old photos from cool natural places around the world that I have been to. Hopefully, in a few months, I will be able to go out to nature regularly again and take a nice fresh picture for each round just like I did it over the years but before that happens, I will show you some beautiful natural places that I got to see during our travels. It will also be a nice way for me to remember and relive those moments from the times when it was just me and my wife, traveling around the world - happy, young and free :)

THE RULES

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 7 days.

Add a few lines about the photo (at least 50 words) including the date and location.

You can start submitting your entries to this round in the comment section below from now until the next round. If you want to create a separate post as your entry, you can do that but please always remember to submit your entry in the form of a comment here under this post as well. I only check the entries submitted here as comments.

Prior to publishing the next round, I will pick 3 winners, give my full upvotes on their entries and send them 1.5 Hive each as the prize. The winning entries will be featured in the next round of the challenge. I also give smaller upvotes on the other valid entries as I mentioned before.

So that´s it. Let me now open the new round of my photography challenge called Appreciate Beauty of Nature with @phortun :)

As if I was not behind the schedule enough already, I just got sick and I´m writing these lines from the bed with a fever and horrible headache. It´s just around 3 PM here in Prague but it´s already getting dark outside. It´s cold, gray and depressive. Therefore, I decided to browse a photo file from my very favorite country in the world and that´s Costa Rica. Reliving those amazing memories from the land of Pura Vida seems so comforting and yet so distant and unreal right now... The picture that I picked is from the Black Beach (Playa Negra) that is located just outside of the lovely coastal town of Puerto Viejo. Our rented cottage was so close to this stunning place that we could hear and smell the Caribbean even when lying in the bed. Le sigh, I miss those moments so much...

In the last round of this challenge, we had 8 participants. After some thorough consideration, I decided to pick these 3 winners:

@triplug with this entry from Romania:

Hello everyone. I want to share with you in round 196, the round launched by @phortun, a picture I took yesterday, but unfortunately I didn't get to upload it right after I took it although that's what I wanted when I took it. Yesterday morning I woke up to a wintry atmosphere outside, windy, cold and very foggy. So I took my drone and raised it above the village where I live here in western Romania, although I lost the signal a few times (I was a bit afraid of losing it) I managed to capture a few photos that I hope you will like. On the left side of the image you can see the village over which a blanket of fog spreads, and on the right side you can see the hills with vine plantations on them. I wish you all a wonderful Sunday.

@friedlymoose with this entry from the Netherlands:

What a great entries last week! It's completely understandable that you have less time for other things when you have a newborn. Just enjoy the time. Soon you'll be walking in nature with your little one. I'll keep on following and try to join more often. Yesterday, I made a nice walk in the mist where I took some cool shots like the one above. Greetings from the Netherlands!

@himalayanwomb with this entry from India:

This photo has been clicked on 3 December 2023. What happened was that Aman (my friend) and I had gone to visit Sahastradhara (India), my plan was to swim in the river located there but in search of a good pond and a good location, we reached a dead end while walking along the river bank. And from here we chose trekking to come back and after climbing the mountain in front, we reached the road after about an hour.

Congratulations guys! It was my pleasure to give you 100% upvotes on your entries and sent 1.5 Hive each, you can check that out in your wallets :)

I am looking forward to what you all will come up with in this round :) Have fun everyone and don´t forget to... Appreciate 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.