Happy New Year

2989 - From Irina, a friend in St Petersburg, came this New Year card and a great frank on the back.

2993 - Susanne in Germany has just sent me this beautiful card.  I expect there will be plenty of card and letter writing going on in 2016.

2988 - There will be many different postboxes used over the next twelve months but this card from Eva wasn't posted in the box shown - it is situated in Madrid and only used for postage within that city.

2990 - I expect cats will feature on a number of the cards I receive.  Thanks to Susanne for this one.

2991 - And, of course, cats come in all shapes and sizes.  Another from Susanne.

2992 - No doubt the subject of  'Reading' will feature on a number of cards like this one, also from Susanne.

Lots more cards

819 - Sini in Finland has sent me some super maxi-cards.

821 - Ann from Sydney in Australia sent me this beautiful picture of the Sydney Opera House - (another UNESCO WHS) as a thank you for some cards I sent to her.

Lovely wildlife stamps.

823 - My lovely friend Martine - my favourite Corsican - has sent me lots of maps of Corsica.  I doubt anywhere has more map postcards. This one has a charming little pussy cat on it.

826 - Seren in the USA (US-2371932) sent me a picture of her favourite hotel 299 Madison Avenue - the Library Hotel, just down the street from the New York Public Library.

I love all her stamps.

838 - A thank-you card from Andrea, David and Petra in Hungary.  It shows part of a cyclorama which depicts the arrival of the Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin in 895.

839 - Another post-related maxi from Sini.

859 - My Chinese postcrossing friends Dai Li and Feng have both sent me lots of UNESCO World Heritage Sites.  This one from Feng shows the Mutianyu Section of the Great Wall.

844 - This is another UNESCO site - The Potala Palace in China - from Dai Li.

841 - And another UNESCO site from Dai Li but this is in Cambodia.

Angkor is one of the most important archaeological sites in South-East Asia. Stretching over some 400 sq km, and including a forested area, Angkor Archaeological Park contains the magnificent remains of the different capitals of the Khmer Empire, from the 9th to the 15th century. They include the famous Temple of Angkor Wat and, at Angkor Thom, the Bayon Temple with its countless sculptural decorations. UNESCO has set up a wide-ranging programme to safeguard this symbolic site and its surroundings.

848 - Irina in Bulgaria sends me lots of cards and many of them are the shape of the country like this one.

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851 - Another from Irina - God's Bridge.  It is not a UNESCO site but regarded by many as one of the world's natural wonders.

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907 - My first card from Thailand (TH-145305) - thanks Leedonghee.

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1206  - Rita from Lithuania sent me this wonderful card (LT-341001).

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1212 & 1214 - Virginia from Barbados sent me a number of cards from one of her visits to New York.

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1222 - Monica in Sweden and Danielle in the USA are fellow bloggers and send me lots of cards - they are my most regular swappers and have become friends over the years.  This card from Danielle is really atmospheric.

1221 - Bonnie Jeanne from Pennsylvania sent me a card that I have sent to others - it is from the postcard book 'The Reading Woman' and I love it to bits.

Bonnie Jeanne used these stamps.

1227 - Amit in India sent me this view of The Valley Of Flowers.  I appreciate the scale is probably a bit different but it could easily be a view in the Grampians.

A little selection

Some of these are from as far back as August 2013.

757 from Alina from Dneprodzerzhins'k in the Ukraine (UA-702038).  (Try pronouncing Dneprodzerzhins'k after a drink or two!)

And the stamp has this super inkwell on it.

770 A mail carrier in Puerto Rico from Matt in the USA (US-2347235).  Where a card is received as a result of postcrossing I have included its i/d number so that anyone who wants to ‘Favourite’ it can do so.

775 – From my friend Mish in Belarus to whet your appetite.  It reminded her of one of her favourite childhood treats – bread with butter mixed with garlic and salt.  “Yummy!”

Aren’t these fantastic stamps?

776 – Kerilesen from Germany sent me this picture of a motor post vehicle from Berlin around 1900 (DE-2381999).

778 – Also from Germany came this card from Conni (DE-2377477).  Entitled ‘Read’, the photo was taken by Raffaele Celentano.

789 – Simona sent me this from Lithuania’s first ever postcrossers meet-up.  It was signed by all those who attended (LT-313498). 

792 – A Lithuanian postbox – also from Simona.

And a Happy New Year...

I have received so many cards over the Christmas and New Year period that there is no way I can put them all on this blog.  So I have just chosen a couple of my favourites.  The above one (1269) is from Susanne, my friend in Dortmund, Germany. 

This one (1273)  is from eight year old Katya, a postcrosser (UA-900492) in the Ukraine.

It had these super stamps on it -

The above stamp is of a beautiful Russian actress from the turn of the Twentieth Century.  Vera Kholodnaya was the first star of Russian silent cinema. Only five of her films still exist and the total number she acted in is unknown, with speculation ranging between fifty and one hundred.  She died young as a result of the 1918 flu pandemic.

Anastasia from Minsk in Belarus sent me this delightful card - 1223 - which says (in Estonian) 'May your Christmas wishes come true'.

This map of Switzerland - 1201 - came from Michi (CH-174908).

This was the first time I had ever seen a hologram stamp (which proved impossible to scan properly).

 Chloe from the Philippines sent me this direct swap map - 1208 -

 
 Books, of course, feature on a lot of my cards.  This one - 1195 - from Danielle in Nebraska is by Katsuhisa Toda and is entitled 'The Key'.

 Bonnie Jeanne sent me this Reading Woman card  - 1222 - which is one of my favourites.  By Edouard Gelhay it is entitled 'Elegant Women in a Library'.

 Kate, a teacher from Russia, sent me this postcrossing card (RU-2247373) from my favourites - 1205.

We have had a mild winter so far but there are floods across the whole country (100 flood warnings last night alone).  So the title of this card from Danielle - "Mail in all conditions" - seems quite appropriate even if we haven't had the snow yet.  Meanwhile Danielle and much of North America is freezing.

Many of my Christmas postcards featured Santa Claus in his various guises but on this one from Monica tomten knocks on the door on Christmas Eve while the family are gathered at the table rather than sneaking down the chimney overnight.

 The postal services have been extra busy over the last few weeks  as 1197 from Heleen in The Netherlands shows.

Heleen used one of the best postal services stamps I have seen yet -

Natalya, a Russian civil engineering student and postcrosser (RU-2236074), sent me this Happy New Year Card (1191) and I am happy to pass on those same wishes to you...

I have been so lucky.  And I haven't even shown you my New York cards from Virginia, my cards of India from Amit,  or my Chinese cards from Dai Li yet...