2474. Travel pics. Chamonix snow mountain and train

Jun 22, 2015
Hotel Mercure Chaominx Les Bossons  Room 332. Good mountain view. 80 rooms. Tap unusual as you cannot see water flowing out of faucet. Excellent choice of breakfast with good bacon. Scrambled eggs watery. May be what the French like.

72-year-old man bled in nose yesterday due to exertion, helping the driver to pull out the luggages from the coach on arrival at hotel. Then he lugged his own luggage. Wheel broke. He bent down and nose bled. Giddy.

Guide said eyelid swelling and other arm and facial swelling normal. Take one tablet of pannadol and lots of sugar in coffee, the tour leader advised.

As the local guide Mary was sick owing to spotting from 5 months' pregnancy, there was a spare ticket. The Italian coach driver went up the mountains with us. He was rushing taking pictures and soon he staggered and fainted. A caucasian put his legs up and after a while he was conscious. Insufficent oxygen at 3000 m. high can kill a person. I stopped going out to the cold when I found myself breathless.

 

2473. Annecy and Chamonix

Jun 22, 2015

At Hotel Gap, local guide had to take medical leave - 5 months pregnant and spotting blood.
Motion sickness up mountains - one lady
Nose bleeding - a senior citizen



Base of Mount Blanc.

2472. Travel Picture Tips - Lavender farms, Valensole, France

Jun 21, 2015
Best Western Hotel Gap, France
Rm 206

A 3-star hotel with clean modern furnishings and good food and beverage services. No swimming pool but there is a public one some distance away. A veterinary clinic opposite. 4 years old and with 4 vets. An interesting wall mural of Noah's Ark with anaimals advertises the practice. Cats form majority of patients with horses at 20%. A weighing machine is on level with the waiting room floor.

I had to open the window to let the cold air in as this hotel has no air-conditioning and the bedroom became stuffy. A house-fly visited me at 4.30 am.

Visited Valensole where the lavender farms are as far as the eye can see.

TIPS
Travel pics must be taken speedily as the people get restless.  I used zoom lens mainly, except for the group photo. The others use handphones.

BEST PIC.
I was across the road.
Suddenly, this sports car appeared and stopped for a few seconds. So this presence of the drivers and red sports car add vibrance and variety to the image of blue, lavender and red. The driver waved and soon zoomed away. 

From inside the coach window. This is the best father who raised the bar very high for boyfriends. I hope the daughters can find husbands that meet the care and love of their father who is more a friend than an authoritarian.  

I commented on the coincidence of two ladies wearing zebra stripes on this lavender farm visit day

 Very restless group. The vocal lady said it is too hot to pose and so the camera people must be speedy. I used macro lens. Blue skies, lavender flowers, brown sand and this triangular angle makes an unusual pic.  The tour leader to the right was using her handphone which is handy. DSLR cameras provide sharp close ups and are used by 3 people. Handphone cameras are the trend. 


Dogs on holidays make great travel pic but you need to be very speedy and use a zooms lens on the dog's or owner's eyes to focus.

2471. Travel Picture Tips: Lavender flowers and stragglers

Jun 19, 2015

"You should have one tour guide to wait for the rest of the group," the two men scolded the tour leader as they boarded the coach at the parking lot in Roussell. "We waited at the designated area and even walked back to the cafe but nobody was around!"

The tour guide and the assistant assumed all had been present and had walked down from the meeting point. There were stragglers in a bigger group. Probably they had been having pizza and was late. When they arrived at the meeting point, all of us had strolled towards the coach parking area. They waited and waited. So the resentment and anger boiled with the tour leader bearing the grunt of their resentment. Not a happy ending to a tour.

"Cocked up" was what a lady summed up this situation. Even an experienced travel agent can forget to wait for the "stragglers". The problem was that the meeting area should be at the coach parking lot instead of a distant shop area between the sights and the parking lot.

We all learn from mis-management by being shouted at by some angry clients. Some angry customer are not so forgiving and would never admit their own actions had caused the problem in the first place.

2470. Avignon painter

Jun 18, 2015

Avignon has heritage places to visit. Churches, castles and bridges from the past.

Painter Coriz Thierry.
Best sellers are traditional water colour paintings of Avignon to tourists. Also do surreal paintings as it must be boring to do usual art pieces every day..
Has online sales, even selling to China.
Experienced. Present to sell paintings 7 months per year. Accredited.
Water colour painting exposed to sunlight appears not faded or browned. Bought a small painting to support the arts. He signed behind with pencil and stamped. 60 years old and enjoys his painting at the market place outside the Avignon Theatre.

Some pics.

A close family with children migrated to Canada but grandparents in China.

The staff at Van Gogh's mental institution had to be rough on tourists who want to take pictures of family members and friends among the lavender flowers in the garden. She even touched this lady to warn her to get the child away from the flowers. When she left to man the reception, more tourists, European and Asian, just pose amongst the lavender flowers.

Looking at the positive side, it will be better to have so many tourists than to have none the whole day long. But to the staff, the lavender flowers need protection from the crowds. Other than fencing up the lavender garden, human beings do not much care about the integrity of gardens. 
 

2469. Travel Day 3 - Dog travellers

Jun 18, 2015 is Day 3.

2 nights in the first hotel. Mercure. The bacon looked uncooked. Dare not eat it. Excellent big croissant and sweet strawberries.


Now, 2 nights in 2nd hotel. Ibis. No bacon, eggs or sausages for breakfast. Yesterday, the tour leader was scolded by one male traveller for not asking him whether he ate beef or not.

12 in the group of Singaporeans did not want beef. Pork was given. Even with over 10 years of experience, she had assumed that after 2 days of fish in Hotel Mercure, all would eat beef which is very expensive in Singapore. A standard operating procedure (check list) of asking food requirements during briefing or start of travel may be useful to avoid such unpleasantries.

Another challenge was the toilet stop before reaching this Hotel Ibis. Only the male disabled toilet without toilet seat in this toll gate stop was operational. The short ladies had a challenge.


Best pics are as follows:

At Les

 

2468. Travel pictures - Day 2

Jun 17, 2015

Some of the best travel pictures are fellow travellers rather than buildings as these can be seen in the internet and are dull. Unless you want to take a collection of eg. door frames.

Pics were taken using Canon EFS 55-250mm zoom lens, P mode and autofocus
Focus on the eyes
Amongst a group, focus on the eyes of the person in the middle. It is difficult when all wear sunglasses
Bright sunshine is best rather than shady areas, to bring out the best pic in people

Singapore tour leader (left) and French tour guide (right)

 

Ladies given a sales presentation on perfumes. Some are distracted by photographer

 

 

She was being photographed by her friend and hence looked away

 

A selfie by the happy tour leader (right)

 

The hat dominated the picture

 

Continuous speed captured one good image. White-eyed and nosed bee or wasp.
Bright sunshine at around 10 am, Fragonard perfume factory

 

 

Sat on a kerb and caught the little girl's eyes. She smiled