Today was a beautiful Spring day for a walk along one of our favourite city trails here in Vancouver, the Admiralty Trail in the Pacific Spirit Park. How different were the colours today, a wonderful array of greens and umbers, compared to the rich reds and yellows of the Fall, which you will have seen last October in my post for the Weekly Photo Challenge: Boundaries. Take a moment to look back yourselves and compare; I think you’ll find it’s worth it.
For this inaugural Discover Challenge: Blogging the Senses, Cheri asks us publish a post that piques one of the five senses, hearing, sight, touch, smell, and taste, having found inspiration herself in an interview with medieval book historian Erik Kwakkel. Since we are free to “interpret this in any way, and in any format: prose, poetry, photography, audio, video,” and having been also inspired by Erik Kwakkel’s blog myself thanks to Cheri’s introduction, I thought how appropriate this would be to revisit the Abbey of St. Antimo, a former Benedictine Monastry in the commune of Montalcino in Tuscany, which I blogged about over two years ago.
The map is from a journal I kept during our Italian travels in 2000, and the entry for the 21st of April describes our visit to the Abbey that day. As you can read we took the bus from Siena to Montalcino and then walked the 10 kilometres to St. Antimo.
The video is from the photographs I took during that memorable 10 kilometre walk through the magnificent Tuscan countryside. I hope your senses will be piqued as you enjoy the beauty of those Tuscan hills and listen to the Gregorian chant, “Haec Dies” from “Mysterium” a recording made in the Abbey in April 1995 by the five fathers of the Communita die Canonici Regolari di Sant’Antimo.
Thanks to Jen’s Weekly Photo Challenge: Seasons, yesterday we visited Vancouver’s beautiful Queen Elizabeth Park and captured, in a few snapshots, a sunny Saturday afternoon in one of our city’s special places.
Queen Elizabeth Park, Vancouver
The open crocuses, rhododendrons and snowdrops, a wedding in the sunshine, children playing peek-a-boo around the Henry Moore sculpture and dancing in front of the fountains, the tulips and daffodils getting ready to burst through, a leisurely cyclist, and all against the backdrop of the city, blue sky and cumulus clouds – I hope your spirits are as uplifted as ours were.
I’ll be back when the flowers are in bloom to share the glorious array of colours that await.
Thanks Jen.
January: As I started my 365 day challenge and the days moved from single to double figures I wondered if I could really achieve my goal of posting every day for a year. Now, looking back with amazement as it looks as though I might actually succeed, there have been so many days filled with happiness, joy and at times a real sense of achievement but also too many others filled with a weary sadness, days that have now become deeply embedded in our collective consciousness. The year was only seven days old when we all became Charlie, as I wrote on the studio floor on January 7th and on my palette four days later when the world showed its solidarity with the millions marching in Paris and France on January 11th:
I felt that the world stood still in sympathy and remembrance for a few days as we all collected our thoughts before moving on with our lives. I certainly did and was more determined than ever to ensure that my goal was met. The studio became my sanctuary and as the year progressed I found I was creating more and more freely and often with surprising results.
Over the next few days I’ll revisit some of those creations, and there seem to be a surprising number of them.
This homage to my hero Henri Matisse I posted on January 24th in anticipation of our visit to New York to see the exhibition of his Cut-Outs at The Museum of Modern Art, which we almost didn’t make because of the severe winter weather on the East Coast. Although we had to cancel all of our bookings we were able to reschedule and New York, New York became the highlight of February, of which more tomorrow…
Victory Square, Vancouver 18.11.15
One week ago today this square was filled with many thousands attending the 95th Annual Remembrance Day Service…
Two days later war came again to the streets of Paris and sadly another date must now be added to an ever-growing list of days of remembrance:
…and too many more.
We will remember…We must Remember
Here we are back home again and it’s Day 300. After all the glorious colours in England and France all I had to do today was step outside to find autumn had come to my own back door.
It’s hard to believe that three hundred days have gone by since I committed to posting every day throughout the year, and so far I have been able to keep to my goal. On both Day 100 and Day 200 I looked back at some of the paintings from the previous one hundred days, so it seemed like a good idea to do so for Day 300 today.
Only sixty five more days to go.
Home tomorrow after two glorious weeks travelling in Southern England and South West France with dearest friends. The photos each day have been just a selection of so many magical and unforgettable moments; and how lucky we have been that the weather cooperated with blue skies and sunshine almost every day.
Thanks to all of you who joined us, albeit virtually. It was great to be able to share the holiday with you and I hope you enjoyed it as much as we did.
…for J and V.
If you go down to the woods today…
Walking in the woods today the music and words of Teddy Bear’s Picnic immediately came to my mind as I tramped in muddy boots through the trees. I hadn’t thought about the song for many years but it’s one that is so familiar to me, and I suspect to many of your reading this, and yet I knew nothing about its origins. Thanks to Wikipedia I discovered the melody was written by the American composer John Walter Bratton in 1907, and the lyrics were added by the Irish songwriter Jimmy Kennedy in 1932. The first vocal recording was by Henry Hall and his orchestra in 1932. Enjoy his classic recording as you “go down to the woods” with me, although “you better go in disguise.”
The highlight of today was our visit to Saint-Emilion, listed as a world heritage site by UNESCO in 1999. After climbing the 171 steps of the bell tower the view of the town and the surrounding countryside was simply and (literally!) breathtaking.
I’m not sure how much more of this I can take!
This morning’s view of the bridge over the Dordogne which leads to the centre of Bergerac.
The main square of the 13th century bastide town Monpazier, a member of Les Plus Beaux Villages de France, and where we had baguette and cheese for lunch.
The spectacular Chateau de Biron which we toured in the afternoon.
This balcony of cascading flowers in the main square of the bastide town of Villeréal was a colorful climax to another memorable day. It just keeps getting tougher!
thechangingpalette 