Tag Archives: America

Antelope Canyon

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Antelope Canyon

Antelope Canyon is full of picturesque rock formations, but no antelopes.

  • Antelope Canyon is primarily a water eroded rock canyon located near the city of Page, in the northern part of the state of Arizona, in the United States.
  • Antelope Canyon is a slot canyon known for its smooth, wavy walls of sandstone, caused mainly by flash flooding and rain.
  • Antelope Canyon is a popular tourist location, particularly for photography and sightseeing, and is said to be the most photographed slot canyon in the world.
  • Antelope Canyon has two parts, an upper and a lower section, called ‘the Crack’ and ‘the Corkscrew’ respectively, and the Upper Canyon is easily accessible and relatively flat, whereas the Lower Canyon requires significant quantities of stairs to access the site.
  • The area surrounding Antelope Canyon has historically been used as a site for livestock grazing and the area is part of the Lake Powell Navajo Tribal Park.

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Lower Antelope Canyon
Image courtesy of James Chang/Flickr
  • Some curved parts of Antelope Canyon beautifully reflect light, and light beams can be seen in other canyon locations, especially in the Upper Canyon during summer.
  • Before European discovery, Antelope Canyon was the home to numerous pronghorn antelopes, hence its name, and the native Navajo people call the Upper Canyon ‘Tsé bighánílíní’, meaning ‘the place where water runs through rocks’ and the Lower Canyon ‘Hasdestwazí’, which means ‘spiral rock arches’.
  • Antelope Canyon is only accessible via a guided tour, and it has been open to commercial tours since 1987.
  • Flash flooding in Antelope Canyon is still common, causing 11 fatalities in 1997, and death prevention measures are now in place, including radios and loud alarms.
  • The distance between Antelope Canyon’s walls range from 1-3 metres (3.2 to 9.8 feet) wide and run up to 50 metres (6.5 to 164 feet) deep, and the Upper Canyon sits 1219 metres (4000 feet) above sea level and the walls are 36.5 metres (120 feet) tall.
Bibliography:
Antelope Canyon, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antelope_Canyon
Leco M, Antelope Canyon, Arizona, n.d, USA Tourists, http://www.usatourist.com/english/destinations/arizona/antelopecanyon/antelope-canyon-main.html
Travel Navajo Nation, n.d, Navajo -Nation Parks and Recreation, http://www.navajonationparks.org/htm/antelopecanyon.htm

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Monument Valley

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Monument Valley

Monument Valley is a symbol of the American Wild West.

  • Monument Valley is an area that contains a group of tall cliff like individual formations, known as ‘buttes’ and ‘towers’, made of sandstone, found in the Colorado Plateau, in the south western area of the United States of America, on the border of Arizona and Utah.
  • Monument Valley includes the valley’s Navajo Tribal Park that covers an area of approximately 37,110 hectares (91,700 acres), and is part of the Navajo Nation territory.
  • Monument Valley has been home to the native American Navajo people for hundreds of years, and rock engravings, as well as other cultural points of interest, can be seen with a tourist guide.
  • Monument Valley’s buttes reach heights of up to 300 metres (1000 feet) and are coloured red or blue-grey due to the different oxides they contain.
  • The Najavo name for Monument Valley is ‘Tsé Biiʼ Ndzisgaii’ and means ‘valley of the rocks’.

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Part of Monument Valley
Image courtesy of Wolfgang Staudt/Flickr
  • Parts of Monument Valley were mined from 1948 to 1967, mainly for large quantities of uranium, and it has caused significant controversy due to the radiation and contamination hazard it has left in some areas.
  • Monument Valley temperatures range from -18°C to 38°C (0°F to 100°F) with desert like conditions, and sometimes it snows.
  • Monument Valley is popularly used in media due to its prominent symbol of the Wild West, and numerous films have featured the valley and monuments, as well as artwork, music media, television, video games, advertising and print media.
  • Monument Valley’s buttes were most likely formed by large rock erosions and volcanic activity.
  • Monument Valley is a popular tourist destination and is easily accessible via car, accessed by the US Highway 163, and guided tours are available for a fee.
Bibliography:
Phillips C & C, History/Geology/Culture, Monument Valley, http://www.monumentvalley.com/Pages/english_infopage.html
Monument Valley, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monument_Valley

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Spotted Salamander

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Spotted Salamander

Did the spotted salamander lose a body part? No problem! It can be regenerated.

  • A spotted salamander is an amphibian that moves through a metamorphosis process, from a water dwelling creature to one that spends its time on land, except for breeding purposes.
  • Adult spotted salamanders can grow to lengths of 15 to 25 centimetres (5.9 to 9.8 inches), and they look similar to a lizard due to their short legs and tail.
  • Spotted salamanders are native to the United States and Canada, in North America, and are also known as ‘yellow-spotted salamanders’ and have the scientific name Ambystoma maculatum.
  • Spotted salamanders are nocturnal and live among rocks, logs, leaves, or in abandoned burrows in forest habitats, that contain temporary water sources during the rainy season, and they usually stay hidden unless it is damp or raining.
  • Spotted salamanders have the family name Ambystomatidae, the family of mole salamanders, and are one of the 32 species of the genus Ambystoma, the only genus in the family.
Spotted Salamander, Lizard, Orange, Black, Flickr, Ten Random Facts, Animal,
Spotted Salamander
Image courtesy of Brian Gratwicke/Flickr
  • Spotted salamanders are primarily coloured black, but they can also be dark blue, brown, grey or green , and they are patterned with yellow to orange spots.
  • Female spotted salamanders lay an average of two hundred eggs in temporary freshwater ponds that lack much wildlife, like fish, during the rainy season, typically breeding in the same hole annually, reached by the same route.
  • When threatened, spotted salamanders release a poisonous substance on enemies, although they generally prefer to stay out of danger by hiding.
  • Spotted salamanders can regrow body parts, from organs to limbs, and while they only have up to a 10% survival rate in the pool of water, once they change to their adult form they can live to 20 or 30 years.
  • Spotted salamanders’ diet mainly consists of spiders, insects, bugs, worms and slugs that they catch with their sticky tongue, and they are preyed upon by snakes, birds, raccoons and other creatures.
Bibliography:
Spotted Salamander, 2014, National Geographic, http://animals.nationalgeographic.com.au/animals/amphibians/spotted-salamander/
Spotted Salamander, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spotted_salamander
Stout, N. and G. Hammond, Ambystoma maculatum, 2007, Animal Diversity Web, http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/Ambystoma_maculatum/

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Highlighter

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Highlighter

Only the highlights appear in these highlighter facts!

  • Highlighters are stationery items in the form of a pen, used to highlight, or mark, text.
  • Highlighter ink is typically brightly coloured, often fluorescent, and see-through.
  • Highlighters typically come in colours of yellow, blue, green, pink, orange and purple, although the most prevalent colour is yellow.
  • Highlighters are similar to a felt-tip pen, except they contain a different ink.
  • Highlighters are believed to have been invented by the United States’ Carter’s Ink Company in 1963, and were called a Hi-Liter, soon after Yukio Horie, from Japan, had invented the water-based marker the year prior.

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  • Yellow coloured highlighters are generally not visible on a photocopied document of a highlighted original.
  • Different colours of highlighters can be used to organise groups of ideas or texts.
  • Highlighters can be stacked together, waxy, retractable, three in one, take the form of a pencil, or have non-seeping ink.
  • A dry line highlighter is a tape that is applied to the page, and has the advantage that it can be erased without much difficulty.
  • Digital documents can be highlighted by selecting text, in a similar way to standard highlighting.

 

Bibliography:
Highlighter, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Highlighter
Greenbaum H & Rubinstein D, The Hand-held Highlighter, 2012, The New York Times, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/magazine/the-hand-held-highlighter.html?_r=1

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Robin Williams

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Robin Williams

“You’re only given one little spark of madness. You mustn’t lose it” – Robin Williams

  • Robin Williams was a prominent actor, comedian, screenwriter and film producer, that started acting in the early 1970s, continuing on until his death in 2014, and a significant component of his work was unscripted and improvised.
  • Robin McLaurin Williams, or ‘Robin Williams’ as he was known, was born in Chicago in the United States state of Illinois, on 21 July, 1951, and he was the great, great grandson of governor Anselm J McLaurin from Mississippi.
  • Robin Williams was nominated for and received numerous awards during his lifetime, gaining two Emmys, five Grammys, four Golden Globes, an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in the film Good Will Hunting, and the Golden Globe Cecil B DeMille Award for ‘outstanding contributions to the world of entertainment’.
  • Robin Williams died on 11 August, 2014, in California’s Marin County, in the United States, and despite being a well-loved actor, it is believed he hung himself after suffering from significant depression.
  • Robin Williams attended New York’s Juilliard School and became successfully popular as an alien in 1978 on Happy Days, a television show, that launched his acting career and led to his leading role in the television series Mork and Mindy that ran from 1978 to 1982.
Robin Williams, Happy Feet Two, Premier, Comedian, Actor, Death, Dead, Ten Random Facts, Flickr, Comedian
Robin Williams
Image courtesy of Eva Rinaldi/Flickr
  • Robin Williams has been featured in 80 films, including Popeye (1980), Good Morning, Vietnam (1987), Dead Poet’s Society (1989), Aladdin (1992), Mrs. Doubtfire (1993), Night at the Museum (2006) and Happy Feet (2006), and also made numerous television appearances.
  • In 1993, Robin Williams had a dispute with The Walt Disney Company, due to the belief that the company broke their agreement of the use of his character, Genie in the marketing of the Aladdin film, in 1992.
  • From the 1970s to 1980s, Robin Williams was addicted to drugs and alcohol, and after years of self-restraint, he resumed drinking alcohol in 2003, although later he attended rehabilitation to overcome his addiction.
  • Robin Williams was married to Valerie Velardi from 1978 to 1988, Marsha Garces from 1989 to 2008 and Susan Schneider from 2011 until his death in 2014, and he had three children named Zachary, Zelda and Cody, born in the years of 1983, 1989 and 1991, respectively.
  • Robin Williams enjoyed playing electronic games and was an avid cyclist and enthusiast, and in 2003 is said to have owned more than 50 bicycles.
Bibliography:
Robin Williams, 2014, Bio, http://www.biography.com/people/robin-williams-9532797
Robin Williams, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robin_Williams

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Barbecue Sauce

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Barbecue Sauce

Do you like barbecue sauce?

  • Barbecue sauce is a sauce or condiment used for flavouring food items, and its use and recipe varies in different regions and countries.
  • ‘Barbecue sauce’ is also known as ‘barbeque sauce’ and ‘BBQ sauce’.
  • Some barbecue sauces are designed to be used to marinate or baste meat cooked on a barbecue, as well as flavouring other foods.
  • Barbecue sauce typically has the primary ingredient of at least tomato paste or vinegar, depending on its purpose with an addition of sugar or molasses, spices and sometimes liquid smoke.
  • One of the first commercial barbecue sauces was made in Georgia’s Atlanta, in the United States, and was available for purchase in 1909.

Barbeque Sauce, BBQ, Barbecue. Condiment, Commercial, Bottled, Australian, Homebrand

  • Barbecue sauce is typically red-brown to dark brown in colour.
  • Barbecue sauce is commonly sold in bottles in supermarkets, and is often similar to ketchup or tomato sauce in its taste and use.
  • Barbecue sauce originated from the culinary practice of marinating, combined with the barbecue method Native Americans used to cook their meat.
  • Barbecue sauce was probably invented in America from the 1400s – 1600s, and was later developed in Europe.
  • Some barbecue sauces have a very high content of sodium, are a good source of manganese, and have a significant quantity of vitamin A and potassium, as well as other vitamins and minerals.

 

Bibliography:
Barbecue Digest: The secret history of BBQ sauce, 2012, Eatocracy, http://eatocracy.cnn.com/2012/07/09/bbq-sauce/
Barbecue Sauce, 2014, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barbecue_sauce
Goldwyn M, The History of Barbecue Sauce, 2012, Amazing Ribs, http://amazingribs.com/BBQ_articles/history_of_bbq_sauce.html

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