A Vincent Mounier Photography Blog

What it's all about
July 22, 2009
Being able to enjoy this moment without the dreadful knowledge that a plane ride is about to dilute it with 5000 km of loneliness. There's a certain je ne sais quoi to a comfortable routine, when that routine is made of organic love and called home. It's soft, and it's warm and it's cozy and slow and languorous and plush. It's ours.
Running New York: First Blood
July 21, 2009
I have long known - and dreaded - the unavoidable fact that after three-and-a-half years of running along Vancouver's Seawall, Montreal and the Big Apple would pose some serious challenges to my exercising routine. If there is such a thing as a runner's high, I knew I was headed for my runner's low. With a difficult month-long campaign in mind, I've began to investigate New York as a running ground, looking for exclusive pedestrian paths, parks and other ideal areas. An ...
Visiting Governors Island along with 10,000 friends
July 19, 2009
It was Sunday. We'd decided to have a picnic. Governors Island sounded like a decent choice because of its abundance of shade, free ferries, a blessed absence of cars and nice panoramic views of Manhattan. When we left Brooklyn at 1:15 to catch the 2:00 PM ferry from the bottom tip of Manhattan, it all seemed possible. The F train, however, had other plans. Afflicted by a high week-end fever, if was avoiding our Bergen station altogether and forced us to negotiate a long...
The eagle has bounced, many times, and finally landed
July 19, 2009
Bear with me. Many habits have to be twisted. Bearings shall be taken. Solutions must be drafted and ideas might sprout. It could be as simple as looking for a spot to lay my laptop or a way to hang clothes. Sometimes it's as comical as comparing our evolutions in the tiny flat to that of submarine crew members. Everything has a place, square inches must not be wasted and sequence does matter. The bowl goes on the shelf before the cup or it will not fit. It's chaos t...
The Adirondack Train to New York
July 15th, 2009 A coffee at my side, I’m sitting in the almost deserted café car of Amtrack’s Adirondack train to New York, pondering how much more comfortable than planes these trains are… A wide table all to myself that could sit four people easily, the smell of coffee and breakfast, the gentle rocking - I love restaurant cars. They represent everything a plane still can’t offer, decades after Boeing came up with its Jumbo jet’s hump as a potential lounge area. On a t...
Free @ YVR
July 11, 2009
It's 9:26 AM. Finally, Vancouver's International Airport offers terminal-wide free Wi-Fi access. I'm sitting in the more modest Domestic Departure Terminal, gate B21. Westjet flight 506 is on time, bound for Montreal Trudeau International, aka good old Dorval airport. Even though I'm still in town and I didn't have to clear customs this time, Vancouver and the West Coast have already receded far behind the horizon and an imaginary but very tangible line now separates me ...
Good bye Vancouver
As I sit at home in an almost empty apartment, sorting out my fireworks pictures while waiting for Craigslist to do its magic and rid me of a few remaining pieces of furniture, I am peering through my immense window at the city beyond. Without leaving my seat, I can count around 60 buildings - the tallest being Shangri-La at 62 floors - and less than 10 of these are office towers. With more than 100,000 people living on a 5 by 5 km peninsula, the heck if I can't sell a cou...
The Tweetboard experiment
July 1, 2009
There's a new kid on the blog. You will have noticed the green (or red) vertical tab, left of all things major - on the very edge of Coriolistic Anachronisms. It's called Tweetboard and it's a new widget that links to the blog's Twitter account and allows, among other things, for visitors to leave threaded (or nested) messages, a feature blatantly lacking on Twitter itself. The sweet little thing is still very much in alpha phase and being released on an invite basis, bu...
Great blue heron
June 30, 2009
Part 3 of the rainbow evening shoot, here are my herons, photographed on the beach just across the street from home. I wasn't the only one interested in the herons, as can be seen. They most likely nest in the huge rookery just a few blocks away on the edge of Stanley Park - guano smell and constant cacophony, if you ask me...
A balcony with a view
June 28, 2009
There is something to be said for living on the 15th floor of a Vancouver high rise. Beach Towers will have been a haven of peace and the most fantastic location I've ever lived in. In over two years spent in my 23 floor building, I've never had really inconsiderate neighbours. The premises are kept squeaky clean, the parking is hidden underground and newly repaved (ok, that was a bit of disturbance at times, but quite bearable.) The building managers were nice and the ren...
The rainbow that reached across a continent
June 28, 2009
Earlier this afternoon, I called Marie on Skype. She answered a little out of breath, and untangling her earphones she said in an excited voice: "I was on the terrace. There is a beautiful rainbow!" Nice, I said, thinking that New York's really got it all, mammatus clouds, rainbows and black cats. Then later tonight, after the wind had picked up and blown hard bringing low grey clouds and rain, I caught a glimpse of orange light through my curtains and thought ...