POSTCARD N.256 - U.S.A.

Posted on 18th July; received on the 19th October 2026

Postcard image: A whale watching tour boat on the Inside Passage, Alaska, gets a close view of a pod of Orca

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A scene I would love to see one day: a pod of orca in the wild. Thanks so much, A.W., I loved the card!

Orca are no strangers to the waters of the Atlantic in the region that I live in. In fact they are frequently seen in between 2 to 5 nautical miles from the beaches where I often go (therefore,  not visible from the beach, unfortunately).

And, lately, they have become a not so welcome sight for sailboat skippers, since this year alone  88 interactions between orcas and boats have been registered in Portugal so far, with some ending up in boats with inoperationl rudders. (Last year there was even a sunken boat, in September).

Marine biologists say that the type of behaviour that orcas are exhibiting around here is not any form of aggression but only a consequence of curiosity and the playful and exploratory character of the beautiful mammals.

Since they are also good learners, the behaviour is rapidly spreading amidst the newer members of the pod, so it is foreseeable that interactions and consequential incidents occur in the future.

As far as I could investigate on the internet, this tipe of behaviour is limited to Iberian Orca and although interactions with boats do take place in Alaska, damage to boats is a very rare occurrence.

A. W. used one of the "Global Forever" triangular self-adhesive stamps celebrating Postcrossing, issued by USPS on 26MAY2026.

The stamp features a motorcyclist holding a postcard. The other three stamps in the issue feature similar images of Diver; an Astronaut and a Cowgirl... postcards can go anywhere....

The stamp was cancelled with a celebratory postmark of this year's California State Fair which ran from  July 17 through August 2, 2026, at the California Exposition & State Fair (Cal Expo) in Sacramento, California, applied at the Expo Centre Post Office.

COVER N. 778 - SPAIN

Postmark: Oficina Postal de Avilés 06.10.2026

Posted on the 6th October;  Received on the 16th October 2026

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Always a treat to receive a cover from the beautiful region of Asturias, on the other side of the border here in the Iberian peninsula, graced with one of the lovely pictorial postmarks that Correos de España has available at some of its main local Post Offices.

Muchísimas Gracias, Angel!

Stamps,  left to right:

- Felipe VI became the King of Spain on 19 June 2014. The first definitive series featuring his portrait was issued on 19JAN2015. The self-adhesive 0,05€ stamp on the cover was the issued on 01FEB2017, this being the only stamp in the series issued on that particular year.

- The United Nations Assembly General of 2011 proclaimed the 30th July as the International Friendship Day.

This fact notwithstanding, this day  is also unofficially celebrated in Spain and in some of the Spanish speaking countries of Latin America and in Brazil slightly earlier, on the 20th July, the day when Neil Armstrong first set a human foot on the moon.

This year, to highlight the date, Correos de España issued on  20JUL2026, the 1€ self-adhesive stamp on the postcard, illustrated  with  a suggestive and self-explaining image and the legend Dia de la Amistad (Frierndship Day).   

I was not familiar with the Lyceum Club Femenino, a Spanish women's association established in November, 1926, aiming at the promotion of the social, cultural, educational and political development of  women.

Throughout its existence the club carried out an intense activity enrolling very relevant figures, both masculine and feminine, of the Spanish political and  cultural scenes of the day and no better proof of its relevance could there be than the fact that the organisation would be disbanded in 1939 in the aftermath of the republican defeat in the civil war, being replaced by a regime oriented women's sports organisation, the Medina clubs.

Celebrating the 100 years of the founding of the Lyceum Club Femenino, Correos issued on 07SEP2016 the A tariff (Domestic 20g) on the cover illustrated with a suggestive image of three women in what seems to be a library, with the legend Centenario del Lyceum Club Femenino. The illustration contains the signature of Clara de Frutos, a Spanish illustrator and Comics author.

The Pictorial Postmark is illustrated with what I believe to be a view of Calle de Rivero (Rivero Street) one of the landmarks of Avilés, with its distinctive arcades.

COVER N. 777 - FRANCE

Postmark: Service des Oblitérations Philatéliques Boulazac Isle Manoir 09.10.2026

Posted on the 9th October;  Received on the 16th October 2026

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What do such disparate contraptions as the sewing machine, the folding umbrella or the hot air balloon have in common?

Once again stamps are happy to provide answers to those of enquiring minds and I have to thank Roland for sending me a cover with a stamp that led me to a possible answer. Un grand Merci, mon ami.

According to la Poste, they all are French inventions; same as the calculator, cinema, soundtracks, radio and the digicode, although I am sure that such an assertion, in some of the cases, must be opened to discussion...

The above mentioned eight inventions were highlighted in a self-adhesive, "Lettre Internationale" stamp set issued as a carnet on 16JUN2025.

One of these stamps, the one featuring the hot air balloon, was used on this particular cover.

It is well known that the principle that governs hot air balloons had been in use long before Pilâtre de Rozier and  Laurent d'Arlandes rose to the sky in Paris, in 1783, aboard an unthetered hot air balloon designed by the Montgolfier brothers, for it is, of course, the same principle that was used in sky lanterns in ancient China and other parts of the Eastern hemisphere.

I wouldn't also be a decent Portuguese if I were not to mention the experiments of my fellow countryman and Jesuit priest Bartolomeu Lourenço de Gusmão who, in 1709, proved the feasibility of the concept of manned hot air ballooning, with a  demonstration of his flying apparatus, which he called Passarola and in which he would actually later actually ascend (and descend, hopefully.... :-)), as stated in an article dated of October 1786, in the London Daily Universal Register.

For the purpose of this article let us though assume that the first fully functional hot air balloons for practical human flight were  those of Joseph-Michel and Jacques-Étienne Montgolfier, who would lend their family name to their invention - the Montgolfière - the subject of the stamp on the cover.

The stamp was cancelled with the pictorial postmark of the Service des Oblitérations Philatéliques, located in Boulazac Isle Manoir, a commune in the Dordogne department of south-western France.

POSTCARD N.255 - U.S.A.

Postcard dated of the 29th September; received on the 19th October 2026

Postcard image: West Virginia - The Mountain State

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A very nice illustration that would not look out of place on a West Virginia Tourist Board advertising campaign, landed on my letterbox, courtesy of the indefatigable Ghost Who Walks, my friend The Phantom. Danke Sehr, Alex!

The 10th smallest of all the States that are represented by a star in the American Flag  West Virginia, whose Capital is Charleston, a city of about 50 thousand inhabitants, is located within the Appalachian range, in the the Southern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States.

Its location and orography  makes it a magnet for outdoor recreation fans something which is also highlighted in the nice illustration of the card, where some rafters are seen going down New River, close to one of the State's Icons, the New River Gorge Bridge, dated of 1977 and  the longest steel span in the western hemisphere.

The flag of the State, a blue bordered white rectangle with the State's Coat of Arms, featuring a farmer and a miner, in the middle is also present in the illustration

Alex used a Global Forever self adhesive stamp issued on 14MAR2022,  part of the circular stamp series dedicated to flowers initiated in 2017.

The flower on it is the African daisy (Osteospermum sp.) numbering 70 species, which can be found in the wild in southern and eastern Africa and also in the Arabian Peninsula.

It is also widely cultivated, cultivars and hybrids of the species being a common sight in gardens all around the world.

Further to the postmark of the Fayetteville Post Office, the card shows green stampmarks from The National Coal Heritage Area and Bluestone Scenic River.

As if 4 manual stampmarks were not enough, an overzealous someone at the USPS processing centre chose to scribble the centre of a cancelled stamp with a ballpoint.... 

On the front the card also bears a rather subdued mechanical cancellation with the slogan "Mail a smile, Smiling at you...."

COVER N. 776 - SOUTH KOREA

Postmark: World Maritime Day / Gangnam Korea 21.09.2026 

Posted on 21st September;  Received on the 16th October 2026

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What a lovely cover, this one from Korea. From the high quality envelope to the equally superior quality cancellations, everything looks fine and dandy! 감사합니다  Jung Min.

IMO, the International Maritime Organisation, a specialised agency of the United Nations, was established in 1958, with a view  "to provide machinery for cooperation among Governments in the field of governmental regulation and practices relating to technical matters of all kinds affecting shipping engaged in international trade; to encourage and facilitate the general adoption of the highest practicable standards in matters concerning maritime safety, efficiency of navigation and prevention and control of marine pollution from ships"

World Maritime Day was celebrated  for the first time ever on  March 17, 1978, marking the 20th anniversary of the above mentioned founding convention. On that same year the IMO Assembly decided that  The World Maritime Day would be  observed on the last Thursday of September each year. 

This year it was also decided  that henceforth the theme for World Maritime Day would be biannual. So the theme for 2026-2027 World maritime Day, which was celebrated on the 24th September, is "From Policy to Practice: Powering Maritime Excellence".

Celebrating this observance date Korea Post issued on 15SEP2026 the 500 South Korean won on the cover, illustrated with a view of  what I believe is Busan Harbour, the busiest in Korea and one of the busiest in the world  with the South Korean Flag and IMO logo superimposed.

The First Day postmark features a nice head-on image of a cargo ship and the regular postmark was applied at Gangnam, a district of Seoul famous for being "a world-class fashion and trend centre and affluent area". (cf. wikipedia).

COVER N. 775 - HUNGARY

Postmark: Balatonalmádi 05.10.2026 

Posted on 5th October;  Received on the 8th October 2026

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Fast mail! Just 4 days between sending and receiving for a much appreciated letter from Hungary, with some nice stamps both inside and out. Not bad at all. Köszönöm szépen, Hóka! 

Hungary is also not that frequent a port of call here on my blog so I was extra pleased to see my box had been served with a cover with some Magyar stamps on it. Nice!

Traditional costumes is a theme that I find quite interesting, since clothes can really carry within themselves (design, materials, shapes, colours)  the distinctive traits of a human group, be it a vey localised, hence small one or of a nation or a country, as a whole.

Add to that the fact that cultures take immense pride in their distinctive symbols and it is easy to understand that sometimes even the humblest garment, made out of the most common and readily available materials  can be  skilfully manufactured and presented as a national treasure, which indeed it can be.

This is of course true for both popular and elite garments and more often than not even if the latter can exhibit more sophisticated or complex designs with better quality materials, constituents of the former are integrated into them, thus protecting their national identity, their national soul.

In our days.  when a large proportion of the world population tends to dress in a totally globalised way (myself included, of course), most times more concerned with manufacturer's labels than with real comfort or durability, traditional clothes, be it high or low end, are a pointer to the history of who we are and can be read as a book... most often than not, a beautifully illustrated one!

In 2016 Magyar Posta issued the first two stamps of a series dedicated to historical dresses that has recently seen its 5th issue, with the two se-tenant 440 forints stamps on the cover, issued on 15JUL2026.

They are illustrated with the male and female version of  a traditional Hungarian court dress of the 19th century, presumably from the times when the country was part of the Dual Monarchy, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which lasted from 1867 till the end of the Great War, in 1918.

 

Two more stamps were used to post the cover, these belonging to a set of six stamps with the same denomination - 300 forints - issued on 25OCT2022, designated "Coats of Arms of the King of the House of Árpád".

The House of Árpád was the first royal dynasty of Hungary and it ruled first the Principality of Hungary in the 9th and 10th centuries and later  the Kingdom of Hungary from 1000 to 1301.

The stamps show the coats of arms of the rulers from 1196 till 1301 inscribed in coins,  the one on the face of the cover being that of  Stephen V (1270-1272) and the one in the back, that of Emeric (1196-1204).

Postmark from Balatonalmádi, a town of about 8.500 inhabitants, located on the shore of... Lake Balaton, of course.

POSTCARD N.254 - PORTUGAL

Postcard dated of 1st October; received on the 7th October 2026

Postcard image: Cabo Espichel, Portugal

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Postcrossing was a good idea and so was World Postcard Day, which I believe, was also the brainchild of the Postcrossing team, who established it in 2020, as a way to celebrate the 150th anniversary of the creation of the Correspondenz-Karte, the first  official post card, issued by the Austrian Post on the 1st October 1869.

Ever since the first edition of WPD, special commemorative cancellations have been created for the event by CTT, the  Portuguese Postal services provider and as usual I do not let pass the date without sending out a few postcards to friends and also one to my own self.

This year I used a postcard with a photograph of a place which I visit every now and then not only because it is absolutely beautiful but also because, come spring, I can find some wild orchids  there, something which is always a matter of joy and pleasure: Cabo Espichel, with its ancient sanctuary and church and its imposing lighthouse.

To send the postcard I chose a N20g (domestic up to 20g) stamp from this year's issue of the "Portuguese Contemporary art" series, dated of  12SEP2026, featuring a mural by Street Artist Vihls done with his trademark technique of surface perforation, part of his "Scratching the Surface" project.

Unfortunately, the work, dated of 2014, which was located in Avenida da Índia, Lisboa, very close to the Tagus river, does not exist anymore, since the building on which it was created, part of a sugar manufacturing plant,  was demolished in 2018.

The celebratory postmark is self-explanatory and was applied at the Chiado (Lisbon) Post office.