Ljubljana by Night

Here are a selection of some night time pictures I've liked from walking around the old city in Ljubljana. I deliberately packed my tripod for this trip so that I could make good use of it for night shots, especially with all the Christmas lights.

Lots of boat tours along the river. This one taken from the Three Bridges next to Prešeren Square. The building on the right has lots of open-air shops for both souvenirs and also produce, and the Dragon Bridge is in the distance. I like the blue tinge to the lights spilling onto the water, along with all the archways on the building.

Handheld shot taken at 2500 ISO or higher to enable steady shooting. Couldn't risk coming back later with the tripod. Seems the Germans have taken over the Grad.

Other members of the café party band from the last post. Hard to get a decent shot between the handheld shot at night along with the drunken patron continuously dancing and inciting the crowd in the midst of the group and constantly getting in my way. Only possibility is patience in such situations, which also gained me the accordion shot from the last post.

Sure it's -5°C or so, but that's where warm clothes and the radiant heaters come in handy. The red glow is an added bonus. Taken from one of the many bridges in the old city. This particularly one is modern and completely out of place, but it is located at the perfect geographical spot for shooting Prešeren Square if I look the other way.

So this is what happens if I turn around! Took this shot many, many ways and I think I like this one the best. Other shots were taken landscape and cut off the full glow of the lights on the river.

Tripod shot of the Grad. The café on the centre-left was where Gary and I anchored ourselves for cappuccino each afternoon.

The Doors of Ljubljana Cathedral

Halfway walking down from the Castle, climbed up on the railing to catch this shot of the Cathedral with the snowcapped Alps beyond.

The Ljubljana Cathedral right underneath the "Grad" (Castle) has two doors that are massive and cast from bronze, then cut into doors. They were installed in 1996 for the 1250th anniversary of Christianity's arrival in Slovenia, and also to celebrate Pope John Paul II's visit.

To say that they're stunning is quite the understatement. The "front" door is called the Slovene Door, and recounts the history of Christianity's arrival to Slovenia. There is so much detail in the door. One of the things I'm learning from photography is to slow down and really pay attention to both my surroundings, the neat little details I otherwise usually overlook, and of course the intricacies of light.

The door is even sculpted in a way that the woman's head on the right picture is perfectly placed as a door handle, as you can tell from the shininess. The priest's hands have obviously been rubbed quite a bit for luck. Notice the faint relief of the Grad too to the left of the priest? That's the kind of cool detail you don't notice until you really pay attention for a while. I pretty much spent 30 minutes or so just admiring the doors and taking pictures, of course regularly interrupted by old ladies coming and going from prayer.

The side "Bishops Door" has these massive 3D reliefs of different Bishops of the area from the 20th Century.

3 in 1

Today (July 27) we went for a long bike ride, it was about 30 kilometers and took us 4 hours total including all of our stops and things like that. We went to 3 castles, they were newer castles, probably around 200 years old each.

One of them is now a hotel (Hotel Lake Vuurge), one was the recent queens palace (Paleis Soestdijk), but now that she has died, the Netherlands doesn't know what to do with it. The last one (Kasteel Groenveld) is a museum now, but is getting renovated for a conference, but we could still go into it.


As an added bonus, we also biked down to Amersfoort later on for Happy Hour at Van Gogh Frites!

We also stayed up for the olympic opening ceremonies,  the best part of the show for me was with Mr. Bean in the Orchestra, he pretty much only had one key to play which he could do with one hand. So first he got out his phone, and started doing something on it, next he sneezed, and since his backpack was just a few inches away, he had to get an umbrella to play the key while he reached for his backpack, to blow his nose. After that he started daydreaming that he was in a race across a beach, in his daydream he was falling behind, he saw a car, so he went and got into it, then at the line he got out, tripped the guy in first and won the race.

This here on the left, is a bar and a bike combined, you can rent it for a party, and it has 10 seats, all with pedals to move the "bike." all of the seats are made facing into the table because it is also a bar where you can drink beer while you ride, the owner of this bar/bike is the one who drives, and doesn't have to pedal!! and  guess he isn't allowed to get drunk with the people renting his bike. The dangerous part is that none of the seats have backs, so people can fall off if they get too drunk!!

Daddy wants to get one for the next Pez party!

Mannheim

Since our main focus in Mannheim was going to the Lego competition, we spent a lot of time at the Rosengarten convention centre but  we did find some time to wander around the city. The University is housed in very beautiful buildings, part of which was once the castle.  The nearby Jesuit church was being prepared for a wedding when we stopped in for a look and indeed it was an excellent June day for a wedding. The flowers in the parks were lovely.

We found the Angel of Peace sculpture "Friedensengel" by Gerhard Marcks which was removed from it's more prominent spot beside the Jesuit Church and hidden away in a non-tourist area (Mannheim, E6). It was created in 1952 to commemorate all those people who died violent deaths during the Nazi regime.  There is another memorial beside the Angel but it is only a dark block of rock and we didn't even realize we missed it until we were reading later.

We also found the Holocaust Memorial that is located in an equally strange place. It is right on the sidewalk of the ParadePlatz but it consists of a clear glass cube with names that are written so you would have to be on the inside to read. There is no identifying plaque and no one walking along this busy street even stops to consider it. There was supposed to be a plaque in the sidewalk, but we couldn't find it; maybe it was covered up by the construction boarding that was also placed along the sidewalk.

Mozart spent time in  Mannheim and that is being commemorated by a summer music festival advertised by these hot pink deer statues. Not sure about the design of these, but you can't miss noticing them.

Near the conference centre is a horseshoe shaped park dominated by the massive "water tower" (der Wasserturm).  The fountains, waterfalls,  and green arbours made this a very restful place in the centre of the city and it was a popular spot for wedding shots on Saturday afternoon. 

Heidelberg

Finally posting a couple from our Germany trip!
We only had a short time to spent in Heidelberg but we had a nice stroll around the old town. We climbed up to the castle and walked around it but to me, the castle seems the most impressive with the way it sits nestles in the hills on the edge of town. There are 3 main churches in the old town. The church of the Holy Spirit has a tower where you can climb up and get a magnificent aerial view of the town, bridges across the Nektar River and the castle and surrounding hills. The Jesuit church is very light and spacious with a magnificent organ at the back of the church and St. Peter's Church, "Pieters kirk" is the oldest, build in 1645?

We were able to see the Gothic Renaissance building side by side with the later Baroque style. Most of Heidelberg was destroyed between 1686 and 1689 and few buildings survive from before that. On exception is the "Rathouse", now a hotel and restaurant. Most of the buldings build as the town was reconstructed are in the lighter Baroque style (pictures)

Fortunately, Heidelberg was spared in WWII since it didn't have any significant military or industrial sites, and so can see these beautiful buildings from the 1700's.

Kasteel Amerongen

Mother's Day, Eric and Astrid's (kids Dorien and Jacco) and us got together for a lunch at their place and then took an afternoon trip 40 km south to the town of Amerongen to visit their Kasteel (castle). It was a really cool old house from the 17th century, and especially the way it was presented.

Kasteel Amerongen

They'll be featuring on many of our blogs, so some introductions are in order. I first met Eric and Astrid a few months before I met Debbie in 1996. They moved to spend a year for Eric to do research at York University during his Ph.D., and we were introduced via Hein Daanen, who was at DCIEM (where I did my Ph.D.) as a visiting scientist and who worked at TNO with Eric. One of Eric's very first tasks in Canada was to serve as pannekoeken (pancake) chef extraordinaire at a party at my place! Anyway, over many outings, movie nights (I think we went to about 100 movies together at the Bloor Cinemas), Heavenly Hash ice cream, and roller blading sessions, we've somehow still remained friends!

Onto the Kasteel. They really had a unique way of presenting the history of the house in a way I'd never imagined before. Rather than normal exhibits or even video displays, the entire mansion was running a movie set as one day in the life of the castle, when the mistress receives an urgent letter that the husband was returning that night with major political dignitaries for a banquet. Thus, we're taken into the life of the castle's many servants as they prepare over the course of the day in 1680. It wasn't even just a "factual" documentary, but a movie plot line with internal intrigue, scandals, etc. The story was projected over 20+ huge screens throughout the different rooms, with multiple plot lines. Really fascinating!

Of course, the tradeoff for the unique AV presentation was that most of the rooms were near pitch-black, so it's not the place to go if you want to open cupboards and peer in. However, there were a few rooms not used for the AV where you can see the house collections well, such as the butterfly displays, animal heads, pianos, and family portraits. You can't see from the first picture of the kids airborne, but the castle is surrounded by a moat seen here on the right picture.

Another cool "Lord of the Rings" scene!

No Baloney in Bologna!

Quick dash on Sunday to Bologna to drop off Olaf at the airport for his flight home (grazie for the grand times Olaf!), giving us a couple of hours to wander around the old city of Bologna after a long drive from Chitignano. Olaf being Olaf, he guided us up and down another twisty curvy mountain road to get to Firenze. Bologna has some pretty beautiful sights and is a bit of a hidden treasure in Italy. Unfortunately, we only had time for a quick visit and most everything was also closed for Sunday (Domenico) or for siesta.

Our Tuscany Flickr!

The big scene in Bologna is the Piazza Maggiore, featuring the 16thC Fontana della Nettuno (Fountain of Neptune). Another beautiful feature of Bologna, and indeed many Italian towns, are the wonderful portico  walkways in the old cities.

Saint Petronius (left at Piazza Maggiore, right at the two towers) is one of the main saints of the city. Bologna also houses the oldest university in Europe, founded in 1088AD! Unfortunately, the Biblioteca for the Uni was closed on Sundays, as it's supposed to be incredibly impressive and ornate. It also houses one of the very first Teatro Anatomico for the study of anatomy. Luigi Galvani, founder of bioelectricity, is also from Bologna. The Basilica San Domenico was closed for siesta, but it was built in the 13th century by San Domenico, the founder of the Dominican Friars.

Another iconic sight in Bologna are the Two Towers, medieval towers built by wealthy families to out-compete each other. The taller one is 90 m high and there are stairs to a viewing platform all the way up. But the one next to it, shown here, is actually leaning a few degrees (just like Zach's handstand!) due to the ground beneath it settling. You can see it a bit on the left, but especially on the right with the foundation. So it's not just Pisa!

The Most Serene Republic of San Marino

On Friday night we went to the republic of San Marino, our family's 14th country on this trip! The country is only 61km2. San Marino is surrounded by Italy and is located on a mountain named Mount Titano. Mount Titano is on the east side of the Apennines. It was founded in the 4th century by the monk Saint Marinus of Rab.

Mommy and Daddy making small talk after supper at the main square (right). At another table were an older couple, and it turns out they were Canadians and he studied at Dalhousie! They live in Houston now but are on vacation for a few weeks.

We went for a walk up the rest of the big hill after supper, some of us walking on our hands. Check out the cool house and front garden on the right!

There are 3 Castelli on the 3 peaks of Mount Titano, castello means castle. San Marino has a population of ~30,000 and has NO National debt. During WWII the Sammarinese (Or the people of San Marino) protected 100,000 Jews.