Upward Over the Mountain

At the end of May I took my final European vacation--a cruise to northern Europe and to St. Petersburg--with Dad, Mom, and Wayne before I returned home.  I'll never be able to complete my places to see list and that's a good thing, but I did get to see a lot of those places during the cruise.  We departed from Copenhagen and visited Oslo, Norway; Aarhus, Denmark; Warnemuende, Germany; Tallin, Estonia; St. Petersburg, Russia; Helsinki, Finland; and Stockholm, Sweden.

Copenhagen

 

We all arrived in Copenhagen either a day or two before the ship sailed.  It's a neat city, but then all of the cities in Scandinavia are neat.  We did some wandering and Dad found a new love--Carlsberg.

Changing of the guard in Oslo

Beer in Oslo

The beach in Warnemuende, Germany.

A delicious dunkel in Warnemuende.

Oslo wasn't much to me personally, but I did wander some and we saw the changing of the guard.  Warnemuende is about 3 hours is so from Berlin, but since I had been to Berlin several times, Dad and I stayed in this little seaside town.  It's very popular with Germans for the beach and has lots of fresh fish dishes.  So, we found an outside restaurant under cover when it started raining, had some lunch and some delicious Rostocker beer.

A medieval restaurant in Estonia.

An Estonian microbrew.

I don't know about everyone else, but Tallinn was my favorite stop on the cruise.  Mom found a tour company run by college students and we had a great walking tour of the city.  The country's history is fascinating and they seem to be very proud to finally be on their own, under no other country's control.  Our tour guide recommended that we have lunch at this medieval restaurant where everything is a euro, there are no lights, no utensils, and they jokingly serve you without any customer service. 

Catherine's Palace in St. Petersburg

Paying in rubels can't be that much, right?  Lunch in St. Petersburg.

Church of Our Savior on Spilled Blood

St. Petersburg was interesting, perhaps only because we couldn't ever visit there for so long.  I'm glad I went, but I don't think I'll ever go back.  My one goal was to see an onion dome church, with the colorful tops and mosaics.  I got to see that and it was awesome!  Most of the time we were on a bus, though, which I'm not a fan of, but it was probably the better option after seeing how people drive.

 The Vasa in Stockholm

Probably the coolest thing any of us ever have seen in our lives was the war ship the Vasa, in Stockholm.  It sank on it's maiden voyage, just 2km from it's berth and remained at the bottom for almost 350 years.  When found it was almost completely intact.  It was HUGE and breathtaking.

The cruise was a wonderful way to end my tour in Germany, especially with Mom and Dad.

Old Country Fairytale

You know when you think of Germany, you think of timbered houses, quaint villages with cobblestone roads, and in general just cute?  Well, that's where I took Mom when she visited....to France.  To be fair, it's that portion of France that changed hands so many times between Germany and France that it's a little of both.

We went to the Alsace region of France and drove along the wine route.  It's made up of those quaint villages with cobblestone roads.  The required phrase was "awww, how cute."  We visited Obernai, the Haut-Koenigsbourg Castle, Riquewehr, and others that I can't remember.  But they were cute.

It turns out that the emblem of the Alsace are storks.  There were stork nests on the tops of buildings, at the tops of poles designed for stork nests, and it seemed everywhere.  We got a few good pictures of these storks in their nest. 


 













I took Mom to Heidelberg on Friday so she could see the castle with the views.  There's an American base near by, so there tend to be a lot of Americans there, but it's a nice city and the castle, the grounds, and the view are beautiful.

The trip was relaxing and not the run-around of trying to see a bunch of things all in a week.  The weather couldn't have been in any better.  It was sunny and in the low 60s every day.  I think almost every single one of our lunches were outside in the sun.

Love Like the Movies

 October 31, 2010

Baltimore, MD

Anna Maria Island, Florida

Say Hello, Wave Goodbye

In early September I had a couple of visitors. Dad and Chad arrived on the same day for their Euro trip. They had the requisite schnitzel and beer for their first meal and I showed them around Wiesbaden.

The next day we took a Rhein river cruise up to St. Goar. It was a tad brisk on top of the boat, but we had great weather and saw so many castles. Some of us *cough* even saw submarines. We all really enjoyed the cruise and I don't think Chad thought he'd ever see so many old things within such a short period of time.



In St. Goar, we took a self-guided walking tour of the castle that was built in 1200AD. The views of the river valley were amazing and the castle had so many nooks and crannies to explore.
Chad flew to Paris the next day and Dad and I started our journey. Our main destination was the Belgium beer festival in Brussels, but on the way there, we stopped in Cologne so he could see one of the largest cathedrals in the world.

The festival took place the entire weekend, but unless you get there in the first few hours, it's terribly crowded and very difficult to maneuver (i.e. get beer). Instead, that evening we just went to the main square to see the craziness and then headed to dinner at Chez Leon. It's on a touristy pedestrian street, which meant we got to sit and watch people, a lot of them drunk, pass by our table. I don't know how long we were there, but I know we both enjoyed watching the characters walk by. We ate at the same place both nights, because the food was good and the people watching was phenomenal.


We had a lot of fun at the beer festival. We got there right when it opened at 11 a.m. You have to buy tokens to use inside the fence and Dad, for some odd reason, thought 20 was enough for the both of us. (I used 20 or more last year by myself.) I relented, knowing that we'd need more later...and we did. This year, you had to buy a separate token that you used to return your glass and when you did, you received the token back, which allowed you to get another beer. Last year, when you were done with your glass, you just set it down and someone would come by to pick them up. I guess, with this year's method, the vendors lost fewer glasses.


Dad's first order of business was walking around to all the stands to grab their coasters, which made great souvenirs. Dad also picked up some For his first couple of beers, I directed him to a few of my favorites and ones he might enjoy. We probably stayed there for about 4 hours before we went back to the hotel for a nap (and some water).



The next morning we made a pilgrimage to the Trappist brewery Westvleteren. The monks' brew has been voted as the best beer in the world (the 12 that is) and you have to have an appointment to be able to pick up cases of it. (I've written about this before.) They do have a cafe and a small gift shop, so I had a 12 and Dad had two blondes (those are beers). I made sure to give him a hard time for not having the best beer in the world and instead having blonde beer. Given that this was his first true indulgence in to the world of Belgian beer, I let it slide. We also each bought a six-pack, which is the only opportunity to buy the beer unless you were lucky enough to have an appointment to pick up crates of beer.

After the monastery, we headed to a beer store and found a couple of the beers that Dad enjoyed at the festival, as well as a glass or two, and I got a case of something too. The American military cemetery in Luxembourg was our next stop, but by the time we arrived, it had just closed for the day. We did go back before we headed home. Then, we made our way to the oldest city in Germany: Trier.

Trier has a lot of Roman ruins all over the city and I knew Dad would like it. We saw the amphitheater, the city gate, the baths, and the bridge--all Roman ruins. It's hard to believe that they're still standing and we can still get a good idea of what these structures looked like and how they were used.


On Dad's last day in Germany, I took him to the market, and for lunch to a great Italian deli that serves wonderful, fresh sandwiches, and some yummy prosecco. He also got to meet my friends Kim and Brian, and their ball of energy, also known as Jack.

It was a great visit and hopefully both Dad and Chad can return before I leave next summer.

My Old Kentucky Home

I had a wild hair. Which is funny, because it's usually a stiff chin hair, not a wild hair, but whatever kind of hair it was, I went home over the 4th of July for a wedding reception. I had already declined my invitation many weeks before, but bored one Saturday, I discovered "cheap" tickets, so I plucked the hair or smoothed the hair or...I bought the ticket, okay.

It was a quick trip home, I'll admit that, but well worth it. I flew into Washington and out of Louisville, where the reception was held. I spent 1.5 days in Baltimore, if you can count the rush hour traffic from Dulles Airport, which we avoided by stopping in Washington D.C. for Angus burgers and beer. On Friday Chris and I set out early on a road trip to Louisville, Kentucky.


Instead of the typical mindset of having to get there as quickly as possible, we drove and when we wanted to stop, we did. Our first fun stop, was at a casino somewhere near Charleston, West Virginia (but not Charlestown races and slots like you hear on the commercials in Ohio). In 30 minutes, we lost $33 in a few slots, but mostly my fault at the craps table. I was able to annoy a bunch of old men when I showed up to the table and everyone passed the dice until they got to me, when I happily threw them for craps. Everyone loses! Woohoo!!

Back in the car and on the road a while longer, I saw a sign for Louisa (Kentucky), when I exclaimed, "that's where my great-grandparents were from! I was there once to see G.G.'s (great-grandmother) grave!" The genealogist in Chris couldn't resist, so we turned the car around and headed back for the exit and found our way to Louisa.
Once there, we trolled through town searching for a cemetery and finally stopped to ask someone. He gave me directions and we headed up a hill to find it. I had been to Louisa once before when I was probably around 10 years old. The area where my great-grandparents had their house was going to be flooded to turn into a park and we went down so we could see it one time, and for Grandpa and my Dad to see it one last time. We saw where the house used to stand and some bricks that once made up the one-room school house where my grandpa attended. On that trip we also visited G.G.'s grave and all that I could remember was that the grave was on a hill.


So Chris and I searched this small cemetery, looking at every headstone and plate in the grass, but found nothing. Back into town we stopped at a gas station for water, where Chris asked a customer about another cemetery. He gave us the locations of two others, which were more out of the way than the first. The largest of the three we visited, I was certain felt right, but after searching, we found nothing. Although we didn't find the graves, we did learn that one of our federal government officials came from Louisa. Pretty exciting.


On Saturday morning, for breakfast we met Chris' family, who had driven up from Tennessee, along with his daughter and son-in-law, the bride and groom. I just loved listening to them talk, because I love their accents. However, after not understanding something Chris said (his accent gets thicker the more he's around his family), I was corrected by his Mama that he didn't have an accent. Yes Ma'am!

The reception was Saturday. It was a burger bar and a local Louisville brew, with instructions to "wear whatever you're comfortable in." Perfect. I think weddings are overrated. The beer was wonderful and the burgers were delicious! Low key and no chicken dances. Nice job, Jen and Scott! Congratulations!

We visited the Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory and that was awesome. They had an exihibt where you could choose from 4 game-used bats to stand at a plate to swing or have your picture taken. Every kid was opting for Lou Gehrig's bat (or was it Mickey Mantle's?), but being the oddball Reds fan, I chose Johnny Bench's bat.


On Sunday, we went to Churchill Downs. Because of the holiday, it was free to get in. Completely confused on where we could sit to see the track out of the sun and how to bet on the races, we sought help. A lovely usher gave us seats for a very small tip, a card on how to bet, and the program for race day. We sat in "box" seats, which had a tv with the race and were directly in front of the room where the rich people stayed, with air conditioning, servers, tables, food, and drinks. They only came out to watch the races.


We bet on every race we saw. We knew nothing about the horses, but chose based on their names and sometimes their odds. Our math wasn't that great, but I think we came out almost even.

Here's to America's birthday and to chin hairs!