Something I threw together yesterday in various little bits.

Captain's Log, Stardate 101007.22 or something along the lines.

I write this entry from a TGV as I depart Paris. Internet access was so horrible in the hostel I was staying in that it made it incredibly difficult to get online, and when I did, I would be sitting haphazardly on some stairs along with a dozen other 20somethings asking their boyfriends if they could hear them because the Skype connection was so bad. So, needless to say, I didn't spend much time online.

I did however have a really good time in Paris; I went on a tour in Normandy at the beginning of the week, saw Omaha, Point d'Hoc, the artificial harbour, some surviving German gun batteries, the American graveyard, and we had a guided tour of the Caen Memorial.

I highly suggest anyone who has an interest in WWII and would like to see some of the sights to go on this tour; the rates were pretty reasonable (170 USD) considering we had lunch included (steak and wine) and our groups were very small, at most 8 people per guide. The fact that the groups are small really made it worthwhile, you didn't have to wait for the guide to finish repeating their speil in four languages before you could ask a question. It was really great. The visit is organized by the Caen Memorial, but I bought my tickets through http://www.linkparis.com. If you can get a good deal on your train fare to Caen and back from Paris, it should cost you no more than about 200 dollars. Sure, it's a good chunk of money at face value, but if you're interested in the material, there's nothing like getting taken around by a professional.

The next day I went to the Eiffel Tower. I was there at a time that I thought was early (10AM), but when I showed up, the lines were huge. I spent at least an hour waiting to get my ticket to the second floor, at which point they informed me that the top of the tower was closed due to congestion (not unjustifiable, at least). I didn't really care, going to the second floor is better than not going. Up there, however, they were selling tickets for the tower, so I queued again for about half an hour, this time. I was luckily able to get a few kerbillion pictures as the line wrapped its way all the way around the second floor.

Upon reaching the top, I declined getting a 10 Euro glass thimble of champagne, took a couple pictures and essentially got right back in line for the elevator down. 45 minutes later, I was back on the ground looking for the Notre Dame cathedral. The line to Notre Dame had a lineup akin to that of the Eiffel Tower so I took some outside pictures, sat down in the park behind it, and crossed it off my list.

Ah yes, now, the adventure for supper. I had read about a Canadian pub (yeah, apparently they exist?) called the Moose that actually looked like it would be interesting, so I tried to make my way over there. Epic fail. About an hour into the 13 minute walk I ended up at a tavern that had some nice looking beer and food for less than ten euros. It was pretty simple, I had a "tartine", some sort of bread with cheese melted onto it and toasted. It was simple, but tasted good; mine had goat's cheese and another kind I couldn't pronounce. For desert, I found a crepe shop and had a nutella/Gran Marnier crepe, scoffed it down while it was still warm, then walked what (at the time I thought was) the road back to the hostel. 20 minutes later, I realize something is up; I should have at least seen a building or street that looked familiar... or the frakking Pantheon that I knew was on the way. I was really, really lost, and naturally without a map. I had somehow ended up in a part of town where metros were scarce, so I couldn't even figure out what stop I was at. Eventually, though, I found a metro, managed to misinterperate what direction I was facing, and then stumble somewhat in the direction of where I was going.

By the time I got to the hostel I had been wandering around for about 90 minutes, was drenched in sweat, and fell asleep on my bed fully clothed (minus the shirt I was wearing which had to be burned), with the lights on.

My last day in Paris (yesterday) I went to the "Cite des Sciences et Industrie", a purely immense science museum geared towards everyone. It has to be at least 3 times as big as the Science and Technology Museum in Ottawa, which in itself is pretty huge. In the 6 hours I was there I saw a 3D IMAX show in their theatre, a planetarium show that was pretty fantastic, and two and a half out of maybe a dozen exhibits. I can't imagine anyone actually having the time to visit the entire museum in one day.

That night, I met up with a coworker from McGill who was in town for a high energy conference (TeVPa), and he, his girlfriend, sisters and myself went on an hour long boat tour. You couldn't really hear the guide which was a bit of a drag, but the experience was still nice (albeit a bit of rain). We had supper at this South American place, then my coworker and his girlfriend and I went out for drinks. We ended up at this royally expensive (but really cool) place next to the Pantheon. I had a 1L "glass" of kreik (a sour cherry beer) out of a kwak bottle.... The pictures can explain more than I can with words.

Today, I made my way to Ghent, got royally lost on my way to my B&B, checked in, took a 4 hour break (was pretty pooped), and now I write this sitting on a terasse, drinking a Duvel, surrounded by live music, magicians, street performers, this creepy girl in a dress (see the pictures) and swaths of people. Ghent looks like it would be a blast to visit when there isn't a festival going on, this is nuts. It's like the Montreal Jazz Festival on crack with a small section of LaRonde thrown in (did I mention there are rides set up here?). I missed the Ghent jazz festival, which is too bad; I was hoping to be able to compare it to Montreal's. Oh well, it gives me an excuse to come back. Also, at (I think) 45 Euros a night, my B&B is really nice; nicer than some (most) hotels I've stayed in.

Well, my glass is empty. Time to order another bottle of something that'd cost me three times as much back home.

*caveat: I do miss my brewery. I should be taking notes on all the things I try; it would be really cool to try and figure out what makes then and attempt to duplicate some of the flavours. I don't want to clone them, there's no fun in that. Instead, I would like to be able to pull together something similar.

PS, there are some really, really pretty girls in Ghent.

PPS, most of them smoke.

PPPS, I hear that there are all you can eat ribs somewhere around here. w00t.

Partial update

I'm at this crazy huge museum in Paris, called the "Cite des Sciences et Industrie". Saw a 3D movie (unfortunately spoiled by the daycare groups who were there) and a planetarium show (fantastic; I almost want to go to the second show). 

This place is way too big to see in one day; I've still got most of the museum to visit, there's a 50s era submarine parked outside that I have tickets to go see, and I've just discovered that the Louvre is on a direct metro line from here. 

Not sure if I'll be able to make it to the Louvre; I have plans to go on a 1 hour boat trip tonight at 8PM with one of my colleagues (and his girlfriend and sisters) who is in Paris for the TeVPa conference (I love being a physicist, we get to go to all these cool places). 

Internet access in Europe is very meh.

OK, I have to make this short, the internet access here is flakey. I will post the links to my pictures, and then tonight from my room I'll write up a proper log entry.

Last Days in Erice

First Hours in Paris

Normandy D-Day Tour

Apparently, I did get a tan the other day.

Friday morning. Need moar coffeeeeee

OK, at this point I think I'm running out of steam. Since I've been here I don't think I've had more than about 6 consecutive hours of sleep. We spend alot of time out at various places (two nights ago after our banquet we discovered a bar next to the Castle with a nice view of over the cliff, for example). 

The fact that at 9AM we have yet to have coffee or any real kind of breakfast, combined with the lights being off, make for a very difficult time staying attentive. The last talks are going on now; the current presenter works on VERITAS out of University of Delware and just gave my research on a shout-out. 

This afternoon, there is no Science program; the bunch of us who have been spending time together (representative of at least 50% of the attendees) are going to take a cable car down to Trapani, the town/city at the base of the mountain, for the day. I[m not sure how I feel about staying late, though; I've got to pack my bags, do a bit of laundry, if possible, and finish getting ready for tomorrow.

My flight leaves Palermo around noon, landing in Paris CDG some 4 hours later or so. I've got to decide whether to taxi or public transit my way to the dorms I'm staying in; clearly, public transit will be cheaper, but I'm weary of public transiting with a big bag and my backpack. I'll have to think about this tonight, I guess. 

Tomorrow night I'm going to try and take it easy, maybe get some work done instead of go wandering around, because I've got a train to catch the following morning at 6:50 or so. I'm going on a D-Day tour and I really want to be well rested. At least that will be a change from the hardcoreness that was this week. I think I only made it to bed early (before 1AM!) one night....

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The Excursion

Yesterday was a big day.

At 8:30 we left Erice for a visit to some Greek temple ruins. We began in Segesta, an ancient city that was abandoned some 700 years ago, but since Antiquity has been occupied by many cultures (Greeks, Muslims, Normans). The interesting bit about Segesta is that it contains an unfinished Greek temple that has somehow managed to survive over the millenia. There are pictures of this available here. The city also contains an ancient theatre that was once capable of holding 4000 people.

Afterwards, we went to Selinunte, which is a host to a number of temple ruins. The temples themselves were destroyed during an earthquake some time ago. Of the three we visited, one has been raised, one does not contain enough surviving material to be rebuilt, and another (the largest, a temple to Zeus, I believe) needs only the money to be rebuilt. 

It was very hot, so we went swimming in the Mediterranean, where I had the honor of getting a pretty nasty sunburn on my forehead, which makes it pretty difficult to, for example, move my face.

I realize that I haven't spent much time talking about the conference. There are alot of people from the Pierre Auger observatory (Argentina) here, and IceCube. There are two of us from VERITAS and a few Fermi people, so there's an interesting mix of talks. Given that most of my work has been hardware based over the past 14 months, I am not giving a talk. For my project, there just isn't enough known about the science for me to be able to go down that route; I'd have to talk about hardware, and not everyone (experamentalist or not) is interested in instrumentation. After I take some data I'll be able to talk some more about the science of my research.

Pierre Auger (www.auger.com) is an interesting experiment that is bound to make some neat discoveries as soon as they have taken enough data. One of their most recent results is the detection of an anisotropy in the cosmic ray background (ie, there seems to be a source of cosmic rays somewhere but we don't know where). This is big news in the Cosmic Ray society. 

I can't believe that it's already Friday; tomorrow is our last day in Erice, afterwards I head to Paris for the beginning of my vacation. Due to some timing issues, I'm going to have to be up early on Monday, though, I'm heading to Normandy to go on a D-day tour. 

Anyways, I've go to go get some aloe or something to soothe my face. Also, can't wait to see what's for lunch today. 

Two more days of pictures.

I just got in from visiting the Castle of Venus Erice with some friends. Pretty stuff. Now, more talks, later a concert.

Day 3: Erice Day 3
Day 4 (the afternoon of): Erice Day 4 Afternoon

No regrets.

While we're at this summer school, we have a list of ~7 places that we can eat at at no charge (except drinks (including water)). Last night it was Elimo, a great place with an entryway that looks like a stereotypical "old person" house, with old furniture and carpets everywhere, hanging plants and a distinctive smell (not necessarily a bad smell).

The man typing next to be can be described in no other way than smashing his fingers on his keyboard. I can hear him from 10 feet away. Hell, I can feel the table moving.

The dining area was really interesting looking. Very brown deco, alot of plants, elaborate tablecloths and carpets, and a view that looks out at Tripani. The meal started with a plate of cold couscous made with tomatoes, wine and (I think) anchovies, and was followed with some slab pizza (so-so) and prosciutto. 

During the meal I had a long conversation with one of the speakers at the conference, Kerry Lee, a scientist working in the Space Radiation Analysis Group at the NASA Johnson Space Centre, who offered to give me a tour of the JSC when I drive through Houston on my way back from VERITAS in early December, which is pretty awesome.

We made out way back to the free wine room (which I've since learned serves "marsala"), but there's only so much of that you can have before the heartburn sets in due to the acidity. A group of us, mostly astrophysicists but a few new people who are here doing a summer school on acoustic photonics, went to the closest cafe for gelatto and a pint. 

This didn't last long as it was about 1:30 in a town where everything closes at about midnight (at latest). Three of us (for some reason) decided that it was far too early to go to bed (not sure it was a great decision) so we decided to track down a shop that was open (ambitious at best) and grab a bottle of wine to have at the castle. While wandering the streets, we found a shop that was still open, and we made out way to the castle where we shared the bottle while sitting at the benches on top of the Temple of Venus. 

I'm somewhat tired right now; we took our time with the wine (with good reason, it was really cool to be at the castle). 

This conversation actually just happened as the speaker was briefly inturrupted by the cutoff alarm:

Speaker: "How much time do I have left?"

Chair:      "Three minutes plus ten minutes for questions."

Speaker: "Okay, I will try to finish in five minutes."

We eventually made our way back to the free wine room and I had a long c

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Re: awesome.

I'm off to supper then wine drinking at a 1000 year old castle.

Night 2 and a bit of the morning

Last night after the conferences, a bunch of us went to the Venus pizzeria (there's a temple to Venus in Erice), had some pizza (no charge because of the conference) and 4 bottles of wine (we were 14 people). The entire meal cost us less than 5 Euros each, and our wine was pretty tasty. Afterwards, a couple of us made our way to the San Rocco Cafe for a pint, before we remembered the existence of what we call the 'free wine room', a piano room containing two casks of something that looks like amaretto but is somewhere between that and wine. 

Interestingly enough, when the casks are empty, they magically get replaced.

The talks this morning were a bit theory heavy, not exacctly my cup of tea, but after lunch at Ulysses (sardine pasta and fried fish) I walked back to the castle in an attempt to get a picture form the very top. Unfortunately, access to it seems to be closed off, albeit there does seem to be a (and I quote) "Cafeteria / Long Drinks" built inside the castle, but I've yet to see it open. 

There is however a part of the castle that you can visit, but I didn't have enough time this afternoon. It's likely tomorrow's activity. On the way back, I tried going a different way back to the hotel and ended walking halfway around Erice. It was a nice walk, byt my shoes are on their last legs, especially considering the cobblestone roads, and it is hot. 32C in th sun. It's not too humid, but I'm burning through my clothes twice as fast as I thought I would be.

Erice Day 1/2 Pictures

As promised... Erice Day 1/2

The International School of Cosmic Ray Astrophysics - Erice 2010

So, I can't remember if I'm mentioned this before, but this week I'm attending a summer school in Erice, Sicily. 

I flew out last night at 7PM (EST). The flight was OK. I had an exit row window seat, which would have been great, but it was extremely cold on the plane; cold enough to not be able to sleep very well, which was a bit of a drag. The time change is such that when I arrived in Rome, it was 9AM. Considering the absurdidty of my regular sleep schedule, it wasn't that bad. About an hour and change later, I took off again for the second legof the trip, from Rome to Palermo, Sicily. I wasn't awake for a second of the trip. 

The first thing I noticed about Palermo airport ios that it is tiny. There are (apparently) 6 belts for luggage (albeit I only actually found three), and one set of doors that every landing flight comes through. I didn't mind this, because I figured that it implied that I would find the guy who is supposed to pick the school participants up easier. This was not true. I kind of stood around awkwardly for an hour until someone else waiting for their lioft tracked me down. Eventually, after about two hours total, we left on a minibus for Erice.

Erice is a smallish town built on a mountain at ~750m altitude. The roads are at least 75% cobblestone (and my shoes are garbage, but that's another story). There are a few castles here (or I suppose it's really just one castle spread out?) so my new friend and I spent the day wandering around the city. The school openening 'ceremony' was only at 10PM local time, so we had something like8 hours to explore.

Eventually, we met up with some other students. Therew's another summer school going on here at the same time, on Quantum Electronics. So far as I can tell, most of them are Italians. We ended up walking around with some of them for awhile (which was great because there are not many English-speakers in Erice). 

At about 11PM I konked out, fell asleep without even setting my alarm. 

The internet connection here is tenuous at best, and there isn't wifi everywhere, so I'm going to have to figure out a system for uploading pictures without blowing all the bandwidth for everyone. Alright, it's breakfast time. 

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I still do this.

Tiles in the eyes of children.

science ... SCIENCE!

Um.... 'kay. Magnets.

Seriously?

How can she see anything on her utility belt?

Just saw two guys fishing in the Lake of Two Mountains while standing in it. Not a bad Yay to cool down.
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The AC in the physics building is out. Has been all week. At least the humidity has dropped somewhat.
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I stand corrected.

It has been brought to my attention that my most recent post was not, in fact, a Pokemon hanging out at a bus stop. He is called Totoro, and this picture makes the last one even funnier.