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Bridges.6

Oops, somehow I skipped this lovely new series when I ran through the “6” set, so now I need to catch up. Since we’ve shown you bridges in Paris and Berlin so far in this series, I’m home to Amsterdam for this first catch-up post, a lovely pedestrian bridge (bikes also, but the paths to the left side there aren’t paved and do wind a fair bit through a surprisingly wild patch of parkland) the park across the street from me.

Village Views.97

Last shots from my early-July stay in Heusden for a work week, with one shot from a bike ride I did across the Maas in Geldersland, the church from the town I believe was Spijk below right.
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Signs of the City.107

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Coasting.117

Urban Garden.217

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Small Wonders.257

City Views.247

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Urban Entrances.147

Ah, Royalty.47

Yes, Mary Stuart aka Queen of Scots was also Queen of France for a while too. The sign at the bottom notes that these are a series of sculpture of famous queens and other women of power and influence through the ages. Taken in the Jardins de Luxembourg, adjacent to the Palais de Luxembourg where France’s Senate now convenes, but which Louis XIII seems to have built for his Mom, Marie de Medici (another woman of power), after her husband passed and left her queen mum instead of queen :-), as it were.

Lake Living.57

The blessing and curse of train travel through Switzerland is that you see so many beautiful things out your train windows, and you think to yourself “I’m sure I’ll remember which of the lakes and goregeous lakeside towns that our train passed through en route from Locarno to Zurich this one was.” And it turns out you’re wrong, because I’m not sure if these were taken along the eastern shores of Lake Lucerne, or the Zugersee. I’ll need to get back there some time to identify it properly :-).

Mountains.67

More from the first morning’s exploration of the slopes between the town of Zermatt and the Matterhorn. Only the bottom image here shows the Matterhorn itself b/c the other four photos were looking north, back down-valley, as I climbed up towards the hanging bridge over the creek that created the valley.

From the Air.67

This is Uetliberg, 870 meters (2500 feet) or so above Zurich. Spent the last night of my Switzerland say, and then this last day (before the overnight train back to Amsterdam), exploring the city with a local friend who was also my host. We hoped the clouds- mist – would clear so that from the viewing tower, we’d see Zurich. But as this gallery demonstrates, from the viewing platform a long climb above the top of the mountain proper, the mountain itself and everything below it was still shrouded in clouds and mist. But the alps rose above the clouds :-). In the bottom photo, you see just a bit of a tree ghosting into the bottom left corner, while the southern alps rise above the clouds in the distance. It was an interesting and somewhat surreal experience.

City Lights.77

Schaffhausen, back in northern Switzerland, at dusk. Zermatt, a stream whose mountainsides featured in that last post, is the southernmost German-speaking town in Italy; Schaffhausen is pretty much the northernmost canton in Switzerland…and is both German-speaking and largely surrounded by Germany. And also hosts Switzerland’s other exclave (remember the Italian Campione?), a German town just upstream from Schaffhausen which has no direct connection to the rest of Germany. No, I didn’t have time to make it there: was too busy enjoying the mulled wine and hillsides, plus Schaffhausen’s most famous feature, which we’ll show you in the next post :-).

Islands.77