AESOP WROTE;
ADVENTURE IS WORTH WHILE.
SALUT, SKÖL, CHEERS.
EVERY PHOTO IS MY OWN AND HAS A STORY OR DESCRIPTION, UNLESS I DO NOT REMEMBER THE STORY BEHIND A PHOTO. HEY, IT HAPPENS.
OUR LIFE IS WORSHIP.
WHEN WE WORK
WE WORK AS A DUTY.
WE WORK AS A WORSHIP.
IN WORKING, WE DIVERSIFY OUR WORSHIP.
IN TRAVEL.
IN STUDIES.
IN HEALING.
WE WORSHIP.
YES, THE PAYCHECK IS THERE.
BUT IT IS NOT THE MOST IMPORTANT.
THE PAYCHECK IS A GOOD CONSEQUENCE.
TO BE USED FOR FURTHER WORSHIP.
THE RESULT IS IN THE WORK ITSELF.
WE ARE NOT IDLE WHEN WE WORK.
WE FURTHER OUR WORSHIP WHEN WE WORK.
WE FURTHER OUR WORSHIP WHEN WE TRAVEL.
WE FURTHER OUR WORSHIP WHEN WE STUDY.
The Seafarers' monument located on the langelinie promenade area, Copenhagen, Denmark. The Little mermaid sculpture is in the same area.
WE FURTHER OUR WORSHIP WHEN WE BREATH.
TRUE ART IS WORSHIP.
MY TRAVEL IS MY ART.
THEREFORE I MUST STATE:
MY TRAVEL IS MY WORSHIP.
SO IF I DESCRIBE HERE MY TRAVELS.
I AM ALSO DESCRIBING HERE MY ART.
I AM DESCRIBING MY WORSHIP.
A GUIDE BOOK OF LIFE, MY VERSION OF THE SEARCH FOR THE HOLY GRAIL.
PAULO COELHO SAID:
"TRAVEL IS NEVER A MATTER OF MONEY BUT OF COURAGE.
ROAD TRIPS IN NEW MEXICO.
Historic Plaza Hotel in Las Vegas NM has a nice ramp that we used to bring the luggage cart down to our car. The hotel also has a loading zone in front of the entrance doors so it was very easy to load up our car. At the bottom of the ramp, I noticed the 2 hardly used buildings at the right of the hotel so I photographed them.
What did we do for Father's Day 2020? We travelled through Santa Fe, Los Alamos, Valles Caldera Park, and Jemez Springs.
VALLES CALDERA IS IN THE JEMEZ MOUNTAINS, NORTH CENTRAL NEW MEXICO. THE CALDERA IS ABOUT 13 MILES IN CIRCUMFERENCE.
THIS PHOTO AT VALLES CALDERA IS AT VALLES CALDERA NATIONAL PRESERVE.
My favorite hotel in Santa Fe is called Inn On The Alameda. This is the walkway from the office lobby to our room. We can easily walk the 3 blocks from this hotel to Santa Fe Old Town Plaza.
Another view in La Plazuela Restaurant at La Fonda Hotel, Old Town Santa Fe. @lafondasantafe
Family picnic in the Jemez Mountains half way between Valles Caldera and Jemez Springs.
AROUND TAOS NM
At the southeast corner of Taos Old Town Plaza is a mini plaza or a southeast courtyard of Taos Old Town Plaza where I found two interesting sculptures. This is the first sculpture I took a photo of
The first photo of sculptures in Taos Old Town Plaza.
AT HOME IN ALBUQUERQUE NEW MEXICO.
The moon shining above the trees seen from the west side of Roosevelt Park looking towards the east. This is near the Silver Hill neighborhood of Albuquerque. Roosevelt Park was created around 1935 as a result of Franklin D. Roosevelts' New Deal program. It is a historical landmark with about 2,000 trees and bushes.
The moon visible between the two towers of the Hyatt Hotel in Downtown Albuquerque at Third street and Tijeras Street. This photo was taken on the other side of 4th street which is west of the towers. These are 2 of the tallest towers in Albuquerque. This is easily accomplished because there are only about 12 skyscrapers in Albuquerque and most new buildings are only 7-8 stories tall, at the highest.
A COUPLE OF DAYS SPENT IN CREEDE, COLORADO AREA.
I am not posting photos of my wife on a horse only because she is so cute on a horse but also because the mountains of Colorado are very beautiful. Colorado has more 14,000 feet high mountains than any other state in continental USA.
Here we continue on our horse riding tour outfitted by Cottonwood Cove Resort southeast of Creede Colorado..
This photo was taken by our guide who offered to take a photo of Farida and myself together. Of course, we accepted his offer.
I know that I took a lot of photos at the Cheyenne Mountain Resort but it is really beautiful there so I have a good excuse 🙂
VISITING MY HOMETOWN AS A TOURIST FOR THE FIRST TIME
The year: 2019.
A sculpture that stands in the downtown area of Colorado Springs CO. He lived there but he is best known for his years living in Cripple Creek Colorado. He discovered a gold vein called the Independent Lode and this made him the first millionaire in Cripple Creek. He was a generous philanthropist which is probably why he deserves to be immortalized here. He was born in Jeffersonville Indiana 1848 and died in Colorado Springs CO 1902. In 1872 he was making $3.00 an hour as a carpenter. He helped to build the McAllister House and the Helen Hunt Jackson House. In 1891 he filed a claim for the Independence Lode which was a gold mine he was able to develop after having worked a small mine he had sold after several years of prospecting. He made about one million dollars a year for about 8 years until he sold the Independence Mine for ten million dollars. He bought quite a bit of land in Colorado Springs and donated a lot of it to the city. He provided the land for the Colorado Springs City Hall, the Mining Exchange Building, the Post Office and Federal Courthouse, The El Paso County Courthouse which is now the Pioneer Museum, and the land which is the location for Stratton Park.
Downtown Colorado Springs has a lot of gratitude to Mr. Winfield Scott Stratton. This building is located on land that he donated to the city..
A historic plaque concerning an especially important lady of Colorado Springs. This plaque is in the Pioneer Museum which is also located on land that was donated to the city by Winfield Scott Stratton. I don't have to write anything about Helen Hunt Jackson because this plaque did the work for me. 😄.
WE VISITED PARIS TWO YEARS
Photo of the lovely vase with Farida and Rayhend in front of me. This is just a tiny hint of the almost unbelievable opulence of the Operá Garnier.
9 DAYS IN PARIS, FRANCE PROVIDED FOR HUNDREDS OF PHOTO OPPORTUNITIES. Actually, we could have gotten THOUSANDS of photos in a city like Paris. Paris, especially within the 20 arrondissements, is a huge artwork.
Photos of a very nice vase in the lobby rotunda of the Opera Garnier. There are several vases like this surrounding the lobby. We met here to wait for the guide for the tour I had booked.
There are 6 or 7 locations of the Angelina Tea House in Paris. This photo was taken at the Luxembourg location, on the north side of Luxembourg Gardens. I think the original location is at 226 Rue Rivoli. It is just down the street from the Louvre Museum. It was designed in the Belle Epoque style in 1903 by Edouard-Jean Niermans.... Tarte Citrus and mineral water at the exquisite Angelina tea house next to the Jardine Luxembourg, Paris. Another location of Angelina tea house is in Versailles.
While walking from the Eiffel Tower to the Dôme des Invalides, we came across this rather large wrought iron gate and decided that it would be a good place for Farida to pose for a photo.
After taking the photo of Farida posing in front of the huge wrought iron gate, she walked out to the street and we then took this photo. We are at the corner of rue de Université and Avenue de la Bourdonnais. It is a very very short stroll towards the east from the Eiffel Tower.
These 3 photos are all within Montparnasse cemetery of Paris. We arrived here after leaving the catacombs and then having gone to Rue Daguerre to buy a bottle of vin rouge and then to Boulangerie Dossement where we bought desserts, we walked another 10 minutes to arrive at the cemetery. Farida and the boys sat near the entrance eating their desserts while I searched for a few things to photograph there.
This is one of the gravesites I wanted to photograph in Montparnasse cemetery. First to be photographed was that of Charles Baudelaire. Many months after posting this photo here, I found out that this is actually not the place where Baudelaire is buried. He is buried in the same cemetery but he is buried with his wife's family where his stepfather is also buried and Charles Baudelaire hated his stepfather. So a committee of artists who wanted to honor him more properly created this monument for him.
This tomb stone states that this explorer made the expedition that provided France with the territory of Cote d'Ivoire. He was an officer and an explorer who not only helped France colonize Cote d'Ivoire as a result of his exploration there but also updated maps of Africa. Maps of Africa used to include a mountain range called the Mountains of Kong (yes this was a real thing). This mountain range supposedly ran across most of western Africa just above the Sahel region. The Mountains of Kong were on world maps until around 1880 and were even shown in Goodes World Atlas until the 1895 edition. The explorations of Louis Gustave Binger helped to eliminate the notion that such a mountain range existed.
In Paris there are a few churches with the name Notre Dame. This is the interior of Notre Dame des champs. Champs means field and, since this is one of the oldest churches of Paris, at the time it was built, it was outside of the city walls, in the midst of a field. The neighborhood that would eventually be created around the church is Saint-Germain des près neighborhood. 🌹🌹 And for Notre Dame Cathedral, may she quickly be restored. 🌹🌹
Gertrude Stein was an American expatriate novelist who lived here in Paris. She held a salon here where she entertained many aspiring artists and a few who became famous artists like Henri Matisse, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway, and F. Scott Fitzgerald. Actually, F. Scott Fitzgerald was already pretty famous during this period having already written a couple of novels. (This Side of Paradise and The Beautiful and the Damned). He was also writing The Great Gatsby which he finished around 1925.
Elliott Paul was an American expatriate journalist who wrote a book about life on Rue de la Huchette which is just 10 minutes walking to Notre Dame cathedral. He wrote about living on Rue de la Huchette and about the people who lived around him. The book is called "The Last Time I Saw Paris ". This photo is at Rue de la Huchette and Rue de la Harpe. On the other end of Rue de la Huchette is the narrowest street in Paris called Rue du Chat-Qui-Pêche. It means something like street of the cat that fishes. There are no storefronts on Rue du Chat-Qui-Pêche.
No comment nesessary. Actually, on a personnal note, I rarely appear in photos because I do not like making selfies. I have made only 4 or 5 selfies in my life. Bringing our sons with us on our excursions allows me to appear in a few photos. Farida, on the other hand, thrives on selfies and multifarious photos.
ONE WEEK IN SCANDINAVIA.
Dänmark.
On my video page there is a 16 second video of Holger Danske in the cellars of Kronborg castle. Still he sleeps awaiting Danmark to request his aid in any possible time of dire need.
Kronborg castle is located at the Øresund sound and ships used to have to pay a toll while passing through Øresund Sund. This helped to make this castle and the nearby community Helsingør quite wealthy. It is a UNESCO site. This is a renaissance castle with defenses reinforced with several canons that have awfully big balls. 😃
SWEDEN
This photo shows how the canons would have helped defend the castle from invading ships.
Approaching Malmö Castle in Sweden. This was a fortress castle built around 1530 commissioned by King Christian III who was king of Danmark. Danmark encompassed southern Sweden at that time.