art
buddhist cave art in the yungang grottoes
With Le back into full-time work, time has just been slipping away. It has been over six months since we returned from our last overseas trip and we just are getting edgy to plan our next one.
At the moment, we have a few short local getaways planned but we are hoping for an overseas trip at some point for 2-3 weeks at the end of the year. We’ll see how it pans out.
In the meantime, let’s go down memory lane for a little bit. We thought we would look back on a UNESCO site that we visited back in 2012….
It was April 2012, and we were in China. We were rather unaware that it was still going to be COLD…. So very very cold!
The day we went to Yungang Grottoes it was absolutely freezing and windy. We can recall so clearly how we had the hoods of our windbreakers pulled tightly over our “beanied” heads, our scarves wrapped around our necks and up around our faces… just enough to reveal our eyes.
The cold air was slicing through us despite our multiple layers…
But walking around the grottoes in that cold air was worth it! It was worth every teeth chatter, it was worth every shiver, it was worth the sting on our cheeks from the wind.
Before arriving at the caves, we walk down a path with tall majestic carved columns, then over a bridge with the frozen lake below.
We had no idea what we were in for…
There are more than 250 caves and more than 50 000 carved statues of all shapes and sizes. Impossible to see them all in the time we had there.
The sizes of the statues vary from tiny to massive – some are inside the caves while others are outside.
The level of detail on the carvings was mindboggling. And to think this artwork dates back to the 5th and 6th Century, it had us in complete awe.
The visit to these grottoes was definitely an experience to remember for many reasons. By the end of that day, our cheeks were frozen solid!
Yungang Grottoes was listed as a UNESCO Heritage site in 2001.
To see the other UNESCO sites we have visited, visit our unofficial bucket list
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weekly photo challenge: scale
We couldn’t go past this scene of a kitchen made to scale to share; the art of scale miniatures.
For more interpretations of scale, see The Daily Post.
For more scale miniatures scenes, see our post on the Museum of Miniatures and Cinema.
Have a fabulous weekend, everyone!
As always, we welcome your comments 🙂
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mural art in lyon
For us, Lyon was a convenient city to stop into for a few days before we ducked on over to Switzerland.
But not only was it convenient, it was an incredible place for us to explore for three days. There is so much to do (free and not) and plenty of little surprises, like the Miniatures and Cinema Museum that we stumbled across, we really enjoyed Lyon!
One of it’s free attractions is the city’s mural art. There are certainly a few scattered around the city. Our favourite is at the corner of rue de la Martiniére and Quai St Vincent, it depicts and honours Lyon’s famous citizens such as the Lumière brothers (the first film makers) and Laurent Mourguet (creator of the famous French puppet, Guignol).
We sat on a bench right across from the artwork and spent quite a while staring at it. The mural is detailed and life-like, there is so much depth in the art and it simply drew us in. We ended up with pretty sore necks after we moved from our vantage point.
Here are the Lumière brothers:
And Laurent Mourguet and Guignol:
We love how the ground floor of the mural looks so realistic. We could easily have tried entering the building and walking up the staircases …
Or enjoyed a warm drink in that cafe.
So if you ever find yourself in Lyon looking for something to do that won’t affect the budget; walking the streets to explore the mural art might just be the thing.
Have you been to Lyon?
What did you think of the murals?
As always, we love hearing what you have to say.
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weekend walks: the doors of old tallinn
The old town in Tallinn is such a charming medieval town, dating back as early as the 13th Century. The cobbled streets of the town weaves into lane ways and courtyards. Each corner you turn, there is something fascinating to see.
We walked through the streets of the old town for a couple of hours and stumbled across so many churches and merchant houses. But what intrigued us were the doors; each one so unique! The old town simply has so much character. Even the doors have so much character! Here is a selection of the different and interesting doors we came across.
For more of our photos of Tallinn, visit our Facebook album.
wise monkeys abroad 