Paris

June 6 - 12

My wife and I had a kid free trip to Paris, here are some of the photo highlights.

We had a hotel near the Seine which proved to be fortuitous for photography, I had not really done any research so did not have any real plans from a photography point of view. My wife had done the basic travel research so we hit some of the tourist highlights.

The Conciergerie is an old palace that was later a prison. Marie Antoinette was held here before she was excuted during the French Revolution. Neat place, but not super photographic (at least to my landscape eye).

The outside of Sainte-Chapelle, an old Gothic Chapel for the French Kings. Outside = kind of boring

Inside = amazing almost floor to ceiling stained glass, just wow

Unfortunately, like most pretty places in Paris, it was packed with people, still totally worth seeing.

Another day we headed north to Sacré-Cœur Basilica. Pretty church, but there was a church service going on and we don't like to be disrespectful to others, so we did not spend much time inside. Outside was a tourist shit show that detracted from the views of the city. We did not linger long.

After dinner one night we got back to the hotel around 10ish, my wife was tired and I was not.
I said, "I'm going for a walk along the river"
My wife said, "Be careful, don't get mugged"
I had a great couple of hours, Paris and the Seine is very beautiful at night.

Along the Seine during the day, not quite as pretty, but still nice.

There are a lot of bridges across the Seine of varying ages/architecture. It made for an interesting walk.

One night, I dragged my wife out after an earlier dinner to see the sunset (about 10pm) and an after dinner drink ...

... and then I went hiking some more,

Musee d'Orsay and the Eiffel Tower

And with the moon, I can't decide which version I like better

The next morning, I woke up early for some reason. So I left my wife sleeping and grabbed coffee at Starbucks nearby and enjoyed a couple hours along the early morning Seine. I decided that this was a good time for a different type of reflections.

I did take a couple "normal" reflection photos as well. 

I really liked this old wooden motor boat passing by. I had seen it or something similar the previous day. I think they do expensive private boat tours, sort of wish we had ponied up for something like that :)

The last full day we went to the Musee d'Orsay, it was packed with tourists with selfy sticks. The art was great, but the crowds were horrible. The view of Sacré-Cœur was nice though

Not in the photographic record, we went to the Lourve Museum twice (once by ourselves and once with a private guide). We had a couple nice dinners, we wandered around a couple ok neighborhoods, but nothing I wanted to photograph. We walked past Notre Dame a couple different times, but this was only a couple months after the fire, so scaffolding and fences, i.e. not photograph worthy.

In the end, June in Paris is just to crowded to enjoy the obvious tourist stuff. I'll go back, but only in the winter when it is cold and wet and most of the tourists are somewhere else.

Red River Gorge Veranda

Jun 3 - 4 2019 (1 night)
Red River Gorge (Daniel Boone NF)
2019 bag nights: 4

I wanted to test out a lens for astrophotography and got permission for a quick overnight trip. At the last minute, my wife suggested I take my son for some boy's time, sure why not since I was not planning on anything hard.

We had an easy hike to "The Veranda" where I was a little disappointed to find a solo camper already set up. I figured I'd have the place to myself in the middle of the week. He had a hammock so was back in the trees while we setup the tent near the end and a nice view. I talked to him a little bit before dinner and probably would have chatted more, but this was supposed to be "boys time" with my son.

Texting mom with my InReach

Afterglow from the sunset, this is looking east towards Hansons Point

My son went to bed and I watched the stars and had a splash to drink, but it was pretty obvious that the clouds were going to ruin astrophotography.

I left my camera set up to take photos all night. There was enough humidity that the lens ended up coated with dew by the morning, but you can still see the milky way rising here (about midnight).

We woke up and made a small fire in an existing fire ring. He had hot chocolate and I had some coffee.

While packing up the tent, we found a small praying mantis which he thought was pretty cool. 

Then one last photo ...

... and down the trail 

Grays Arch, notice my son in the lower right corner for scale.

Then pizza at Miguels and home. Note: we don't usually drink soda, but this was a "celebration". He wanted Sprite but they only had Mountain Dew. I told him that I loved it when I was his age (can't stand it now). So his first Mountain Dew, he thought it was awesome and mentions it all the time. I think he needs to go backpacking again if he wants some more :)

A great trip with my son, I'm glad my wife suggested that I take him.