June included a visit from my friend Mowgli, who spent several days in paris getting trapped in elevators, seeing the sights, and eating well. After he was forced to leave paris by the police, we took a trip to southern germany, visiting stuttgard and munich, where his parents were born. The weather was agreeable, and visiting germany was certainly easier with a german speaker around. Shots here are of the flowers around the pond in the center of Stuttgard, close to the opera building, the fountain next to the train station, everybody looking up at the Munich glockenspeiel as it does it's dance on the hour, and finaly, mowgli, in tourist mode atop the radio tower overlooking Stuttgard.
On the heels of mowgli's visit, my mother returned with a yen to see the french gardens. Visits to the various gardens in Paris, followed by road trip to Versailles, and Monet's garden at Giverny ensued. Shots here include the calalillies outside Marie Antoinette's "rustic village" at Versailles, An almost perfect picture of the symmetry of the little trinton palace, a shot of the yellow marigolds outside the grand trinton palace, a closeup of the door at the Chartes cathedral, and finally a picture from the Giverny garden.
In August, before returning home, I spent a weekend in Normandy, thanks to my collegue Thomas. His mother's house isn't far from Omaha beach, and Caen, so I took a picture of the caen cathedral, of the american cemetery that overlooks omaha beach, a picture of the beach itself, chosen for it's gentle slope, and length, and finally, a picture of my host and his girlfriend valarie. The shot that looks like a golf course was a german bunker on top of the cliffs with heavy guns that was pounded by bombs and shells by the americans the day of the invasion. Impressive!