World Rivers Day: The Rhone

It's the last Sunday of September which means its World River's Day, and having come just come back from Geneva I'm celebrating the Rhone.

Flowing from the Rhone Glacier its cold blue waters flow into Lake Geneva and from there rush through the city at slightly scary speeds.

Indeed navigating its rapids has been an issue though the years. Indeed according to Wikipedia (which is never wrong) "most travelled with a painted cross covered with religious symbols as superstitious protection against the hazards of the journey."

Sound's a bit like Tillerman's flight with its faulty hydraulics.

Of course the region is well known for its wine and also the Rhone later flows through Avignon where there's a pont so famous they wrote songs about it.

It also supplies 8% of France's electricity (citation needed)!

Near the Med it splits into two called (wait for it) Grand Rhone and Petit Rhone. One of ancient tribes that lived near it were the Helvetii, famous for their fonts!

Ok, might have made the last bit up, but hurrah for the Rhone.

Views from Geneva

There she blows!

Isn't that pretty? Of course your really posh hotels (video a must-watch) can see it from their windows. They also have a better class of car outside:

The view from my hotel was a bit less g-l-a-m-o-r-o-u-s:

The view from 38,000 feet was ok though:

Can you guess where that is? For those using Apple Maps, no it isn't Timbuctoo

Some missing, something extra

What's missing in the photo above? There's a clue here.

What was unexpectedly extra to the bread basket in this (indoor) restaurant is pretty obvious:

Fortunately I'd finished with the bread anyhow.

Rowing this Viking boat

What would make rowing this reconstructed Viking boat difficult?

Picture puzzle: what, where, why?

Restaurant with a view

Listen up, yeh sons and daughters of a banana faced baboon, that ye be!

Aye, it be talk like a pirate day this very day!

Alas, JP be pressed ganged, 'tis true, ah sad it be me hearties. He last be seen feasting and drinking at yon Duck and Waffle, surrounded by the most deadly and dark pirates of the ol' Spanish main, otherwise called bankers.

But now he be WORKING!!

Arrrrrrr! 'tis a sorry day for all free souls. I'd rather walk the plank into waters as thick with sharks as a cuttlefish soup than suffer such a fate.

JP says the sights from yon Duck and Waffle are fair to behold and the victuals worthy of a pirate, but avoid the wood pigeon as if it were marked by the black spot!

Make of that what you will, I said me piece, aye, that I did, and will say no more.

Great River Race 2012 - more photos

Great River Race 2012 Photos

Great River Race 2012

I've just spent a pleasant hour lying in the sun watching 200 or so boats of the Great River Race pass by Putney.

Hope everyone had a good time, in particular Chris from Rowing for Pleasure pulling well on Gladys, below:

London 2012: My Olympics and Paralympics

Now the Olympics and Paralympics are over its a good time to look back over this summer's posts and report on JP's London 2012, hopefully without using words like "journey":

• My first Olympic moment was watching the torch relay on the streets of south London
• I then soaked up the atmosphere on the tall ship Maja as it went underneath Tower Bridge the day before the opening ceremony
• The following day I watched the torch on its final journey (oops, sorry, it just slipped in there) on the Gloriana up the Thames
• Living in London I couldn't help notice all the preparations and take pride in the Olympics coming to our great city
• The Red Arrows roaring over London signalled the start of the stunning Olympic's Opening Ceremony
• The first weekend I saw the two cycle road races flashed over Putney Bridge, the men's with Wiggo on Saturday and the women on Sunday, winning one of Team GB's first medals.
• Of course my main interest was the sailing, watching online and on the web site
• Much better than either were the three trips down to Weymouth, sitting on the Nothe soaking up the great atmosphere as posted here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
• By then nearly everyone was getting Olympics fever so the official web site was melting as people tried to grab those last minute release of tickets
• I managed to get a ticket to see the Beach Volleyball where we were joined by some of Team GB's rowing medallists
• Medallists were beginning to appear everywhere, including Tom Slingsby with his Laser gold
• The Olympics even reached up to Nelson's hat
• There was a parallel cultural London 2012 with events including art installations (not all equally good)
• Across London there were the National Houses and I visited those of Brazil, France and Denmark
• The Olympic Closing Ceremony wasn't that great so I made up my own
• No problems with the moving and inspirational Paralympics's Opening Ceremony
• The cauldron was lit again in the Olympic Stadium as I saw when went to see the Paralympic's athletics
• I also managed to get a ticket to the amazing Paralympics Closing Ceremony
• Finally I was in the City for the parade of Olympic and Paralympic heros and then in Trafalgar Square for the Red Arrows fly by (below)

It's become a much repeated truism that the London 2012 Olympics and Paralympics were a once in a lifetime event.

For that reason I'm glad I didn't hold back, but enjoyed as much as I could of both the Olympics and Paralympics

Not available in the US

Suffering like so many over here from Olympic and Paralympic withdrawal symptoms I found myself wondering what other nations have made of this summer of sport.

There was good stuff in Australia and on Al Jazeera, but what about across the pond in America? What did it say, for example, in the NY Times article on the Paralympics Closing Ceremony?

....er.... where is that exactly? And is there really only a handful of blog posts about the whole Paralympics?

Now this isn't some local London derby, this is the second largest sporting event in the world.

I heard that NBC didn't show anything live and is condensing the whole Paralympics into a few extracts, but then this is the station that cut the tribute to the victims of the 7/7 attack from their broadcast of the Olympics Opening Ceremony (not cool guys).

But it does seem to me to be a shame and I've got to ask those American readers, what is going on?

Why so little coverage of the Paralympics in America?

London 2012: Paralympics Closing Ceremony Photos