As we didn’t have a few hundred of spare euro to throw around (i.e. rent a private boat) so we can tour the caldera and climb the volcanic island of Nea Kameni, F and I had booked ourself a Caldera Morning guided tour that technically would last for most of the days. We waited at an assigned location in Fira to be picked up by a bus that would transfer us to the port to catch the boat, together with a good number of other fellow visitors.
10.30am… 11.00am… 11.30am… 11.45am…
It’s an understatement to say that we were getting antsy. So far, we’ve seen busload after busload of cruise ship passengers arriving for their tour of Fira. Our bus? Nope, not a shadow. It was while in conversation with a French couple then that we got to know that tours on Wednesday mornings always run late, by a good hour, thanks to the arriving cruise ships. Of course, the travel agency would not tell you that, unless you go by the same morning and ponder over tour booking. This is when you get the utmost assurance that it’s not too late to catch that day’s tour due to this little delay. Riiiiight.
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Sometimes, I question my sanity. For someone who grew up near the equator with the benefits of fans and air-conditioning everywhere, a three-hour walk in the middle of the day is simply unthinkable. However, plant me long enough in Europe (especially after a very long and cold winter, followed by a very wet and chilly spring) and what do you know, I cheerfully agreed to walk from Firá to Oia under the scorching Santorinian afternoon sun.
The walk actually took longer than three hours. Whoever who wrote this little snippet of information on Wikitravel must have either just copied it from somewhere and not did the walk, or used to doing a lot of walking on a hot day, or forgotten to add a little addendum that this is the time required if starting from the cable car station in Firá. If you’re starting near the bus station and/or plan to do a lot of photo stops, it’s best to add another hour or so. (Note: I am no couch potato and normally walk a good bit in Paris.)
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Santorini is one of the most beautiful islands that I’ve been. After wistfully going through photo albums of several friends who visited this very Cyclades island last year, I decided to push it up high on my priority list as well as into my 101 goals list, which is met by F’s approval. It is a very popular holiday destination, and there are good reasons for it – picturesque villages, friendly locals, ease of communications, delicious food (and wine), fascinating (geological) history, sunny weather, intense sunset – take your pick.
The village of Oia (pronounced “ee-yah”, not “oy-yah”; also written as Ia) is the one spot everyone seem to converge come every evening. There are other view points on the island for beautiful sunset, but between various recommendations (and a good dose of clever tourism marketing I guess), Oia becomes *the* prime sunset-watching spot. We tried to photograph the sunset – something not particularly easy as we attempted to master our new camera – from various points of Oia and not just where everyone goes. It does get uncomfortably crowded with everyone clamouring for the perfect view of the sunset!
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The largest cathedral in France (you could put two Notre Dame de Paris in it!) also possesses the tallest nave for a complete cathedral in the country. It stood proud before me on a glorious Wednesday morning when I was in Amiens and yet I was at lost on photographing it with Frédéric’s few-days-old camera. The small manual that I’ve grabbed on my way out of our apartment sat in my bag; I didn’t have the time to consult it page by page, nor the patience to. I would just have to make do somehow.
Amiens Cathedral is a Gothic cathedral which construction began in the 1220 under the instruction of Bishop Evrard de Fouilly, while three architects – Robert de Luzarches, Thomas de Cormont, and Renaud de Cormont – oversaw the works. These men are commemorated through an octogonal plate embedded within the floor of the cathedral, enclosed within a labyrinth. Standing at 112.7m in height, its nave stretched an impressive 42.3m, giving it the real meaning (esp back in the 13th century) of reaching for God and the heaven. With multicoloured stained glass and imposing sculptures that recount religious stories to the populace, the cathedral in its entirety was deemed worthy to be listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1981.
(Hover over photos as usual for captions)
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I must admit, I didn’t know much about Amiens. In fact, even after visiting the capital city of Picardy, I still have much to learn about it. My daytrip happened very much out of coincidence, suggested by Anne when we were chatting one day while I was searching for an interesting place not far from Paris that I could visit. At that point, I’ve been working on getting myself upgraded from the status of Voyageur to Grand Voyageur with the national train company, SNCF, and I was just a couple of train rides short from making it.
Travel time between Paris-St Lazare and Amiens takes just a little over an hour on the inter-city train, and as the train pulled into the station of Amiens, I could spot the one dominant building in the skyline – the Amiens Cathedral. My plan for the day then was to visit the cathedral, the historical centre of Amiens, and the Hortillonnages. I wish there was a walking tour that I could join, but a quick check on the eve of my visit showed that the sole walking tour available for the months of September to June runs only on Saturday afternoons. Visiting on a Wednesday, I was out of luck.
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If anyone tells me right now that he/she will be visiting Giverny, my immediate response is “Call Le Jardin des Plumes, book a table in their restaurant and treat yourself to a wonderful meal”. It may only be a few months old, but at its helm is Chef Joackim Salliot, who interprets the vision of Michelin-starred Chef Eric Guérin, and a warm welcome from the maitresse de maison, Nadia Socheleau, awaits all. Seriously – Just. Do. It.
Tucked hidden away from the main village on rue du Millieu but mere handful few minutes walk away from the Musée des Impressionnismes, the restaurant is part of an elegant boutique hotel surrounded by the calm of the countryside. Few visitors of the village explore beyond rue Claude Monet, so this is, for now, truly off the beaten track.
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It shouldn’t be any surprise that the main road of the village of Giverny is named after its most famous (former) resident, the Impressionist painter Claude Monet. Afterall, without his fame, it is unlikely that thousands of visitors would flock daily between April and October to the village. He lived here for over 40 years, drawing inspiration from the kaleidoscopic garden just outside his house and the adjacent water lily pond/garden.
The star attractions of the village are undoubtedly Monet’s House and Gardens, and the Musée des Impressionnismes Giverny. Apart from these, the Ancien Hôtel Baudy and the Église Sainte-Radegonde de Giverny are getting considerable attention as well from the visitors, particularly the latter, for the burial site of Monet and his family can be found in the grounds of the church.
In addition, the tourism board has done an excellent job in setting out a trail of cultural walking tour of the Giverny Village. Along this route of approximately 4km (give or take an hour walk), 20 points of interest are identified with information panel planted in front of them. We did try to complete the trail but was unable to do so, as the path parallel to the Aqueduc des Moines had been closed off, most likely for safety reason given the high water level of River Seine in recent months.
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On our final morning in Dublin, we woke up at the ungodly hour of six in the morning. Frédéric had been a little restless through the night. The unpredictable Irish weather had rendered our planned cliff walk from Bray to Greystone a no-go on the previous day, and he really hated the idea of leaving the excursion to another trip. He had stealthily checked the weather right before waking me up, and quietly declared “it IS clear this morning so shall we go to Bray?”
I groaned at remembering my promise from a few hours earlier that we would go if it’s not raining in the morning. Unfortunately, we could not leave any later either or we risked not getting back in time for our lunch meeting with Nora. Bray and Greystone are situated to the south of Dublin, of which travel time by DART from Lansdowne Road (the station closest to us, 10-12 minutes walk) takes about 35 minutes and 45 minutes respectively. A trail of cliff walk of about 6km separates the edges of these two small towns and here are some photos from the walk.
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Frédéric loves Dublin. Rather, the nature of Dublin that’s close to both the sea and the mountains, while at the same time it being a bustling capital city yet maintains a particular quiet charm that isn’t drowned out by the sound of city traffic. He sees a life where weekends away from the work desk are spent exploring the great outdoors, especially in the Wicklow Mountains, given the taster that he’d got when we went to Glendalough recently.
About an hour drive the south from Dublin city centre, Glendalough (i.e. glen of two lakes) is a former monastic city and today a popular site for visitors who are keen to see the traces left behind from the monastic heyday against the beautiful setting of the Glendalough Valley. We’ll come back to that a bit later in the post.
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Drizzle, drizzle – just another typical Irish weather that greeted us in Galway. Like good troopers, we pressed on with the second part of our express roadtrip to the west coast. Direction: Connemara.
We hurtled down the small and windy roads of the region, while keeping an eye out for spots we’d like to take a break and enjoy at the same time. It was not always easy to find shoulders where we can safely parked though – the roads that are good for one-vehicle access in both direction often border ditches. Half-parking the car between the shoulders and the roads is a no go as oncoming traffic of some 100km/h at bends means certain blindspots that could very easily lead to some nasty bangs.
As the morning progressed, the sky did clear up considerably. We were lucky too, that for most part, it was rainy while we made our way in the car but when we stopped for photo-ops, the rain abated or ceased altogether, at times accompanied by bright blue and sunny sky. Couldn’t really complain about that now, can we? ;)
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