Warning: the colours and light balances were heavily distorted in the scanning process. It also seems that the camera that I had with me had a bit slow shutter so the corners are a bit dark in some pictures...
Copyright laws of course apply to all the pictures. The Dilbert comics were borrowed from the most excellent Dilbert Zone. For copyright reasons, they are here just temporarily.
I think we arrive at Heathrow here.
Then to Seattle, over Scotland, Greenland, and Canada. This picture is
of my first encounter with the Rocky Mountains in Canada. Before this
were the Labradorian peninsula and its thousands of very beautiful
lakes. Sorry, no pics from those.
My hotel in Anchorage, Rodeway Inn. Not very excellent quality, but it
was about $45+tax(8%) per night, which I suppose was cheap
there. Well, it seems that in USA there is a big difference between
cheap and expensive hotels...
Hmm, this DOES remind me of the hotel receptionist girl, although she was quite polite...
The Egan Convention Center, where the conference took place.
...and with me. Some kind oriental-looking person offered to take this
picture. There were about 10 finnish people in the conference. There
were many interesting presentations. Some plenary and panel sessions
were very good.
May 5th. Mountain view from Anchorage, somewhat near the port. There
was a "Railroad Brewery" nearby, where we had a student reception.
Well, going back to the hotel one evening. From inside this cottage,
some quite loud gospel could be heard. I suppose they tried to rescue
me, but I was beyond any help. The city planning was somewhat strange
- skyscrapers and these little cottages side by side. And yes, parking
places. Very little people walking on streets in the downtown, lots of
cars though. Strange people these americans.
Same evening, still going back to the hotel. A bunch of police cars
had stopped by the road, with all their lights flashing. Quite an
impressive light show, actually. Two days later I read from the
newspaper that some guy had gone berserk with his gun and the police
had shot him. Maybe this was the place. Wow, action!
Wall painting from the shop: The Source. It sold some occult,
etc. stuff. The other side of the shop, the Black Market, was a
"tobaccoo shop", that sold mostly cannabis pipes and magazines. I
didn't ask if they sold any grass...
Then follows a series of semi-boring forest pictures. Just a recording
of reality here, nothing really artistic. This place is the Earthquake
Park. In the last evening I just had to get to a forest. So, I took a
taxi and asked the driver to take me somewhere. He recommended this
place. We agreed that he would come back after an hour to pick me up
so I might have time to go to another bigger forest nearby. There was
an earthquake some decades ago in Anchorage and some land sled into
the ocean, with a bunch of houses with it. Well, personally I think it
looked prettier now than it would have with the ugly houses.
So, the area consisted of these long ridges with water pools between them.
The trees were quite nice and friendly.
And as it was a beach, I had to take some nice beach pics. Really
boring here, go on.
Here you can again see the mountain behind the city.
And yet another beach view. Well, nice land this Alaska, were it
without those inhabitants.
Some moose I bumped into. I looked at them, they looked at me, we
didn't care to bother each other, and so I went on. It may be that I
saw a glimpse of a beaver escaping fast nearby, but I didn't see it
very well. There were also lots of birds that escaped every now and
then, so maybe it was just another bird.
A boring forest-picture. Here you can observe that the (quite small)
firs are a bit different from european firs.
Another one; same place, different angle. How awesome.
This looks like the full moon. Well, I just had to take a picture of
her. This is from the parking place. No, the taxi driver didn't come
back to pick me up as we had agreed. And yes, my feet were aching
horribly after the 6 mile walk back to my hotel.
Also on the last day, I bought some 10-15 teddybears and such, as gifts for friends, etc. They were sold with discount rate in a gift shop. I had so many of them that I considered tossing the smaller ones as tips to the hotel receptionist, etc. ("Here, have a bear."). Well, I didn't.
And some other mountains, the Rocky ones most propably:
I met Dr. Neil Branston and his wife Marilyn at Seattle airport. They
were also in WCCI. Some of their american friends had arranged a
surprise at Seattle airport; tea and all kinds of pastry and such
served in a most english fashion. Quite unbelievable, really nice
people, I must say. Below am I, sipping some tea peacefully:
And here are the people I met:
A switch of photographer:
Well, just seeing the British Airways stewardesses gave me an impression of returning to the civilized world. Well, I had to stand an elderly american couple in the plane. Well, it was actually quite nice chatting with them, they were just so typical rich american tourists.
The city was quite expensive. I almost died of hunger in the first day; I walked around the city looking for an affordable restaurant, but didn't find any. The prizes were about 2-3 times those in Finland. Then I took an attitude that one Finnish mark is one pound (not 8.7), and everything looked sooo cheap, and so I survived the next two days.
Well, anyways, here am I, riding the red londoner. This picture is
actually from the last day, from Oxford Street, when I was heading to
Heathrow with a big rush.
Trafalgar square. Lots of pidgeons and their feeders out there.
The Tower was closed at 6 pm, just before I got there. Oh well, I
suppose it would have been expensive. Hmm, I didn't visit the London
Dungeon either.
``We met next day ... and inspected the rooms at No. 221b Baker Street.''Well, there I was, feeling almost like at home in that place. The book I'm reading there is about surgery, quite an old book, apparently from the times of Holmes, as everything in the building was. Really beautiful place. A bought a big tea-cup (£14), two bookmarks, and postcards.
- Dr. Watson
...and some views without me. Notice the violin, magnifying glass, laboratory equipment, etc.
The next two are from the second floor; on the third floor there was a shop (as well as in the basement). On the ground floor there was a restaurant. On the fourth floor there was a toilet, etc.
A different angle:
Below are pictures from the famous Hyde Park. No, there was no speaker
in the Speaker's Corner. What a pity.
The parks were full of pidgeons and these rather well-fed
squirrels. They came to eat stuff from hand.
And one picture from the Regent Park, which was near the Sherlock
Holmes Museum, but was maybe a bit smaller than the Hyde Park and more
divided into compartments.
Well, that's about it.
Last modified: Wed Jan 31 00:09:11 EET 2001
