travel – Page 2 – Ripple Effects

Serendipity on Route 7

My drive continued south from Bennington, Vermont, via RT 7 to Williamstown, Massachusetts. There I stayed for the night. I knew Williams College was located there. But while exploring the town, I came to this building and saw the huge banner. Upon further investigation, I was excited to discover the campus of Shakespeare & Company:

Later I found out that the actor Christopher Reeve met his future wife Dana in Williamstown where they later married. Reeve began as an apprentice at age 15 with the Wiliamstown Theater Festival right in those venues and eventually performed there for fourteen more seasons.

I had the chance to talk to a woman who was working on the grounds and learned that, lo and behold, she was born in Alberta, Canada, my home province! Imagine a chance encounter with an Alberta born American thousands of miles away.

The Berkshires region is beautiful and cultural. I made a mental note to come back to Williamstown for its annual Theater Festival.

My original plan was just to drive south on RT 7 from Williamstown to Lenox to see the Edith Wharton House at The Mount, when another serendipitous find came upon me: Tanglewood Music Center. So here I was at the famous summer home of the Boston Symphony Orchestra on my way to Edith Wharton House.

The Koussevitzky Music Shed was named after the Russian-born conductor, composer and double-bassist, long-time music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra from 1924 to 1949:

I lingered at Tanglewood for quite some time, for the grounds were beautiful and offered magnificent views. Another mental note: I must come back for the Tanglewood Festival in the summer. :

Across the road from Tanglewood, fall foliage began to emerge. That was October 7. I can imagine how beautiful it is now:

And finally, to The Mount, Edith Wharton’s home from 1902 – 1911. I knew she was a prolific novelist and short-story writer, the first woman to win the Pulitzer Prize (The Age of Innocence, 1921); later I learned too that she had been nominated for the Nobel Prize for Literature three times.

So I was a little surprised to find out from the tour guide at The Mount that she was also a house and landscape designer in her own right. Her book The Decoration of Houses is still used today by architects and designers.

Built as a writers retreat, The Mount reflects Wharton’s fondness of symmetry:

What happened to the left side of the building? That makes it not symmetrical, you might ask. That’s the servants quarter which Wharton was willing to compromise her design principle.

Here’s another view why it’s called The Mount:

I took a tour of both the inside as well as her gardens. Here’s one wall of her library:

Well read in several languages since she was young, Wharton left these books behind when she moved away to live in Paris the latter part of her life after the demise of her marriage. Her husband Edward had fallen into a state of dementia after lengthy bouts of depression and mental illness. The writer’s years at The Mount had not been as happy as its surroundings could offer her.

The Drawing Room:

Dining Room, where Henry James was one of several usual guests:

But where did she write? Not in the library, or at the desk in her room, but right in her bed. She had an assistant who would take her handwritten pages and type them up after her six hours of continuous writing every morning before she got out of bed. I’m sure Wharton would love to have a laptop:

And these other items I found interesting. Downton images conjured up in my mind. Typewriter, telephone, telegram:

An original 1902 ice box, Daisy would love it but maybe not Mrs. Patmore. Give her some time to warm up:

A luggage lift. Definitely would be a fave among the footmen:

And only after the tour did I find out, The Mount had given a Life Time Achievement Award to Julian Fellowes. The Downton creator had attributed Wharton as a major influence on his works, first Gosford Park (Oscar Best Original Screenplay, 2002) and then Downton Abbey. Speaking upon receiving the Award at the Harvard Club, Fellowes noted that he was particularly inspired by Wharton’s “… ability to judge without feeling the need to condemn.”

I bought the book The Custom of the Country in the gift shop and only just now did I learn that it is being adapted into a TV mini-series, with Scarlett Johansson playing the anti-heroine, Undine Spragg. This will mark Johansson’s first TV role.

As for Julian Fellowes’ new work? I eagerly await. After visiting The Mount, I can see what a natural shift it is for him to create an American version of Downton. The Gilded Age should be a smooth sequel.

From Lenox, I began the last leg of my New England Road Trip. I headed east on I90, a breezy 2.5 hrs. drive back to Wayland, the suburb outside Boston, thus completing the loop and a memorable journey. An item checked off my bucket list.

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Vermont: More than Scenery

Vermont has so much to offer on top of the scenery. But I’ll start with that.

The hills are alive overlooking a breathtaking view of the distant Green Mountains. That was what attracted the von Trapp Family to settle there. Right, that’s the Family von Trapp of The Sound of Music fame. Goerg and Maria moved to Vermont in 1941 and bought a 300 acre farm near Stowe, as that location reminded them of their native Austria. There on the mountain top they started a guest lodge and had since developed into what is now an upscale resorts on 2,500 acres.

The Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, VT, owned and operated by the eldest son of Maria and Georg von Trapp:

Just 36 miles west of Stowe was Lake Champlain on the edge of Burlington, a vibrant college town. The Lake is a large body of fresh water, once called the sixth of the Great Lakes. It borders the States of Vermont, New York and stretches up north to Quebec, Canada.

At the pier of Lake Champlain:

I totally get how this boat is named:

I took the Vermont scenic drive Rt. 100 and headed south from Stowe. My destination was Bennington in the southwest corner of the State.

Not far from Stowe I arrived at Waterbury, a town with lots of restaurant choices for such a small place. I visited two major tourist sites there.

Just off RT 100 was the Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream Factory, and they sure were prepared for the hundreds of visitors on the day I was there. A well organized and informative factory tour let me see how two college buddies’ $50 investment on an online ice cream making course had come to fruition. What’s impressive is their commitment to use supplies from local farms and cows that are steroids-free. A fair trade business to ensure global responsibility. (no, I don’t get a buck for writing this.)

In contrast, not far from the madding crowd at Ben & Jerry’s was the serene Waterbury Reservoir. When I got there it was already past sunset. So glad I could still take these photos:

Continued on Vermont Rt. 100 south I came by this most interesting site in the fields outside the small town of Waitsfield, population: 1,719 (2010). Here I found The Big Picture Theater, screening The Martian:

Two posters at the door caught my attention:

One was a “Kickstarter Film Festival”. An indie film festival in this area? I was most impressed.

Another poster was about a talk on “The Costumes of Downton Abbey”. Here’s what the poster says if you can’t see it clearly (above right):
“Jule Emerson, former Costume Designer and Theater Professor at Middlebury College will discuss the fashions worn by Lady Mary and her family in the popular PBS series Downton Abbey. Free and Open to the Public”

No place is too remote for films and the Crawleys.

Rt. 100 offered some fall scenery very different from NH. I was attracted by the clumps of trees in distant hills along the road. It was a cloudy day, so instead of seeing bright and cheery foliage, I was captivated by the moody atmosphere. Just as beautiful:

Before arriving at Bennington, I stopped by South Shaftsbury to visit Robert Frost Stone House Museum. Frost bought the stone house and its 80 acres land in 1920, moving from the White Mountains in NH to warmer Vermont mainly for “a better place to farm and especially grow apples.” Aren’t we glad that he threw in some poems as well in his time-off from apple-picking.

In this fertile soil Frost not only gathered apples but poetic harvests as well. In the Stone House, there’s a “Stopping by Woods” Room where the Poet wrote his most famous “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening.” A facsimile of the handwritten manuscript and many other pertinent materials – parody included – were displayed. Trust my words. I didn’t want to get caught taking pictures in a ‘Photography Forbidden’ premises.

I did take photos outside of Frost’s Stone House:

and his juicy legacy, the apple tree in front of the house:

From Shaftsbury I drove the few blocks to Bennington, There at the back of the First Congregational Church was the cemetery where Robert Frost was buried.

Yes, the sky was that blue that day:

Frost’s grave gathered no pens or pencils as I saw in Authors Ridge of Sleepy Hollow Cemetery in Concord ; instead, people have left pennies there. If they were meant to be tributes to the Poet, it’s simply mind boggling to see how people could think a penny would suffice. Allow me to offer a little alteration to a common saying, standing in front of Frost’s grave: If you don’t have anything poetic to leave there, don’t leave anything.

Coming up: my last stop, Lenox, MA.

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Finally, Fall Foliage

This was a fall foliage road trip after all, albeit I must say I’d thoroughly enjoyed the coastal scenery in Maine.

New Hampshire’s White Mountain National Forest offered some magnificent sights. Last heard, there’s snow in NH and Vermont. So I’m all thankful for even getting a glimpse of maybe just 40% of fall foliage before the white stuff cometh.

The trees were lovely at the White Mountain National Forest Visitors Center:

There, I learned that a portion of the Appalachian Trail passed nearby. I told myself, I must experience that.

I stepped onto the path of the relatively difficult trail (for me anyway), just to have a taste and to see how challenging it was. To make a short story even shorter, I only stayed for a little while. Here’s a view looking upward while there:

I’d asked for recommendation for an easy walk to a scenic point and was given instructions to the 64 ft. drop of the Glen Ellis Falls at Pinkham Notch; now that’s much better. I’ll leave the Appalachian Trail to the adventurous, like Redford and Nolte:

To continue on westward to Vermont, I’d read that I must take the Kancamagus Highway for the magnificent views. And so I did. Driving the 34 miles on the scenic route from Conway to Lincoln, NH, is one of the highlights of my trip. Here are some views of the foliage along The Kanc, as the locals call it.

Car-stopping view:

Onward to Vermont, some picturesque country roads as well:

More about Vermont to be continued…

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Orange is the Primary Colour

Driving from coastal Maine westward to New Hampshire, the foliage colours began to change a bit more. Even though I was totally enjoying myself along the coast, I did look forward to seeing some fall foliage as I moved inland.

I drove from Rockport to Maine’s capital Augusta, then continued on some small country roads towards Bethel and Gilead before crossing the State line to Gorham, New Hampshire. It was a pleasure driving through these more remote parts of the country, for the routes offer some gratifying scenery:

But it was the colour orange on the ground that caught my eyes. From afar, they were tiny orange dots in the field:

A bit closer I knew, of course, that was a pumpkin patch. And it was orange that would be the predominant colour everywhere, in towns and in the country.

On flatbeds and wagons:

Or laid out neatly in arrays on grass:

In various shapes and forms:

At door fronts, entrances, in hanging baskets and shop windows:

Or in the form of pumpkin people:

Or as pumpkin elves like these two sitting outside Elf Academy:

No wonder there’s a shortage of pumpkins in the U.S. as the demand is so high. With recent crops diminished by record rain, there arose a pumpkin shortage. Help is on the way though. Here’s a recent headline on CBC News Business section:

“Canadian pumpkin patches poised to fix U.S. lack-o’-lanterns problem.”

What are neighbors for?

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This is my Saturday Snapshot October 17 entry. Saturday Snapshot is hosted by West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

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Camden, ME: A Gem of a Town

The scenic drive from Rockport (last post) led me to the town of Camden where I was welcomed with free parking everywhere. A walk down the streets could make you feel you’re stepping right into a movie set.

But the stunning view came later when I drove up to the summit of Mt. Battie in the Camden Hills State Park. There at the highest point of the town, a panorama of Penobscot Bay and its surrounding countryside was fully displayed:

That was the same breathtaking view a young aspiring poet Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892 – 1950) beheld, inspiring her to write the famous poem “Renascence”. Her epiphany at the top of Mt. Battie set off a poetic expedition which eventually led the Poet to the literary summit of a Pulitzer in 1923. There on the mountain top was this plaque honoring ‘America’s finest lyric poet.’

“And reaching up my hand to try,
I screamed to feel it touch the sky.
I screamed, and—lo!—Infinity
Came down and settled over me…”

– lines from “Renascence”

Every time I feasted my eyes and mind, my stomach would in turn crave for my attention. So after a lingering at this inspiring site, I went down the slope back to town and found my way to the popular Cappy’s Chowder House. There I had the best chowder of my life: A Lobster/Oyster/Mussel/Seafood Chowder, yes, all of them in a Cappy’s cup for $9.99

A good finish to a rewarding day.

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Scenic Drive from Rockport to Camden, ME

Rockport and Camden used to be one town at the mid-coast of Maine. Now separated as two but are still joined closely with easy access. The Maine Route 1 could lead me from Rockport in the south up to Camden in just 6 minutes, but I chose to drive into Camden using the side streets, the scenic route, more slowly, stopping for photos along the way.

The day broke grey but I was grateful that despite the overcast sky, there was no rain. Actually, after that wet pounding on I95 to Portland the day before, all the rest of the driving in my road trip was breezy and enjoyable.

The scenic route from Rockport to Camden was particularly memorable. Here’s a view out to Rockport Harbor along the drive:

And what I saw as I looked down to the ground was an unusual sight, for me anyway:

Apples everywhere:

Coming from the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Western Canada, I’d never seen so many apples fallen from trees, covering the lawn. I mean, they were not tiny Crabapples which are common back home, but big ones that I usually associate with orchards, but not at a harbor or marina.

What I did connect though was the huge number of apple pies they could make…

From Route 1 heading north I turned off Pascal Avenue, then followed the scenic loop beginning with Central, then Russel, Limerock and Union. Once on Russel Avenue, I came to the Aldermere Farm, a landmark of mid-coast Maine. The farm is the world’s premier breeders of Belted Galloway cattle, or ‘Belties’, a breed originated from Southwest Scotland.

These white-belted cattle sure made one whimsical picture as they lazed on lush green pastures… think Oreo cookies in a large dish of wasabi:

Seeing I had a camera, this ‘beltie’ showed off how to scratch an itch with no hands:

The foliage was still overwhelmingly green, making the few sporadic splashes of orangey-red even more inviting, confirming to me, yes, I was a week or two early. No matter, this kind of a setting was pure joy, even just for a look. And yes, the grass is always greener on the other side…

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Lobster, Lobster

In pouring rain I drove north from Wayland, MA on Interstate 95 to Portland, Maine, about 120 miles. As I came close to the city, anxiously looking for exits with the car wipers at the fastest speed, I saw a sign in a distance with a digital message. I strained to check out what it was saying, could be crucial information. Soon I got close enough to read this alert: “Rain Pounding on Road” Thanks. That was helpful.

A bit later after I exited and entering Portland, I was met with another warning sign: “Flash flooding in some intersections”. Thanks again. Which ones?

After a few tense moments, we found our way to an Arabica Café, calmed down with a latté and regrouped. In this weather, no sight-seeing around town was possible, so might as well drive to our next destination, a must-see, pounding rain or not. That’s New Harbor in the eastern tip of Maine, about 70 miles from where we were. What’s the bait? Lobster of course… and, Kevin Costner.

Earlier on I came across the website epicurious (love the name), Shaw’s Fish and Lobster Wharf in New Harbor was listed as one of their 7 favorite lobster shacks in Maine, and the tidbit that it’s one of the filming locations of the movie Message In A Bottle. So obviously, the motivation to get me driving all that 70+ miles in the rain under a dark grey sky was not just the lobster but Kevin Costner… oh, throw in Paul Newman as well.

Here’s the place at the end of a long and winding road along coastal Maine in fading daylight:

A view from the dock:

Inside the bar, a movie poster:

and some production photos (See Paul Newman in the middle?)

Since it was getting late, we decided to take out instead of eat there. And so we did, heading out to our rental car with two cooked live lobsters (oxymoron?), drawn butter, paper plates, and a lobster cracker kindly thrown in for us, all for $30. Not a bad deal.

Just as we congratulated ourselves on our triumphal exit with lobsters and Costner poster photo, we saw the iPhone on which we’d so depended for its GPS to be not in service. Now we had to find our way out of this remote place before darkness totally engulfed us. It’s not as easy as you might think. It felt like forever for us to find our way back to the main road and headed north for another 40 miles to our motel in Rockport. It seemed a much longer drive when you had two cooked live lobsters in the back seat.

Another seafood restaurant I can whole-heartedly recommend is Archer’s on the Pier in Rockland, ‘the lobster capital of the world’. Just a 12-minute drive south of our motel in Rockport, Archer’s lobster is one of the best I’ve tasted for as long as I can remember. Of course a bit pricier than Costner’s place, but well worth it with all the extras, corn cob, coleslaw…

the location and the view:

I haven’t seen much fall foliage yet but that’s ok. It’s been a delicious journey so far.

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Historic Concord, Massachusetts

“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.”
– Henry D. Thoreau

Just a few miles north of Walden Pond is Thoreau’s birthplace, Concord, MA, a beautiful town bursting with history. The Minute Man National Historical Park, North Bridge, Paul Revere Capture Site… major historical events took place right here. I’d learned to appreciate their significance especially in a modern day context.

But what caught my attention as I drove into town was this church building, meeting place of the First Parish in Concord:

While the present structure was built in 1900, the Church – the gathering of a community of faith – stood as a monument of the social history of America dating back a few hundred years to the 1670’s. To me as an outsider, this is meaningful. It’s the first of many such Christmas card icon that I would see during my road trip, in every town I passed by.

The Concord Museum displays history in a nut-shell. In there I found the actual furniture from inside Thoreau’s cabin in Walden Pond:

and those in Emerson’s home:

Lesson learned? No, one doesn’t have to go to the woods to live a Spartan life to be inspired. But, the experience sure could help develop work skills in case the writing vocation didn’t pan out.

I skipped Emerson’s House across from Concord Museum, instead, followed the sign of ‘Authors Ridge’ in the Sleepy Hollow Cemetery to the graves of Thoreau, Hawthorne, Alcott, and Emerson. Much amused to see pens and pencils left at the authors’ graves:

As I was pondering the philosophical meaning of this sighting, a greater urge suddenly took hold of me, one Thoreau could empathize, the necessity of life sustenance: food. I said goodbye to the great authors and drove back down to the main streets of Concord in search of the essential.

It’s the name that first attracted me: La Provence. The little French restaurant/café and patisserie on, where else? Thoreau Street. I ordered at the deli counter their popular Jambon de Paris sandwhich and a cream of mushroom soup. To my delight, as I stepped into the dining room with my lunch I felt like I’d entered a van Gogh painting. (Click here to see what I mean.)

While the sandwich was just average, the mushroom soup was superb. I wouldn’t mind a second helping but reminded myself another essential I must make room for, a dessert from the patisserie.

I was over at the glass case in the pastry section in no time. As a chocolate lover, my choice was easy… just look for the brown color items. I pointed to my selection and upon asking its name, was given two different replies by two different staff. So here I’m combining them: “Milk and Honey Chocolate Dome”, and it’s heavenly.

A crisp milk chocolate dome shrouding smooth melt-in-your-mouth chocolate mouse on a thin layer of cake at the bottom, this little dome sealed the best a dessert can offer any chocolate lover. The white chocolate bee on top was the added fun.

Fall foliage will have to wait.

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Saturday Snapshot September 20: Ward’s Island

My ten-day trip to Toronto was not only about films. I brought along my camera and my ‘birding lens’, hoping to catch some birds in migration. Before I left, I read about the hotspots for birding on Ward’s Island, and printed some pages off the Internet.

Ward’s Island is just a 15-minute ferry ride south from the Toronto Harbourfront. As soon as I got off the boat, I realized I’d forgotten to bring along the birding pages. Why was I not surprised? No matter, without the guide sheets, I was in for a fresh exploration and a mental exercise in information retrieval. So much the better.

It turned out that the first week of September happened to be a little too early for bird migration. Temperature is also a factor. The day I visited the island, it was 30C (86F). But instead of birds, I did take some photos on that piece of tranquility a stone throw from the busy metropolis.

The Toronto skyline viewed from Ward’s Island:

The Boardwalk along the periphery of Lake Ontario:

House boat or was it boat house on the canal… serene and reclusive:

I’ve never been to Monet’s flower gardens at Giverny, but I can imagine it looking at the canal. Just like to name these photos the Monet Effects:

Ok, don’t rub it in. I appreciate the irony. But here’s the interesting thing: Look carefully and you’ll see the reflection is sharper than the subject, use ‘Chaos’ as the guiding light.

When I was just about given up on photographing birds, I sat down at the outdoor garden of The Island Café near the pier and had my breakfast. And what did I see? My very first sighting of Monarch Butterflies!

The Monarch 3

The Monarch, more than enough to compensate for my lack of bird sightings. A new burst of enthusiasm led me to retrace my steps along the canal to look more carefully for birds, but thanks to some overzealous fire ants successfully targeting my feet, I had to retreat after spending a fruitful four hours on Ward’s Island. A half day of total serenity.

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Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

Photos in this post taken by Arti of Ripple Effects, September, 2014.
DO NOT COPY or REBLOG.

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AGO Exhibition: Terror And Beauty

The Art Gallery of Ontario, AGO, is a must-see whenever I visit Toronto. Not only because I’m a Frank Gehry fan who never gets tired of looking at the centre spiral staircase in there, but the exhibits are always intriguing and thought-provoking. Spent a few days in Toronto last week and this time, I was much gratified to view the current show at AGO: “Francis Bacon, Henry Moore: Terror and Beauty”.

Terror and Beauty, the motif resonates with the idea of Wabi-sabi. I’ve explored visually the notion of Wabi-sabi before. Two seemingly incompatible states juxtaposed against each other, beauty and sadness.

“You can’t be more horrific than life itself” says a quote from Francis Bacon on the AGO’s Artist page. The exhibits speak to that by extracting from the horrors of WWII and other forms of human sufferings and struggles depicted in the works of these two 20th century Irish/English artists who were contemporaries of each other.

The exhibit is a wealth of surrealist works from Bacon, and sculptures and drawings from Moore. But I was particularly captivated by the WWII items. While Moore is well-known for his abstract sculptures of the human body in larger than life poses, here’s a rare chance to see his more personal, wartime drawings.

Going home one evening in 1940, as he entered a London subway station, Moore discovered crowds of people sleeping on the platform to take shelter from an impending German air strike, the Blitz. He was taken aback by what he saw and his later drawing was a ghastly interpretation:

Photo Source: http://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/moore-tube-shelter-perspective-n05709

That’s Moore’s view of the underground subway station used as impromptu bomb shelter. But what was it really like in those tube stations? That’s when I was totally captivated by the photos of the renowned photojournalist Bill Brandt displayed alongside Moore’s shelter drawings.

Rather than horrific depictions, I was utterly surprised by the actual photographs by Brandt, who acted as official war photographer. His noir and darkened perspective is haunting and yet, full of mystique and beauty.

What I saw was an opposite interpretation of the subway scene: rather than terror, I saw resilience. Indeed, the London populace came out in droves to seek shelter in the subway, a much safer haven than their own homes. What I saw in many of Brandt’s photographs was the strong sense of ‘life goes on’.

Two photographs in the exhibition will forever remain in my mind.

First is the Liverpool Street Underground Station Shelter during an air raid in November, 1940. The photograph shows a family sleeping soundly, bedding against the grooves in between the steel structures of the tunnel. But look more carefully, there’s even a bunk and blanket for a doll beside the child. They all look peaceful and calm.

For the archive in my mind, let me call this photo: “The Doll in the Subway”

The second picture by Brandt is in the Elephant and Castle London Underground Station Shelter. Here, people sleeping on the crowded platform while taking shelter from German air raids during the Blitz.

But look how they were dressed in. The mid-heel pump the woman in the foreground was wearing caught my attention. Looks like she was dressed for work. Blitz or no Blitz, after she woke in the morning, she had to go to work. Life as usual.

In my mental archive, this photo will now be entitled “The Mid-heel Pump”.

What more, after civilians had crowded into the subway stations against government’s advice, the officials had to respond with helpful measures by installing chemical toilets, first aid facilities, and providing drinks, while the people created their own entertainment. With all due respect to the victims of the Blitz, the resilience and adaptability of the Londoners are most inspiring.

After I stepped out of AGO, I wanted to go back in to take a more careful look at the exhibits again. But that was not feasible so I had to write this post from memory (no photos of the exhibits were allowed) and from some online digging. Glad to have found these two memorable images from the Imperial War Museum website. Thanks to AGO, these two historic photos will remain in my mental archive for a long, long time.

CLICK HERE to see 9 Incredible photos of the London Underground as Bomb Shelter.

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Related Posts on Ripple Effects:

The Frank Gehry designed Art Gallery of Ontario

Sketches of Frank Gehry (2005)

Art Gallery of Alberta

Saturday Snapshot February 22: Austen Doors and Windows

Continuing with the theme of doors and windows, let’s hop over to the UNESCO city of Bath. I was there twice. These are a few photos I took on those trips.

The beloved author Jane Austen lived there from 1801 – 1806 after her family moved from her birthplace Steventon when she was 26. Their first address was 4 Sydney Place:

In their last year in Bath the family moved to 25 Gay Street:

Down the road to No. 40 is the Jane Austen Centre:

The Great Pump Room was a social hub in Austen’s day. Her observations there must have inspired her satirical descriptions of high society in Northanger Abbey. Now an elegant restaurant:

Austen used Bath as the setting for her novel Persuasion. Milsom Street was a vibrant commercial area of shops and businesses in those days as in now. The first time Anne Eliot saw Captain Wentworth again was when he passed by a shop on Milsom Street.

Here’s a modern day shop window, Milsom & Son, a music store:

No, Jane would not have stepped in there to shop for CD’s or DVD’s. But she would likely have gone into this place, Sally Lunn Bun, the oldest building in Bath dating back to 1482 and a business that was present in Jane’s time. There’s a Kitchen Museum in the basement of the restaurant:

How can I resist showing you what’s inside the door and window:

You might like to explore more of Bath in my other posts Jane Austen’s Bath and Bath’s Persuasion in which I recorded my walking tour using the novel Persuasion as a guidebook.

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. Click Here to see what others have posted.

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Saturday Snapshot February 15: Windows & Doors

By now, I’m sure many of you are tired of looking at white and greyish stuff, be it snow, or its liquid form. Let me take you on my escapade to Provence, France, and continue to bask in some warm colours.

This time, we’re looking at windows and doors. Again, they are photos from my trip to Avignon and Arles in the summer of 2010.

Now here’s the trick: Choose a photo. Look intensely at it for one minute then close your eyes and let the image imprint in your mind. When you reopen your eyes, I’m sure you won’t see white. Let’s just dream a little dream of warm summer daze.

Saturday Snapshot is hosted by Melinda of West Metro Mommy Reads. CLICK HERE to see what others have posted.

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ALL PHOTOS TAKEN BY ARTI OF RIPPLE EFFECTS.
DO NOT COPY OR REBLOG