Cards From David

 All the cards in today's update were sent by David of Ireland. His recent trip yielded a nice assortment of cards from Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan, and India. Let's start with a card from Khulna, Bangladesh. David's card shows a reflection of post-monsoon clouds in a river in the East Sanctuary Sundarbans area . The Sundarbans is the world's largest mangrove forest. Khulna is located in the southern part of the country and is the 3rd largest city. Here is David's card.

David wasn't lucky enough to find a stamp for this postcard. I imagine that didn't go over too well, I know it wouldn't have for me. He had to settle for a postage meter of some sort, showing Bangladesh, Postage Paid and the date. The good part though is that it works. Have a look.

Card 2 is from Kathmandu, Nepal. It is a picture of Kathmandu Durbar Square, with the external courtyard facade of the Taleju Temple to the northeast.

 This card arrived with a really nice stamp issued back in September of 2012. It is a Joint Issue with Israel. It shows the Highest  ( Mount Everest ) and the Lowest ( the Dead Sea ) places on Earth. It is also the first joint issue by Nepal.

Next is David's card from Paro, Bhutan. Paro is a town of around 15,000 in the Paro Valley of Bhutan. It is also the home of Bhutan's only international airport. The card gives us a look at some of the houses and buildings  in the valley with the farms near the bottom of the valley.

 

Many, many years ago as a young stamp collector, you might get a stamp or two from exotic Bhutan and think to yourself, these don't even look real. Now , those many years later, who would have thought that I would even receive mail from there ? Certainly not me. 

The stamp here is the 2012 Year of the Dragon Stamp.

  

Now for a card showing the Khangchendzodnga Mountain Range. It is looking from Phoktay dara, above Chiwabhanjyang, West Sikkim, India. Sikkim sate is the least populous state in India. It shares borders with Nepal, China's Tibet and Bhutan. It has the only open land border between India and China. 

 

The stamp on the left was issued in 2012, celebrating the Consumer Protection Act of 1986. The lighthouse stamp is 1 of 2 in a recent 2012 set. The 2 formed a very nice souvenir sheet. A 2009 definiteve can also be seen.

David's next card is titled, les enfants de Calcutta and it's easy to see why with a couple little kids and a mom on the front. My Lovely Teena likes this card, she always  likes cards with people.

Quite a large stamp on the right, it was issued in 2010. It commemorates the Rath Yatra held in Puri. It is the oldest , and biggest Rath Yatra held in the world. It is a Hindu festival that involves transporting idols on a chariot. The left stamp was issued in 2012 and is 1 of 4 celebrating 100 Years of Aviation in India.

Here's another one thanks to David. This one is of Shore Temple in Mahabalipuram, a town in the state of Tamil Nadu. The state is in the southernmost part of the Indian Peninsula. The Shore Temple was built in 700-728 AD and has been a UNESCO World Heritage site since 1884.

The stamps on this one feature two very well known females. On the left is Indira Gandhi, a former Prime Minister of India , while on the right is Mother Teresa, an Indian Roman Catholic nun, born in Skopje, Macedonia.

David's last card for this time is from Pondicherry, India. Pondicherry is a city in the Indian Union Territory of Puducherry. The French acquired Puducherry in 1674 and held it until 1962. David commented on his card that the area had a little French feel to it. From looking at the card , almost anywhere comes to mind except India.

Three of 4 textile stamps were used on this one. They are from a set of 4 issued in 2009.








That's David's cards for this time. Thanks David. , Nothing left except for my bonus Airlines postcard and bonus Aviation stamps.

The card this time is of a Alaska Airlines DC-6C, pictured at Seattle-Tacoma Airport. Alaska first introduced DC-6 service in 1957. With the DC-6 , Alaska was the first carrier to introduce in-flight movies on regular passenger flights.

 

My Aviation stamps for this time are a group of stamps issued by Sweden. On the left are a Friedrichshafen FF49 and a Junkers J4-52. The 2 center stamps show a JU-52 and the right stamps are of Douglas DC-3s.

Be sure to click on these and see just how beautiful and detailed these stamps really are.

 

So ends another update. Next issue in April. See you then. 

Long Awaited Update ( at least by me )

Hello faithful, glad you keep coming back. I know this is long overdue and I have lots of excuses, not least of which  is some technical  glitch with Blogger that is not allowing me to sign in. However,  as is evident with this, I ( actually , my son Steve ) have found a back door way that allows me to sign in. That's enough about that, I'm sure that if you're reading this , you're here for the postcards. Speaking of postcards, I might not have been on my blog, but that didn't stop the cards from arriving. I think 28 or so arrived since my last update.

A private swap card from NSW, Australia is first up . It's actually a maximum card with a very similar stamp of the Blue Mountains of the Grose Valley area. Spectacular sandstone cliff formations dominate The Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. The Blue Mountains is a national park and a W H Site since 2000.  The Grose River Gorge stamp on the front of the card was issued in 2008, one of four

in a New South Wales set.

Don , a Postcrosser who hails from Springwood, NSW sent this card. He and I will do a few card swaps in the coming months. Don  used 2 stamps from a 2012 set of 5 entitled Agriculture in Australia. 









I'm not quite sure what to think about this next card. I'm not even sure it is actually a postcard. It did the work of one and was accepted by the post offices of Taiwan and Canada. Isabel sent this tiny card to fulfill her Postcrossing obligation after drawing my name. It is certainly the smallest card I have received , measuring just  8.5 cm x 5.5 cm.  Here is Isabel's circus ride.

Even as small as I have shown the card, it really doesn't give a true idea of its size , especially when one looks at the stamp that was on it.
Isabel's stamp is 1 of 4 in a Berries set issued in 2012.

I wonder if I just bought a stamp and wrote an address on it , would that be accepted and get to a destination, because let me tell you, I have seen stamps bigger than the above card. Who wants to try ?

My next card is another addition to my Airplanes on Postcards collection. This one flew in from Belarus. It's a cool looking 2 seater little prop job.

Anna from Minsk used a neat 2013 Embroidery stamp from a set of 3 issued Feb 12th of this year.

As I receive more and more Train cards I am starting to find them quite interesting and can see why some collect  them , much like I collect planes. And when they arrive with a train stamp , it makes it even better. This is an interesting card as Sirpa  the sender actually took the picture and then had the postcard professionally printed . It's a good job, too. The train is one that makes an old style trip from one city to another, just once a summer.

 

The stamp is from a booklet of 6 self adhesives issued in 2012 celebrating Finnish railway's 150th Anniversary. And, if my geometry holds up, I believe the stamp is a vertical trapezoid. If not, I'm sure someone will let me know.

Today's final card for today is my bonus Aviation card followed by a couple of Aviation stamps. The card is a beautiful view of a C-141 Starlifter. The Starlifter provided a variety of heavy lift duties for the Air Mobility Command of the USAF. It was used to airlift combat forces, and equipment along with transporting the sick and wounded. This postcard brings back memories from the 1970s for me. When I lived in Goose Bay, Labrador, the USAF had an air force base there and quite often one could look skyward and see a C-141 landing or taking off. If I'm not mistaken, one of the tings I remember is that they didn't seem to make a lot of noise, unlike the KC-135 Stratotanker refuellers which were based there. You couldn't hear yourself when they were on the move.

 

To to make sure you were paying attention I will post a C-141 Starlifter card to the first one to correctly answer the following 2 questions :

1-  How many C-141s were lost during the Viet Nam War  and 

2- What were the dates of their destructions ? 

First email with correct answers to glenn.moores@shaw.ca  Wins

 

Here are my Aviation stamps for this time. Enjoy.

 
  They come from Lundy, not exactly a bastion of stamp issuing prowness, but I can't help liking these two. On the left is a De-haviland Comet and on the right a Bristol Brabazon.

Thanks to Don, Isabel, Anna and Sirpa for their cards. 
Come back soon, as I hope to get a few more updates in before the end of the month.
My next update will be a bunch of cards all from one sender- David from Ireland. It will be cards from his recent trip to India, Bangladesh, Nepal and Bhutan. Sounds good to me, 

St. Patrick's Day Update

Hello folks, well today's update has nothing to do with St. Patrick's Day, other than  the fact it is written on this day. But I do have an Irish connection, so let's start with that. My good postcard friend David from Dublin or thereabouts has a new postcard blog online as of a few days ago. He gets around a lot so has a lot of cards to show us over time. His blog is called "Postcards A World Travelogue "and you can find it   here . Don't be shy now, go ahead , give it a visit and and add some words of encouragement to a new blogger.

Okay, let's get to today's cards. My first card this time is a flag card of Turkey. This one arrived unannounced from a new reader of this blog, Onder from Istanbul. He collects flag cards so a Canadian flag card is on the way to him. Of course Onder has a postcard blog too, it's "Postcards On My Wall " and you can find it  here .    

Onder used a great 2011 souvenir/sheet of 1 , featuring Kemal Ataturk on his card. 2011 was Ataturk's 130 birthday. 

My second card today is another one for my aircraft on postcards collection. It comes from Minami, a Postcrosser in Japan. It's a really nice picture of a small single engine plane equipped with skis on a large snow covered area.  







Minami used 1 1997 definitive , 1 of 3 in a set along with a round stamp of a strawberry wreath. There was a time when if confronted with a round stamp, one thought about Tonga or Bhutan. It seems times have change as there seems to be more round stamps coming on stream. There's this one from Japan and the recent Forever stamp from the USA. Let me know if your country has issued any round stamp lately.

My next card is a wonderful , clear picture of the area surrounding the Arc de Triomphe, one of the most famous monuments in all of Paris. It honours those who fought and died for France in the French Revolutionary and the Napoleonic Wars. Beneath its vault lies the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier from World War I.

 

Dominique used a nice stamp related in a way to the subject of the card. It is a 20 gram letter rate stamp celebrating the Armistice signed on November 11th , 1918. Nice looking stamp.

Here's a card from David  who I mentioned in my opening. He's just back from his recent trip to Bangladesh and India. His card shows a great load of straw moving down the road. The card says "the carter are carrying the bulle of straw. " I leave it to your interpretation.

David used a wonderful block of 4 issued in 2011. It marks the 150th anniversary of the birth of Viswakobi Rabindranath Tagore.

The last card , other than my Aviation bonus card is next. It comes from Sri Lanka , compliments of Dr. Mikram. This time he sent a card with the Toque monkey, which is endemic to Sri Lanka.  

The good doctor used 2 rather long stamps. The top one is 1 of 4 in a set issued in 2012 featuring Colonial Buildings. The larger bottom stamp was issued in 2010 for Singapore 2010, The Youth Olympic Games. 











Well that about wraps another update, other than my aviation card and stamp. But first let me thank Onder, Minami, Dominique, David and Dr Mikram for their cards. , because that's what it's all about, it's also why you're reading this.

Now it's bonus time. Today's  card is of a TCA ( Trans Canada Airlines ) Canadair North Star flying over Bermuda . Somewhere I wish I was now as winter seems to be just stuck here, with snow and cold temps. Anyway, TCA operated 20 North Stars from 1946-1961. Here she is.






Today's aviation stamp is a single , Scott 2148 from Argentina. It was issued April 21, 2001 commemorating the 75th Anniversary of the first single flight from Spain to Argentina. The stamp shows a Plus Ultra seaplane "Dornier Do J Wal " with two tandem engines. Have a look at the placement of the engines. You wont see that too often.

That's it  for today. Take care.

More March Madness

Hello and welcome to my new update.I have a few postcards, a few stamps and a bit of other stuff for this time. The postcards are first. Let's start with a card from Providenciales, Turks and Caicos Islands, a virtual paradise I'm sure.The card shows a view of the beautiful beach at Grace Bay.   







I don't usually show the back of cards, just the stamps, but in this case, I'm showing all of it. The card came from Zach, Xander and Will, three of my fine grandsons. Fine boys they are , too. They are recently back from their second visit ( first for Will ) to Turks and Caicos with their Mom and Dad. The boys used a 2007 shell definitive from a definitive set of 13 values.  I showed the whole back of the card just in case their Dad showed this to them. They might want to see just what they wrote. 



Next is a beautiful winter view of a part of the Baltic Sea, with a snow covered boat on shore.

Aukse, a Postcrosser,  in Vilnius sent this card and used 1 of 2 Christmas stamps in a 2012 issue.












Pierre, a new reader of this blog sent this next card. He collects Military Aviation Postcards. He is from Blyes, a commune in eastern France. His collection interest is obvious from this card.







Pierre used 2 bird topical stamps from 2012. They are part of a set of 4 issued for Bird Protection.













Now it's a card from Bulgaria. I haven't received many cards from this country, just 3 in 7 years , make that 4 now with this one. The card is of ETAR, the architectural-ethnographic complex at Gabrovo.It is a unique collection of old time water driven machinery in Bulgaria.   



The 2 smaller stamps on the left were both  issued in 1999. The 2 larger stamps are from a m/sheet of 4 issued in 2012 celebrating the History of Railways.








This past week I've received a number of cards from Russia. With that in mind , I am only looking at one of those cards but will show all the stamps. This card comes from Yekaterinburg, the 4th largest city in Russia. The card is from Kate and is entitled "Evolution of a Postman ".I can see the postman but I just don't follow the evolution part.  










The stamps are a wonderful collection of stamps from 2008 - 2012. Among them is an animal definitive, a Cossack stamp , a Sochi Olympics stamp, a stamp celebrating 300 years of the Moscow Post Office and a Modern Art stamp picturing a lady and a child. Back in the old Soviet Union era, the stamps from Russia didn't appeal to me at all, too much propaganda I guess. Now I find that I like them, they are nice and large with many topics covered.









Here's my last regular card for this time. It comes from Burlington, Vermont, USA and is a picture of a New York burlesques actress from around 1890. All I can say is , that's quite the outfit or costume she has .














This card arrived with my first copy of  the first global forever stamp issued Jan 28, 2013 by the U.S. Postal Service. The new nondenominated stamp fulfills the new 1 ounce international letter rate for mail to any country in the world. I think Postcrossers all over will see a lot of these arriving on postcards. The stamp is round shape and depicts a digital illustration of the globe.












                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              That's the update for this time. Thanks for cards going out to Zach, Xander and Will, along with Aukse, Pierre, Kate and a couple that I can't make out the names.

My bonus card today shows a Guyana Airways Tupolev 154 aircraft.  Todays's selection of aviation stamps

are from the bygone era of biplanes.  The top 2 stamps are from French Morocco and were issued in 1931. They show a Breguet 14T Biplane. The Romania stamp was issued in 1930 and pictures a Bleriot Biplane.
Just beautiful stamps and ones I am happy to have in my collection.

Take care  and check back often for a new update.  Any Comments ?