Star Turn on 3rd Rock

Thirza Ember: happy first contact day everyone

James Atlloud: and a first contact day to you too Thirza

Our first stop on this new season of Safari is the absolutely spectacular Star Trek colony on 3rd Rock Grid. a great crowd of 3rd Rockers were there to meet us, and the peerless Alia Souldstar gave us a wonderful tour. The HG Address for this wonderful build is, of course, at the end of the post.

Nila Shvaress: greetings everyone arriving

Georgina Mills: Hello everyone :)

Ellemir Maven: Hello Lucy, Lavia and Kitty

Dolfke Barbosa: pls take your time to let everything rez properly

James Atlloud: Hello!

Pauline NOVA419: ooo, visitors :)

Alia Soulstar

Alia Soulstar: Hiya Thirza and Safari people :)

Beth Ghostraven: Hi Alia!

Prodyck Theas: Helloo

Alia Soulstar: Is that everyone or are there a few still coming ?

Thirza Ember: ok we are good to go, APPLAUSE! for Astraios colony

A Mobius Spring

Springtime is here on Mobius Grid with lots of good news and innovation! 

The unusual and colorful Mobius grid, inspired by all things Sonic the Hedgehog has recently re-opened its doors to OSGrid  gridjumpers, just in time for their Easter Hunt event, held on their big Welcome sim.  Grid address, is, of course, at the end of the post. 

The look of the Easter Hunt game is unmistakable and charming - this is Cream, an NPC who is part of the fun. Green Hill Zone is the sim most visitors know best, but don't neglect a visit to Lunaria, the gallery sim  belonging to Luna Lunaria, in all its violet glory.

Along with its signature look, Mobius Grid is all about innovation and making the best use of all the features the Viewer offers, so when you arrive you can participate in an Experience rather than just going around doing your own thing.

Deadheads on Neverworld

 IT’S ONLY A SLIGHT EXAGGERATION TO SAY THAT 
THE INTERNET IS A TECHNOLOGY THAT WAS CREATED 
SPECIFICALLY TO TRADE GRATEFUL DEAD SHOWS.
Scott Beauchamp, Pacific Standard Magazine

He was only 53 years old when he died in 1994, but Jerry Garcia packed a great deal into those decades -  133 songs,  four children, 30 years with an iconic band, a place in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame, that whole Haight-Ashbury thing, and of course the missing finger. Before the Grateful Dead was formed, Garcia studied art, and though it necessarily took second place to his music career, he created well over 2000 pieces.

Paintings, sketches and doodly drawings are all part of the rich pattern of Garcia's artistic journey, brought inworld for this event - completing the circle between internet and deadheads, digital and analog, pencil, paints and pc.

Govega Sachertorte

This week a special RL/VW crossover event happened on Neverworld Grid, organized by Govega Sachertorte. You don't have to be a big fan to the music of the GD to appreciate what it means for events to double up their realities, and slip the bounds of geographical being there... it's just a case of relax and enjoy.

Show Me the Monet

There are a lot of good builds in OpenSim, but some are beyond good - for the attention to rl details, for the exceptional building skills, for the atmosphere created on the sim. 

French creator Erwan Elan has a lot of lovely regions on his Serenity Grid, but perhaps the best of all of them is his bravura re-creation of Giverny, in Normandy, the famous home of the Impressionist painter Claude Monet. 

Inside and out, this is hands down the best Monet inspired build you are likely to ever see. Erwan's feel for his subject matter, his thorough research and dedication, radiate out of every texture, and his clever use of the excellent plant resources in opensim (Jimmy Olsen and Imperator Janus spring to mind) thoroughly meet the task he sets for them.

If you have spent any time at all at Giverny in the real world, you'll probably have a story to tell about long queues, an international crowd shuffling dully through the carefully organized garden trail, or about how you went there on a cloudy day, or when the flowers were not looking their best. That is a pretty common experience that you can totally avoid by going to this virtual version of the old farmhouse and two acre garden laid out by Monet and his family in the late 1800's. It is on Serenity Grid, the address is, as always, at the end of the post.

Wat Ever

It all happened in the 1100s, and only took a little over thirty years to complete. It's probably the world's largest  sculpture, because the sandstone was all sourced, delivered by water cut to size, friction-fused, and only then carved and decorated by hundreds of talented sculptors skilled in bas-relief and monumental stone art. 

Its principal courtyard could hold four Vatican Cities, the whole complex covers an area the size of Paris. 

Its name is Angkor Wat.

If you're not up to taking the trip to Cambodia to see this precious symbol of Khmer culture, history, and religion, then sidle over to Craft Grid and you can see a fantastic recreation by renowned builder Tosha Tyran. The HG Address is, as ever, at the end of the post.

 Tosha Tyran: Some years ago I casually saw a very fascinating movie on TV about Angkor Wat and right away I had the wish to do something about it in Virtual Worlds. I researched about it and grew fonder and fonder of that crazy idea...

Egg sistence on AMV

AMV grid is celebrating the spring season with a whole raft of Easter games and hunts, and among them is the latest offering by Nyx, realworld photographer, digital artist, curator and all round good guy. It's a fabulous, faberge-style eggstravaganza laid out on four different levels.  You should set your environment to Midnight to see it as intended, some of these pictures have more blue in them just to make them a bit easier on the eye in a blog.  When you arrive, there's a poster, you can get the explanatory notecard, which has LMs to where toe goodies are, you know, just to give you a chance...

Thirza Ember: how do you play? click on all eggs?

Nyx Breen: the 5 eggs are hidden. Use your virtual skills to discover which ones will give you a prize. There is one on different levels, all within 75 meters of where the LM takes you, and there are 10 textures in each one... so over 1000 eggs find the five ! lol evil evil laugh

On Absalom

The first month, which the Latins call January, is Giuli; February is called Solmonath; 

March Hrethmonath; April, Eosturmonath; May, Thrimilchi;

June, Litha; July, also Litha; August, Weodmonath; September, Halegmonath; 

October, Winterfilleth; November, Blodmonath; 

December, Giuli, the same name by which January is called.

The Venerable Bede, De ratione temporum 15

Blame the Bede for Easter, for it was he who immortalized the goddess Oestre. Without him, the name of the ancient English goddess of fertility, and the month that belongs to her, would have been lost to the ages. It's the season for new beginnings and old traditions, and one of those is about to happen on sim Absalom, in OSGrid.

Perhaps  another run-of-the mill Easter Egg Hunt or something difficult? Wrong on both counts! Pas de souci, Ange promised, it's not one of those super complicated games where you have to follow clues and match photos with locations on the build. Pas de quête cette fois ci, he said, une simple chasse aux oeufs avec 10 cadeaux. Well, a girl needs all the cadeaux she can get, and anyone can chasse an oeuf, am I right?