One Crater, Two Colors

From high above the interior, Polly looked down into a single enormous crater, more than twenty-two thousand years old and wide enough to hold a small town, two lakes, and several farms inside its rim. A thin strip of land crossed the middle, and on either side of it the water was a completely different color, one lake a deep blue, the other a vivid green, as if someone had poured two different oceans into the same bowl.

Visoko nad notranjostjo otoka je Polly pogledala navzdol v en sam ogromen krater, star več kot dvaindvajset tisoč let in tako širok, da je znotraj njegovega roba prostor za majhno mesto, dve jezeri in več kmetij. Sredino je prečkal ozek pas kopnega, na vsaki strani pa je bila voda povsem druge barve, eno jezero globoko modro, drugo živo zeleno, kot da bi kdo v isto skledo zlil dva različna oceana.

The two lakes are not really separate. A narrow channel under the land bridge connects them, so the water itself is one body. What changes is everything around it. The blue lake is deeper and simply reflects the open sky, while the green lake sits closer to plant-covered slopes and tiny algae, both of which tint its water a rich green instead.

Jezeri Sete Cidades v resnici nista ločeni. Pod kopnim mostom ju povezuje ozek kanal, tako da je voda pravzaprav eno samo telo. Spremeni se vse okoli nje. Modro jezero je globlje in preprosto zrcali odprto nebo, medtem ko zeleno leži bliže z rastlinjem poraslim pobočjem in drobnim algam, ki njegovo vodo obarvajo bogato zeleno.

Polly flew low along the land bridge that splits the two colors, close enough to see fishing boats resting on one shore and grazing cattle on the low hills above the other. Thick fog rolled in off the ocean and settled inside the crater rim, hiding first the green lake, then the blue, until only the bridge between them stayed visible.

Polly je nizko preletela pas kopnega, ki deli barvi, dovolj blizu, da je videla ribiške čolne, ki so počivali na eni obali, in govedo, ki se je paslo na nizkih gričih nad drugo. Z oceana se je privalila gosta megla in se usedla znotraj kraterskega roba, najprej skrila zeleno jezero, nato modro, dokler ni ostal viden le še most med njima.

She perched on the old stone wall of a lookout point and waited for the fog to lift again, in no hurry at all. When it finally thinned, both lakes reappeared at once, blue and green, exactly where she had left them.

Sedla je na star kamnit zid razgledišča in prav nič v naglici čakala, da se megla spet dvigne. Ko se je končno razredčila, sta se obe jezeri prikazali hkrati, modro in zeleno, natanko tam, kjer ju je pustila.