Happy Valentine’s Day Everyone! In our travels over the past year, we carried on our four-year Gallivance tradition: a photo safari hunting for hearts to celebrate Valentine’s Day with you.
We enjoy it when big ol’ hearts just jump out at us…
…but we love the challenge of searching for the sneaky, subtle ones.
We look for hearts in nature, architecture, art … and some very unexpected places. In Plovdiv, Bulgaria we thought the crossed-legs symbol on this portable toilet was so cute, we totally missed the hearts!
Often we’re so busy capturing an interesting image that we don’t even realize we’ve also snapped a heart.
Naturally, using the heart shape as a metaphor for love means that it’s a repeated theme in religious art and as an architectural detail on churches.
There’s a lot going on in this street art mural, but the artist manages to squeeze in the concept of love with a small face tattoo.
Studies have suggested that capsicum, the mouth-scorching ingredient in peppers, has been found to lower blood pressure, and this heart-shaped, red pepper is the perfect reminder.
The number of heart shapes that turn up in architectural accent pieces, must surely indicate that it’s a requisite shape in blacksmith school.
This is a bit of a reach, but this popcorn kiosk was so much fun, that we couldn’t resist.
Hearts reaching for the Heavens make the perfect gate for this graceful Jewish Synagogue.
Do you have any great photos of hearts? Please include a link in your comment.
Have a lovely Valentine’s Day, everyone!
Terri & James
GALLIVANCE 
Hearts are a fascinating shape and meaning and more often around us than we would think or as you have said notice at first sight. Happy Valentine’s Day!
I agree Bertie, and this year’s post is good proof that hearts show up in lots of unexpected places. When we went through our photos, we were surprised by how many heart photos we had that we were unaware of. ❤ James
Lovely post! 🙂
Thanks Kelly! It’s always so much fun to hunt for these hearts – especially the ones we didn’t realize we’d found. Hope you have a great Valentine’s Day. ❤ Terri
What a great post for Valentine’s day!
I’m so glad you enjoyed it, Vilma! Do you celebrate Valentine’s Day over there? ❤ Terri
We celebrate it but for us it is day to celebrate friends and friendship. Hearts go well with that too! 🙂
This is a super cute post. Love it! X
I’m so glad you enjoyed it! I remember that when we lived in London Valentine’s Day was catching on. Is it popular now? ❤ Terri
Oh yeah it’s really popular here now. Restaurants get booked at least 6 months in advance and everywhere gets busy☺
You do manage to capture hearts wherever you go!! I must look for some in Spain. Happy Valentine´s Day to both of you. ❤
Happy Valentine’s Day, Darlene! I would think with all the beautiful wrought iron in Spain you should be able to find some lovely hearts. Is this holiday also celebrated in Spain? ❤ Terri
Only by the many English people living here. Hubby took me for lunch at The White Rose Tea Shop and then a lovely walk along the sea. A bit of both worlds.
Lots of love in the world. Happy Valentines Day to you both!
Thanks Laura … and to you and Steve, too! Are you still in Florida or have you headed back north? ❤ Terri
Unfortunately, I am back in the deep freeze. Hasn’t been out of the single digits all weekend!
Great eye to pick them out and lots of fun. Enjoy Valentine’s Day every day.
Many thanks, Tim and Anne. I hope you have a great Valentine’s Day, too. How are your plans coming? I’m sure the end of March can’t get here fast enough! ❤ Terri
Thanks for the greetings. We are getting very excited (and impatient). We fly to Costa Rica the first week of April for three months to chill and mentally unwind. We will likely have to return to Nova Scotia to finalize our house sale over the summer and then get started in earnest in September. We can’t wait. Happy trails. Tim & Anne
Beautiful! I never thought of looking for hearts! I wonder if I have any in my photo collection. Happy Valentines Day!
Thanks Nicole. For someone who travels and photographs as much as you do, I’d be surprised if you didn’t have quite a few hearts hiding in your photo library. It’s fun to search and it makes a fun holiday post as well. Have a fun Valentines Day. ❤ James
I hadn’t imagined so any hearts were used in paintings, construction or as accents. Who knew. Gorgeous photos. Thank you for sharing. Happy Valentine’s. ❤ 🙂
Thanks a bunch, Tess. We’re always delighted when we find them – especially when we didn’t see them initially! 🙂 Happy Valentine’s to you, too. ❤ Terri
Thank you. Hope yours was a good Valentine’s.
I always look forward to your hearts post. It is so intriguing and reveals your love of the search around the world and here at home. Happy Valentines Day T & J!
Thanks so much, Sue. It’s funny how it’s become a tradition, and now I look forward to it every year. You and I need to plan a photographic safari around Lexington to hunt some hearts – that would be a blast! Wishing you, Bob, and the Pups a very Happy VD! Love, T ❤
Whimsy and charm with all those hidden hearts. There are lots of hearts in my video and song Moments of Affection at http://www.swo8.wordpress.com
Leslie
Impressive Leslie. Not everyone can just whip out a beautiful song for Valentines Day! And look at all the hearts! ~James
Thanks, James. There are hearts hidden all over as you two have found.
Leslie
Lovely! Enjoyed the post very much. Here are our heart posts from the past:
Sandhill Crane Valentine: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/sandhill-crane-valentine/
Seashell Valentine: https://naturetime.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/seashell-valentine/
I love it Pam. I’ve seen lot of sandhill cranes, but never from that angle. Very impressive photo indeed. I remember my first sandhill crane. I was on a bike ride going to Cross Creek in central FL. I was just cruising along in the middle of nowhere, and there was a pair about 20ft off the road. They wandered off of course, but I got a great look at them. Pretty cool. ~James
We love our cranes. A pair visits us every day!
Such a cool idea! Loves abounds!
Thanks Alison. This is always a fun post to put together. Keep an eye out. I’m sure there are lots of hearts hidden in Paris. ~James
Happy Valentines Terri and James. Thanks for sharing your hearts. –Curt
Thanks Curt, and a Happy Valentines day to you and Peggy as well. ~James
You have a keen eye to notice all those! I think I will be looking at the world differently for now on.
As we said Jeff, when we started looking back through our photos, it was pretty funny how many hearts there were that we hadn’t even noticed. It’s a popular symbol, that’s for sure. ~James
What a fun post you guys! Happy Heart Day!! xo
Thanks Liz. It’s gotten to be a fun tradition, and unlike some posts, it’s easy and fun to put together. Happy Valentines Day to you as well. I’m sure there’s some delicious chocolate to be had in your neighborhood. Europeans know how to do chocolate. ~James
You seem to have a special knack for finding the heart – intentional or otherwise – in everywhere you travel ❤
My favourite is the church window in Plovdiv. It's the look of surprise (?) on the tiny little face at the bottom of the crucifix.
Interesting that you picked that one Joanne. This is one of the photos where we didn’t see the hearts until after the fact. But, I did take the photo for the tiny head, and I have no idea what it means. Of course, I don’t understand lots of religious art that I photograph. ~James
There is something about little faces peaking out from unexpected places. 😉
Absolutely fabulous collection of hearts, even the ones you didn’t see at first. Just love this whole post — a testament to your ability to piece things together from so many travel photos. Happy Valentine’s Day to you both!
Thanks for your kind words Rusha. We just love doing this sort of thing. Terri did all the looking through the photo archives, and she’s developed quite an eye for spotting hearts. It really is amazing how much the shape turns up. ~James
Ya gotta love it!
That was fun but I will admit I had to look for a bit to see the upside down ones on the Orthodox Church. Happy Heart day to you two!
Thanks Sue. Our discoveries this year were definitely more subtle – and some were nearly hidden! 🙂 It’s amazing how often the hearts turn up upside-down. So glad you could spot it. So how do you and Dave celebrate Valentine’s Day? ❤ Terri
We were snowshoeing in the mountains. Absolutely silent with stunning vistas and snow piled on top of still trees like giant mushrooms. How about the two of you?
We had one of Lexington’s rare snows and spent the day playing in it, with a wonderful fire in the evening. Bliss.
That sounds like great fun! Here in western Canada we are having such a mild winter whereas in Ottawa they had 51 cms of snow yesterday!
You must have put in a lot of time on this post…just finding those hearts!
It’s gotten to be a fun quest, and forces us to pay more attention – which is never a bad thing. ~James
Funny how hearts crop up everywhere, even when you’re not looking for them. My Valentine’s heart this year came at the end of a walk in the woods in the guise of a hollow in a tree. http://wp.me/p5c8JE-69f
Very cool Marie. A heart in a hollow of a tree is a new addition to the list. ~James
Heart warming post.Cheers
I love this idea. It has really cheered me up and made my Monday.
Thanks for the comment and for dropping by the blog. I encourage you, in your travels and at home, to keep an eye open for hearts. You’ll be amazed to see how many pop up. And the side benefit is that it’s an easy, fun, and automatic Valentine’s Day post every year. That takes care of one day – just 364 to go. 🙂 Love the name of your blog BTW. ~ James
I love it – the world is such a tough place right now so to spend a little time looking for hearts really delights me.
Lovely post. I love the heart theme and am delighted as a little child, when I find heart-shaped leaves on hikes! 🙂