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Welcome to the Gupole website of David & Gail Clarke. On this site, you will find the Clarke Chronicles - a record of what we've been up to over the last few months and years together with images in the Image Collection gathered from our travels.

There are images of our home at Le Gupole in Italy and images of our family who are scattered around various parts of the world - Kenya (Ben, Karina, Frank & Digby), Hong Kong (Zo, Lily & Phoebe), Dubai (Daniel) and X marks the spot (Lea & Jonathan).

In addition, there are links to a number of websites relating to businesses run by various members of the family.

If you want to contact us, our email addresses are: david at gupole dot com & gail at gupole dot com. It would be good to hear from you.

The word 'gupole' is the local dialect version of 'cupole', the plural of the word 'cupola'. La cupola has the same meaning as cupola in English, i.e. a dome. So 'le gupole' means 'the domes' or 'the cupolas'' and it is the name given to the particular part of the hill where the house is situated. All the different parts of the hill are named on the old maps, the names presumably relating to the shape of the part of the hill. Gupole is pronounced with the emphasis on the 'u', so it is gOO-po-ley

Wow, where does the time go?! - suddenly it's well into July. This photo was actually taken this time last year when there was a wasps nest in one of the brass fish on the terrace. Finding a new nest a couple of days ago in the larger fish reminded me of the session last year when I took loads of wasp portraits. This one was, I think, the best and I used it on a calendar with the line: 'I'm a wasp, is that a problem'.

I was wandering around the back streets of the Old Town of Mombasa, escorted by a friendly local, when this little babe popped up. I was holding the camera at knee level so I just roughly pointed it and clicked. A second, more composed shot didn't have the same dramatic feel as this one.

This little fellow was only about two inches long but could make a noise totally disproportionate to his size when in a mating mood. He - or maybe he's a she - had taken up residence under the winter pool cover and could be heard over the rumble of the tractor engine. Since spring has sprung, we were in the process of pumping the rainwater from the pool cover to a cisterna up the garden and so froggies' home environment was disappearing from around him. From the look on his face he was not impressed. David popped him in a jug and took him down to the spring about 200 metres away. However, within about five minutes, there was a plop in the water and he seemed to have returned. Unless of course it was his/her prospective mate.