What I did on my holidays (I)

Perhaps, after all, there's something to be said for the usual annual round, in this case, trips to photogenic places I've been to before.

First,  back to Austria for some walking down in the same picturesque mountain valley as for some years past.

Hard to resist the temptation to take yet more photos of the same dramatic waterfall (enlarge this and scroll down to see some tiny humans for scale) and cataracts.

Easier to resist the temptation to snap at every last wild flower (quite possibly exactly the same plants as in previous years),

However, there was something new in some surprisingly un-flighty butterfles who for once stayed posed (heat? or still air?) - and not forgetting an Alpine traffic jam:

Then another brief home exchange in Paris. where the first thing to see on emerging from the usual everyday metro station was this group of inflatable polar bears taking advantage of the hot air from the trains below, and flapping frantically in the breeze.

It appears there's a regular artist at work here, aiming to remind us all of global warming. But his work was purely temporary and vanished within a couple of days (I don't know if the bears simply took flight).

Equally eye-catching was this enthusiastic gardener's full use of a tiny balcony overlooking (what else?) the Promenade Plantée.

And then, in the Tuileries gardens, there was this: