Sunset Stroll

On December 27 I decided I wanted to get out of the house for a little while and 5 p.m. seemed like a good time. I'm so glad I left when I did, since it meant I was able to capture this sunset moment:

Just after this I noticed a long line of glossy ibises flying north on the other side of the river

and took the time to shoot a video. Unfortunately, I couldn't manage to add the music I wanted to it, so you'll just have to imagine "Evening Raga" by Ali Akbar Kahn playing in the background:

When the flock had passed overhead I descended to the Lower Corniche where I captured these images:

Another Great Sunset...

What can I say?

Except...how 'bout those clouds?

And what about these from Sunday while we were on the roof for our first shisha of the season:

It's a hard life!

Inbound: Part Three

After our visit to Chinon, Bette and I stopped in Amboise on our way back to Blois to attend a meeting of Loire Connexion, a international group of people who get together on a monthly basis and speak English. We arrived in Amboise at that wonderful time of day when the light on the buildings and the Loire is rose-gold.

Here's a nice shot of the town from the island where the get-together took place:

And a nice sign to add to my collection:

And finally, a view of the Loire through an arch of the bridge leading back over to Amboise:

Bette was making a presentation on American musicals to the local chapter of an organization called France-États Unis a couple of days before I left to return to Paris. We met at a restaurant on the south bank of the Loire and these photos were taken from an upstairs window looking back at Blois.

The bridge you can see in the foreground behind the hedge in this final photo is the bridge in the photo that won me a blue ribbon at the Yolo County Fair.

UP NEXT: Inbound: Part Four--back in Paris, my visit to the Louvre, specifically the newly-opened Islamic Art Department...