Category: Reviews

Where the soft breeze of the sea wind touches your face, where you smell the fruits of the trees. Where in the evening the flowers spread their smell, where life is simple and slow, and your glass of wine always filled.

– From Lemon Trees Mediterranean About Land

So reads the description for Lemon Trees Mediterranean, a Homestead region design by Lian (LiandavK) that I’ve hopped into a couple of times over the course of the last month or so, and have finally managed to sit down and write about.

As the name suggests, this a public setting with a lean towards the Mediterranean, although it is distinctly a place of two halves. Lemon Trees Mediterranean refers to what might be regarded as the main part of the setting, offering a high landing point amidst aged ruins on a plateau top, with a pair of villas sitting below it, reached by a long stairway that descends the finger of a hill pointing south.

The first of the villas sits bounded on two sides by water, one of which is actually a bay that cuts into the landscape. The villa, with bell frame raised to one end, has the look of a converted chapel about it; a long, single-floored building with what might have once been the priest’s room alongside. Now it forms a simple house, the courtyard outside given over to a place for music and dancing, the far end of which forms an open-roofed bar.

The second villa sits half way up the hill, tucked into two shoulder of rock, one of which forms the base of the landing point plateau. It is more suggestive of a private home (but one open to the public rather than an actual private residence), with a light snack set out on the table on the terrace, the house simply but comfortably furnished. Modest rows of vines are growing on the slopes below it, suggesting this is a working home, whoever occupies it taking the time to produce their own wine – so perhaps the bar at the second villa is their means of selling their produce to any visitors who drop by.

Both villas have views to the south and east, the latter looking out over the waters to where the sea has carved the rocks of a ribbon islands, and the view more directly sough looking over the bay to the southern end of the region.

This southern end of the region can be reached via a tree-shaded path that runs due south from the steps leading down from the landing point. It sits as a somewhat different location to the villas, being set out as a spa complete with its own landing point bounded on three sides by coastal waters. Most immediately facing the walk leading to it is the main swimming pool, its waters warm and inviting, wooden decking stretching out from one side around an aged tree to form a place set for music and barbecues.

Beyond the pool, and setting between it and the southern beach, sits the main spa building, complete with further decks on its beachward side. The building offers a mix of environments: the main section providing lounges, a bar and dance floor; the smaller section presents what appear to be private bedrooms / treatment rooms.

This is an interesting setting in that the spa area is signed in different places as “PG” and “Adult”, although the region itself is Moderate. As such, the signage may appear to run counter to Second Life maturity ratings, but it is intended to give fair warning that some of the furnishings to be found within the smaller section of the spa building and out on the south deck include Adult animations and poses. The spa also has its own group (free to join), but this doesn’t appear to be a requirement for access to any of the areas within it, or to the “Group Access” elements of one of the sets of teleport discs found throughout the setting.

There are also various activities available as the spa – the smaller of the two swimming pools has poses (including dives into the water), there is a sign that can be touched for swimming in the Linden water, a jet ski rezzer. All of which add to the spa setting. For those who want a little more privacy, the north-west corner of the island offers a secluded sing sitting over a rapidly flowing stream that drops away from the local waterfalls.

All of which makes for an engaging visit with some excellent opportunities for fun and photography.

 SLurl Details

Auto 1 is rated Moderate.

• Lemon Trees Mediterranean
• Lemon Trees Spa

 

Ars Vivendi has been a public destination since late January / Early February 2022, and a place I’ve dropped into on a number of occasions and explored with the intention of writing about, but never quite getting to. However, after receiving several suggestions that I pay it a visit (thanks to all who forwarded them!), I felt it about time I did put down some notes on the setting.

The work of Camila (Camila Runo), it is a part of her 80 Days series – builds focusing on various locations from around the world. In this case – as the name might suggest, this full region takes as its inspiration the countryside of Italy.

Stroll through the wide, yellow rapeseed fields and discover the splendours of the Tuscan countryside and beaches. Places that look like they were drawn by hand: a vineyard, a cypress alley, an old town inviting you to sit down and breathe the atmosphere!

– Ars Vivendi About Land description

This is very much a setting that speaks for itself, from the landing point within the walled courtyard of the farmhouse landing zone, up through the hilltop town and over the water to the neighbouring little island that has been topped by a villa.

The landing point farm sits on a northern headland to the west of the region, ribbons of beach sitting at the bottom of the sloping cliffs on either side. Reached via stone steps to the west and a set of wooden stairs mounted on tall wooden piles to the east, these beaches offer sandy walks under the Sun, shaded places to sit and, in the case of the eastern beach, a little pier from which a Culprit motor boat can be taken to that neighbouring island and its villa crown.

Meanwhile, reached by a country track running up to it from the farmhouse, the hilltop town spans the southern extent of the region, west to east. With its walls and towers, it has about the the sense of once having been fortified, and with it, a sense of age – one that possibly runs back as far as the days of the Roman Empire. At the western, down slope end of the town stands a great bathhouse, its waters clean and clear, its walls painted in frescos. But whether a place of antiquity that has been preserved, or a reproduction designed to lure tourists, is up to you to decide.

Above this, to the east, the little town rises in steps and sloping streets up to where the hill is crowned by the local church, sitting as it does on its own small headland, somewhat aloof and separated from the main town by a set of gates and single track reaching out to it from the town’s piazza.

The town is rich with a sense of life. Shops are open, the piazza is set with bleachers and a stage ready for an outdoor event, whilst locals shop and barter and tourists take photographs. To one side of the piazza sits The Four Seasons boutique hotel as it rubs shoulders with the houses below and looks across a broad slope of road running up to the piazza to where the local cinema stands, a pizzeria nestled beside it.

This is a location that is worth taking the time to explore as it has much to see, and care has been taken to presenting it as a living, breathing place. Similarly, the countryside to the north and the beaches to either side of it offer an escape to the country that many in towns large and small appreciate, and so then blend well with the hilltop town whilst also presenting the full richness of the Tuscan countryside from the beauty of its often rugged coast to the rich colours of its inland towns and farms.

Taken as a whole or in its various parts, Ars Vivendi is a beautiful and well-executed design and a deserving destination not to be missed while it lasts.

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• Ars Vivendi (Nausicaa, rated Moderate)

Following a poke from Shawn Shakespeare, I hopped back to Cathy Vathiany’s (zaziaa) ever-evolving region design Lost Dreams, which has had a further re-dress (and relocation), with a design that now exists in a region of two distinct halves, with several secrets awaiting discovery.

To the west, and with a north-south orientation, sits a very temperate-looking landscape which encompasses the landing point within a very rugged setting. This presents a pair of cliff-sides plateaux separated by a low meadow that is home to most of the local wildlife and spanned by a tall suspension bridge that picks its way over an inland body of water fed by falls dropping from a curtain of cliffs.

From the landing point sitting alongside a cobbled path, it is possible to walk path west and then north to where it runs down a slope to a set of steps to where a small waterfront town sits. This is a place of broad paved roads, a busy wharf and waterfront where artists of both the visual and performance kinds have found a home, and posters on the walls give the setting something of a French connection.

Following the cobbles south from the landing point quickly leads to the tall bridge and the southern plateau, a slightly wilder setting offering camping (or glamping, given the use of ultra-modern geodesic domes), with a hint of history with the presence of the ruins of a stone-built church. Winding across the plateau, the path runs down to a southern shoreline and a small island. Those wandering down to this should be aware that there is a rental cottage tucked into the south-west corner of the setting.

To the east, and again with a north-south orientation, the region takes on a completely tropical look. Separated from its temperate neighbour by a broad channel of water, this tropical environment can be reached via a broad bridge connecting the north-western town with a broad events space with café and fairground rides.

Beyond this, the sandy landscape points southwards – although again, be aware that the southern end of the beaches is again given over to a further pair of rental cabins – and these are not the only rentals here. Sitting off the east coast is an arc of tiki rentals, each on its own little sandy hump for those facing a holiday on the water.

Within these two environments, however is more to be found. Clues to this can be found in the form of a couple of teleport portals – one in the temperate one on the tropical – that are hard to miss, and more subtle teleport disc scattered around. Find the right one, and you may be transported under the waters to a sunken gardens, or another to find yourself in a skyborne multiple-room lounge that has – for those of a sensitive nature – a decidedly adult theme (although other adult, umm, pointers, can be found floating on the beachside waters of the intervening channel between the two halves of the region). While sitting over those waters is a cliff side house that – I believe – is open to the public, although access is somewhat restricted.

There are also multiple touches of detail that await photographers – not that the entire setting is in any way unphotogenic; but small details are often what bring a place to life; so these are worth looking out for. There are also curious dichotomies within the region. Take the town for example: it offers something of a European tone with a pub, outdoor café, the street performance, etc., – and then sitting on the streets is a pair of stagecoaches right out of the American west.

Compared to past versions of Lost Dreams – and Les Reves Perdus (“Dreams Lost”) before it – this iteration of Cathy’s vision is very different in tone, simply because of the way it offers that temperature / tropical split whereas past designs have tended towards just the one overall theme for their setting, be it Nordic, temperate, tropical or pastoral. However, it is clear Cathy has taken extraordinary care to make sure the two sides of the region work both as individual settings and as a united whole, with equal care being taken to keep the rentals sufficiently apart from the public spaces so as to minimise the risk of intrusion from public to private.

All of which makes for another engaging visit.

SLurl Details

• Lost Dreams (Creative Hearts, rated Adult)