Hang my Hat...

Well, I'm back from Turkey and I think I found a great place. Here's the view:



And, here is the entire Virtual Tour!

Lingua Franca

It was interesting in Spain. The last time I was there was with Charissa, and her Spanish was 'mas bien' than mine, so she did the heavy lifting of translating and I took pictures. This time, I had to step up to the plate. I felt I did quite well. There was a cab driver how didn't know were the company was and I was able to direct him. A couple of cafés without an English speaking wait staff. A guy asking me what time the train arrives in Barcelona. That felt pretty good.

Now, I am in Turkey. I have had a few lessons, but I just feel clueless. Restaurants are done with pointing. I would be lost in a cab if they didn't know 'Hilton'. This will take some time!

I start house hunting tomorrow. I guess 'apartment' hunting is more correct. It will be good to know where I will be...

España

A week of work deposited, and a weekend in Barcelona withdrawn. The weather, while cool, was very sunny all week. Then the weekend comes and the rain decided to hitch a ride. I was able to miss most of it on my outing in Barcelona on Saturday. I was interested in doing some higher resolution photographs, so headed of toward Parc Güell and Sagrada Família. I've had better weather, but did get some images. I'll have to wait until I am home to process most of them, but here is one:

Here is a larger version of the massive sixty mega-pixel image.

Sunday saw a trip to Girona, a medieval walled city a 90 minute train ride North of Barcelona. It was very certainly a time travel to walk on a wall that for years was the domain of soldiers. A different world where a couple of feet of stone could protect a city from a month long siege. Inside this fortification was an old town with its wonderfully twisty, narrow streets, houses of stone, and of course, a big cathedral. The rain held off for most of my stay, but came down about the same time the sun dropped, so I quickly found refuge in a small café on the bank of the River Onyar. I was in luck, too! The TV was turned to the 2005 Handball Championships where Spain was taking on Croatia. Spain took the game 40-34 against the former champions...

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