After arriving back at the Great Wall, I managed on my third attempt to get down to the T-junction in Itame and not far from the junction I spied a bus stop.
Arr I thought, a bus stop, I like buses, a bus could get me going on this tour, set me on the right direction. I had a look around to see if there were any buses but there were none and it didn’t look asthough there would be any turning up . The sign on the bus stop looked clickable so I clicked on it and it informed me about how to use the bus stop teleport system. Yes the Bus stop that took you to interesting places in SL. That was it really, you just click on the sign below and it teleported you to an interesting place in SL and from there you could get another bus (metaphorically) to somewhere else interesting or back again. Sounded ok, it wasn’t going to get me very far on the tour really, but you have to go on a whim when doing these things don’t you and I had nothing to lose apart from time that is, so I tried it out. The bus stop took me to a sim called Stolen Moments.
It looked quite pretty with a large willow tree and various little animals scurrying around. On further inspection stolen moments turned out to be mainly made up of a a wedding chapel called *Heaven Sent which was a place to arrange your wedding in SL. Overlooking the sea, with honeymoon suite, reception rooms and champagne laid on 
and as I later found , a handy shopping mall for the guests to buy those last-minute wedding gifts .
It was hardly a place of interest to me Just another sim with another club and mall and wedding reception area.
I did take a look around the mall though, you never know what bargains you might find.
I scolded myself for getting distracted, This was getting me nowhere Stolen moments had certainly lived up to its name. I had a long way ahead of me and I was still unsure now whether I might still be under the influence of the vampire magic, after all I had been held up again, that’s what vampires do they play around with you like a cat plays with a mouse, then they move in for the kill. I teleported back to Itame and set off again heading towards the coast.
I made some headway this time and had got as far as the sim of Pryeri before I noticed another bus stop .This one was different from the last in that it had a real, well virtually real bus that would actually take you on a tour of SL.
Sounded just the ticket, I could gain back the time I had lost. Just what I needed I could sit back, relax, take notes on the bus as it trundled along at a leisurely pace from sim to sim. Yes for sure that would work (I don’t think) I hopped on anyway.
What is it about buses in SL that attracts me to them? . I guess in a strange world with outrageously weird stuff everywhere, they are not only something quite familiar but also I think the thing that endears them to me most is the fact that you don’t need buses at all in a virtual world. It’s the same as walking in a place where everyone flies the sheer perversness of it 
I boarded the bus , settled down in my seat and the bus took off. Yes it took off from the ground and proceeded to fly.
I quickly read the instructions that were presented to me when boarding. The instructions informed me not to stand up at any time whilst the bus was travelling. The trouble was the bus was taking me the wrong way, back the way I had come.
Oh dear , I stood up and as I did so the bus exploded (like flying buses do in SL) I thankfully made it to the ground and pulled myself from the wreckage .
Ok No more bus stops or buses, I made my way back to the road and headed in a westerly direction . After I had gone around about a hundred meters along the road I received a postcard from Steelhead sent by my friend Dr Ryne Beck I looked around for a place to rez it and spied an Outy’s particle paradise store. The great thing about Outy’s stores (apart from the fantastic particle related products they sell) is that 1. they are all over the place and 2. you can rez stuff in them. When I was driving my tour bus around SL and crashing it off world , Outy’s stores were nearly always handy and the perfect place to rez your vehicle again. So crossing the road over to the Outy’s store I rezzed the postcard from Ryne and not long after doing so he IM’d me and invited me to pay a visit to the Steelhead steampunk sims where he had his practise
If truth be told I would have loved to of gone there and then but I had to press on. It seemed every turn I made I was somehow or other being coerced into stopping. Now of course I wouldn’t suspect my friend of any intended skullduggery to stall my journey but the thing that made me stop and take note was the date on the card .
For the post date was the same as my real life birthday (not the 1800’s part). Coincidence? I think not (no such thing in this blog :) ). You have to look out for signs like these, they are the only way you can notice outside influences, underlying currents and things that lie beneath and don’t ring true. It was well documented that Friend Doctor Ryne had recently attended a Halloween short story reading in Steelhead and My guess was that there were probably more bloodsuckers winging their way round that night than I would care to shake a (crossed) stick at. It would have been quite easy for one of them to enchant the poor Doctor unnoticed as he concentrated on telling his parable. I thanked him for his invitation but declined his offer for the time being.
A short while later as I crossed in to the sim of Lebeda a Japanese bus sat there waiting for me at the side of the road. Just sitting there ? hmm could I trust it I thought not once bitten or should I say twice bitten
I reached into my rucksack and drawing my SL bible out I waved it at the bus and hurried past.
I’m not a religious person but I was given a bible some time back by a kindly nun who was spreading the word and I’ve carried it around for no particular purpose to this day. It’s tucked away in my special things to keep file . Well there you are, maybe it helped me against a (probably almost definitely) possessed bus. I don’t know it might of.
I do know however that those suckers don’t like the god thing, crosses, holy water, bibles, could there be some truth to its power hmm. I pressed on with that thought in mind through Bhima, Trabala, Bouraq, Sylvina and Gallii
hardly stopping
only once when I had to drag myself out of the road
and again, a bit further on from where I had fallen.
That’s where I saw this sign.
I clicked on the sign and it played onward christian soldiers and recited the Lords Prayer meanwhile I involuntarily started praying half underground and inside a plywood pyramid which was located behind the sign . (most odd)
Was I being sent a message here ? Bearded Priest type characters, missing churches, wedding chapels, powers from the bible and now another bearded effigy, Jesus what was going on here. Could it be that a struggle between good and evil was taking place, things were connecting like crazy, almost as crazy as my thoughts.
Brrrr Shaking my head in a weird sort of way that avatars do sometimes, I tried to take hold of my senses and just enjoy the walk.
After a while I was enjoying the walk so much I missed the turn and took the dead-end at Galli. I would of took to the sea there if there had been a place to rez my boat, but there wasn’t ,so I didn’t and I then had to backtrack to Sylvina.
I noticed in the sim of Elpenor another of the huge crystals that I have seen sprouting out of the ground I’d been noticing them more and more since I left the hobo township of Calleta.
They were made by Plexore Lumiere Ameshin Yossarian . They seem very popular with the folks on this continent and they reminded me very much of fuchsias in their colours and form
and also, because of its crystal structure it brought to mind something that the baker’s kept mentioning in Baker blinker’s Weblog; the Fuchsia Diamond .
I ‘m not sure if there is any connection there, I’m just channeling thoughts as they come. What with the crystals being in my favorite colours I was hoping that they would bring me some good luck, a bit of earth magic maybe, although the one growing right next to the exploding bus didn’t seem to :)
So I walked and walked and then walked a bit more
and it was getting dark by the time I reached the bridge at Alcis, so I looked around for a place to rest for a while.
Someone had thoughtfully pitched a tent and also lit a fire just across from the bridge so I made my way down to the water’s edge and settled down for the night.
I awoke to bird song and the crackle from the fire
and after having some breakfast at the picnic table
I decided to take the next part of the journey by boat . This time I wanted to sail, I have a Trudeau sailing boat powered by SL wind packed away in my rucksack (it folds away very neatly).
I find it is a lovely way to travel, I did the whole of my round the 4th continent tour on this little sailing boat It’s very relaxing just the sound of water trickling by and the occasional flutter of the sail and creak from the mast, the waves breaking on shore and the cry of a gull overhead. Never have I sailed in RL but if it’s as relaxing as this virtual sailing I might give it a try someday. Of course I don’t want to be doing with all that hoisting the main brace and avasting me hearty’s stuff. Just a pleasant gentle not getting really wet sort of sailing is what I’m after.
I rezzed my boat on the shore and hopping on board, used the motor to get me away from the land and then raised the sail .
The wind wasn’t with me at this point so I had to tack, slowly but surely down the estuary and out to sea. Its a very slow way of travelling sometimes but I find extremely satisfying. Everything I needed to control the boat was on an easy to use hud, but you still feel as though you’ve achieved a little something when you’ve successfully dealt with some difficult wind :) (pardon me) . I sailed effortlessly up the coast and getting some strong gusts behind me now I really made good time.
It’s when you’re at your most relaxed, that is when you lose your concentration and when trouble rears its head. My boat hit the rocks near the sim crossing in Jota and I capsized.
I managed to swim ashore to a waterside store in Algira and pulling myself up on the decking, looked out to see my little boat sinking down beneath the waves.
There was no place to rez my boat here and the sabre tooth tiger that was roaming the shop wasn’t in the mood to let me by at the time so I jumped back in to the sea and swam across the Algira coastline till I crossed over into Togata.
Up ahead of me a large ball seemed to be floating in the water. It was very large indeed.
As I got nearer it turned out to be a huge geodesic glass structure.
I swam around it and then took to the air to see if I could get inside.
There didn’t seem to be a door. I peered in but it was difficult to see inside as there were hundreds of trees and plants.
I then hit upon swimming underneath
so I did and low and behold I found I could swim up inside of it.
Inside I found myself in a beautiful tropical like greenhouse, a sort of ecosphere. It was gorgeous with fish swimming around the lily pads and mangrove type trees and beautiful butterflies fluttering around the little island in the middle. I would think this to be an ideal breeding ground for Rhopalocera and for my vamped up Heterocera friends maybe this too could be a paradise.
In such a place as this my little vampire moths could breed and ready themselves for their fight against the undead.
I looked at the land and it said for sale with all objects. It was very tempting to upgrade again and buy this plot. I had just enough money on me. I seriously thought about it but I had made other plans for my future and although this gave me a few ideas it wasn’t the right thing for me just at this moment.
I left the creatures to their Shangri La and swam ashore once more. The road had now turned to boardwalk and I was on the new Route 2 coastal path made by the famous moles from the Linden Department of Public Works.
I have to say they’ve done well. There have been some lovely touches made to the walkways and roads since these creatures got their paws into the grid. The rez places along the side of the road are a godsend for a start, not only for rezzing your vehicles but anything that you suddenly feel the urge to rez, you can do it now without searching too long for a patch of build land or an Outy’s particle paradise . On top of this there is more detail to the road sides with sign posts and little features like this bridge
with its jetty and pipe outlet all made by the LDPW’s moles.
The boardwalk route came to an end on the upper right hand corner of Togata and lead into the mouth of a tunnel.
The tunnel curved round the sim of Moma to meet with the next sim called Tiger.
The tunnel itself, as I made my way through it had several large creepy spiders hanging from its ceiling, nothing unusual in that. The unusual thing that took me by surprise was that I immediately started floating upwards as soon as I ventured inside .
This was due to my swimming override which I always wear when sailing. I knew then that the sea level had been raised in the vicinity of the tunnel, as to why they had done this I can only guess that it made it appear darker from the outside. I’m not sure if it was just my view but It didn’t seem to make much difference once I was inside, it just appeared as normal. I carried on swimming through the tunnel, It felt a bit weird swimming through a tunnel on land, though it was an even stranger feeling when I reached the other end and carried on swimming down the road.
I took my AO off at that point and walked the rest of the way through Tiger.
The sim of Tiger seems to be entirely owned by one individual called Kenti Rau former college professor, with a dual PhD, one in Wildlife Biology and the other in Counselling (Psychology)
At least that’s what it says on his profile. He also happens to be a tiger which seems appropriate enough for the sim he lives in.
At Manduka I tried to rez my boat again but even though I was in a rez area found ban lines completely surrounding it and had to move on to Girdler where I found a rez area that was right next to the sea.
I had to wait for the wind to pick up a bit but soon I was back sailing and very quickly reached the sim of Oakworm on the northwest corner of Heterocera.
From there I took to the open sea and across to Hummingbird
where I capsized again and had to walk ashore. (Must remember to put swimming AO back on doh)
Actually I did as it happens, intend to stop around here somewhere because I had another of my small excursions to make.
When I had been making my famous (not) couch based flying vehicle the Quest 1. I had been looking for a place to take some pictures of it for advertising purposes.
I came up with a little story line about a rescue mission on the slopes of a mountain .
I did a search for the highest mountain in SL and came up with the sim of Campion where the peaks rise to a staggering,.. Wait for it 366 meters.
I hadn’t spent any time looking around the rest of the mountain range as I was too busy taking pics for the storyboard so I wanted to get a proper look now and also at a large creek like feature that ran diagonally through the sim of Hydrangea.
And so with camera and notebook in hand I set off inland heading for the uplands.
I took the road at first following it through Pandorus and into Hydrangea where it curved steeply round to join with the inner highway between Ello and Woolybear (I love that sim name, think I’d like to live in Woolybear)
A short distance from the top of the bends heading west and I had reached the creek like feature I had been interested in .
It was as I suspected, exactly what I had thought it would be ,and that was emm a creek like feature :)
It was rather deep though and devoid of water apart from a resident owned stream near the start.
I made my way up the creek crossing through Ello and eventually into Cisseps where I found more resident owned water at the end of the creek
and a wooded area on the eastern bank
When I took a closer look at the wood I found it to have had an infestation of vampires.
. This time it hardly surprised me to have stumbled upon another bloodsucker lair. It was as if it was inevitable that our paths should once again cross . Only this time I was keeping an eye out for the opposition, If there was a power struggle between good and evil going on in SL the opposing side might not be too far away.
Just a short distance up, by the side of the wood I found a small temple like structure stuck in a 16m parcel of land and surrounded by ban lines.
It had a floating text sign above it saying Teleport to Mandala Bead games Mandala.
I tried touching it but nothing happened so I gave up and crossing over to the west side of the creek found an area that seemed to be dedicated to of all things. The Mandala bead games!! (curiouser).
The tree-lined area had lots of bead type objects spread over various boards aswell as a movie area which I couldn’t get to work. It all seemed to be connected with earth energy and about some guy who was going to integrate RL with SL using his brain waves and then somehow play the Mandala bead games. The guy in question was called Carlos Tapioca. I think the thing that struck me about Carlos above all was his resemblance to the bearded fellow that had read my fortune.
It might of course been the fact that they both had beards but when I thought about it you don’t see that many bearded av’s in SL , well I havn’t really.
My thoughts then turned back to my first night of the tour when I had bumped into Neal Lyle the Palomarian lighthouse keeper. Neal had a beard, not a big beard but a beard none the less, was there a connection? First Neal then the bearded fortune-teller then the Jesus effigy and now Carlos hmm (curiouser) Surely this had nothing to do with the struggle of good and evil in a virtual world or did it ? . My head shook again and I laughed to myself. I looked around at the playing surfaces with the beads on.
It was a lot to take in and I’m not clear what the bead games were exactly about but I tried clicking on a few of the beads that were laying around and was rewarded with the message FOCUS ON THE ALCHEMY OF THE ENERGY OF THE ELEMENTS. What did that mean? I think it meant it was time for me to stop trying to make any sense of all this and to carry on with what I had intended to do in the first place and that was to head for the hills , so that’s what I did.
The next part of the journey took me south-east and cross-country to Phasma. I could begin to see the mountains as I drew nearer.
The tops were quite clear of cloud but the slopes below were shrouded in mist. As I got nearer it became very atmospheric. I crossed over a ridge line where the sims met but didn’t match in height
and then a bit further on the land began to rise sharply and I began my ascent.
it wasn’t long before the sides of the mountain became almost sheer and I struggled for a foothold . I found I could easily go tumbling back down if I wasn’t paying attention. The mist was surrounded me for some time you could almost feel it chilling your bones
but eventually the sun broke through and I could see the mounting peaks towering above me.
The whole northern mountain range of Heterocera which actually forms part of the outer volcanic basin of the atoll; stretches roughly from Athetis where the great wall ends right the way round to Nolidae, about 14 sims long Surprisingly this high up there is no snow .The grass covering the mountains is a rich green and densely covers the volcanic rock upon which it lays, I would guess the geothermic convection from the atoll’s substrates are still at work!! .
. Once I reached the top I really got a sense of height, one not always present when flying I might add. It could be you become slightly blasé with the height thing when you can fly like a bird. I started the trek along the mountain ridge heading east.
Along the top of the ridge various homes and outpost structures had been built. There had been no problem of course getting materials up this high, and the range of building was as varied as down near sea level, maybe one or two more airship and helicopter landing pads were present.
As I surmounted a peak along the ridge way and was finding a route down past some ban lines and steep terracing I came upon some marvellous anomalies that stood out from the mountain ridge. They had been named Bug spikes.
Incredibly high needles of gridrock pushing up from the ground close to the sim edge.
I’m sure the Bakers must have recorded these spikes or at least ones similar to these at some time or other. I took flight and ventured up the side of the strange cluster, up and up they went right up in to the clouds. At the very top was a small platform that the owner of the land had built around the peak.
I dropped down onto the platform and took out from my rucksack an altimeter. You never know when you might need one of these so it’s something I always store next to my hang glider and . I placed the altimeter script inside a cube prim and placed the cube on top of the platform. It read 495 meters, that was 129 meters higher than what was supposed to be the highest point in the mainland;
perhaps they just didn’t count these spikes as mountain peaks for some reason.
I dropped back down to the ground and continued along the ridge getting steadily higher as I approached Campion.
Here in SL anyone can build a tower that reaches into the clouds but not everyone can claim to live on the *highest mountain (*as far as I know) in SL.
The lucky couple who hold that honour are Keen and Camille who “Welcome you to the Castle Bella.”
Their neighbours who must be a bit Jealous of their position have built some sort of tower to raise their status above Keen and Camille
but Cammi and Keen who incidentally when I looked into his profile sported yet another beard ;(cue twilight zone music) can quite categorically claim the honour .
The actual highest point on their land is just over from the castle next to a small chapel. I walked over and measured the height with the altimeter just to make sure and it was ,exactly 366m.
I couldn’t let the opportunity pass me by so I took a look around the chapel
But this one I think was not *Heaven Sent
Inside I found a free shotgun to aid with marriage ceremonies
and also a place to confess your sins .
As for inside the confessional box, I can’t begin to tell you what the animation with the priest had me doing
Standing up..hmm, I took leave of the chapel and wandered outside to where there was a stone balcony protruding from the side of the mountain top. The balcony had no railing at the end of it and when I looked down it was a long drop to what appeared to be some sort of graveyard.
This seemed as fitting ending to the excursion as any I could think of so without further ado about the matter; I jumped.
After crash landing in the graveyard a few seconds later I looked up and my eyes met with the grim reapers (His eye sockets actually)
I thought him quite a cheery looking chap even though he wasn’t going to get me in his clutches today, after all I had survived the leap of faith.
Not all had been so lucky though,
or maybe they had, judging from the pictures on the gravestones.
One caught my eye in particular, I’m sure I recognised that guy from somewhere :)
could just be the beard though
Bye Bye Be Back
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