Another chilly week - yesterday morning I awoke to a harbor completely veneered with a thin coating of ice. But yesterday was also another day of gloriously clear skies and sunshine that kept luring me outside. Grabbed my camera for the early morning walk (of course)... but I was not the first one outside. There were joggers a-plenty, and the little blue boat of the harbormaster had already cut a swath through the ice and along the length of the harbor. Soon after the harbor master passed, I watched with amusement as a boat from the Bristol gig-rowing club moved valiantly (and noisily!) along the narrow free water path, which was, of course, sufficiently wide for the gig but not the oars. In fact, I was surprised at how many boats decided, after lying still for weeks, to break their way through the harbor ice - maybe it was the sport of it, or maybe it was that the tide was high...
By the time I headed back around my end of the harbor, the comings and goings of boats had started to break up the ice around the shipyard and the sunlight was pouring in over the roofs of the Baltic Wharf apartments... the quality of light is really wonderful at these high latitudes - a benefit to counteract the short winter days. Although they are getting noticeably longer... I was walking to Mark and Alison’s at about 5:30pm yesterday, and it was still light with that pink grayness that follows sunset. I had dinner with them and then we all walked down the street to the “Tobacco Factory”, a converted factory that is now a small theater. We went to see a production of King Lear - it was excellent! The Tobacco Factory theater gets top quality British actors - last night Lear was played by John Shrapnel, who is not only a famous Shakespeare actor but has also been in numerous BBC TV series (including Inspector Morse and Inspector Lynley, for those of you who are PBS Mystery fans) and many British films. The theater is small and the stage is in the middle - truly a theater-in-the-round - and therefore the setting is intimate and the emotions of the play quite intense.
It was also another week of traveling. This time to Pisa, Italy, for a “kick-off” meeting about a new European Union training grant for early career researchers in Volcanology. Alison is the point person for Bristol’s role in the grant, and I went along to help out. It was also, of course, a chance for me to catch up with my Pisa friends. The workshop was held at a monastery now converted to a hotel... not surprisingly, the rooms were simple (to the point of austere) but at least were (I assume) better heated than in the time of the monks (which was lucky, because even Pisa was unusually cold) and it was the perfect place for a small workshop. Breakfast was provided by the hotel, and all other meals were catered - I needn’t say that we ate well! In fact, I’ll confess to eating a few too many croissants (‘cornetti’ in Italian) and other pastries, because Italy does them so well...
The workshop lasted for 1.5 days, with an executive meeting on the afternoon of the second day. While Alison attended that, I headed into the center of town to find my friends in the Geology Dept (Mauro, Raffaello, Marco) and to re-acquaint myself with Pisa... the winding narrow streets that open into small piazzas, the small shops and open-air stands, and, of course, the Arno River and the ‘duomo’ complete with tower that really does lean. I’ve pulled out a few pictures from past trips, where the sun was shining higher and brighter than this past week.
By the time I headed back around my end of the harbor, the comings and goings of boats had started to break up the ice around the shipyard and the sunlight was pouring in over the roofs of the Baltic Wharf apartments... the quality of light is really wonderful at these high latitudes - a benefit to counteract the short winter days. Although they are getting noticeably longer... I was walking to Mark and Alison’s at about 5:30pm yesterday, and it was still light with that pink grayness that follows sunset. I had dinner with them and then we all walked down the street to the “Tobacco Factory”, a converted factory that is now a small theater. We went to see a production of King Lear - it was excellent! The Tobacco Factory theater gets top quality British actors - last night Lear was played by John Shrapnel, who is not only a famous Shakespeare actor but has also been in numerous BBC TV series (including Inspector Morse and Inspector Lynley, for those of you who are PBS Mystery fans) and many British films. The theater is small and the stage is in the middle - truly a theater-in-the-round - and therefore the setting is intimate and the emotions of the play quite intense.
It was also another week of traveling. This time to Pisa, Italy, for a “kick-off” meeting about a new European Union training grant for early career researchers in Volcanology. Alison is the point person for Bristol’s role in the grant, and I went along to help out. It was also, of course, a chance for me to catch up with my Pisa friends. The workshop was held at a monastery now converted to a hotel... not surprisingly, the rooms were simple (to the point of austere) but at least were (I assume) better heated than in the time of the monks (which was lucky, because even Pisa was unusually cold) and it was the perfect place for a small workshop. Breakfast was provided by the hotel, and all other meals were catered - I needn’t say that we ate well! In fact, I’ll confess to eating a few too many croissants (‘cornetti’ in Italian) and other pastries, because Italy does them so well...
The workshop lasted for 1.5 days, with an executive meeting on the afternoon of the second day. While Alison attended that, I headed into the center of town to find my friends in the Geology Dept (Mauro, Raffaello, Marco) and to re-acquaint myself with Pisa... the winding narrow streets that open into small piazzas, the small shops and open-air stands, and, of course, the Arno River and the ‘duomo’ complete with tower that really does lean. I’ve pulled out a few pictures from past trips, where the sun was shining higher and brighter than this past week.
Returned to Bristol on Wednesday, reversing the long trip to Pisa on Sunday (a 3.5 hour bus ride to Gatwick Airport, the usual hanging about in the airport, a 2ish hour flight to Pisa - not bad, but apparently in the summer there are direct flights from Bristol to Pisa, which sounds much easier!). I was an internal examiner for a PhD ‘viva’ on Friday, so was kept busy prepping for that on Thursday and Friday morning. I was ready to slow down yesterday, so that it was particularly nice to wake to sunshine, and to watch the slow progression of open water from the early morning ice-breaking to partial melting in my waterway later in the day.. although, even this morning, with the temperature above freezing, the skies overcast, and the main harbor completely ice-free, my strip of water is still hosting almost invisible thin ice sheets that move with, but rapidly damp, the swells propagating in from water taxis and tour boats passing the blue bridge.
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