|
The above will search Traveljapanblog.com. Concerts - Landscapes - Sports |
To wrap up this brief tour of Washington D.C. (which I pre-blogged to cover for me while I’m on a trip to Seattle) we end with a picture of the back of the White House. We met some nice guys from Norway at this location, not realizing that we would be visiting Norway less than a month later.
We had only a morning to explore D.C. before we headed back to the airport to catch our flight to Copenhagen (the flight we missed the day before which caused our brief stay in the nation’s capital). This was actually a good thing as we missed the crowds and heat of the day. We didn’t miss the morning commute into D.C. from Virginia though.
Today’s picture is from the Iwo Jima Memorial in yesterday’s entry. If you are viewing the front of the monument you need only turn around to see the above view of traffic gridlock on a weekday morning. The Capitol Building and Washington Monument can clearly be seen in the background.
With all of the images on TV these days of Washington D.C. I figured I’d share a few of my own from this past summer.
Today’s photograph is from inside the taxi cab that took us from our hotel in Virginia to D.C. I actually have several pictures of the Iwo Jima Memorial (Marine Corps War Memorial) that are much better than this, but I like this one for the no left turn sign. I also like this picture because it shows how huge this monument is. I always imagined it as being life size since pictures usually show only the monument with no frame of reference. The figures aren’t six feet in height though. They are more than 5 times larger than life as you can see by comparing them to the two people on the right of the base.
I hope you’ve enjoyed these past couple of weeks “traveling” through Italy. Today will complete Italy, and we’ll get back to our regularly scheduled program of Japan tomorrow (unless I’m snowed in somewhere).
The above photograph is of the Victor Emmanuel Monument in Rome. Although “only” a hundred years old or so, it has a somewhat classical feel to it. Apparently some very ancient sites were destroyed in the building of it, though, which is unfortunate. The views from the top are supposed to be great, but we didn’t go inside, let alone up to the roof.
Our final picture of Italy will be this rather humorous one of Moses with horns. One of the many translation errors in the Bible once had Moses with horns coming out of his head, rather than rays of light or shiny skin, in Exodus 34:29. So you see several paintings and sculptures (some by Michaelangelo) of Moses with horns while walking the streets or browsing the art galleries in Italy.
When I turned the corner where the above picture was taken I had no idea I was about to see the Pantheon. What an amazing surprise it was to be walking around the streets of Rome and stumble on this scene.
The ruins of the Roman Forum are a must see while in Rome. I was fascinated to walk through it and feel the history.
From the vantage point in the above photograph you can also see the Coliseum (background, slightly left of center), a place I pictured in my imagination to be off by itself. Instead there is vehicle traffic buzzing around it constantly. The Coliseum was a bit of a disappointment in that regard but still incredible to tour on the inside.
I’m not sure if this is the same every day, but on the day we visited St. Peter’s there were tons of people lined up in the morning to enter. Once we got in we could barely move and it wasn’t all that enjoyable.
After St. Peter’s we went into the Vatican Museum (which was also extremely crowded). In late afternoon, after coming out of the Vatican, we noticed that there was no line for St. Peter’s so we walked back in. The difference was striking. Not only was the place relatively empty but the afternoon sun was streaming in making the place far more beautiful.
This is the main dome. It is hard to capture just how huge it is in a picture. Imagine a person floating up there. Well, you’d barely be able to see them. That’s how big it is.
Here we see a couple of Swiss Pikemen guarding the Vatican doors. These are real guards, not just props for the tourists to take photographs of. I think their official title is something like Papal Swiss Guards. If you have played Age of Empires II or III you know a pikeman can easily be taken out with a few crossbowmen. đŸ˜‰