#Another beauty of a cancellation. This time, posted in Hamilton, the capital of Bermuda. Somewhere we have fond memories of. In fact, decades after our first visit we stall have a sticker we bought on Hamilton main street on our front door.
Random but nice
Vying for the honour of being the most random stamp in my collection, and indeed the inspiration for a new category of 'random stamps'. This was, I assume, sent to me by mistake.It arrived in the post with another stamp I'd ordered. Anyway, I like it. So it stays. At first I was puzzled by the words that seem to reference the Antarctic but show a polar bear alongside the Adelie Penguin. A bit of time on Google and Google Translate and it turns out that Max Douguet was a distinguished French sailor who spent time at both poles. The stamp was issued in 1991.
An exquisite squid
Look at these beauties.An unusual addition to my collection as they are not reef fish, I don't collect this country and the stamps are mint not my preferred used. However, that squid (bottom right) is exquisite. And the Congo is one of the most fascinating places on Earth.
Connie landing
1963 and the Super Constellation landing on the remote pacific islands of Cocos and Keeling. This incredible webpage - https://www.goodall.com.au/australian-aviation/cocos-island/cocosisland.html
Malaysian Airlines
Some of my best flights have been on Malaysian, (mainly their old 747s) some of my shortest flights (KL to JB) and one of the most uncomfortable (their A380 home). But always happy to fly with them and now really happy to be collecting stamps featuring Malaysia and its civil aviation.
British North Borneo
In 2004 our honeymoon took us to Borneo and the island of Sipadan. Truly one of the most special places on our planet. It was incredible back in 2004, I can't imagine what it must have been like when these stamps were used in the late 1870s, around the same time Alfred Russel Wallace would have been exploring.
Lowestoft
Another random. Who took this letter to be posted at 5:15pm on the 18th August 1897? What was going on in Lowestoft at that time? And what was the message?
A frogman with flippers
I wanted something unusual to introduce my section on reef life. This caught my eye. A bit random but a lovely old school scuba image, diver wearing no wetsuit and cheap flippers. Very like moi! I did hesitate about which way up the stamp went but was eventually guided by the bubbles!
St Georges, Bermuda, 1949
This is pretty near perfect because it we have a date and a place, 15 March, 1949. 3d postage was probably quite a lot, even for Bermuda, so what mystery. St Georges is the second town in Bermuda, situated in the east end of the islands. Back then it would have been rebuilding after the war and growing its tourist industry. Only the very wealthy would have been there back then.
These stamps were produced in 1948 to celebrate the silver wedding of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth (queen mother). Many other commonwealth countries used the same print and style for their stamps.
The Royal Angelfish
The DG Penny Black
This is a rare 'childhood memory' stamp. I must have been 7 or 8 years old. It was a summer fete at the 28th Croydon scout group headquarters in Addiscombe and Father best had set up his stamp shop in one of the huts. He had this huge (to me) box of stamps and told me that somewhere in there was a rare Penny Black. I spent hours rummaging through that box to no avail. That a catholic priest would ever lie? Surely not?
I've now discovered that the Penny Black is neither rare (there we tens of millions of them produced and millions still in circulation) or terribly expensive. The letters at the bottom of the stamp (each side of 'one penny') indicate their grid position in the sheet they were printed. Over 50 years since that fete in Addiscombe and it was time to finally bag myself a Penny Black. And it had to have my initials on it natch!
Gilbert and Ellice Islands
The Gilbert and Ellice Islands Protectorate was established by Britain in 1892 (the Gilbert Islands are now called Kiribati) and the protectorate became a colony in 1916. The Ellice Islands became a separate British dependency in October 1975, and gained independence as Tuvalu on 1 October 1978.
These stamps were issued in 1956. More info http://brcstamps.com/catalog/countries/Gilbert_and_Ellice_Islands/GEI_Page_6.html
Johor Bahru 1940
Johor Bahru would become very important to us as the stopping off point between Singapore and Pulau Sibu, our beautiful Malaysian Island. So many good times associated with JB. Who knows what the seas around Pulau Sibu would have looked like had you been able to dive there on 9 Novemember 1940, when somebody posted this stamp in JB.
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