Glad September is over

Last month I briefly listed the September events.  So many things happened after that post (Sept. 6th).  First off, I turned 70 on September 12.  I'd planned a birthday event mainly to head off my siblings' plans for a surprise celebration.  I took a bunch of people to lunch and a baseball game:  Washington Nationals vs. Florida Marlins (surprise:  I wasn't paying attention to the game). 
Lunch was in the PNC Diamond Club.  

How kind of Joe to point to my age!

Now that's a nice venue with a well-prepared and varied series of buffet tables.  According to my contact there, the menu changes seasonally.  Those lucky people were, in addition to Joe and me, my brothers John, Charles, Paul and Richard (Regis was in England for some shoot or other) and my sisters Ellen and Elizabeth.  And also Letty (Richard's wife) and Ric (Ellen's husband) and Mary (Regis' wife) and nephews Chris, Dave and John, and cousin Leo.  And, best of all, Lorelei, Andreas and Obree and Ray, Tara and Matthew.  So once that was done and I hauled all those presents(!) home, time to think about and pack for the next three weeks when I'd be gone.

Little fingers sneaking into the frosting . . . .

Where did I go?  First on Sept. 16, I flew to Chicago where Obree's 2nd birthday was to be celebrated with a party in the local park.  Well, it rained the night before and morning of, and who wants to party on wet ground?  So the apartment was cleaned and cleared, additional chairs brought in, food and drink set out, birthday cake refrigerated, and even Obree joined in the cleaning - - he likes to do what the grownups are doing.  Andreas' parents, Bruce and Carol, arrived first, complete with a really neat model plane that Andreas had as a kid.  They hung this great thing from the very high ceiling where air currents gently turned it this way and that. 



Bruce & Carol & the plane





Tiny guests enjoying O's tent.



Obree's bedroom was turned into a playroom for the 14 or 16 kids who came.  They were pretty much children from his Montessori school, from little Violet at 9 months up to Oliver, age 5.  Incredible energy and noise and fun happened in that playroom.  Adults wandered in every now and then and back out again to enjoy adult conversation and sandwiches and beer.  And of course a cake and presents and goodie-bags for kids.

I flew on to Rochester the following Monday, for the World Canals Conference.  Too bad I missed the great flotilla and celebration held the day before I arrived.  But I was there for the amazing "Dinner in the Ditch" - - the ditch being an old Erie Canal aqueduct over the Genesee River, on top of which a road bridge had been constructed.  But what is amazing is that the aqueduct STILL EXISTS!  And there are plans afoot to restore the old Canal AND the aqueduct through the city.  Yes, there was a great dinner on the old aqueduct.



The aqueduct is below the bridges small arches.





Add carpeting, lighting, furniture:  voila!



The conference was full of interesting papers being given and interesting nearby Erie Canal towns to visit and a great many old and new friends to spend time with.  There were 15 of us from the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal Association.  All the many Davids from England and Canada (and France, where one expat Brit resides).  And a group of funny and interesting US and Canadian women, all working for their national parks.

The final event - a treat! - was a visit to Niagara Falls - about 3 dozen of us did that.  What an experience!  Getting blasted on the little Maid of the Mist boat by great hurricane-gusts of wet wind - no wonder we were each handed a blue plastic poncho.  The volume and force of the water flowing over the rock is wondrous to behold and to feel, even from a goodly distance.  The roaring sound of the falls, the rocking of the little boat, indeed, the tiny size of the boat in relation to the waterfall . . . definitely worth being there. 
Following that, I spent the next week . . . . but that's another post altogether.



The American Falls at Niagara



Drenched on the Maid of the Mist boat.



David Edwards-May attempts to dry his soaking shoes.  Please note the puddle beneath his feet!



Globus Tour, June 21 - on the mainland to Sorrento

I'll add some photos to this later on . . .

Back on the good old Globus bus to the ferry station, and cross the sea from Sicily to Messina.  Then a long long ride through some farming country, with a brief reststop at an Agip for the tiniest espresso ever.

We zipped past Amalfi and the coast and found ourselves in Sorrento - facing a hotel entry that was really a long tunnel.  Perhaps the town of Sorrento is on such a cliff that tunneling from the road to the hotel was more practical than using valuable surface land for a driveway?

We had a really lovely room overlooking the pool area on the left and a large patio area with many tables, chairs and couches well spaced from each other.  The rest of the afternoon was unscheduled.  It was a short walk into the town.  There is one wee street too narrow for vehicles, but crammed with shops of all varieties.  And like the street, the shops were also narrow but long.

Today's schedule called for an open-air dinner, after touring a shop that sold inlaid wood pieces.  Too bad that there is so much selling being pushed at us.  It's not my preference, and besides, I was never big on accumulating lots of stuff.  So - - the dinner was in a fairly large square beneath a tent.  It was a fixed menu - like all of the other group dinners, you ate it or not.  But it was a very pleasant evening  We sat at two very long tables.  A wandering guitarist stopped to serenade several of the diners.  And the weather was perfect, the town was quietly buzzing, and the food was good - not memorable but good.