The expedition began in Aqua which is a shopping park. As usual, I mounted Vixen-the-Wonder-Horse and naturally, I could not resist the opportunity to shop. I did find some ballet slippers which I desparately needed, but other than that I spent way too much time in this well developed but unextraordinary area.

We headed north into Green and I was immediately confronted with yet another “I can do this” creation, and this brings me to the sermon for today. The more I journey on these expeditions the more I’ve become very judgemental and even snarky. And those are qualities I truly dislike in myself and others.

I’m particularly harsh on plots which I’ve been referring to as “I can do this” creations; that is my snarky way of referring to work that is often unimaginative even mindless, without theme and usually poor craftsmanship. I’ve come to have disdain for those creations because I see so many of them, and more often than not they pollute other creations where obvious thought and craftsmanship has been invested.

At the best, these plots can be referred to as “whimsical” or “imaginative”. At the worst, they can be called “capricious” or “abominable”. Going forward I will use those terms instead of “I can do this”, but the meaning is the same. Below is an example of what I would refer to as a whimsical creation, but believe me, if you’d seen as many of these whimsies as I have you’d find it hard to differentiate. End of sermon, and I promise no more sermons on this subject.

Anyway, Green was infested with whimsy and capriciousness but in the southwestern quadrant I found the home of Second Style magazine; which is very cool but totally out of place in this sim. So, we moved north into Bisque which was filled with more whimsy with a touch of abomination. Even the coastal area of no interest. However, the biggest joke of all about this sim is that there was a 512sqm plot for sale for L$115,000 and it wasn’t even coastal. I wonder, who owns these plots of SL? Do they pay monthly tier fees to maintain these “things”?

We left Green and entered Argent along the northern coast. After passing though so much mindlessness, I was pleasantly surprised to find a lovely home called the Livingston Estate – Madison’s Home. And then next door, the Belle d’Argent home is a sort of northern California coastal style home, but with too many stained glass windows. There was enough whimsy in Argent to make me wince, but comparatively it was a pleasant experience with two corners of ocean front.

Heading south, we entered Brown which is a planned community much on the line of Broadman. I wrote quite a bit about Broadman in Expedition #7 and much of the same applies to Brown, except the rents were lower and the homes were generally more of a modern style. And surprisingly, the available coastline which should have been a great asset was of not really useful or usable.

So, we headed into the last sim on the plan, Caladon. The northern quadrant was nice ocean themed community called, The Waterside of Caladon. It had all the elements including piers, lighthouse, waves rolling in and quaint homes. However, only a few hundred meters south however, and as usual, the theme was polluted by one particularly grotesque plot called, Tiger Treasures of Caledonia, a moronic arcade with games for subhuman avatars. And then an even greater abomination, SHOPHIE’S Delicious Designs, which is apparently no longer in business.

Although the expedition was officially complete, there were two more sims to the west of Caladon and I decided to continue onward into the Fuchsia sim, which appears to be a sandbox for group called Kiss Kiss Nation. Then north to Voilet, a well developed themed sim with a Japanese style Welcome Area. In addition, there were lovely gardens, mountains and rivers where and numerous avies hanging out and apparently enjoying the sim.

I thought this might be a good time to end the expedition, but earlier in the day I’d received an invitation to the opening of New England Township on Sunday. I really love the New England style, so I decided to go sneak a peek and I was so pleasantly surprised. I made a quick flyover with Vixen, but landed in the street where we trotted around the town. There are numerous residential homes and several shops available, and there are some very cool sites especially the little ocean side cafe (photo below). I met the owner, Amaliscious Destiny and hope she is successful with this delightful, whimsy-free sim.