Eat, walk, eat, walk,eat, walk and then do it all again…got to love a place where the fruit food group is a tarte…
Never in my whole life would I have thought to combine pear and grapefruit…but here…magnifique!
If you go up in the ugliest building (Tour Montparnasse)
You see this
If you ride enough Metros and trains
you see many sights
Cluny Museum
Sainte Chapelle
Notre Dame
Reflections of the old and new…
Soak it all in…it is joy…
The hubs and I toe tapping to some music
How far we have come-both of us in Keen shoes so we can walk in a city, as opposed to the sandals we would have worn back in the day when we first began to listen to…
along with Maria Muldaur, Rickie Lee Jones, Jim Kweskin, Harry Shearer, plus Dan Hicks’ jazz band in Junior High in Santa Rosa in the early ’60′s. Oh, yes, and the Hot Licks. A great night of music and nostalgia after a walk through the city center
Over to Hayes Valley for a quick bite
Then back to the Hall for the birthday bash…can’t believe Dan Hicks is seventy…
Turns out that Davies Hall has two balconies on the top floor (good thing we got cheap, high up seats) or I never would have gotten these views
I decided me playing with processing my photos on my phone while we waited to go to our seats was very much akin to the woman at the next table sketching. Husband had to fend for himself, tolerant fellow, while she observed…
Hope I see a lot of sketchers in Paris…that would make a nice thread…
You are probably thinking by now… when are these people ever going to get home…almost done now…only a few more hill towns…and today…
So is it raw sienna or burnt sienna (the paint color names come from the French language hence the double “n” but the color comes from the earth in Tuscany)?
Or is it gold? (a human statue)
The Duomo
Across from the Duomo is the Museo filled with amazing art (of course) and at the back of the second floor (at least I think we were on the second floor) there is a door down a hallway that leads you to a very narrow spiral staircase. Very close quarters but serves as both up and down. Only one person can move at a time but it is so worth getting to the top. It is called the Panorama and this is the view.
After the Museo, inside the Duomo.
Ceilings and floors, ceilings and floors.
After enjoying the Duomo we were off to the Palazzo Pubblico. (Think the James Bond movie with the horse race.)
This is the Mangia Tower built between 1338-1348.
The construction of The Palazzo began in 1288. The large medallion is the monogram of San Bernardino. Inside are the amazing frescoes of the Allegory of Good Government and the Allegory of Bad Government.
Then we enjoyed walking though the streets
Enjoying the patterns
and celebrations…a wedding!
Great lunch included rabbit stuffed with carrots and pine nuts wrapped with prosciutto.
Then dessert at Grom!
The very best flavor…salted caramel.
What a day, what a day…
I wish I had read a little more history before I went to Portland, because I would have been on the look-out for particular landmarks. Especially, I would have taken a picture of the Benson Bubbler fountains dotted around where we were walking. I thought they were a new feature, but actually the city started to place them back in 1917 from a gift from a local citizen (Mr. Benson) who was hoping to keep his loggers out of saloons at lunch time. They merrily bubble continuously (they are now set with timers to turn them off late at night and early morning) and are four bowls of continuous flow, bubbling along. Wish I hadn’t missed that picture. I did get these fountains, though, around the Pioneer Courthouse Square.
Bronze fountains around a Federal Courthouse reflecting the natural history of the area.
Of course, old buildings and new convention centers.
Had to take one shot from within the MaxTrain because it is such a fine system of public transit (and they refer to their senior citizens as “Honored Citizens”—now, that is a really nice place!)
Then it was time to fly home
Happy to have such good friends and old-time roomies to meet in far-off places to see beautiful cities and catch up on old times and children. Story after story and laugh after laugh. Lovely days, girls…see you next year.
Bright and early (well not so bright, afterall it was Seattle) Terry’s brother, Pat, picked us up for our day of sightseeing in Seattle.
A swing through the University of Washington and then down to the Olympic Sculpture Park.
I will only give you a teaser here and dedicate an entire post later to the sculptures. This is Eagle by Alexander Calder. A perfect setting for this soaring piece.
Pat and Terry waited for me to take pictures most of the day They were very patient!
Our next stop was the Pioneer Square section of Seattle where we walked around the historic buildings and found the tasting room for Dry Soda. This is my favorite new drink, but I haven’t found it in California yet. It has flavors like lemongrass, rhubarb, blood orange, cucumber and vanilla bean. Less sweet soda and delicious. They have a tasting room in Seattle, just like in a winery.
At street level is the original second floor of the building because Seattle was rebuilt at a higher level after a fire in 1889 destroyed blocks of the city. Wooden buildings were rebuilt in brick. This created an “underground” portion to the buildings.
Some of the trees and light posts in Pioneer Park had knitted coverings. It made me giggle and think of my “knitting friends” back home.
Really? Still?
And over to:
This was a very crowded place and I thought if I stopped for pictures of the flowers I would get trampled, so I waited until lunch at Campagne Cafe where it was a little quieter.
Then off to the Washington Park Arboretum (while driving there Pat pointed out this building which is the new library in Seattle.) The building is made of glass and steel and when I make it back to Seattle I will be sure that I see what it is like to look from the inside out instead of only from the backseat of a car through the lens of my iPhone. The iPhone proved again how quickly it can respond to important sights.
The garden has this type of planter (iron with terra cotta). Great design, wish I had some, although the design is a tad formal and massive for my garden. But, a great design idea. Around now we were beginning to realize that for everything we did that day we could have used an entire day’s worth of time to explore. We walked through only a portion of the garden and left wanting more. The plants weren’t labeled so some of the identifications are guesses.
This golden maple was magnificent:
and a honeysuckle
and another lovely flower with freckles and back-light.
Tree trunks in amazing shapes
Then a rollicking evening with Lisa, Pat, Ben, and Jeff at the Italian restaurant Il Terrazzo Carmine. Fantastico!
We will be back! Thanks for the memories! (and pictures)
A few last images of Canada before getting back into the states.
We crossed the border and had dinner with my nephew, Jed, and his wife, Roz, in Bellingham. They have three great kids but I forgot to take a picture because I was so excited to see them! We had a nice dinner in a Greek restaurant. They are a terrific family and we had a very nice visit before taking off for Port Townsend the next morning. By ferry! What a great system.
Port Townsend, what is their to say…if I get near historic buildings I am in heaven and this was an incredible collection.
My favorite of them all, the Jefferson County Court House. I can’t resist including many views.
Even a farmer’s market…
The next morning we were back on the ferry approaching our reunions in Seattle.
The square images are taken with the Hipstamatic app and the rest are taken with the native camera of the iPhone.
We left home at 9:02 this morning (pretty good for us—our goal was 9:00) to head toward Ashland, Oregon to the North. I do not think that in my whole life I have taken the inland passage to Oregon up Highway 5. My memory is of always going up 101 through Crescent City (always famous for the effects the earthquake tsunamis had on it.) So the scenery was new and by the time we arrived at Shasta Lake I kept muttering, “wow…”
The ClassicPan app caught it from a rest stop.
The only uncomfortable thing about the drive was that it was Friday and there were lots of transport trucks on the road.
Hipstamatic app caught the traffic but we kept ahead of the rain blowing into the San Francisco region and saw some snow topped mountains.
I think this was the native camera with no apps from the front seat of the car.
We stopped for afternoon coffee in Dunsmuir, an historic town with a great theater (no longer open). Native camera with Iris Photo Suite cropping and vignetting.
Although I didn’t drink the water I think this refers to the quality of the fishing since they also had this painted wall and a fly shop.
Iris Photo Suite again.
We walked all around Ashland before dinner and found another movie theater.
It was a Friday evening art walk in a very vibrant downtown.
Sculpture:
and copper people:
If you have ever been in my house you would understand how excited I was to see copper people. I’ve put copper on counters, walls, lightfixtures—anywhere I can crinkle it and patina it.
To top it off, there were many historic buildings that are on the National Register of Historic Places.
An Episcopal Church.
A library.
And best of all, the Peerless Hotel and Restaurant.
I got a good night-time shot of the San Francisco City Hall a few months back and when the Giants won the World Serious (as my father used to say), it briefly crossed my mind that it might be worth the trip to get a shot of the City Hall bathed in orange light. I did nothing about the impulse and quickly forgot. Last night I went over to San Francisco for Terry’s staff holiday party and as I came out of the BART escalator I found that most beautiful City Hall building was lit up uniquely.
Some memories from my recent trip South to visit my old friends Joyce and John. After the pick up at the airport, a quick run through our growing-up town, Pasadena.
City Hall
The Library
A Church in the downtown area
The house I grew up in
The house Joyce grew up in
The Getty Museum the next day
Not architecture, but my new BFsF, Beau and Savannah Rose
and Joyce sent me a picture of their finished mosaic bird bath in place and sparkling…NICE!
I had a lovely reunion with college roommates this week. Two old friends and I got together after an expanse of many, many years. Kathy, a retired teacher from Atascadero, and Jenny, a retired teacher from Canada, and I met up for some fun. Jenny had been my roommate in the dorms at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, and we both had lived with Kathy in San Luis Obispo the summer after our first year of teaching. We have been friends for more than forty years, but had long spaces during that time when geography and situation kept us from seeing each other. To me it is so astonishing that the years just fall away when I have these reunions and we are right back to where we left off back in the day when we were oh-so-young.
Jenny flew in and spent Sunday night at my house and the next morning we left to rendezvous with Kathy (I use the word rendezvous because she has just returned from Paris. During her trip she kept such a great blog that I felt like I was seeing all the sights with her-and eating the food without the calories!) For thirty years, Kathy has had a house in Arnold that has been a topic of conversation and many stories, but I have never seen. So Jenny and I would join her there for two nights.
Kathy drove up from Atascadero and we met in Murphys for a picnic before she led us up to where her cabin is. This was so appropriate because originally Kathy was known as Murph since her last name was Murphy. Jenny and I may be the last people who still call her that, but we giggled that we were to meet Murph in Murphys.
Murphys was originally a gold mining town and Mark Twain country (there were a few frogs in evidence) and has some great old buildings.
And best of all, a Baggallini store. Mecca, folks…
After unpacking, we took a hike in the Calaveras Big Trees State Park.
A morning meal of my clafouti, (good thing I put the recipe on my blog so I could mobilly access it) we headed out for some lake-hopping and short walks amongst the majestic scenery of the Sierra Nevadas.
Chickeree picnic area (snow still on the ground!):
And Mosquito Lake (they were not too bad, yet…)
Girls, we made the summit, and we are on the wall of comparative ovations:
Time to enjoy the “appies” (as they say in Canada) and plan our next reunion. July, 2011, Sisters, Oregon, quilt show…
Thanks, Murph, for the hospitality and thanks, Jenny, for coming all this way. Beautiful setting, beautiful time! There is nothing quite like the Sierra Nevadas and reunions with friends. History and history.
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