Berit & Chris's weblog

Montmartre

Today, we climbed the steps to Sacre-Coeur, which is located Northeast of the city centre. Avoiding the somewhat aggressive street sellers (and pigeons), we made it to the top to enjoy a fantastic 180 degrees view of the city. The first stone for the white catholic church of Sacre-Coeur was laid at the end of the 19th century; the church, nevertheless, was only completed in 1914 and not consecrated until 1919 after the end of World War I. The interior of the church contains one of the worlds’ largest mosaics, depicting Christ with outstretched arms, and the nearby bell tower contains one of the worlds’ heaviest bells at 19 tons. From the top of the Dome, one has a panoramic view of 30 km in all directions. Unfortunately, due to a recent paint attack, access to the Dome had been abandoned.

After a brief look around the church, we headed for the artistic quarters of Montmartre, a few blocks West. Montmartre is famous for its many street painters, cosy narrow streets and cafés. We both fell in love with some small portraits of an old man, but due to the sad current state of our finances, Chris settled for a sneaky digital pic instead. We then headed for Moulin Rouge in the red light district and in close proximity of Sacre-Coeur. Unfortunately, the show house looks nothing like in the film ‘Moulin Rouge’, but it does have the famous red windmill on the roof.

After an early meal near the opera, we took an evening walk to the gardens in and around the Louvre, which unfortunately, being as it’s still terrorist season, was locked shut. Luckily, the fun fair on the edge of the park was still open to keep us amused. The fun fair contains one of the largest Ferris wheels either of us has ever seen and, although seemingly appearing to be a temporary set-up, it has been there at least two years, as I was not well enough to go on it last time we were here.

Wi-Fi pay as you go?

I've just discovered a new (to me anyway) Wi-Fi service from Meteor Networks covering the hotel we're staying at in Paris. Finally it seemed that someone had appeared to have figured out a nice and easy way to get wi-fi to the masses. It doesn't utilise WEP encryption and as long as your not using a proxy server (took me ages to figure that one out!) it will allow you to connect using any browser. I'm currently using Palm Web Pro v3.0 by Novarra (www.novarra.com) on a Tungsten C and I also checked it on the default browser - Palm Web Browser v2.0.1.1 by Access and it seemed to work fine on both.

Once you start your browser, and your connected to METEOR (found IP address etc), hit refresh and it redirects you to a log in page. Here you have 4 payment options. The first is to simply input a password from a payment card (bit like a top up card for phones) which were available in the lobby. The other options are paying by credit/debit card, SMS or by your mobile number through your operator (eventually to the phone bill, arghh reminds me of dial up!). The SMS option involves sending two txts but upon reading the description 'Remember that a 10 mn connexion costs 3 euros + SMS (that is to say two SMS at 1.5 euros each)' I decided it would be cheaper to use the top up card or credit card options. Although I wasn't going to risk it I should give them the benefit of the doubt and put the 10 mn down to a translation thing and not meaning 3 euros for 10 minutes! In the end I just bought a top up card for 5 euros which gave me 30 mins.

Unfortunately the data transfer speed was pretty slow so my 30 mins was quickly up. This pretty much finalises the conclusion on that alone as it's definately overpriced. I suppose it is limited by the number of users connected but I can't imagine that it was being used extensively at the time. Should have guessed from the transfer rate on Meteor Networks own pages, which it lets you navigate through prior to logging on. It's this fact that has lead me to believe that it has something to do with the security (cookies etc) that limits it's overall performance.

It's short fate was also sealed when I found that a friendly neighbour had left an open access point which worked fine, and much much faster but only if I dangled out the window, ah well, one can't be fussy :-) This piece of luck also highlighted another annoyance as even though I was connected to the open wi-fi point on hitting the homepage function it would link back to the Meteor Networks log in page. I was worried that it had modified my homepage but this was not so, probably more likely that it was due to the poor signal availability from the open access point.

So the final conclusion is that it's too expensive, especially with the slow transfer rate, and they need to reduce the amount of bandwidth taken up by the security function although I would like to understand this further. Also helps if a friendly neighbour isn't covering the same area with a free and faster service, shame really, nice try though!

PS whilst writting this blog on the palm and getting truly annoyed with the copy limitation of the clip board in the palm OS, Memo Pad v4.5.1P in this case, I accidentely discovered that Word To Go has fixed this problem (thank you DataViz) so I now write all my blogs using Word To Go :-) – update – unfortunately although the copy and paste function is hacked within docs to go as soon as you try to utilise it in another palm program (palm pro V for example whilst trying to update blog) the restriction is re applied so scratch that last note :-(

A Paris

We spent most of yesterday, the day we arrived in Paris, browsing the streets near our hotel and around l'Opera. This also included a quick look at the large decorative Galeries La Fayette, Paris' famous shopping centre. From the roof terrace of the Galeries one has an unspoilt view of some of the best known sights in the city, including the Eiffel tower, Notre Dame and Sacre-Coeur. We rounded off the evening with a romantic meal, celebrating our two-year anniversary which, looking at both of our past records, is a miracle indeed :-)

Today, we spent some five hours covering a fraction of the art collections at the Louvre, one of the worlds' finest museums. The Louvre was originally a royal palace, until the transformation to public museum was commenced under Louis XVI (1774-92). The Grande Gallerie was opened by Napoleon in 1793, and in the decades following, the first collections and works of art were put on display. These included the former royal collections (which after the revolution became the national collections), works of art from churches, convents and the nobility. Meanwhile, additional buildings were added to the existing structure, decorated to suit this new 'palace for the people'. Finally, the signatory glass pyramid was constructed in the courtyard and inaugurated in 1989.

The museum is home to some of worlds most famous and significant pieces of art, including sculptures such as 'Psyche and Cupid', 'Venus de Milo' and 'The Winged Victory of Samothrace', and paintings including the 'Mona Lisa', 'Wedding Feast at Cana' and 'The Madonna of the rocks'. Sadly, the 'Mona Lisa' by Da Vinci had been moved to a new location recently and as such was no longer situated in the Grande Gallerie. Still it generates an enormous amount of interest (scrum some would say!) by visitors and has been the subject of continuous speculations, not least in the recent novel by Dan Brown, The Da Vinci Code. For pics and descriptions of above mentioned pieces of art, please click on More below.

If you're planning to visit the Louvre we recommend that, unless your French is particularly good, you invest in a guide book or rent a portable CD audio device, as we did, since all the descriptions by the paintings are in french only. We'd also advise that you fake a leg injury and borrow one of those fold-up electric buggies as there's miles of walking to do and unless your very fit (not us!) it's hard on the legs. Still, it's well worth it!

We concluded our day of culture with a walk through the gardens around the Louvre (Jardin des Tuileries), continuing up the Champs %-3lys%-1e to Arch de Triumph.

Picture 1: Sculpture of 'Psyche and Cupid'.

Picture 2: Sculpture of 'The Winged Victory of Samothrace'.

Picture 3: Sculpture of 'Venus de Milo'.

Picture 4: The Mona Lisa (or La Gioconda) by Leonardo Da Vinci was painted circa 1503/06 on wood, and measures 77 x 53 cm.

Picture 5: The Wedding Feast at Cana (or The Marriage at Cana) by Paolo Caliari (Veronese) was painted 1562/3 on canvas, and measures 666 x 990 cm. This immense painting, which transfigures a religious scene into a lavish worldly banquet, was destined for Palladio's Refectory in the Benedictine Convent on San Maggiore in Venice.

Picture 6: The Madonna of the Rocks by Leonardo Da Vinci was painted in 1483 on wood transferred to canvas, and measures 199 x 122 cm. According to best selling author Dan Brown: "Da Vinci's original commission for his famous Madonna of the Rocks came from an organization known as the Confraternity of the Immaculate Conception, which needed a painting for the centerpiece of an altar triptych in their church of San Francesco Grand in Milan. The nuns gave Leonardo specific dimensions and a desired theme—the Virgin Mary, baby John The Baptist, Uriel, and Baby Jesus sheltering in a cave. Although Da Vinci did as they requested, when he delivered the work, the group reacted with horror. The painting contained several disturbing "un-Christian" anomalies, which seemed to convey a hidden message and alternative meaning. Da Vinci eventually mollified the confraternity by painting them a second version of Madonna of the Rocks, which now hangs in London's National Gallery under the name Virgin of the Rocks. Da Vinci's original hangs at the Louvre in Paris." (source: danbrown.com)

Off to Paris

We are off to Paris early tomorrow morning. Last time we visited the city, I single-handedly managed to keep us well away from any attractions and places of interest due to a severe allergic reaction affecting my ability to walk. Instead, we spent most hours in the emergency room or with specialist doctors, and Chris had to carry me around until I was equipped with some rather trendy metallic-blue ‘cannes anglaise’. This time around, we are hoping to experience a little more of Paris.

Fahrenheit 9/11

Last night, we went to see the perhaps most talked-about film at the moment; Fahrenheit 9/11, written and directed by Michael Moore. Although clearly biased, antagonistic of the Bush administration and manipulative at times, this documentary brings into question points, which desperately need to be addressed in America. In the film, Moore not only questions the close personal and professional relationship between the Bin Laden family and Bush family, the inability of the President to act in the minutes immediately following the attacks on September 11, but also how several private jets were allowed to fly members of the Bin Laden family out of the country in the days following the attacks, while every other plane was grounded. Satirical, moving, sad and extremely frustrating, this controversial documentary has cinemagoers clapping in support of political change.

Cornish rescue run

In order for Chris to repair the camper van, we are spending the weekend in Cornwall with Linda and Claire. We arrived late Friday night after a not entirely smooth ride. Suffering from acute fuel trouble, the Mini slowed to an almost complete halt on the motorway. Fuel was disappearing fast and we were barely able to hold first gear, and locating a petrol station a mile further uphill, proved a real battle. Luckily, the fuel problem was easily fixed and an educating lesson in carburettors later, we were again cruising down the motorway.

After a quick trip to Plymouth and Liskeard for vital spares and a stop at beautiful Merryfield, Chris started work on the camper van. He ended up spending the remainder of the weekend in the garage as the engine had to come out!