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Signs of the City.111
Bridges.11
The Source.1
Windows.1
Small Wonders.260
Ah, Royalty.50
More than just that statue of Louis XIII makes my favorite mini-park in the heart of Paris royal. As you can read if you enlarge the left-hand photo above, this site once housed one of the loveliest residences of France’s kings. Until, that is, Catherine de Medici tore it down in 1583 to install a horse market. Then Henry IV decided on a royal square – these days more likely known as a real estate development scheme – of which three sides would be sold to the highest bidders of, no doubt, the ‘right’ background. The fourth side, natch, was reserved for royalty. It was renamed Place des Vosges in 1800 – when royalty was still out of vogue, before Napoleon ended France’s first republic by deciding he was an emperor – because, wait for it, they were the first department to pay their taxes! 🙂
Lake Living.60
These are all from my first evening ‘living’ if only briefly in the village of Bissone on the southeastern shore of Lake Lugano. Curious about the Italian exclave, and noting that it was a short walk past the nearest grocery store where I’d be buying my dinner fixins and breakfast supplies, I walked on up the narrow road without decent sidewalk and caught these views, some of Campione d’Italia and others looking more south. In the gallery below is another image similar to the one above, which I’m sharing b/c it lets you better see the causeway that made overland travel possible between Melide and Bissone, early in the last century. John (and possibly others equally curious), you’ll be interested in the Wikipedia article on Campione and how it came to exist, and this arch, and the the boundary marker I showed in my last post from Campione.
Mountains.70
All these shots come from the viewing platform at the top of the building into which the gondolas arrive, and from which skiers ski down year ’round, because indeed up here there’s year-round skiing, though when I was there only as far as the middle station. In the right-hand shot with me just above, I’m pointing at a mountain I sort of thought might be Mont Blanc because of how big it is both in height and mass. I couldn’t get anyone to solidly confirm or deny my idea. And yes, that pyramidal mountain on my other side is the Matterhorn seen from the southeast and not too far below its peak. On the left, notice the sign showing which mountains are which. As I recollect, the similar sign on the other side was weather-worn enough that one could not definitively confirm or deny my hypothesis.
From the Air.70
(so much world, so little time....) 