Perspective

Today's itinerary was supposed to include a junket to Croatia, but due to a couple of items that are out of our control, we decided to stay in town.  Namely we are having an issue, the first ever of its kind for us, with our host.  It's been frustrating, but we are keeping our chins up.  I think we've been maintaining a positive perspective despite this little inconvenience.  Anyway, here is a birdseye view of the street from the mansard or manzardo apartment we are staying in.  It truly is a garret apartment, the equivalent to a five story walk up.  This morning a man playing an accordion strolled under those trees at the bottom right where the corner cafe keeps its seating area.  The other night we sat there munching on cookies and sipping  mineral water before retiring for the evening.  Tonight however, being Sunday, the cafe closed early so no cookies under the trees.

Since we decided not to leave town, we headed to Miramar Castle, which is only a few miles down the road.  The bus dropped us off at a popular beach-like spot about a mile away from the castle where it seemed all of Trieste was bathing and parading on a concrete promenade in various states of undress.  There's really no beach here but people manage to sun bathe on this sidewalk between the craggy shoreline and the road on towels and beach chairs.  It looks awfully uncomfortable but it's so popular we had to walk up the hill to the castle on the street because there was no room to navigate on the pavement.  

These pics were taken closer to the castle past the sun worshippers who were of every age and social class.

I didn't take too many pics of the inside of this castle.  Talk about perspective, I felt like being in there gave me more than enough to last a lifetime.  Meaning that as opulent as it was, there truly is no accounting for taste.  A wanted me to take a picture of the music Maximilian liked.  They had this list posted in his personal rooms that he had specially built to look as though one were on a ship.

This was literally my favorite room in the castle.  The bathroom.  It was built for some guests in the 1920s along with a more modern apartment.

A view from the castle.

And another.

One of the grounds.

Afterwards we took a walk on the grounds and then stopped for a snack.

Then more exploring.

We used the pillar above to gain some more new perspectives.

And then we started back down the hill, past the bathers to catch a bus back into town.

Oh yes, Maximilian left his M just about everywhere on the grounds including at the bases of all the street lamps.

After a light dinner in the apartment A and I took a quick walk hoping to see again the Engelmann park that is so close to the apartment.  But it had closed a half hour before we got there.  

I took a picture of this building right next to ours.  The horse head is so random.  I'm sure it has some wacky story associated with it.  Maybe I'll make one up.

And here's almost the same view that we started this post with from the garret's window just before sunset.