Paris Day 5

Last day in Paris!

We started out with breakfast in bed.


















Then we went out walking in the Marais, the jewish district. We saw lots of members of the tribe, and there were lots of great restaurants.
























Here we are in Chez Something-or-other, where we got a great meal of mediterranean food, in some cramped and smoky quarters.


















I think this is the modern art museum. Very interesting and Super Marioesque, but we didn't have time to go inside.


















We went back to le Bistro du 17eme for dinner, since it was the best place we'd eaten so far. Not so nice the second time though. The waiter we had the first time really made the experience. The one we had the second time was just average. Still, not a bad dinner.



















Plenty of drink...



















Waaaay more than enough escargots! I couldn't even finish them, embarrassingly enough. Just too much oil and snail. I still feel a bit queasy just looking at this picture...


















Sara had a neat appetizer with shrimp in a creamy sauce.

Paris Day 4

Day 4! We went to the Ile de Paris, where we got some french onion soup in a bistro!

























This is Sainte Chapelle, one of the most beautiful cathedrals I've seen in all my travels.
























I just can't believe the place can even stand up, there's so much window and so little stone holding it all up. Very graceful.

























And then we went to Notre Dame.



















Much bigger than Sainte Chapelle! Not quite as graceful, but still amazing.























After cruising the inside, we hit the tower. These steps are really old, and have seen lots of tourists feet!
























About a million stairs later, we're treated to a gargoyle eating a crunchy stone chicken.
























The view was worth all the steps. Windy and cold though!



















Stinky cheese!



















And the Eiffel Tower at last!
























Eiffel Tower with Sara and Jared.
























The view from the top was breathtaking.

Paris Day 3

Here's another bunch of vacation pics!


Day 3, and we're off to the Louvre. Man, that place is a maze! Even with a map we were going around in circles. Here's the Venus de Milo.


















The coolest thing we saw at the Louvre was some kind of protest! I have no idea what they were protesting, since it was in french.



















Then we left the Louvre, with it's big, crazy glass pyramid.


















Then after we walked through the Tuileries toward the Champs Elysees, we caught a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, all lit up. They have it all festooned with bright flashing lights that they flash every hour or so.


















Here we are at the east end of the Champs.



















Taking a break on a bench...




















Then a stop for some coffee in a cute Cafe...



















And a steenky cheese plate!




















And all the way to the west end of the Champs Elysees, and the Arc d' Triomphe at night.

Comments vs. emails

Ok, everyone who doesn't know how to leave comments, listen up! There's a link at the bottom of each post that says "0 comments". Click that link and you can leave a comment! If nobody actually leaves any comments, then it looks like nobody reads the thing. (Ok, ok, I know having 1 or 2 comments isn't much, but it's infinitely more than the pitiful 0.)

Thank you! :-D

Spaaaaaaace Pictuuuuuuures!

Here are some shots from my first moderately successful, non-lunar astrophotography session. These were taken last night with my Casio Exilim EX-Z4U camera mounted on my Orion StarMax 127mm Mak telescope. Images were stacked and processed using MaxIm DL Essentials. Unfortunately, they don't look nearly as good as through the scope itself. Gotta work on my technique.


Here is Saturn at low power (61.6X)


















Saturn at high power (256X)


















And here's the Orion Nebula at low power.

Pluto here we come!

One of the perqs of living in Tampa is that in addition to Yankees spring training games, I can see space launches from Cape Canaveral! I watched the launch of the New Horizons mission to Pluto on NasaTV online, then I ran downstairs with my camera. After a little trouble finding east, then some retarded camera issues, I finally got the picture below, of the dissapating vapor trail. :-D Click on it for the larger version.

Paris Day 2

Here we are on the second day in Paris. We went to see the Arc d'Triomphe, walked the Champs Elysees, and then took in an evening of gayness at the Moulin Rouge.


Ah, breakfast!





















Someone's happy, because we found...
















THE GREATEST OMELETTES IN THE UNIVERSE!





















Then we went in search of the Arc. Looks pretty small there, huh?

















Looks much bigger close up!





















Here's the Champs Elysees from the top.





















And there we encountered the delicious chocolate cookie that I've been dreaming about ever since.





















After a trip back to the hotel to freshen up and dress up, we went to yet another cute bistro for snails and other delights.






















And then on to the Moulin Rouge, which Sara baited me into attending with talk of dancing boobies.





















Actually, the whole topless dancing thing is just a sneaky ruse to allow women to trick their unsuspecting husbands into seeing an evening of bad choreography and overdramatic music. Truth be told, the topless women comprise only about 25% of the show. The rest is dancing men, acrobats, and mimes. All this and a bottle of impudent champagne for $100 per person. Did I mention it was totally gay?

Paris Day 1

We finally made it to Paris! Here's Sara as we sat and ate wine and cheese at the cute little lobby bar at our hotel.





















Here's Sara peeping at the Parisians across the way, having nice family dinners.






















Here's our dinner, at a place called Bistro 17eme, which was just across the square (more like an octagon) from us.





















It was a prix fixe menu, complete with a bottle of wine. I got a little blurry...

















They did warn us that the plates were hot, just before Sara's hand evaporated.





















On the way back we saw the interesting notions Parisians have of what constitutes a good parking spot.