well that was a trip. back home reflecting on all, i realised there may be some changes a-coming. i really loved being in europe and visiting different cities and all. the food, the culture, art, lifestyle...all really appeal to me. not to mention i spent six weeks doing all these things with a wonderful woman. so upon returning i felt a bit depressed...and lonely. as much as i love ny, it is my home town, i'm not feeling it. you know, they say home is where the heart is, and my heart got stuck in freiburg. here in ny, i don't know how i fit in right now. it's great my family is here, and it was great to see my dad and aidan and his family, and of course savannah. but i really don't want to be here right now. and i have the oppurtunity not to, so i think i'll spend the fall back in germany.
my trip through france, germany, italy and switzerland was one of those life changing experiances. i want to write a bit more about some of the places that i couldn't while on the road...i'll do it in bits as the inspiration strikes me. right now i'm inspired by france..
paris was wonderful, and i need to spend more time there to see all the museums and art. seeing the physical city was very exciting and beautiful. we got to sample a good dose of parisian lifestyle, and staying in montmarte was a good place to do that. very funky neighborhood. unfortunately, very expensive...but i hope to go back and see more someday.
travelling south, from beaune to italy was so beautiful. each region had it's own distinct vibe. beaune and burgundy was amazing. the town of beaune itself was very charming...old and beautiful. but the surrounding areas of vinyards was really great. grapes as far as the eye could see. beautiful sloping hills, ancient walls and towns, great churches and cemetaries. and the light there was very special, especially in the late afternoon. in general, i found the light throughout europe so beautiful, and it opened my photographers eye again. i will never forget having a picnic dinner of local foods, on the slopes of pommard, overlooking the valley as dusk approached...sitting at a picnic table next to four local, older women doing the same thing. the decending sunlight on the grape vines is burned in my memory. and to be in a place that for centuries was and is the center of the the greatest wines in the world! very special indeed.
our next stop was in remoulins. we were going to go to avignon, but couldn't get a decent hotel rate...and i'm glad we ended up where we did. remoulins in a few miles west of avignon, and at the junction of the rhine river valley, provence and the languedoc region, another great wine region. a small old town, not spectacularly beautiful, but more rustic and rural. it was great to see the pont du gard aqueduct, and to ride thoruogh old orchards in the hills. the gardon river and gorges were also very pretty, and history permeated everything we saw. they are still living there and doing the same things that were done for hundres of years...farming, vinyards, etc. and we got to see le sanglier, the wild boar! another beautiful evening was spent eating is abandoned apple orchards above the city as the sun went down. the photos from there have not been posted yet, i will get them on this week. you'll see what i'm talking about. there are photos posted of the town, and the pont du gard...take a look. we used remoulins as our base for some travelling through provence also. remoulins is one of our favorite memories of the trip.
provence is gorgeous. rolling hills, towns built upon the hills overlooking the fields of sunflowers, lavender, grazing sheep and cows and goats, and vegetables. we missed the lavender by a week or so, the harvest in in mid july..but we found a few wild fields here and there. we picked wild herbs on the roadside...thyme, rosemary, anis all over the place. check out the views from gordes, a town built high in a hills overlooking the lavender fields. we almost drove right by the town, as it was on a spur from the road we were on, but as we topped a hill and started to descend, we saw the village above us and decided to backtrack...good move. we only saw a small portion of the provence region, but it was so beautiful. i could spend a summer there, no problem. look at the photos and you'll see what i mean.
we headed next to the riviera, cannes and the mountainous region called le verdon, north of cannes. i'll pick up on that later...done for now.
btw, i'm going to continue posting some photos, both of europe (i have a lot of 35mm pix not yet posted, and i really love the look of film vs. digital), and of new york city...i'm going to use my tourist eye here and see what happens.
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