All Fete-ed out

This week has been a busy but fun one. On Wednesday (June 21), we had the yearly Fete de la Musique. All sorts of musical performers are scheduled all over the city in open air free concerts. We saw all sorts of stuff. In the upper right of the pic was our favorite, a guy playing Spanish, Turkish, and Moroccan music in the courtyard of Hotel de Sens. We also saw a cuban band, a classical woodwinds concert, and the odd group in the upper left. Their instruments looked like a bunch of trumpets glued together. We also saw the Gay mens chorus (drowned out by two other choral goups), and a bit of Cesaria Evora. All of this was within a 10 minute walk of our apartement. There were other concerts happening all over France, the news said the next morning that there were over 20,000 concerts in France at Fete de la Musique. It was fun, you really felt like the city was out celebrating summer.

This weekend was also Gay Pride weekend in Paris. Wow. There was a march from Montparnasse to Bastille, and it went a block of our apartment up bd. Henri IV. At the end in Bastille, there was a huge party. They estimated 800,000 people showed up. The theme for the march seemed to be large trucks loaded up with huge speakers blaring out really cool dance music. It was a really fun crowd, a lot of straight people were there to have fun, it's nice to know us queers still throw the best party around. It did have one small problem, it must have been sponsored by a Hearing Aid company. The volume was dangerously high. While we were taking a Cosmo break in the apartment (a block away from the action), our windows were rattling from the noise. The Hearing Aid sponsor now has 800,000 new customers. It was an incredible gathering, I've never seen any GLBT gathering on this scale before.

Sunday we had planned to go to a food festival at Village St. Paul (2 blocks from the apartment, do we live in the right part of town or what?). We woke to a steady rain. We had a very wet trip to the Bastille Sunday morning market, and decided to blow off the food festival.

Balcony Pic

In IRC today, I realized that I had never posted a picture of our balcony. Here's one I took a month or two ago when Spring was just creeping out. The weather is still a little grey around the edges.

We're on the 5th floor (6th in US terms) . The tree top below has filled out nicely, and you can see the Pantheon way off in the distance. 

Tootie Fruitie

On Sunday morning we went to the outdoor market, the one in our neighborhood is held every Sunday morning at Bastille. Dozens and Dozens of vendors selling all sorts of food. We found a new vendor this week who sells nothing but strawberries. We bought the most amazing strawberries I've ever had in my life. They are deep dark red, and are sweeter than any I've ever had. Usually I'm not too fond of strawberries because they just aren't sweet enough. These are truly amazing. We're also getting fabulous bing cherries and mangos as well.


So begins our tootie fruitie summer fruit. 

POETS day

Friday I celebrated a weekly British holiday, POETS day (Piss Off Early, Tomorrow's Saturday). It was a hard week, I finally finished a looong work item, so I decided to blow out of work early. Don't tell the boss. :-)

I got home by4, and Sarah and I went out for a late lunch. It was a beautiful day out, 75 and sunny. We did a proper sidewalk cafe lunch at Bastille (Cafe des Phares for those keep score). I don't know, somehow food tastes better when you've skipped out of work early for it. Afterwards I grabbed a cassis sorbet cone, and we walked up a street that is packed with musical instrument stores and camera stores. At a guitar store, I notice that they are 50% classical guitar and the rest acoustic/electric. Nice. We must have seen a dozen camera stores, lots of used and collectors stuff. Paris does tend to cluster related stores together: all the papier stores are located together, there is a pet store district, an area with plant stores. Eventually we noticed that it was happy hour (how convenient!) so we had a drink at a Brasilian place. The search continues for a good margarita in Paris. This one was certainly better than Le Perla, but can't hold a candle to Manuel's frozen mango.

Saturday morning was chilly out, we sat out on the balcony and had coffee wearing politec jackets. We had oozing warm pain au chocolate for breakfast while walking around a quiet Place des Vosgues. It warmed up nicely in the afternoon, and we went to the Bagatelle gardens. In mid June, the famous rose gardens are in full bloom. A riot of color exploding, with sweet scent drifting by. The rose gardens I've seen before are ones that are working hard to live in Texas weather, this one was happy roses on steroids. We're also adding this spot to our list of places to picnic. There were a lot of nice open shady places that would be nice for a picnic. 

Room with a view in Assisi

There is just something about throwing open the shutters in your hotel room, and stepping out onto a balcony with a nice view. This photo was taken from our balcony in Assisi. We had a nice view out over the Umbrian countryside, and also a view (not in this pic) of bits of the Basilica St. Francis.

We had a great time here, the place is quite crowded by day with day trippers running around in clumps with their tour guides, but in the morning and evening it it just magical. Wandering around pedestrian streets, with beautiful views around every corner. We did a nice hike in the countryside up into the hills around Assisi, and I don't think I've ever climbed so many stairs in my life. The city is still rebuilding some from the 1997 earthquake, but it's basically finished, and looks great.

The food here was fantastic, a lot of grilled meats including grilled umbrian sausages and the best lamb chops I've had in my life. I had a fresh pasta with a black truffle sauce that was amazing. Pasta was cooked just perfectly, and the truffles added a nice grainy texture that was really good.

More pictures at:
http://suzyinparis.free.fr/Assisi2006/index.html 

Pompeii

We took one day out of our Sorrento stay to go to Pompeii (about 45 minutes away on the train).

It was really interesting. While most of the really cool artifacts are kept at a museum in downtown Naples, there was plenty to see here. Most of what we know about daily Roman life today is because of the sites uncovered by the Mount Vesuvius eruption.

We walked around, going through the bathhouse, by the bakers, and managed to find a brothel.

It's weird, but the photos just don't convey how interesting it was. There is just something really bizarre about wandering around in a city that was snuffed out in 79 AD by a volcano.

Photos at: http://suzyinparis.free.fr/Pompeii2006/index.html 

Amalfi coast Italy

We had a fantastic time in Italy. We spent 5 days in Sorrento, a town on the Amalfi coast. It's just south of Naples. There are several small towns clinging to the cliffs over the Mediterranean. This picture is of Positano. There is an amazing bus ride from Sorrento to Positano along the coast. The dramatic cliffs make for a scary road with cars squeezing by each other. We had Positano gelato (candied orange bits and nutella flavored) after lunch. With so much coastline, we of course had amazing seafood. Fresh grilled fish, fresh langostinos and shrimp. And we were right next to Naples, where they invented Pizza. We pigged out.

We splurged on a nice meal our last night, and had a truly amazing red italian wine served in monstrous red wine glasses. Sarah will have to tell you about the wine, she enjoyed it a lot.

We did some hiking close to Sorrento, and swimming off the coast to help work off all the good food.

We stayed in a villa converted into a hotel. It was a little run down, but we had a great view over the little port from our balcony.

It was a really relaxing vacation, just what we needed.

Photos at: http://suzyinparis.free.fr/AmalfiCoast2006/index.html