I recently mentioned that things have been a little hectic (both in the physical world and SL) such that my blogging frequency has been a little down this last week-ish.
One of the reasons for the slow-down as the decision to say farewell to Isla Pey after some 6 years of using it as an in-world home. Six years is a long time in SL, and while moving elsewhere hadn’t actually been something we’d mulled over in depth, circumstances aligned in such a way that an opportunity to relocate to somewhere slightly larger with the same LI and at a lower cost came up that combined with other changes so as to make a move advantageous.
While living at Isla Pey had been fun – access to Blake Sea, sitting on the very edge of the grid, and so on., there were some disadvantages, and while these didn’t weigh heavily on the decision to move, they have been overcome by making it. In particular, the increased space means the house, gardens and grounds to be properly integrated without feeling cramped and being split into what was effectively three separate parts: north island and gardens, house, and south island, due to the shape of the parcel.
The new location, sitting in a corner of the renewed Second Norway estate – which I’ve had the pleasure of being completely revitalised by Vanity and her team – offers the same benefits as Isla Pey, while allowing house and gardens to be more properly integrated in a parcel that – like all those in Second Norway are offered with (optional) landscaping – a stream, a rocky backdrop in one corners, etc.
This supplied landscaping presented the opportunity to take the “skytower” house design we’ve been using, and move it more it overland and without having to put the various landscaping elements in beforehand. the cliffs also mean that the house – raised as it is above the ground – is also somewhat screened from view so as not to overpower the neighbours.
Positioning the house in a corner like this, a stream bubbling below it, means I could spread the main garden with its pond and zen elements, together with the old chapel ruins, out on the land directly below and in front of it, giving that sense of integration between house and grounds, whiles allowing the pond to be enlarged, and is now nicely overlooked by the infinity pool at the front of the house.
Of course the vehicle rezzing system came along in the move as well, so we can still easily change which boats aircraft as available for us without having to devote a huge amount of LI to keeping them rezzed or the annoyance of pulling the from inventory. If you haven’t read about using such systems, why not check out Adding a little vehicle space with a rezzing system.
Doubtless I’ll be making minor tweaks for a while, but for now it is – farewell Isla Pey, hello Isla Caitinara!
Inara Pey: Living in a Modemworld 
I only had a look at the new Norge estate on the worldmap and … didn’t like what I saw.
It’s all just little islands, sim for sim, the same stuff as we know it from countless other estates. No continuous terraforming, no general styling sense, no more roads and subway system. Everything that made the Second Norway community a community is gone. 😐
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Not an entirely accurate summation. The “old mainland” regions of Second Norway (with the airport, the marinas, the roads) are still there. North and east the estate is more a case of island with waterways, and some of the older “linked” regions with roadways have gone from these areas (although some new group of regions have been added, notably the to south, where there is an entire fishing community grouping of regions with a contiguous road system, wharves, working warehouses, church, houses, etc.
What has been removed is some of the resource-heavy infrastructure that had caused a degree of performance issues in the past, offering a smoother experience for all. I’ve no idea how much of a “community” SN fostered amongst the people living there prior to the redevelopment – but I would note a lot of people who were there before the change-over have returned and appear more than happy with all that is going on on the regions. And it’s people who build communities.
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Oh ooops, on my brief check it appeared like the old SN was gone and replaced by the bargain basement estate.
/me needs a new pair of glasses. -.-
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Nope. In fact one the the things that made the move attractive is that SN retains that core infrastructure, offering opportunities for overland travel as well as water and air options.
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I want to say that I was a resident of Second Norway for over 2 years and it almost broke my heart when I learned that the estate was in trouble. When I found out that there was a buyer, I was initially very skeptical. At first I also thought that the old concept was better, but when I look around today and look at all the many lovingly designed and decorated islands, the many new roads and railway tracks, I have to say that it is much, much better than before. Everything is built properly and there are hardly any problems with lag. Vanity and her team have worked hard and achieved a lot in the past few weeks. And the new concept also seems to have met with broad approval and recognition. If you look around you can see that after just a few weeks almost all land is occupied. The prices were not increased, my land is cheaper today than it used to be and I have even more prim. Only last week I found out that several extensions are planned. Among other things, a coherent continent. In any case, I am completely satisfied and feel very comfortable here.
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Thx Inara and Bia for the valued info. Guess this has-been needs to log in world more often. Fortunately I paused my world cruise not far from the Blake (like a year ago) so the next leg might already bring me into SN.
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stop by anytime Orca, you will be very welcome here 🙂 – we are still working on setting up things and in autumn we will add a small continent with mountains, rivers, valleys and a small city – there is much more to come, stay tuned 🙂
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