This building was undergoing a massive renovation of its exterior and put these construction tarps over the work site. The reason I took a picture of these is because of how different they were from the blue, black, or black with the company logo kind of tarps I saw previously. It's a nice way to keep the building interesting while work is being done.
Those umbrellas and sun chairs are provided by a nearby building for free. The food and other services, however, are not.
Not really impressive, is it? Especially without those body builders.
This building is several things in one nice location. It is a resturant, a swim suit store, changing room, bathroom, and as you can see from my photo, a place where we can observe the beach without getting sand in our shoes!
My map says that location is called Grand Hotel des Bains. If it is or not, I wouldn't know. I didn't go exploring that location out of fear that I would get lost, which happened a lot whenever I was left to explore places alone.
This attractive European was in a very nice composition with the way the stairs and where I was standing worked out. Unfortunately, his phone rang as I clicked the shutter, and as you can see, he was getting up to answer it. Still came out rather nice, but I wish I got the shot with him laying down.
A pair of attractive teens taking a break from tanning under the walkway us non-beachers use to get a better view of the shore. This was taken on Lido Island, which is where the real Venice beach is located.
The plaza of St. George Chruch/Island. Notice how high the water is now. I'm told that this plaza and St. Mark's Square are underwater during the colder seasons when there is more water flowing in the city.
St. Mark's Square in Venice as seen from St. George's Plaza/island on the other side of the canal.
The is the view outside my bedroom window in the flat we shared while in Barcelona.
The view from one of our flats in Barcelona. It overlooked a small alley and was right across the street from a day care.
Since you aren't allowed to take pictures inside the Picasso Museum, this was one of the few shots I was able to take. Unfortunately, due to the bad lighting situation and the fact I was using an ancient camera, most of them didn't come out.
Take a guess what they sell. Seriously, take a guess.
The Gothic Catedral from an ally along the back side. Kind of a creepy place to be late at night, but during a day like the one in this shot, it's... crowded with tourists.
A rough translation of the sign on the windshield says "I'm sorry, but I'll be back in three hours." What flight was this guy going on?
I missed out on getting a shot of one of these in Italy back when I visited Rome in 2000-1. I found this little guy parked in the airport on our way to Bilbao.
From this angle, Puppy looks like a toy sitting in the middle of a miniature play set. Or a really bored dog.
The Guggenheim Museum of Art in Bilbao
Designed by Frank Gehry
I can't remember for the life of me who designed this bridge or why it is so important. All I know is that walking across it was both scary and exciting at the same time.
The blaconies of Casa Lleo Morera are shaped like skulls and represent the knights that faced the dragon and failed. If you look closely at the base of the balcony, you can see their teeth as well!
This teir, designed by Gaudi, is suppose to look like the bones of the victems claimed by the dragon prior to its death. The entire building is actually designed to represent a slayed dragon's insides.
An appartment complex designed by Gaudi that was turned into a museum. Four families still live in the appartments thanks to the legal system and some very old contracts with the building's original owner. Lucky them.
This stairway is suppose to be designed after the back of a dragon, but I didn't see it.
One of two courtyards inside the building. The courtyards were designed for two key reasons: to let light in and to provide access for large furniture to be brought to the appartments via a pully system.
One of the few shots I took of the roof of Casa Mila before my fear of heights kicked in and I started getting all panic struck. The building itself is very organic in shape and design. Those chimnies are actually air vents that are designed after Roman helmets.
This is the view you get from the library of Casa Asia, which is the Asian Culture Community school of Barcelona from what I remember being told. In the background behind the building that looks like it belongs in Disneyland is Sagrada Familia.
Seriously, Prada was having a company dinner at Park Guell the day we decided to visit it, and we didn't know about it. We pretty much crashed the party as they were setting up dinner on the park's famous teir, which was designed by Gaudi. In fact, the entire park was designed by Gaudi.
The street we were staying on is a combination of the business-residential buildings similar to Locanda Montin. The boats you see here are all residential boats, no different to how in the states we would park our cars out in the streets in our neighborhoods.
My obligatory gondala shot. Can't leave Venice without getting one (or five)!
The view from the room I stayed in. For a small window, it does offer a nice amount of light, as I found out one morning.
These steps used to be the main docking areas for boats between the sidewalks and the canals. However, thanks to global warming and other factors, the only time you will ever see the bottom of these steps is in the morning during low tide. Most of the day, they are under the water line keeping the algae that clings to it alive.
Believe it or not, this is where we had breakfast every morning while we stayed in Venice. It's actually part of a very fancy but well worth the price resturant that is a bit difficult to get to. The resturant also doubles as a historic hostel.
In the old days, artists would stay here because the rent agreement was the cheapest in the city. Simply give the owners a finished piece and get a discount! Needless to say, the family that owns this property has a very nice collection of art.
This dock is, as I later found out, the dock that connects you directly to Marco Polo International from just down the street of the place we were staying. Had I known that before, I wouldn't have stressed about getting on a bus to the airport. The bus was cheaper, however.
Just around the cornor from where we stayed is this lovely sight. In the background is a church, one of many located around the city. In the foreground is a building where gondalas are manufactured by hand. It is also the place where to get them repaired or repainted.
The streets in Venice are all water ways. No cars are allowed in the streets past Plaza Roma. Come to think of it, I didn't see any bikes around Venice either. The only thing that had wheels were mostly sales carts and wheel-barrows.
He was our tour guide at Arsenale for that building's part of the Biennale. He's actually really attractive in person. This picture doesn't do him justice as to how handsome he is.
Yeah, I had a little crush on him while we were on the tour, but can you blame me? He was the first Euroboy that I got to see up close (too close, sometimes) without getting stared at like I was some strange pervert on the beach looking at the hot bodies that happen to be tanning that day.
I can't even remember where this is, to be honest.
Probably the second most common thing seen around Venice. The first being the Gondalas or boats in general.
An overview shot of the exterior of the theatre. Because the windows are tinted, the image sucks. There are more exterior shots on my flickr account that I won't be posting here because they suck that bad. I suggest snooping around and taking a look at them while you can before those end up "disappearing" off of my photo stream.
That's right, I'm too cheap to get a Pro account.
My signature on a surfboard. That way, I can prove that all that work is my own in one respect or another. At least until it gets washed off.
Detail of the shell and flower on one of the windows by the escalators
Detail shot of a little pink clam shell on one of the two windows by the escalators.
More shellfish, flowers, and a surfboard with my signature on it next to a dying potted palm.
You'll notice that since I ran out of characters to draw, I just stuck with the generic icons I was using before. Flowers and surfboards and shellfish. Nothing special, but at least it is consistent.
The windows by the escalators had to be painted as well. Why? Because from the parking garage, it didn't look right for the images to just stop after the fourth window. It's a design thing.
Detail shot of one of the flowers that flank the doors into the Concession Lobby
