Some Chicago snaps

Here are some snaps of Chicago. The first one is view of Lake Shore Dr taken from Hancock Tower. The second snap is also taken from Hancock Tower. The third photo is of Cloud Gate in Millenium Park.

Chicago!!

We reached Chicago this evening. In the evening we visited John Hancock Observatory. It's a 94th floor observatory with an amazing view of downtown Chicago and Lake Michigan! I will post some photos I took with our new Panasonic FZ-35.

Chicago seems to be an amazing place! So lively! So full of energy! In contrast to sleepy (not sleepless) Seattle! I just love these big and fast cities. After all I am a Mumbaikar to my core!

What the h##l is Twitter?

Like me, I am sure you would have heard of Twitter. Like me, I don't whether you are ignorant of what it is. I was browsing the Net and somehow ended up on Twitter. So I said to myself, 'why not create an account? And I will soon find out what Twitter is.' So that's what I have done. While registering, it asked me whether I want follow some other Twitter users and gave some options. I have chosen to follow CNN and Time. Hopefully, I will soon find out what Twitter does.

By the way, it's Friday night. We will travel some place tomorrow, but haven't decided where. We have two options - Mt Saint Helen's and Mt Baker. I think Mt Baker is more beautiful, but I am tending towards Mt St Helen's because I have all the information about where to go and what points to see. We plan to leave tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. We will decide where to go in the morning. Well, I better go to sleep. It's close to 2 a.m. and I will have to wake up at 6 a.m. in the morning.

A plane with a view

It was not a part of our itinerary. When we planned our trip to San Diego and Los Angeles, we planned to see Sea World, Universal, Hollywood, and Disney. We even considered visiting LegoLand, an idea that we eventually dropped. However we never thought of adding Mount Rainier on our itinerary. You would say, it's obvious that you won't be visiting Mount Rainier if you are travelling to southern California.

To our utter surprise and much joy, we saw the most unexpected view of Mount Rainier on our way to California! How? Here's how it happened. The Seattle sky was covered with clouds as usual. For a moment we could see nothing as the airplane pierced through the layer of clouds. When the plane was above the clouds all we could see were clouds all the way to the end of the horizon, and one more thing - a huge Mount Rainier standing tall above all. It was a good view, but there was more to come. As the plane moved ahead it went very close to Mount Rainier. A few minutes later we were just top of Mount Rainier to its North West.

Then the plane took a turn and cruised to the south of the peak. The view that we had of the peak of Mount Rainier from the top was one of them most amazing views I have ever had in my lifetime. Unfortunately I did not have my camera at hand, and the fasten seatbelt sign was on. So I couldn't capture the picture for you all to see.

Trip to Scotland

13th November was first wedding anniversary for Poornima & I, and there was no better place for us to be than Scotland! The beauty of Scotland was so overwhelming that I consider it as one of the most beautiful places I have ever visited. I do not remember any previous trip in last few years to any part of the world (and I have travelled a lot in last few years!) when I was so swept away by the natural beauty of a place. Not even in Mauritius. Scotland was absolutely amazing!! It was inconceivably beautiful.

We left for Scotland knowing that it's a good place to visit. But little did we know that it was going to blow our minds off! The first hint of what really lay ahead for us came during the train journey to Edinburgh. Just as the train crossed Berwick-upon-Tweed, the last town in England on the route, the railway track ran parallel to the sea, less than 100 meters from the shore. Every other moment we could see beautiful blue sea in front of us with flocks of seagulls hovering over it. The wonderful views of sea would only be interrupted by equally thrilling vistas of green trees that were changing colour in anticipation of the advancing winter. Since then it was a journey to the heaven for the next three days.

In Marathi there's a phrase, "DoLyAnche pAraNe fiTaNe". That's what you experience in Scotland ... wherever you go.

Second Trip to London

On Saturday, we went for our second trip to London. We walked across the London Tower Bridge and then spent hours at London Tower. We saw the Kohinoor diamond. I was more interested in Shivaji Maharaj's Bhavani Talvaar (sword), but it has been shifted to another place and is no longer available for display. In the evening we sat along the banks of Thames and ate puri bhaaji which we had packed for the trip. We went to Nilesh Gujare's place for dinner and ate paav bhaaji for the first time after coming to UK. On the whole it was a great trip to a great city, London.