Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Good stuff from Paris...where to start!

This will take several posts I think.....

I would also like to point out that I take many more photos when I am by myself than I would ever take when I am with someone else, the desire to show them!

I'm guessing the easiest way to do this would be chronologically, no?

Which leads me to some random photos of cool stuff, and then Monet's garden (and about 75 photos of flowers...I will try and contain myself here!)  Let it just be said, it is worth the visit.

There's still going to be a lot of photos here, and a video no less!

A random door knocker, you'd think I'd be immune to this kind of stuff by now, what with living here, but no....it's still a totally impressive door knocker.


I do think that the number of photos that one can take of the Eiffel Tower does approach infinite.

Here it is ***S*p*A*r*K*L*i*N*g***


This is one of the metro stations, I think it is Gare Saint Lazare, though I could be wrong...very Catalan looking vaulting, and colours, I am wondering if Guastavino had a look in on this!


When you go to visit Monet's gardens, if you take the train, you get off in this town, Vernon.  It is a lovely little town, at least the center is, and you can rent a bike to ride the 7K to the gardens.  Well worth it, even in the rain.

On the ride out of town, there is a bike path that takes you along the one way road out of town, which I (fortunately) didn't see, so I ended up riding through the central square...and it was lovely!


Now you can see the official path.  It was pretty empty, as it was raining pretty steadily, and everyone else opted for the shuttle bus.


Can you see I'm getting wet?


My faithful (though rather uncomfortable) steed.  The seat was too low and pointed weirdly up at the front so I kept sliiiiiiding off the back.....


And here we are in the gardens.  Linnea for a day.

They are, as you might imagine, lovely.




A side view of his house, I had always imagined something rather more square, but it is a long narrow house the long side running along the road.....



THE lily pond, with THE Japonese bridge at the end of it.




Even on a grey day, you can see where he got his ideas from....like photographing an idea.

Imagine landscaping on a tree scale, amazing, no?





The rowing boat(s), they had two....


The frogs were beyond happy.  I even took a little video which you can watch and listen to here



back at the house



there were chickens!  Damp chickens who were kind of unexcited about being so damp....



Then I went for a walk as I had time to spare before my return train, and I found a lovely trail that lead up onto the ridge above the valley and his house.  There was this horse along the way.


His house is the long pink one kinda in the middle.


A pretty path, no?


This was at the top and I would bet money this is where he painted some of those pictures of women lounging in the long grass or walking through long grass with an umbrella and the wind...it was a lovely place.


On the way back down this fellow came over to investigate me, though he was quite shy and started away from my offering of grass.  By now the few bits of me that had still been dry, like my feet, weren't.


In the train, trying to steam a little drier and glad the rain is on the outside of the glass

A barge working its way downstream


And the tower again, in the rain this time.


More to come!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very nice :). The subway station definitely looks like Saint Lazare. And I also have a friend who is from Vernon... Growing up there, he doesn't find it as lovely as you did ;)

oreneta said...

I thought it was....Saint Lazare, lovely architecture there....and Vernon, it looked like large stretches of it are not particularly nice, though that square right in the middle was fine.....