Frost Burn

I was with Lucy Afarensis when the call came in. 

Dabici Straulino: do you have 15 minutes? I would like to show you our winter build.

"Want to go skiing?" I said to Lucy. 

 "Sure, why not."

We were not dressed for it, because as you all know OSGrid has ongoing asset problems to the point that even if the item you click on is present in your Inventory (and that happens only once in about 100)  you still do not dare change clothes, because your current outfit is quite likely to disappear. Never mind, we shower twice a day, so  it's all perfectly hygienic. And I have been barefoot skiing before, so decided to risk it.

A New Safari Season

         After more than three years absence, the Safari hypergrid tours are coming back.

        The ten week season begins on January 12.  Currently Francogrid is experiencing maintenance issues, so although the old base is still there, we have a new home (courtesy Ange Menges) on OSGrid. the name of the sim is... you guessed it, HG Safari (note the space between hg and safari when you type in the address. In satellite view you'll see this on the map.

        As many of your know, OSGrid is itself in the middle of an asset crisis (*insert here your witty remarks on the subject*) so it has not been all plain sailing to get the new sim up and running. So if you notice some content or textures not working, please be patient. It's a work in progress.

          The Safari Market has a few of the old favorites, and you will find the Meshanthropy store on the island too. I am most proud of being able to import the lovely sailing ship built by long time friend of the Safari, Aime Socrate.

          The new HG Safari trips will depart from OSGrid on Wednesdays at 12 noon SLT (Pacific time, that is) which, for Europeans, is 9pm Paris time. We have invites to 17 different grids, and will be doing a range of activities, from talks to dances to hunts to art installations. 

          The slots in this first season of the Safari filled up in less than a week, so if you are interested in being a destination during the second season, which will begin around May/June, please contact Thirza Ember on OSGrid.

The Last Safari...

 It is a hard thing to write about, the last Safari. We stayed home, uncharacteristically for us. And lovely Wizardoz Chrom made a wonderful machinima of the event. 

  Cherry Manga made all kinds of amazing big art for us to be dazzled by, all around the simple clubhouse and the great sailing ship, handmade by Aime Socrate so long ago. 

Hunting and Racing: the Penultimate Safari

               Our last trip out and about took the intrepid Safari goers to two activity sims, one golden oldie, and one so brand new that it was still being tweaked a couple hours before our arrival.   

 

              Kodinpump is a twist on the word 'pumpkin', for this is a Halloween Hunt build from 2015, one of a long series of fantastic ephemeral builds in SL and opensim by nani Ferguson and Ange Menges, who put it back online especially for our visit.

Safari goes from Alexandria to Arizona

           Two horse riding opportunities this week, and two beautiful places to visit any time. The Safari group was honored to be the first visitors to the latest grand attraction on Outworldz, where 16 regions of ancient history, NPCs, architecture and drama awaited us (the good kind of drama, Shakespearean, naturally) and then an opportunity to meditate in the vast open spaces of the Rift Valley on Afar, OSGrid. HG Addresses at the end of the post as always.

Pharos of Alexandria

              Egypt is a collaborative build, bringing together the creative talents of Debbie Edwards aka Nyira Machabelli, Joe Builder and of course the legendary Ferd Frederix. Avia Bonne also did some of the artwork, she's a talented lady. Outworldz is a great grid with many themed activities - Dragons, Fairy Tales, and the African bush to mention just a few. The Outworldz website is undisputably Opensim's greatest treasure.

Zen and the art of Gridhopping

         For the final few Safari trips, I decided to indulge myself and just organize visits to some of my favorite places. This week, we went to TGrid, also known as ViewTwo, and to Kalasiddhi Grid. HG Addresses at the end of the post. These are two of the smaller grids on the hyperverse, and both have a distinctive look and purpose, that goes to the very heart of the owner operated HG friendly virtual homestead.

TG Lucan

     First up TGrid. It's small and built for testing the very heart of opensim. The Welcome region has a musical theme with clean lines and unscratched vinyl. For a long time, hg visitors would arrive on top of the satellite which was a sort of bug but a fun one. TG Lucan was there to meet the group, where we did some dancing before moving on to the massive 256 Var, so see (let's be honest) if we could break it.

Safari Regulars

The Safari trips have come to an end after four years. Thanks for all the kind comments and compliments - they are much appreciated. Organizing the weekly trips has been fun and fascinating and frenetic, but the purpose, and the success, isn't down to a single person, but a special group of strangers who have become friends, the Safari Regulars.
There are hundreds of posts on this blog about the builds and content creators we have visited, this is the only post dedicated to the Safari Regulars, who are also builders, scripters, coders, grid owners...

The calm before the storm - meeting at the clubhouse before the Safari starts