IN THE CENTER OF BALE

Today I drove about 30 kilometers to the town called Bale ...

... and took a long walk ...

... through the interesting labyrinth ...

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... of narrow streets and passages ...

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... in its historic center.

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A friend was there with me, so she will appear from time to time in the scenery during this walk.

It all started here, on the small parking at the entrance of the old town.

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I noticed an interesting old relief surrounded by the relatively new, refreshed facade on one of the buildings in front of me. It seems that is here since 1871.

This is a wider view of that line of buildings. You can also see the sotoportego that leads to some smaller houses on the other side.

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For this photograph, I turned 180 degrees and pointed the camera towards the old center situated on a small hill. I also zoomed in a bit. When this shot was taken ...

... I continued in that direction.

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At one point a big bus that looked like some giant insect because of its antennae-like side mirrors, passed me by and entered the post.

A minute later I stopped and after another 180 degrees turn, took a last look at the starting point of this walk ...

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... that continues ...

... towards the old center.

Here I stopped because I noticed a simple but lovely bench ...

... in front of a house along the way. It looked kinda cool while standing there, in between two entrances.

The electricity meter box near one of those doors had a wide smile drawn on its flat face.

A bit later, I was standing in front of a store that sells local olive oil in small, decorative bottles, products made of or with truffles from the northern part of the peninsula, and some other expensive stuff for tourists on a gourmet spree. While standing on that corner ...

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... I zoomed on some work in progress that was going on further up the road.

With the following photograph ...

... I'm entering the old town.

The asphalt road turned into an old-fashioned street paved with plates of stone. Here, my attention got immediately caught by three interesting plants in front of this old house.

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I don't know what kind of cactuses are these, but they are pretty big for this area.

And they look pretty cool.

Just across the street from those plants, there was a large stone container covered with glass, with some decorative driftwood pieces and big green bottles stored inside. There was a closed souvenir shop nearby, and this is probably some kind of advert for that shop.

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Some of the surrounding buildings were nicely reflected on the cover made of glass.

I also caught some reflections in the glass of the door on one of the neighboring buildings.

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Twenty or so meters further ...

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... I reached the place with the nice, wide view of the interesting little valley surrounded by houses of the old town.

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I spent almost half an hour here because there was plenty to discover and photograph from this scenic place.

It looks that some older buildings were standing in the valley once upon a time, and the stone wall fragments that you see in this and the previous two photographs, are probably their remains. In the following shot ...

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... the focus is on buildings that are still in use.

Colorful laundry on a leash it's a great decoration for any kind of town, old or new.

I shot this old well through the dense branches of some small, shrub-like trees.

Here I'm continuing uphill ...

... towards the fragments of architecture that I see above the buildings around me.

I passed by the window with a very old, worn-out joke written in the dust.

OPERI ME means WASH ME in my language. I wrote that many times as a kid on various dusty surfaces all around my hometown.

Here I took a look through shadows and saw the sunny part of town.

When I passed this way again, on the way back to the car, there was plenty of smoke coming out from one of the houses you saw in the previous photograph, but more about that later, near the end of the walk.

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I was progressing very slowly. This photograph was taken only about ten or twenty meters closer to the top.

There was too much stuff worth a shot or two.

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Here I walked ten or twenty meters back because I forgot to photograph these children's stuff in front of yet another old house along the way.

When this photograph was taken, I reached a little square ...

... with the beautiful Soardo-Bembo palace from the first years of the 15th century. This is one of the most iconic buildings in Bale. It was built as a fortress, but less than a century later it became a luxurious residential building. The cafe bar on the narrow square is made of glass and its rooftop resembles a series of medieval tents. I like this simple design very much.

Here you can see the same square from another angle.

This photograph was taken in a small dead-end street ...

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... with many cool details on display.

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Here you can take a look at another corner of the square. After taking this photograph ...

... I entered the narrow side street paved with gravel.

I stopped to photograph this wooden barrel, and less than a minute later ...

... my friend entered the scene.

She was photographing this fast, powerful motorcycle ...

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... parked on the window sill.

A bit further in the same street, while passing by one of the few renovated houses there ...

... I found this minuscule snail on the facade.

Here I stopped in the middle of the street ...

... to photograph what I left behind.

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When I reached the small, unpaved square at the other end of the street ...

... I encounter a group of pigeons. They were picking some invisible food on the ground.

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I mean, from their perspective the food was absolutely real and clearly visible, it was only invisible to me.

Here I'm passing by some colorful children's stuff on that small square covered with short green grass.

This silent statue probably represents some important Christian character, but I can't tell you his name because I forgot to take a look at the little plate at the base of the statue, and I haven't found anything about it on the Internet. For me, it could equally be a character from The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion.
The statue is situated in front of the biggest church in town - The Parish church of Visitation of Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Elizabeth. Oh, Jesus, what a name! I, mean, it's pretty long - isn't it? Didn't photograph the church from here because the space was too narrow and the building wasn't lit in a photogenic way.

Not far from the church ...

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... I came across another good-looking old well.

This photograph was taken about fifty meters from the church, in the area that I visited not so long ago. At this point, I was walking back to the car.

Here you can see the sotoportego under the Soardo-Bembo building ...

... that leads to the old neighborhood behind the palace. I skipped that part of town ...

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... collected a few more architectural details ...

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... from the square in front of the palace ...

... and then ...

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... with the memory card filled with pictures and brain full of new memories that will take some time to vanish or firmly establish ...

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... I continued downhill.

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I saw some smoke on my way back, and that smoke looked pretty cool in the photographs. The breeze in the alley was changing direction, and so was the smoke. I had a lot of fun taking this series of photographs.

Here I'm approaching the starting point of this Wednesday walk.

Before entering the car ...

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... I photographed this little birdhouse for books that I didn't notice before.

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A couple of minutes later, I stopped on the outskirts of bale to take this shot in which you can take a good look at The Parish church of Visitation of Blessed Virgin Mary to St. Elizabeth - Amen.

AS ALWAYS IN THESE POSTS ON HIVE, THE PHOTOGRAPHS ARE MY WORK - AMEN ... I MEAN - THE END.

POST SCRIPTUM: In this photograph taken by a friend who was there with me, you can take a look behind the scene. I'm photographing the interesting valley in the middle of the old town.