May vacation, stay in London

Early May is the period for our grandchildren to be in vacation.

Good opportunity to travel with them to London and discover or rediscover the England Capital.

Departure flight from Bordeaux on May 5 and return on May 9, 2013

The best introduction and welcome to London, is to travel around the capital using an “open-top sightseeing bus”. We chose the red route starting at Victoria station close to our hotel 

The route takes in the capital's most famous sights including Buckingham Palace, Big Ben & the Houses of Parliament, Downing Street, Madame Tussauds, The London Dungeon, Tower Bridge and The Tower of London

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                         

                                                                                                                                      

 In April 2012 British Telecom confirmed that just 11,000 of the 51,500 public kiosks remaining are "traditional red boxes", but this number is likely to reduce gradually 

Tower Bridge built 1886–1894, a bascule bridge over the River Thames close to the Tower of London from which it took its name.                                                                                                                     

A new building!!! The Shard (of glasses) opened to the public on 1 February 2013, stands at 309.6 meters (1,016 ft) high as the tallest building in the European Union

The changing guards of Buckingham palace 

This colorful and crowded ceremony is probably the top attractions in London! 

The London Eye is a giant wheel located on the River Thames banks

The entire structure Is 135 meters (443 ft) tall and offers a marvelous viewing point in the city.

It's the most popular paid tourist attraction in the United Kingdom, visited by over 3.5 million people annually. 

Hyde Park

Crowded people taking advantage of the warming sun on the serpentine lake’s bank 

Even the swan, very proud, appreciated  the nice weather

London Zoo is the world's oldest scientific. 

Today it houses a collection of 755 species of animals, but we were a little disappointed because lot of these animals were hidden or may be absents … difficult for a giraffe to be hidden

The British Museum dedicated to human history and culture 

...learning how to wrap the body…

We had a long stop at the Antiquities from
Egypt department discovering numerous mummies...

Madame Tussauds London is a major tourist attraction recreating famous people and celebrities in wax 

My granddaughter preferred to meet her favorite band “one direction” instead of meeting with her President!

A new guitar !

On April 29, I turned one year more and I received from ma family a marvelous gift… a guitar… 
a Fender dreadnought, an acoustic-electric guitar apple red.

Its name: Fender California Series Sonoran SCE

I particularly appreciate this new Fender model, looking great, with a traditional Fender headstock and its body style: dreadnought cutaway. The finish is shiny and high quality.

It plays very comfortably, sounding good, both on its own and through an amp

The auto tuner on the side is great and efficient

I’m really satisfied with this obtain thanks to my daughter family and my spouse.

Waiting next April 29… 

France Capital Visit

Paris tour, from Monday Jan 21 to Thursday Jan 24, 2013

For 4 days we were among the 42 million tourists who visit Paris each year.

Paris is the third most visited city in the world after Orlando and New York City 

Traveling by train was a good idea, because the weather (cold, snow and fog sometimes  ...)

La Beauce Plain under the snow

The Eiffel Tower was built as a "temporary" construction of Gustave Eiffel for the 1889 Universal Exposition

The tower is the tallest structure in Paris standing 320 meters (1,050 ft).

But as a temporal construction the tower was under the top removal when we tried to visit her …. 

Parc de la Villette, located at the northeastern hosts the 
Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie, the biggest science museum in Europe and the Cité de la Musique features a collection of several hundred musical instruments

Temporary exhibition of Django Reinhardt

Born in the back of a caravan, Django Reinhardt (1910-1953) belonged to the aristocracy of swing

He lost two fingers at age 18, when his caravan burned down but he triumphed as a brillant virtuosity

17th century guitars 

 

The Museum of Music contains instruments used from the seventeenth century to the present time. 

                Among 200 classical guitars we founded the

      Georges Brassens (famous French singer) guitar

Into the Cité des Sciences an temporary 

Leonardo da Vinci’s exhibition to re-discover the specific nature of this genius

The exhibition is based around the magnificent collection of 40 machine models created in the 1950s after Leonardo’s drawings. Visitors can understand who Leonardo was, this painter, engineer, favorite of princes, architect …

Transforming movements (part 2 of exhibition)

Perpetual motion wheels. Leonardo wanted to prove it was impossible to make a device whose movement continues indefinitely  

Imagining flight (part 5 of exhibition)

The mechanical wings which he drew transposed his observations of birds in flight 

François de Closets the famous writer,

 journalist and TV man, specialized in 

scientist topics was among the visitors 

Pompidou Center is a complex in the Beaubourg area

The idea for the Centre Pompidou as a nerve center of the French art and culture

Pompidou Center, with its “exposed skeleton of brightly colored tubes for mechanical systems”

Paris overlooked from the top of
Pompidou Center

The Louvre Palace which houses the museum was begun as a fortress by Philip II

During the French Revolution it was transformed into a public museum

Today, the Louvre Museum is one of the world's largest museums and a historic monument

A glass pyramid stands over a new entrance in the main Cour Napoléon

The Inverted Pyramid, was completed in 1993.

The Louvre Museum contains more than 380,000 objects as Egyptian antiquities, Near Eastern antiquities, Painting …

The Mona Lisa, Leonardo da Vinci, oil on panel, dated from 1503, probably completed while the artist was at the court of François First

And many thanks to my daughter for Christmas gift that 

allowed us to rediscover Paris !

Futuroscope theme park visit

The theme park is the top attraction in the Poitou-Charentes (near Poitiers) and second in France

The attractions change over the years, so the visitor return rate is 70%

In 2012, Futuroscope celebrates 25 years and offers an outstanding program

We visited the Futuroscope  for the second time,  sharing that celebration the November 7 and 8, 2012

We stayed at the Inter Hôtel Resort Alteora located in the Futuroscope area

Futuroscope overview

Attractions map

A panoramic view from the Gyrotour 

which spirals to 150 ft

iMagic:  probably the best-of. It is a show of illusions of the greatest scenes of Las Vegas

Arthur and the Minimoys, the 4D adventure has won a number of awards 

Based on the film created by Luc Besson, you not only watch, you also feel the jolts and strong sensations 

The large, IMAX® 3D images projected against the giant dome screen plunge visitors into the deep sea

The Kinémax with IMAX® 3D images: Everest conquest 

Cosmic collisions: take a breathtaking journey through space and time to witness the massive cosmic crashes that shape the universe. Dome screen with comments from the actor Lorant Deutsch

and more than twenty others amazing attractions ....

Futuroscope Digital City

Time spending with the best video games

The Children’s World, a unique place where both young and old can play a range of amazing games in a vast, open-air world of games

Playing as the bumper cars, but on the water with a amazing vehicle called Velodos

And the famous racing car with the drivers "graines de pilote" as showed on the below video

Cruise on Dordogne River

On Wednesday July 18, 2012

The name Dordogne come from the Celtic words Du unna meaning fast water. During the Roman Empire, the river was known as the Duranius, and evolved during the Middle Ages to Duranna, Durunia, Durdunia, Dordoigne and finally Dordogne

The river, whose source is in the Auvergne at the Puy de Sancy (1 886m/6 186ft), crosses five departments (Puy de Dôme, Corrèze, Lot, Dordogne and Gironde) before joining the Garonne river to form the Gironde estuary

The cruise leaves from La Roque Gageac:  

welcome aboard the Gabarre!

The Gabarre in front of
the Castelnaud bridge

The gabarres were the traditional flat-bottomed boats used on the Dordogne River for transporting goods between the Massif Central and the city of Bergerac, Libourne and Bordeaux

La Roque Gageac

The magnificent fortified village of 
La Roque Gageac built right into the 
cliff face obtained the title of 
“the most beautiful village in France”

Remain of an old road dating from

 the Gallo-Romain period

The village Hall of La Roque Gageac

In January 1957 a huge rock fell from the cliff face destroying a dozen houses and killing three people 

The little tour goes past a succession of old fortified villages and castles

Paradise for canoeing kayaking

Château de Malartrie

located at the exit of the village of La Roque Gageac

Château de Castelnaud

could have built in the 12^th century is one of the most visited châteaux in France with his Middle Ages Warfare museum