Some Street Art in Paris

Back in March I went to Paris for the weekend with my friend Aimee, these photos were all taken on a bitterly cold Sunday. We started off at the Pomidou Centre, where we had tickets for the Salvador Dali exhibition but as the line up was long and we did not fancy waiting in the cold we opted for lunch instead.

Then we walked to a metro station and got off around the Canal St Martin area, as I had read that it was a nice area to walk in. Maybe it was due to the fact that it was not the best day to walk by a canal, it was not what I thought it would be like, hopefully in warmer days it looks different.

All the street art we saw looked cool and would have liked to see more, maybe another time!

Photo of the Week - Seagull

This hungry fellow was in Edinburgh, my sister and I were walking in Princes Street Gardens on our way to see an exhibition. It may be hard to imagine this from the photo but he was really huge, the seagulls here are just plain old big. Anyway it was pretty amazing to see it close up though!

More to come from the weekend in Edinburgh later on, hope you are all having a good week!

Falkland Village

My last day in Scotland we went to Falkland for a walk and a look around the lovely village. First we did our walk which I will post about later on, then we stopped for some refreshments in a nice coffee shop. I had the sticky toffee pudding with cream, having had a fair share of scones over the last week, it was time to taste something different and it was delicious!

The village was really lovely, but the main attraction of the place is Falkland Palace, as it was late we could only see the outside and some of the gardens. The palace was built by two kings James IV and James V replacing the old castle from before, during 1501 and 1541. It was a favorite retreat of the Stuart Kings and Queens, including Mary Queen of Scots.

I have visited the Palace but a long time ago, afterwards we continued walking around and saw an interesting shop. If you have old violins, fiddles and cellos this is place to go to sell it or buy one, maybe they deal in other instruments too.

On the Rigi

Back in March when we had a lovely sunny and blue skies day I decided to do a day trip with Alessio so we went to the Mt Rigi.

Mt Rigi is in central Switzerland and it sometimes known as "Queen of the Mountains" we got there by way of the mountain cog railway at Arth-Goldau. It has a height of 1,797m and on that day we had really great views all around. You can see around 13 lakes and have views into the Alps, in the distance we saw Lucern and its lake. Right at the summit it was very windy and cold, but we found a sheltered area it was really lovely and warm.

Instead of taking the train all the way back down we decided to walk some of the way. We saw lots of fellow hikers and it certainly was a lovely walk. Eventually Alessio decided he had had enough of walking and wanted to stop for some refreshments, therefore we went to Hotel Klösterli. We were lucky as the next day is was closing for holidays.

As the train station was right there we waited for the next train down, before that we visited the lovely church. I was quite surprised at how decorative it looked.

Instead of going to the Rigi summit there is a cable car that takes you to Rigi- Scheidegg, which is 1,665m. Maybe Alessio and I will do that one too!

Tai O

Tai O is not some form of martial arts but the oldest fishing village on Lantau Island, Hong Kong. After visiting the Big Buddha, we took the bus to Tai O along with lots of other tourist. One of the reasons this small fishing village is a hot spot for tourist is that the houses are built on stilts called Pang uks.  They are all very close together, almost look like they are interconnected, certainly some looked like in need of some major TLC. Back in 2000 there was a fire which destroyed many of the stilted houses and just recently there was another fire about a week ago.

We went on a boat trip around the bay trying to see some Chinese white dolphins (we did not see any), then up and down looking at these amazing houses. Tai O also has the name of Venice of Hong Kong, for people who like eating fish, this paradise.

The specialities in Tai O are salted fish, which you can see hanging in the first photo, then shrimp paste and also salted egg yolks. We walked up and down the small streets looking at all the vendors and their wares, lots of dried fish on offer.

It is definitely worth a visit and combined with the other big attraction the Big Buddha it is a great day out. Lets hope the village houses are rebuilt and the people there can continue their way of life.

Photo of the Week - Zurich Sunset

The week before I headed off to Scotland I was out in Zurich with my friend Natalie, sitting on the promenade enjoying the sun. As the sun started to go down I quickly got my camera and took some shots of the wonderful sunset. Hope you like it too!