View allAll Photos Tagged Awake
Like the rising sun that shines
From the darkness comes a light
I hear Your voice and this is my
Awakening
Song: Awakening - Chris Tomlin
Galloways are able to adapt to a variety of climatic conditions. They have good foraging abilities, ensuring that they thrive where other breeds fail. The double haired coat is shed in hot weather, thus making the Galloway a highly adaptable and versatile breed for a variety of climatic conditions.
"The awake gipsy" Wall painted in the Fokus festival in Görlitz. Inspired by the painting of Rousseau "The sleeping gypsy" where a lion admires an sleeping gypsy. In this case is the gypsy awake and intending to kill an almost sleeping panther. Through this wall i try to represent the treacherous nature of the human being. Dedicated to the one that almost killed the sleeping panther in me.
Awake - Sala Underground (10/11/2012)
No use esta imagen sin mi permiso. © Todos los derechos reservados.
Don't use this image without my permission. © All rights reserved.
The story focuses on a man who suffers "anesthetic awareness" and finds himself awake and aware, but paralyzed, during heart surgery. His young wife must wrestle with her own demons as a drama unfolds around them.
And so near to the middle of October, we come to the final day of our holiday to France, which ended on 7th August.
I had hoped to have all these shots edited and posted by this weekend, as I'm off on a week's churchcrawling in the Midlands, but it is what it is.
After Chartres, I have eight Kent churches to edit and post, five Marsh churches. So, will keep me going over winter, and then there will be the 20 new Midlands churches.
Anyway, on with the show.
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Time to go home.
But before then, a short drive into the city to visit and photograph the cathedral, which if I remembered right has some of the oldest stained glass in all of Europe.
We woke up after a long sleep, the traffic on the bypass outside didn't keep us awake, and the cool temperatures meant it was easy to snuggle up under the duvet.
Cool?
Yes, eight degrees, though it would warm up quickly, but with the roof window open, it allowed the cool air in, and the sound of bird song.
We went down for breakfast after showers, and found the usual mix of fruit, bread, yogurts, and preserves. And lots of strong coffee.
We drove into the centre, parking at another underground car park called "Cathedral". And this time the large churchy building nearby was the cathedral.
Like most cities we drove into, it was quiet, even in the midst of what would be rush hour in Britain. And in the circular underground car park, only about 10% of spaces were taken.
Out into the cool of the morning, blue shadows fulling the streets, and over the roofs were the twin spires of the cathedral.
I got busy snapping the north, west and east triple doorways, as I knew it would open at half eight, but then mass would start at nine, and as I guessed, insides were signs asking no photography when a mass was being held.
Which gave me half an hour. How many shots could I take in 30 minutes?
Nearly 600 if you were wondering what the answer was.
Around the outside of the Sanctuary were incredible carved friezes depicting the life of Jesus, which I recorded in two batches.
Between I put on the big boy lens, and started to record the glass, starting with the rose window in the west, and the three 12th century panels below.
I had only taken a fraction of the shots I wanted, when the clock chimed nine, and the Bishop emerged, and the choir began to sing.
We could have waited for mass to be completed, but that would have been in thirty or more minutes, but we still had a four and a half hour drive to get to Calais, then get onto a shuttle.
We'd best be going, I said.
So we did.
Though the smell of fresh coffee in the row of restaurants on the main square did smell amazing.
Now.
Both Jools and I are old enough to remember, and experience, the traffic jams around the Paris ring road, so our intention was to go to Rouen, then up the coast road from there. Even if it did mean using the crazy fur lane link road that winds it way through a commercial estate, and is clogged with trucks and holiday traffic.
It was a quiet run up to Rouen, along less-known dual carriageways and motorways, but then onto that ring road. Not as bad as I remember, but with roadworks on the bridge over The Seine, but traffic on the road we merged on were allowing one car at a time to blend in, so we made progress, and once through the tunnel we were back out into the countryside and up to warp speed.
And so we ate the miles up until we crested a hill near Boulogne-sur-Mer, and the Kent coast could be seen some 30 miles away.
We paid the last toll of the trip, and dropped into Calais, where we had four stops. Well, two in fact.
The Carrefour hypermarket near the port for some beer. Proper 1664, brewed in France and different to the pish we get in Britain. Then to Calais Vin for some Belgian beer, French cidre, more French wine, and cheap pink fizz.
Next door to the fromagerie for a selection of cheeses, all stinky and runny. Before going to the patisserie for some fresh crusty bread. And we were done.
The car was loaded, and had just enough room for us. We moved off going down two junctions of the motorway to the Tunnel
Check in was easy, then was the chaos of getting through the two sets of border controls. There are now staff directing cars on which lane to join, so not the free-for-all of old, but it still took an hour, meaning we missed our booked train, and there wasn't another for an hour!
So, we sat in line for half an hour before boarding, and then the five minute wait before the train moved off.
We got off at ten to four, and once we took the A20 exit, we were in Folkestone, onto the A20, over the cliffs and down into Dover.
A ferry had dicked, so traffic was heavy up Jubilee Way, but it moved quickly, and so we were able to turn onto the Deal road, then off into the village and home.
Home.
The car was unloaded. Washing put into the machine, and clean clothes put away.
We worked well as a team, and by six so much done, I could take part in the quiz, though I jumped in early and got it wrong.
Jools went to the Chinese, so for supper we dined well and drank ice cold beer/cider, as the evening darked outside, and was dark by half eight.
But we were home, so went to bed and slept well, me after 15 hours driving over two days, and Jools having to suffer my driving for 15 hours over two days!
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Chartres Cathedral (French: Cathédrale Notre-Dame de Chartres, lit. 'Cathedral of Our Lady of Chartres') is a Catholic cathedral in Chartres, France, about 80 km (50 miles) southwest of Paris, and is the seat of the Bishop of Chartres. Dedicated in honour of the Virgin Mary ('Our Lady'), it was mostly constructed between 1194 and 1220. It stands on the site of at least five cathedrals that have occupied the site since the Diocese of Chartres was formed as an episcopal see in the 4th century. It is one of the best-known and most influential examples of High Gothic[2] and Classic Gothic architecture.[3][4][5] It was built above earlier Romanesque basements, while its north spire is more recent (1507–1513) and is built in the more ornate Flamboyant style.[6]
"[O]ne of the most beautiful and historically significant cathedrals in all of Europe,"[7] it was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1979, which called it "the high point of French Gothic art" and a "masterpiece".[8]
The cathedral has been well-preserved and restored: the majority of the original stained glass windows survive intact, while the architecture has seen only minor changes since the early 13th century. The building's exterior is dominated by heavy flying buttresses which allowed the architects to increase the window size significantly, while the west end is dominated by two contrasting spires – a 105-metre (349 ft) plain pyramid completed around 1160 and the 113-metre (377 ft) Flamboyant (late Gothic) spire on top of an older tower. Its three great façades are adorned with hundreds of sculpted figures illustrating key theological themes and narratives.
Since at least the 12th century the cathedral has been an important destination for travellers. It attracts large numbers of Christian pilgrims, many of whom come to venerate its famous relic, the Sancta Camisa, said to be the tunic worn by the Virgin Mary at Christ's birth, as well as large numbers of secular tourists who come to admire the cathedral's architecture and art. A venerated Black Madonna statue enshrined within was crowned by Pope Pius IX on 31 May 1855.
One of the most distinctive features of Chartres Cathedral is the stained glass, both for its quantity and quality. There are 167 windows, including rose windows, round oculi, and tall, pointed lancet windows. The architecture of the cathedral, with its innovative combination of rib vaults and flying buttresses, permitted the construction of much higher and thinner walls, particularly at the top clerestory level, allowing more and larger windows. Also, Chartres contains fewer plain or grisaille windows than later cathedrals, and more windows with densely stained glass panels, making the interior of Chartres darker but the colour of the light deeper and richer.
These are the oldest windows in the cathedral. The right window, the Jesse Window, depicts the genealogy of Christ. The middle window depicts the life of Christ, and the left window depicts the Passion of Christ, from the Transfiguration and Last Supper to the Resurrection.[42][43] All three of these windows were originally made around 1145 but were restored in the early 13th century and again in the 19th.[41]
The other 12th-century window, perhaps the most famous at Chartres, is the "Notre-Dame de la Belle-Verrière", or "The Blue Virgin". It is found in the first bay of the choir after the south transept. Most windows are made up of around 25 to 30 individual panels showing distinct episodes within the narrative; only Notre-Dame de la Belle-Verrière includes a larger image made up of multiple panels. This window is actually a composite; the upper part, showing the Virgin and Child surrounded by adoring angels, dates from around 1180 and was probably positioned at the center of the apse in the earlier building. The Virgin is depicted wearing a blue robe and sitting in a frontal pose on a throne, with the Christ Child seated on her lap raising his hand in blessing. This composition, known as the Sedes sapientiae ("Throne of Wisdom"), which also appears on the Portail royal, is based on the famous cult figure kept in the crypt. The lower part of the window, showing scenes from the infancy of Christ, dates from the main glazing campaign around 1225.