A few days ago

(There's a surreal quality to these cows, isn't it?)

Yesterday evening

A few days ago

Yesterday evening

Photo by Jason Yoon

Yesterday evening

Yesterday

View of the Valais from the Chalet. Picture by Chang

...and arriving...(in Switzerland)

This is, as always, Bürchen. It's dandelion season:

Off to Switzerland again

We're back in Switzerland. We left early on Tuesday morning, and here's a picture of the Cannes Film Festival Chang took along the way (the Bay of Cannes, the chartered yachts for the festival parties):

Portugal (4)

Just a few pictures from Aveiro:

Beach houses...

...in the fog. It's a bit like San Francisco, and almost as cold.

The fog is gone.

It's also a bit like Amsterdam, the place.

The tide is low; Pedro, or new friend, is roaming in the wetlands of the lagoon.

Portugal (3) --- Porto: Harry Potter's bookstore

So we're in Porto, and Chang begins to talk about Harry Potter. Namely, we have to go to this bookstore. Huh? Chang, bookstores?

Yes, the Harry Potter book store

Turn's out, J.K. Rowling, the author of the Potter franchise, had been living in Porto for a while, and when it came to locations for the movies, she moved Hollywood to the Lello Bookstore here, whereto the library of Hogwards had been relocated.

It's now a major tourist attraction, and the only bookstore in the world that charges an entrance fee (of four EUR) and has a line waiting outside.

The entrance fee is exchanged for a "voucher" which one can redeem book-wise. So, we bought "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," the first installment of the series.

Portugal (2) --- Porto

Westerly view of the Douro River. Note the fog; it's like in San Francisco.

View of touristy downtown Porto from the upper level of the Louis I bridge.

We're in Porto at the moment, the city of port wine and Harry Potter. 
Huh? 
Tomorrow we'll explain why.

Portugal (1) --- Bondi Beach

We're on our way to Portugal---in fact, we've arrived already---and so we need to share this picture Chang took of Michael in Pau, a historic town north of the Pyrenees, where Henri IV was born, father of Louis XIII.





And Bondi Beach? In case you were wondering, it's Australia's signature beach, located south of Sidney:



The place where we are now, Vila Praia de Ancora, looks roughly like this, by the way. Stay tuned.

We picked up two friends from Korea, at the airport of Geneva...

...and the weather was like this.

Yesterday evening

Yesterday evening

Yesterday evening

Pompeii (6)

Yes, we're not yet done with Pompeii, we've got interrupted but we are not yet done. Here, the historic site, with a statue that's a contemporary addition (we forgot the name of the artist---have a look at the comment below).

Back in Bürchen

René Margritte

Pompeii (5) The Year of the Spritz --- History of the world

Yes, we're back in Positano, or we are still in Positano because Julia, our hostess, has an uncle who runs this restaurant, and they would pick us up and deliver us back safely despite the fact that the road is barely fit for mules. And this is what we get as the welcome drink: THE SPRITZ. (Henry James also used capitalisation extensively).

When we arrived in Venice in 1988 on a research assignment, our host Massimo picked us up at the airport and delivered us almost directly---we had a brief look at a Tintoretto in a nearby church first---to a small café and ordered something we surely had never heard of. "The Spritz." It's a German word introduced by the Austrians when they ruled Venice from 1815 to 1866, meaning a "dash" of something stronger into a small glass of white wine. It was great and we ordered a few more. Then. 

I returned to Venice repeatedly, but it was only in 2013 that I was confronted with the NEW SPRITZ as you see it on the picture. This Spritz is made from Prosecco and a dashy new version of strong water unfortunately dubbed Aperol. The color is great, the taste is mild, and chunks of lemon and orange are added for effect. There's a Hitchcock movie where the poisonous drink is served to the unsuspecting suspect in a glass illuminated by a little light bulb hidden in a translucent olive. Along those lines. 

Okay, and now, this year, THIS IS THE YEAR OF THE SPRITZ. Everywhere you go, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and today, St. Raphael, FRANCE (not shown)---the Aperol Spritz is everywhere. We ordered white wine in St. Raphael.

Pompeii (4) --- Hotel del Sole --- "We will post a review!"

The view from the restaurant

We booked Hotel del Sole (half-board) because of its location opposite to the Pompeii ruins. We are given the worst room---but somebody has to get the worst room, even in a hotel packed with junior travel groups.

So the sun sets and we proceed to be seated for dinner. We are NOT led to the fourth floor restaurant with a spectacular view of the excavation site but to a sort of green house where piping protrudes from dirty corners and a children's party is in loutish progress. We return to the reception desk and alert the assistant manager to the pictures of this beautiful restaurant with its view of the ruins on Booking-dot-com. Sure, no problem, there's the elevator. Arriving upstairs we're informed that---yes---they serve dinner, but not to guests on half-board. Such guest have to dine in the Green House, regrettably. We descend, informing the reception that we'd like to cancel the half-board arrangement. That's not possible---the reply is---because we've booked through Booking-dot-com and patati patata. We alert them to the fact that the nice fourth floor restaurant is shown on Booking-dot-com. Yes, they answers, because that's where breakfast is served. There's nothing on Booking-dot-com, we reply, that would alert guests to the fact that the half-board dinner is served in a greenhouse not shown anywhere (for good reasons). You can call Booking-dot-com, they say. We won't call Booking-dot-com, we say, WE WILL POST A REVIEW. "Oh...oh...oh...okay. Yes, well, if you insist"...and while we are back in the elevator accompanied by an assistant manager, she tells us that they would have to open the kitchen for us, for us alone, "but if you want...". She cites a few more reasons why life is so difficult. We inform her that there are always "reasons," and that a GOOD HOTEL---if the sad moment arrives that "reasons" have to be invoked---that a good hotel should be able to isolate its guests from said reasons. She goes on. She obviously does not understand what it means to be a GOOD HOTEL.

The dinner with a view up there was very good, by the way.