I have been spending quite a bit of time over at the Naturecon which is open until the 31st . If you have not been there yet, you are missing so much. After roaming the two regions I found little nooks of information about so many places to visit on the mainland that I never knew existed. I have a list and will get to some of them.
The train rides on the regions are fun. At the entrance you can hop on Cranston’s railroad that will drop you off at several levels where you can get to visit the booths of many of these places and find information about them. Hop on and off as you like. It will take you all the way to Mt Campion National Forest. The Zany Zen runs from the Lighthouse to the Treetop Overlook where the view of the volcano and the waterside in the distance are visible. There are also horse rezzers at many sites .
Strawberry Linden came to do a Lab Gab and I hopped the train with her for a ride . Her discussion and tour of the area with the organizers and team members was great fun. I had such a laugh when she hopped on the glider and fell off into the ocean. I really laughed out loud to see a Linden at the bottom of the bay asking for a tp! Watch the Lab Gab to see and hear more from all the team and see some of the locations.
Speaking of the ocean floor do not miss the beach area and the installations there. Then venture into the underwater world to see its beauty.
I entered the artist search contest to find the six canvases where one has to paint the canvas at those points and then send them off to Cranston Yordstorm for a prize. It too a while but I finally found all six with help from the hints on the instructions. The first one is placed right at the railway station near your landing point.
As a real life birder a visit to the Bird Observatory was a treat. Just sitting at the pond looking at the birds in the wetland was relaxing.
True Redrose and Lautlos Resident have information about importance of birds in our lives on the infoboards on the boardwalk.
Not even the mighty Lindens are immune to crashing.
Thursday June 16 was the start of the Second Life Nineteenth Birthday, of SL19B. Yours truly dropped by early at the Arboretum, where Patch Linden was due for the opening speech. There were others whom had the same idea, and we were entertained by Squeaky Mole dancing and doing a few antics on stage. Three of the four sims in the area were quickly filling up. They must have been the high-capacity sims the Lindens were talking about as soon two were at 130 residents each while the third had over a hundred, for over 360 residents.
I hoped they could keep these once-impossible numbers up, wondering if there'd soon be a crash. And it turned out I wondered correct once more. I had Strawberry Linden's Youtube going, and she crashed as well.
Logging back on, I found myself in Horizons. I tried to TP back to the Aboretum, but couldn't. I went to a nearby sim and tried to walk over, only to find the sims were considered full, even though they had about 80 each instead of 130. It seems something happened with the sim, and they cut it's capacity. So I would listen to Patch's speech through the Youtube stream. Due to other technical issues, it would be delayed past the planned time of 12 Noon as well (21:50 in the Youtube).
Patch, whom appeared clouded throughout Strawberry's stream, would talk about various things. This included inspiring others to make their own virtual worlds, or as he put it, "some new legless entrants more recently to the fold." He would mention accomplishments of Second Life, saying the virtual world had a gross domestic product of over $650 billion USD. Patch would also discuss the various places of the Second Life Birthday area, such as the community gallery, where he invited people to share their screenshots, which he called allowing others a glimpse in the virtual lives of the residents, such as times when two friends are having a cup of coffee. Then he made a reference to his Fantasy Faire Jail and Bail, "then there are completely insane moments where a horde of angry tinies throws you into a jail and pokes you with pointy sticks. I may or may not be familiar with that." His aim was for the gallery to be a mix of "The beautiful, the crazy, and the poignant moments."
He also talked about a few changes at the SLB, such as moving the gifts to the Tapestry of Time, and the Music Fest events would be speak over the three stages over the three days, one day for each. He also talked about the three stages, the Arboretum, the Steamworks, and the Vernian Rotunda. Over the course of 11 days, there will be over 350 performers.
He then brought up the exhibits, "There is nothing that better showcases the imagination and abilities of our community than the exhibit regions." Then came the Shop and Hop, "With over 400 merchants, this is the largest shopping event we have ever hosted ... a must-visit for both the sales and the mountain of gifts that are available to the ardent shopper."
He would then go on to describe the accomplishments in the virtual world such as "leveraging our newly-found Cloud environment muscles with the debut of event regions, which you're currently sitting in. It's a lot of people here. In fact, over 350 of us at one point, something we wouldn't have been able to have done without all of the various improvements to performance our engineering teams have been so hardworking on."
Patch stated there would be more Linden Home themes to come, but did not mention the next one. "I don't want to give anything away just yet," he would say, "Next week, please come and see 'Meet the Lindens,'" saying he would be at the first, "I have many great things I have yet to announce."
"I continue to commit to all of you that I will carry forward our mission of making Second Life the biggest, best, and most vibrant virtual world there can ever be. Oh, and we will always have legs." He then thanked the moles, who he described as having been planning the event for months, in addition to certain residents who contributed, and invited people to take a slice of provided cake (the resident-run SLB events were noted for their "Cake Stage" locations), "have fun and stay virtual."
Strawberry would apologize for her viewer not being able to rezz Patch, and would look around a few more places before ending the stream.
Patch will appear again at the SL19B for "Meet the Lindens," once again at the Arboretum, today, Monday June 20 at 2PM SL time: SLB Exhilarate (228/224/23) *
