I don’t have much info about today, other than it was a great day … and they are exhausted. So I won’t add too much text, and instead I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. I’ll start with a sequence from their visit to the musee d’art moderne, showing a very impressive mural. I’m sure there was much more to see, but this is all I have to show you.
After the museum, (it appears) they spent more time wandering along the seine enjoying the many small parks (jardin) in Paris. I noticed a theme around Canadian explorers.
This next one is for me, but perhaps it’s also meant to reflect the current mood in Canada.
We shall never surrender
Meanwhile, on the home front (because I know you are all dying to hear about that) I was playing in the dirt, ripping up the sod around one of our trees.
Playing in the dirt – not in Paris
Then I top dressed and re-seeded the lawn because … it really needs it. Exciting stuff.
I’m including this next one to show how terrible I am at taking selfies. Better not give up my day job … oh wait … I’m retired.
I need longer arms
And then it was time to dust off one of our (my) favourite recipes from 40 years ago.
Dinner
Tomorrow we resume our regular programming, with more info about Paris and Basel.
This is a travel blog. Generally it deals with my travel. But for the next two weeks I’ll be trying something different.
Jan booked a river cruise on the Rhine, from Basel to Amsterdam, with her aunt. At least that was the plan, before drought resulted in very low water levels on the Rhine. Fortunately they are still going on a cruise, rather than being bussed everywhere, but we aren’t sure about the details. I’m looking forward to seeing how this works.
But I’m getting ahead of myself. First they need to get to Europe, starting with Paris.
And we’re off
Low water on a river cruise is not a good omen. And then I gave them passes for the lounge in Ottawa, but after they checked in and cleared security …
Just pretending to cry … I think
Fortunately they knew that the lounge in Montreal was open, and recently renovated. Unfortunately lots of other people had the same idea.
90 minute queue for the Montreal lounge
The 90-minute wait meant they would have got to the lounge about ten minutes after their plane departed. This calls for extreme measures.
Plan B
Fortunately, the really important things (I’m talking about the plane) worked out, and after a six your flight with perhaps an hour of sleep, they arrived at CDG, cleared customs and headed for the hotel. It was still early, and their room wasn’t available (of course it wasn’t) so they wandered around Paris for a few hours and grabbed a baguette sandwich and cappuccino. Other than being tired, that doesn’t sound bad at all. Things are looking up.
Paris
They also enjoyed some of the many small parks in Paris.
More Paris
Doesn’t appear to be too crowded at all. Another good sign.
Sharon in Paris
The hotel was ready before the official 2:00 pm check in time and they decided that a little quiet time would be a good idea, no matter what the conventional wisdom says. After their rest, they did a little more touring as they headed over to the Vedettes de Pont Neuf for a late afternoon cruise on the Seine.
Notre Dame
It’s nice to see a city that encourages bio diversity.
And then it was time for the cruise, with a little bubbly to help with the jet lag.
Santevia
Then it was a leisurely stroll back to the hotel, stopping for dinner along the way (salade chèvre chaud for Jan and soupe au l’onion for Sharon). Now they are hoping for a good night’s sleep so they will be ready for their 11:00 am tickets to the musee d’art moderne tomorrow. Stay tuned.
We were pleased to be invited to visit Wendy and Stu’s cottage this weekend. We arrived late Friday afternoon, and after getting settled, we headed down to the dock for the “hour of happiness”.
The hour-of-happiness on the dock
It had been cloudy earlier in the day, but as we enjoyed our beverages, things started to clear. As we relaxed on the dock, we were treated to stunning sunset views.
We spotted all kinds of interesting cloud shapes – everything from a giant axe, to a fire breathing dragon, and finally a flying goose.
Flying goose
The lake is on the Canadian Shield, so the landscape is rugged with regular outcroppings of granite.
Granite
Every year, Wendy uses one of the old tree stumps as a flower pot.
Organic flower pot
It has been a wet year, so there were a number of very interesting mushrooms in the woods.
MushroomsMore mushrooms
Here is the cottage.
The cottage
There is also a screened-in gazebo with a gas fireplace.
The gazebo
The end of the dock shows the directions, for those who can’t figure out directions from looking at the sun.
For the directionally-impaired
On Saturday, we headed into Bancroft, which is the nearest town. It has a local microbrewery, with very tasty ales.
Bancroft Brewery – flight of local beers
And here is the obligatory group photo.
Group photo
We’re getting close to travel season, so before too long I’ll be posting more often.
We’re trying to include some local-ish trips in our travels. You know, change things up a bit! This year I started following the Munk Debates, and we decided to attend this year’s spring debate in Toronto in person. We made it into a mini vacation and took the train rather than drive. No high-speed trains here (yet … fingers crossed) but we still enjoy traveling by train whenever we can. We certainly aren’t about to subject ourselves to downtown Toronto traffic if we can possibly avoid it.
Via Rail to Toronto
The debate was interesting, and well worth the trip. The essence of the question was, should America continue trying to act as the world’s policeman, or would the world (and the U.S.) be better off if it would mind it’s own business and stop throwing it’s weight around. I’m paraphrasing here, but you probably get the idea. Both sides of the debate made legitimate and interesting points. But occasionally, both sides were completely clueless. Neither side seemed to realize the world has moved on, and returning to the old status quo isn’t one of the options on the table. But what do I know? These are the experts…
But that isn’t what this blog is about. It’s a travel blog, and this was a chance for us to get away for a few days. Spring is further along in Toronto than it is in Ottawa, and the trees are coming into bloom.
Tree in bloom
We stayed in Toronto for two nights. We had a lovely visit with Anne and Sharon, but with two days in the city, we still had time to kill. The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) had an exhibit of photographs by Paul McCartney that Jan was interested in seeing. These were taken in 1963-64, just as The Beatles were rising to fame, so they provide a fascinating snapshot in time. Apparently he misplaced the negatives for decades, and only recently rediscovered them. They are well worth a look if you have the chance.
Our hotel was a half hour walk from the AGO so we headed over. There was an interesting sculpture outside the gallery called the Couch Monster, apparently inspired by the story of Dumbo the Elephant. Several couches were “sacrificed” to create the early mock-ups of the sculpture. I quite like it.
Art Gallery of OntarioCouch Monster
The price for a season pass was only a few dollars more than the price of a single ticket, so we opted for the pass. That meant we could have multiple visits, so before catching our train home today, we went back for a second visit. These caught my eye.
From the Art Gallery of Ontario
Across the street from the AGO I spotted this unusual building.
Mersivity
I was curious. Of course I was curious. Turns out it is a UofT student led initiative exploring eXtended Reality (XR) called … wait for it … Mersivity. Cool idea … I think. Certainly a cool piece of art. If you are a mathematician, that is.
On our way to catch the train I had to stop for this iconic Toronto image. Looks a lot like Auckland … or Seattle … or Las Vegas, now that I think of it. But this one is Toronto.
Typically, I only post when we’re traveling. This is a travel blog. But sometimes I make an exception. I looked out our back door tonight as the sun was setting and saw this.
Home
Twenty minutes earlier it looked rather blah. Twenty minutes later it was dark. Timing is everything.
This is just the beginning of the prime season here. I’m looking forward to enjoying the summer.
I’m writing this from the Auckland airport, waiting for our flight back to Canada. Our trip to New Zealand has come to an end. We had an amazing time and are sad to be leaving. We love home, but we’re still going to miss New Zealand. Enough said.
While we were touring New Zealand, Jan came across a lovely pāua shell ring. She has been looking for something like this for some time, so she immediately bought it.
Pāua shell ring
I loved it too, so I bought one of my own, and then we had a thought. We’ve toyed with renewing our vows for a while now, so we figured “what better time”. We put on our new rings, and headed for the nearest beach.
Vows on the beach
And there, on a New Zealand beach, with no one around but the two of us, we renewed our vows. We promised to return to New Zealand every winter, so long as we both shall live (or at least as long as we can both afford it).
I’ve already posted for today, so I wasn’t planning anything more. But then we went to dinner and … one of the pizzas was called the Zola. We immediately thought of someone (you know who you are) and had to give it a go. It was delicious.
Zola pizza
We ate early tonight so the sun was still setting when we got back to the hotel. Our room faces east, but the sun was still illuminating the city.
We had planned to visit the Auckland Art Gallery today, but then we realized we were going to spend all of tomorrow inside – airports first, and then the plane. It might be a better idea to get some fresh air today. So that’s what we did. Nothing exciting – just walking around the city in shortsleeved shirts. It was lovely.
Sunrise from our balcony
Oh yeah, we also packed our bags. After six weeks of travel, and several new items of merino wool clothing, it took a while to pack. But we’re all done now and having a quiet drink before walking over to dinner. We ate outside last night. It was “cold” enough that they lit the heaters. We were plenty warm. And the food was great too.
Dinner last night
We’re all checked in for our flight tomorrow and ready to go. Our incoming plane is on the ground in Vancouver, getting ready to depart for Auckland in two and a half hours. Then it will take us back to the cold and snow.
We had a great time in New Zealand. We’ve been told more than once that there are a lot of Canadians visiting here this year. Why could that possibly be???
The full name of this museum is the Auckland War Memorial Museum. It’s a misleading name. One floor of the museum is named War and Remembrance, but the other two floors cover a wide variety of topics related to Auckland. Local history, Maori culture and farming practices, geology, and natural history. It even has a section dealing with volcanoes, given that Auckland sits on an active volcanic zone. The display notes that it isn’t a question of “if” a volcano will erupt in Auckland, but rather a question of “when”. Comforting thought. The museum is well worth a visit.
Auckland Museum, seen from our hotel
We had two goals for the day. Visit the museum, but also enjoy a walk through a park. If you look at this picture, it’s clear that most of the area between our hotel and the museum is trees. So walking to the museum satisfied both of our objectives. This shows the path through the large park surrounding the museum.
The walk to the museum
I’ll close with a bit of street art near our hotel. I think it provides good advice for the times we are living through.
If It Was Today... 