NYC + Trip End

On Saturday September 3rd our time in America came to a close.  But not before we crammed a quick visit to NYC!  

Goodbye Ohio

The return to regular life has totally shunted this little project to the bottom of an incredibly long to-do list but I'm not finished yet!  

Grosse-Ile, Michigan

Our main reason for visiting Detroit was to spend time with our good friend Will.  Graham and Will met each other in 2006-7 when they were both studying at Edinburgh Uni.  In December 2007 Will was in our wedding and we have not managed to see each other since then.  

12 Surprises in the USA

In my first post on this blog I made a few promises about what readers could expect to find.  One of them was gross generalisations.  I am nothing if not one who tries to follow through on a promise so without further ado, here are some of my thoughts on spending a month in the USA.

Georgetown + Mount Vernon + Alexandria

So this post is a throwback from our time in DC.  As you saw the DC Digs post and the Monuments post, DC is a very impressive city full of grand buildings and impressive structures.  We loved those but we also enjoyed visiting a few places that were quite different from those but in retrospect very similar to each other.  

Home!

Hello everyone!


We have finally completed our epic summer trips, arriving home to lovely Edinburgh yesterday morning after two uneventful flights (and a few hours in NYC!).  


We are now reveling in the feeling of being in our own house and enjoying the wonderful company of our friends Chris and Skye Walks who are visiting for a few days.  


I still have a few posts to write about our time in America and then I'll need to decide what becomes of this blog after that!  


For now, I'll leave you with this pic of one of our favourite Ohio memories.  
Sun + ice cream = awesome.

Take me out to the...

Ball game!  

A visit from Jason!

The day after we arrived in Hudson, we went back to the airport to pick up our friend Jason!  We were both so excited to see Jason and to explore the area with him.  G and Jason are both city lovers so they spent a lot of time (and I mean a lot) debating about different aspects of the cities we visited and taking waaaaay too many photos of buildings they liked.  Hilarious.

Cars Cars Cars at the Dream Cruise (part 2)

Here is part 2 (see part 1 here) of our pics of the Woodward Dream Cruise.  No commentary this time, just pics for the car lovers amongst you!

Experiencing the heart of Detroit at the Woodward Dream Cruise (part 1)

On Saturday August 20th Woodward Street, Detroit hosted their annual Dream Cruise and we went!  It is hard to describe this event but basically picture a classic car parade going down a very long 4-8 lane street, except that it is not only the fancy cars that drive down the street but also the spectators.  The rule is that the fancy cars drive on the outer lanes (so that the people lining the street have a clear view) and the not-fancy cars go on the inside lanes.  Most importantly this thing is huge.  So so many crazy cars.  SO many!  

Drive-in x2

On our first day in Ohio we did a bit of driving around the area to take stock of where we were. Along the way we passed this:

Passport Dramas

Since we arrived in the US Graham's passport has been through two crazy situations. 

Our Ohio Abode

Hello everyone,

We're having such a great time that I've fallen woefully behind in the blog posting and so I'm going to abandon my policy of posting things in the order that they happened in order to catch you all up on what we're up to right now!  

So first, a tour of our little abode in Hudson Ohio!

The Monuments

We loved the Monuments, we spent a whole stifling hot evening treking around to each one, we were all amazed at their size and at the scale of the mall (where they are all situated).  

Eastern Market

One morning Graham, Steph and my mum went in search of breakfast at the Eastern Market.  The market is in a cool neighbourhood with lots of colourful houses.

DC Digs + The Capitol

The best thing about our trip to DC was the fact that we got to enjoy it with my family! My mum arranged the flights so that we all landed within 15 minutes of each other and met up in the airport.  Not having seen each other for 11 months (the longest yet) we were all excited to see each other and somehow despite the time apart and funny location it immediately felt completely normal to be together again and we resumed our usual mocking of each other before the cab had even reached the hotel.  I love my family!

A Conference in the Capital

The reason for our trip to DC was because the annual American Psychological Association Convention was being held there from August 4-7.  The APA conference is the biggest psychology conference in the world and one that I had been planning to attend at least once during my PhD.  

A weekend in Edinburgh

Home!  On Saturday July 30th we bid our Parisian studio goodbye and took the train from Paris to London (LOVE that train) where we then changed to the Edinburgh train. Edinburgh greeted us with lovely sun which lit up all the buildings and made everything look magical.  Both of us were grinning at the welcome sight of our neighbourhood and the excitement of being home!!  

Ohio Bound!

This afternoon we will be saying goodbye to my lovely family :(  and taking the train to Baltimore for our flight to Cleveland!  We have loved DC but we're excited to start the most unknown part of our trip: living in small town America!

Random stuff in Paris

This post covers a few of the random things we saw and enjoyed while in Paris.  

Modern architecture in Paris

This is a post about our visit to the highrise district of Paris (La Defense), there will be no photos of quaint stone buildings, no accordian players, barrett wearing cigarette smoking or wine drinking.  Instead, there are wonderful examples of modern architecture and impressive structures.  

To Washington!

Hello again,

After a frantic few days in Edinburgh (the most frantic part being me, trying to finish my conference paper) we have unpacked and repacked and cleaned up after ourselves just in time to rush out the door for our flight to Washington DC! 

Afternoon in Giverny: Impressionist Photography?

On Tuesday afternoon we hopped on a train to Normandy to explore the towns of Giverny and Vernon, visit Monet's house and gardens and the Impressionist museum there.  This trip had been recommended to us by our friends Amanda and Joe and my love of impressionism and recent amazement at the waterlilies in the Musée d'Orangerie put this excursion near the top of my list of things to do while in France.


We took the 12:20pm train from Saint-Lazare and 45 minutes later we arrived in Vernon, rented bicycles at the local pub and set off on a beautiful 4km bicycle path to Giverny. The weather was cloudy but warm, basically perfect for cycling.


Although I was very interested in seeing the real-life Monet gardens, I was also slightly apprehensive because I was pretty sure that they would be a let down compared to the paintings I have seen.  I was also quite sure that any photos I took of the gardens would be nowhere near as nice as Monet's paintings.  So, I decided that I would instead experiment with taking some impressionist style photos of the gardens.  This is a quite a departure from my usual preference of perfectly focused photos, but I love setting myself little tasks with photography so I was excited to try it out.  I've included some in-focus shots as well for those interested in seeing the comparison.


Here is the main garden from the upstairs window of Monet's house.

The house itself is fabulous, all the walls and mouldings are painted in bright colours, my favourite is the dining room.  I would take this over Pottery Barn beige anyday!

photo from here

This is my favourite flower, the dahlia, they were everywhere in the gardens (and in Paris!), one day I hope to have a garden full of them.

A view of the house from the garden. 

A lovely shot Graham took of a bee on a flower.

Here are some impressionist attempts

The ponds which inspired Monet's waterlilies are in a separate part of the property.

The next photos are of the famous waterlilie pond itself with the japonese bridge in the background (now quite overgrown with vines).

We also loved the apple trees in the garden, which have been pruned into low hedges.  

After seeing the gardens we hopped back onto our bicycles and headed to the museum.  The village of Giverny is incredibly picturesque.

My favourite cycling buddy.

At the museum there was a special exhibit of 70 paintings from the Clark Collection (based in Williamstown, USA).  Many Renoirs to look at and we loved learning about the Clark family and their amazing art collecting.  

On the way back we ventured off the main cycle path to this little track.  It was lovely.

Every time I am on the continent I happen on little scenes like this and can't believe that people actually live like this.  They probably think nothing of sitting in this incredible garden at their completely perfect red and white polka dot table.  That makes me so happy.

We then cycled around Vernon a bit and came across this funny little suspended house on the banks of the Seine.

The Vernon town centre is beautiful.  Large parts of it were destroyed in WWII but what remains is still lovely.  There was a little farmers market set up just beyond this street where we picked up a huge jar of local honey.  Yummy.

The town square and beautiful medieval church.  Nearly all the stained glass windows inside are modern because the 15th century originals were destroyed during the war.  

Thanks so much for the tip Amanda and Joe!!

p.s.   For anyone interested in photography stuff, in order to get the impressionist feel I tried to fill the frame with my subjects (like Monet did!).  To make my photos so blurry I adjusted my F-stop to the lowest number (=widest aperture) for a shallow depth of field and used manual focussing to further blurr the pictures.  I also boosted the contrast a bit in iPhoto.  If I try this again I will underexpose the photos a stop or two in order to get the darker shadows that I achieved by altering them in iPhoto.  I don't usually process my photos but it seemed to help with achieving the effect this time.  Any and all constructive criticism welcome!  

Au revoir Paris, hello Edinburgh!

Today we leave our little Parisian life by train and to return to Edinburgh via London.

We have loved our time here but we're also looking forward to a wonderful weekend catching up with friends before we re-pack for our American adventure!

Ode to a Beautiful Yoghurt

This my friends is the most beautiful pot of yoghurt I have ever bought at a grocery store.  

Or anywhere else for that matter.  

So beautiful and so delicious that I actually stopped throughout to take pictures of it so I never forget my most perfect yoghurt experience.  

And now in the crazy world of public oversharing that is a blog, I can share this experience with you all!

We should all eat yoghurt like the French.

Watching the final stage of the Tour de France

On Sunday afternoon we set up camp in the Jardin des Tuilleries to experience the final stage of the world renowned Tour de France.  It was the perfect Sunday being equal parts relaxing and exciting.


When we had first planned our month in Paris I had mistakenly thought we would miss the Tour de France.  
However, a couple of very excited facebook messages early last week from our favourite Dakiniewichs Shannon and Troy confirmed that it was in fact on Sunday the 24th and begged us to go on their behalf.  


We were of course happy to take up the challenge and went online to try to figure out the logistics of watching the final laps in Paris.  Unfortunately the english info was sorely lacking.  So, in an effort to somewhat rectify that I'm going to include lots of practical details in this post.  If you'd rather look at pictures feel free to skip the next few paragraphs.


Where to watch & when to get there:


The Tour de France always ends in Paris with the finish at the Arc de Triomphe.  Every year the cyclists start in the outskirts of the city (different parts each year) and then make their way into the centre ending with an 8 lap circuit up and down the Champs d'Elysées and around the Tuilleries Gardens (where the Louvre is).  The cyclists don't actually get into the centre until at least 3:30pm (after 4pm in our case).  


The epicentre of the event is the Champs d'Elysées, crowds are tight and they have screens showing the cyclists as well loudspeakers with commentary.  This is the most exciting place to view the race because the cyclists go up and down the Champs which means that you get to watch them pass 16 times.  However, the catch is that you have to put the time in and be prepared to get there by at least noon in order to get a good spot.  This is especially important if you are short because it is very difficult to see over the crowds.  


Not being diehard cycling fans we decided to take the more relaxed option and view the race from the Tuilleries.  We still showed up pretty early (12:30pm) and this allowed us to bag a primo spot next to the Musée d'Orangerie on the Seine side of the gardens where we could look down at the cyclists as they passed on the street below.  Another huge bonus to the Tuilleries option was that we could sit on the park chairs while we waited.  


After setting ourselves up with the sweet park chairs, a baguette and some cheese for lunch we spent the entire afternoon relaxing in the sun and waiting for the cyclists to arrive.  

Sweet spot

The first group to arrive was a fleet of red trucks, they honked their horns and we cheered them on.  I'm guessing they were on the road with the cyclists the whole time so they must have been pumped to be coming into Paris as well!

As the cyclists neared Paris, the sidewalk opposite started to fill up with spectators.

The first six people (left to right) in this shot are fellow french course friends.  This is also a good shot of our sweet reclining park chairs.  I would totally take one home if it that wasn't stealing.

Lots of official cars came through.

Then some cars with bikes on top, that's when we started to get excited.

Here they come!!

   

SO fast.  Graham had trouble keeping them in focus!

We dutifully screamed "Allez allez!" with loads of French people who materialised to cheer minutes before the cyclists came through.

Then came the team cars with all the bikes on top.  So many many bikes (they are hard to see in these shots but each car must have had at least 10 bikes on top).  They drove like maniacs too, so close to each other and then one would just lay on his horn and start zooming past all the others to get to the front (perhaps to assist a cyclist?).  It was fun/a bit scary to watch.

 At this point Jason decided to take a nap.  Not during the four hours while we were waiting for the cyclists but once they arrived. Some of the other guys tied his shoelaces together as punishment.

Here they are again (remember the 8 laps part), also note the yellow motorcyclist guys holding up a sign, it said 33 then a the next time 32, we could figure out what that meant.  Any thoughts Troy? 

Here's an extra big pic of that.  Would love to know what it means! (update: my friend Chris has kindly clarified that these signs indicate to the distance, in seconds between the breakaway pack and the rest of the riders, thanks Chris!).

And here they are again!  I'm guessing that you get the picture by now, it was so great because they go so fast that if they had only passed once it would have been a let down.  But this way we got to notice new things each time they went by.  Plus, screaming "Allez" is always fun.

A plethora of pics are for our Dakiniewich peeps.

Loved it, totally recommend it, bet it would be even more fun (although less comfortable) watching on the Champs d'Elysées!