Villefranche

About Villefranche•September 19, 2008 •
A fantastic living environment on the French Riviera.

Villefranche sur Mer is one of the most charming — if not the most charming — authentic French and Niçoise fishing village on the French Riviera, in the heart of the Cote d’Azur. With Monaco on one side and Nice on the other, it is hard to believe that it can retain its charm and authenticity of a little village where people still know each other.
The Old Town rises steeply up from the sea to the hillsides that ring the bay of Villefranche. The whole village is pedestrian and has lovely Italian style architecture with medieval accents throughout. The old town is very beautiful, both well preserved and also very much a real living village with mostly local residents. It is always fun to explore its nooks and crannies, like the beautiful church of St. Michel, with its quiet tree-lined squares, or the rue Obscure (a famous medieval covered passage), or the Chapel St. Pierre (its interior painted by Jean Cocteau). Take a break for lunch at Place Pollonnais at one of the several Brasseries with outdoor seating (so you can soak up the sunshine and people watch!). On Sundays there is a wonderful Brocante market set up on the Place around its charming fountain (and on Saturdays there’s a farmer’s market at the top of the Old Town). And of course there’s the waterfront quai (with many fine restaurants serving great dinner fare), and sandy beach of Villefranche, with a kilometer long wall of bougainvillea.
The Citadel is a huge stone fort built 600 years ago at the edge of the Old Town along the water, where there are now 3 museums, the City Hall, beautiful gardens, and the Cinema Plien Aire (outdoor theater). It is quite a magnificent structure and a great place to explore. There is a moat that connects the Old Village to the Port de la Darse, with walls nearly 100 feet high. Don’t miss the Volti museum in the Citadel and the gardens. Nearly every night during the summer there are movies shown in the outdoor theater. You can also walk up along the citadel walls that overlook the moat and, of course, the beautiful bay.
Walk around the Citadel water side path to the Port de la Darse. This is our working port, now mostly for pleasure yachts, with a colorful history going back over 500 years! Check out the beautiful vaulted workshops, the dry dock which can’t be mechanized (since it’s an historical monument) so is still used daily — the old-fashioned way. Great yachts come from around the world to be restored in this little Port. The Darse is a great sub-culture of the village.Although it’s such an authentic village, Villefranche is also surrounded by an fascinating, international scene. It attracts a very interesting cosmopolitan group of visitors and residents, including students who attend the renowned French language school called the Institut Français.


Source: http://villefranche.wordpress.com/

Review: Madonna's Hard Candy

On Madonna's 11th album, Hard Candy, the queen of pop invites us to imagine her as a confectioner running a musical sweet shop. But, after sitting through the 12 tracks on offer here, you'll begin to wish she'd stocked more than two varieties of candy.

Those flavours come from two of America's most bankable songwriting teams: The Neptunes and Timbaland, who between them have conjured up hits for the likes of Britney Spears, Jay-Z, Missy Elliot and Justin Timberlake. Timberlake himself crops up on five of the tracks, posing a particularly pertinent question about who is running the show when he asks "Who is the master? Who is the slave?" as the album closes.

This sort of top flight production is an unusual step for Madonna, who has a reputation for seeking out relatively obscure dance producers like Mirwais, Shep Pettibone and Stuart Price to helm her albums.

This time round, however, the queen of reinvention is trying to win back the hearts of the US audience - who were largely unimpressed with her 2005 love letter to disco, Confessions On A Dancefloor.

Lyrically, the album plays it safe. Madonna may have been inspired to make a documentary about the Aids epidemic in Africa when she adopted two-year-old Malawian orphan David Banda, but you would be hard pressed to find any social commentary in her music.

The main themes are love, revenge, sex and music - subjects on which Madonna surely has very little left to say at this stage in her career. She even repeats herself, echoing Into The Groove when she sings "Don't you know, can't you see? When I dance I feel free" on Heartbeat.

Then again, Madonna has always been at her best when extolling the virtues of music as a release, and it is on Hard Candy's club-orientated tracks that she excels. She's Not Me, a Neptunes production, feels like a five-minute musical summary of her career to date.

It kicks off with Chic-esque guitars that are reminiscent of Holiday before morphing into a pulsing club groove that could have been lifted straight from her last album. Track three, Give It To Me, is already pencilled in as the album's second single. It is one of the record's few out-and-out pop moments, featuring a cute, bouncy beat and a sense of humour that has been missing from Madonna's music since her Dick Tracy days.

"If it's against the law, arrest me, if you can handle it, undress me," she chirps as the song builds to a blistering crescendo that will surely be the highlight of any future live set.

Madonna, a notoriously hard task master (she gave Justin Timberlake a vitamin shot when he appeared to be flagging during recording sessions) seems to have been unable to tame the idiosyncrasies of her omnipresent hitmakers.

As it stands, however, the album is more akin to Madonna's last attempt to harness the urban market, 1994's underwhelming Bedtime Stories.
Bah, humbug.

By Mark Savage Entertainment reporter, BBC News
Story from BBC NEWS:http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/1/hi/entertainment/7336448.stm
Published: 2008/04/08 11:46:13 GMT
© BBC MMVIII

DEXTER

Wednesday, July 16, 2008

Watch Dexter Season 3 this Fall

Dexter is one of the best (and creepiest) shows to come out in the past several years.

A Showtime original series based on the books by Jeff Lindsay, Dexter is a show about a serial killer with a conscious. Well, Dexter doesn't quite have a conscious as much as he has a mission. His mission is to put people who hurt other people out of their misery. He is a serial killer of serial killers.

The show is really interesting, colorful, and fun to watch as Dexter cruises through his life in sun-drenched Miami, a perfect place for Dexter, who works as a blood spatter expert for the Miami police department, to carry out his mission.

Dexter is dark, funny, and always entertaining. Dexter season 3 starts this fall on Showtime. Seasons one and two will be shown on CBS this season as well (FOX in Latin America), so you can watch them for free and get caught up. Season two of Dexter will be released on DVD in August.

Voyager of the Seas

Voyager of The Seas is a revolutionary marvel of naval engineering. Enjoy first- time cruise features like a skating rink, a street fair and a rock- climbing wall, a full-size basketball court - among others. The 142,000-ton, 3,114-guest Voyager of the Seas became the world's largest cruise ship when it entered service in November 1999. Innovations on Voyager of the Seas represent the highest space-per-guest ratio in the cruise market - and include enhanced staterooms, expanded dining options and exceptional recreational facilities. On the Voyager-class ships you'll find more onboard activities, more totally unique adventures and more experiences that you'll remember for a lifetime.

Some of the ship's facilities:

Voyager Promenade
Voyager Main Dining Room
Johnny Rockets Restaurant
Voyager Pig Whistle Restaurant
Voyager Scoreboard Lounge
Voyager Library
Voyager Nightclub
Voyager Theater
Rock Climbing Wall: Royal Caribbean cruise ships are the only ones in the world to offer rock-climbing walls. Whether it's your first time on a rock wall or if you're a seasoned climber, there are challenges for all levels of experience. Royal Caribbean will provide all of the equipment, including shoes, helmets and harnesses. All you need to do is bring a pair of socks and, of course, your sense of adventure.
The Royal Promenade, cruising's first horizontal atrium, is two football fields in length and four decks high. With a wide selection of shops, restaurants and entertainment the Royal Promenade will be the place to be.
Ice Skating Rink. Take a shot at a double axle in the only ice skating rink at sea. Or, once the rink is converted to a stage, settle in for an unforgettable show in the same unique area.

Passenger Capacity: 3,114
Gross Tonnage: 138,000
Length: 1020'
Beam: 157.5'
Draft: 29'
Cruising Speed: 23.7 knots


Ship Destinations
Western Caribbean from Galveston, Texas
Mediterranean Cruises
Transatlantic Cruises

LOST Season 5 early rumours

The fourth series of Lost may have only just left our screens, but that doesn't stop us doing some spoiler-tastic rounding up of what's happening next...

Given the strength of the fourth season of Lost, even if the concluding double episode had its problems, it’s perhaps understandable that talk already has turned to the next – and penultimate – series of the show. And with things needing to slide into place – for this time next year, there’ll be less than 20 episodes of Lost left – we can expect an action-packed and eventful fifth season.

Firstly, the basics. The show won’t be returning to our screens until January 2009 (possibly even February), where the plan will be to run the episodes through without any breaks. That was also the idea this time, but the writers’ strike disrupted the plan, hence it all got a little bitty towards the end. We also know that season five of Lost is now going to run for 17 episodes, instead of the originally-planned 16 (and this will be the case with the final season, too).

There’s still a chance of an actor’s strike, incidentally, which may yet play havoc with all of this, so don’t set your recorders just yet.Now we’re onto rumour and speculation, so look away now if you don’t want anything spoilt.The current word is that a female cast member of the show who has been with the series from the start won’t be back for season five. We’d suggest that Claire is the most obvious candidate (and that’s certainly the name that’s being banded around), but don’t hold us to it. The chances are that she’ll be back for the final series anyway, as she has ties to the mystery that need to be resolved (and, to be fair, from being a fairly redundant character, she finally emerged as someone really quite intriguing by the end of season four).

We also know that of those caught in the boat blast that Michael is definitely dead, as actor Harold Perrineau has been grumbling about it in a new interview he’s given. Jin is likely to have perished, too.

We’ll be finding out more about the character of Keamy in season five, who will get, apparently, a flashback all of his own (although how the show will handle the flashback/forward dynamic is unclear, given the Oceanic 6 are now off the island, and much of series five is likely to be concerned with getting them back there. Plus, er, the fact that Keamy is dead). There are also rumours that Eko might be making a reappearance, but to be fair, there’s lots of wild speculation running round at the moment.

So now we wait. ...

www.denofgeek.com/television/63554/lost_season_5_early_rumours.html

Heathrow chaos

BA Heathrow chaos affects 70,000

Tens of thousands of air passengers have been stranded at Heathrow after British Airways cancelled all flights until Friday evening. The move was prompted by an unofficial strike by ground staff in support of sacked catering workers. More than 100 flights were grounded on Thursday leaving 15,000 passengers stranded - 1,000 of whom spent the night sleeping in the airport.

Union leaders said they were hopeful fresh talks may be held on Friday. Mick Temple, managing director at Heathrow, said there would be "significant disruption today and probably for several days to come" for BA passengers, as the airline faces cancelling a total of 550 flights up until 2000 BST on Friday.

But the Transport and General Workers' Union said they were optimistic talks could take place on Friday afternoon with conciliation service Acas, and progress could signal the end of industrial action. Earlier talks held on Thursday aimed at reinstating 600 sacked staff from the caterers that serve BA flights, Gate Gourmet, collapsed.

Nearly 100 BA aircraft and 1,000 pilots and cabin crew are in the wrong places around the world, BA said.
Qantas, Sri Lankan, Finnair, GB and British Mediterranean, also serviced by BA ground staff, have also been affected by the strike which is taking place during the peak holiday season.
So far, three Qantas London-bound flights from Australia are known to have been diverted to Frankfurt. BA said compensation claims will be considered on a case by case basis and all 70,000 passengers caught up in the chaos can rebook or have their flight costs refunded.

Staff at Heathrow - regarded as the world's busiest international airport - are trying to book travellers on flights with other airlines, while other services including Eurostar have reported a surge in business. Meanwhile passengers due to travel on Friday are being urged not to turn up at the airport, but to contact the airline or their travel agent for more information.

BA, which is set to lose £10m for every day that the dispute continues, said about 4,000 passengers were put up at hotels across London and the South East on Thursday night.
Another 1,000 spent the night in Terminals 1 and 4, some staying in a huge marquee, and were provided with sleep rolls, blankets and food. Those stranded were tired and frustrated on Friday morning, with many complaining of poor communication by airport staff.

SOURCE: http://news.bbc.co.uk/

Lost & Heroes [New Seasons]

HEROES [Season 2]

Tim Kring, creator of NBC’s hit series Heroes, told SCI FI Wire that the upcoming second season will constitute a new volume in the multi-volume series, with new characters and an entirely new storyline. “If you remember, the opening of the pilot pronounced the episode as the beginning of Volume One,” Kring said in an interview. “Volume One comes to a conclusion at the end of episode 23, and Volume Two starts with the opening of season two. And Volume Two is a different story.”

Kring added: “We could have new people and new storylines and new ideas and new threats and new bad guys and new heroes. So I would prepare the audience for that idea, that it’s not just a continuing serialized storyline about only these people. It’s a little more the 24 model than the Lost model.”

The first season of Heroes is exploring what happens when a disparate group of ordinary people discover they have extraordinary abilities and attempt to save New York from disaster.“Heroes needs to evolve, and if we are positing an idea that this is happening all over the world to many, many people, then we get to see some of those people and see how their story fits in.”

Kring also confirmed that some of the current heroes just might not survive this season, but added: “Many of your favorites will live to fight again.”

LOST [Season 4]

The third season's conclusion is set on December 23, 2004. The crash survivors made contact with what they think is a freighter off the coast of the island. Meanwhile, the war between the Others and the survivors came to its climax which saw several of the Others killed.

Not much is known about season four and most of what is known was revealed at San Diego's Comic-Con International 2007.It has been hinted that there is no boat coming to the island; however, whoever is coming to the island is "a lot worse" than the Others.

What happened between Ben and the real Henry Gale and how Ben was caught in Rousseau's trap on the survivors' fifty-eighth day will be explained. The four-toed statue will be addressed. Whether or not Kate is pregnant with a baby from Sawyer will be revealed in the first four episodes. What happened in the Hatch during its implosion will be explored. The fate of Sun and her unborn child will be made clear.

What happened to Dr. Marvin Candle's arm will be addressed. How Libby wound up in the mental institution will be shown. What happened to Ben's childhood friend Annie will be revealed. More will be seen of the authoritative Other Jacob.

Episodes will continue to feature flashbacks, in addition to flashforwards, which have revealed that Jack and Kate escape the island; however, a depressed Jack believes it to be a mistake. Not all the survivors make it off the island.

This season is apparently scarier and more violent than previous seasons. There will be more deaths, some of which take place in flashforwards. Time travel and other supernatural elements will be a part of the season, and decoy endings have been shot.