The Journey From Eternity To Light
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Leave a reason to return…
Despite my misperceptions of the city, Paris still held an undeniable allure. The two and half days we had devoted to seeing the sights was nowhere near enough; it was the sheer immensity and variety of attractions of the French capital. The arrondissements (“districts”) of the City of Light, twenty in all back in 2015, Continue reading
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Trompe-l’œil (“To deceive the eye”)…
The aim of the artistic technique of Trompe-l’œil is to deceive. Realistic imagery is used to create the illusion that objects exist in three dimensions. Much the same way that the romantic books and movies about Paris, the City of Light, beguiled me into an idealized image of the famous Capital. Continue reading
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Raison d’etre (“Reason for being”)…
We had three reasons why we chose Avignon. The First, it was on the very western edge of Provence and could perhaps offer us a different flavor of the region. For almost seventy years, from 1309 to 1377, the city was the home to a succession of popes; a “satellite” office of the Vatican in Continue reading
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Between rocks and hard places…
The entrance to Grotte de Saint Cezare (“Cave of Saint Cezaire”) was deceptive. The nondescript beige-colored building with the undersized balcony in the middle of the woods could not possibly be the entrance to an underground network of tunnels. Maybe this was the ticket office or the gift shop. We would still have to tromp Continue reading
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Moths to a flame…
Tuscany is replete with popular tourist attractions: the Statue of David, the Ponte Vecchio, the Duomo, the Leaning Tower of Pisa. The same could not be said of Provence; it has a unique appeal all its own. There was the scenic esplanade, the Promenade des Anglais, in Nice. Further west along the coast was the Continue reading

