Berlin, days one and two

Day One
Today we wandered around a lot.
We started off early, using the metro and city bus to get to where we thought we wanted. It turned out we where about a 15 minute walk to Museum Island, (our planned destination) and we got lost several times. When we finally arrived, we had to then find out where to buy the tickets. There was a booth that said “No lines”, but a massive line had appeared behind it, and unless they where all wizards and staring at something we couldn’t see, they where there for the tickets. We then figured out that you had to buy a time slot ticket at the museum across the way. We had to be at the museum from 3:30-4:00, and it was about 11. So, we stopped at the bus shelter to look at the map, and find where to go. Then we set off to find the best curried sausage in Berlin, but by the time we got to the appointed address, we were hungry and tired, and it wasn’t there. Then we set off back to the place with a noodle bucket for 3 euro, and Mom got her sausage from the restaurant next door. Then Mom and Dad decided that we should walk back to the island which was an hour walk. So we left the warmth of the restaurant for the rainy out doors and started on our walk. When we were done, we were even more worn out and regretting the decision to walk, but we go there on time and saw lots of cool things, like a solid gold hat, that you could foretell eclipse with, the bust of Nefertiti. I also found my favorite philosopher, who remains anonymous, he states that nothing is superior to books and you should love writing more then your mother. After we had spent a good two hours in the museum, we went back and had a good dinner.

Day Two
Today we went swimming.
We had an identical breakfast to the day before, consisting of bread, meat and cheese. After we were done breakfast, we left for a mall. When we arrived, the elevator room looked like that of a 5-star hotel. When we got up, we went into several boot stores, still in search of the perfect boots. While she went in a Christmas store we found a large toy store, and reached for the five euro we both had in our pockets. Then we found it, a Play mobile advent calendar!!! It has horses and donkeys and puppies and when Luca comes for Christmas we can play with it together, and the best thing was… it was on sale for 10 euro :o so we snapped it off the shelf and Dad sighed as we walked out of the store with our new treasure.
After the mall, we looked around for a swimming pool, as we where itching to use our bathing suits. The one we saw was closed, so we went back to have lunch and then we looked for a pool on the internet. Once we found one in close proximity, Dad left to go see some war thing and we left for the pool. The pool was very nice and we spent about two hours. Then we went back for dinner

King Ludwing

Greetings from Bavaria,

Today we were off to the Alps and the castles of mad king Ludwig. It was great to get out of industrial Munchic to the beautiful countryside. The green grass, cows and majestic mountains were right out of the Heidi novel (which Josephine said she tried to read 3 times but just couldn’t finish - funny). It snowed here last week so the mountains were really lovely. We started our visit at Schloss Hohenschwangau (the highland swan castle), summer castle and boyhood home of Ludwig. Unlike most castles we’ve been too these castles have all the original furniture, paintings, etc. because they were turned into museums after the last Prince died. It was small, but rich in beautiful murals and dark wood. Both Ludwig and his dad were obsessed with knights and the associated legends which were the bases for the construction design and the murals. After a great tour guide at the first castle we went down the hill to ride a carriage in the rain up to Newschwanstein – the fairy tale castle.

Yes it’s a tourist trap, but it is really wonderful. The castle was never finished but what was is breathtaking. It doesn’t have the opulence of Versailles but we all agreed it was more attractive because of its warmth and scenery….out of every window is a view of the Alps! On the way down we bought something that looked like putzelkin (German New Year’s cookies) without the raisins. Deep-fried dough with icing sugar, what could be better on a rainy afternoon? Sorry mom but they were better than the ones you make! It was a grand day and we’re now off to find some dinner, maybe curried sausage!

Jane

Southern Germany

Today was a travel day we went from our home away from home to Munich which is a four hour drive. On the way to Munich we decided to stop at Dachau to visit the first concentration camp that Hitler created. It was very moving for everyone in the family. It was incredible to see how people could treat other humans!
The museum went through the history of the nazi party and how they eliminated all of their opponents including those in parliament. After that the museum describes why and what happened to the people once they arrived in Dachau. There was even a movie about it, however their was too much reading and I am sorry that I didn’t get us a guide to take us through, it would have saved us a lot of reading and not truly understanding what we were looking at. In two of the remaining barracks that we saw men were crowded in like cattle in a cattle truck.
We must not forget how we got there and we must remember to maintain our rights as humans and citizens in our county. Don’t let other people take your rights away.

Once we left Dachau we took off too Munich and found a good place to hang our coats even though we still needed them on. We found the toy museum however it was closed, we try to go there tomorrow, after we visit Neuschwannstein Castle.

Mike

Crazy Animals

Our time in Schifferstadt is coming to a close. It was a great time with cousin Judith and her husband Eugen. Eugen made us some fabulous German meals, we enjoyed his 60th birthday party and we had fun in Heidelberg. Yesterday Mike and I got a day alone together at the spa in Baden Baden. We were pampered in the traditional Roman spa with massages, floating in pools of various temperatures and the best part....being wrapped up in warm blankets for a little sleep at the end!!! Today we visit the Stuttgart zoo and saw some creatures we'd never seen - the Tapir, the Okapi and the cutest little octopus! It was a sunny day but still cold for October in Germany. We ended the day having dinner with Julia (Jennifer's exchange student from a few years ago) in a perfect little German Gasthaus. The food was fabulous - Mike said the best meal yet.

Jane

HTML coding problems

Not sure what happened with the last posting but somehow it got all messed up and I don't want to have to play with all the html coding so if you don't like it well get over it! I have heard this from a famous philosopher so I am using it here.

Mike

Fish!

Today we went to an aquarium. It was really cool; we saw lots of interesting things such as egg cases, manta rays, sting rays, sharks, and big bellied sea horses. My favorite part was the….that’s really hard… it’s a tie between sting rays, watching the sea horses get fed, and walking under the shark tank. We were there for quite a long time. The jelly fish were in tanks that had lights that changed colour.

Then we went to Ikea where we walked around and looked at all the different rooms they set up while Mom and Dad where talking about our house and what we should do with it once we get back. But I think the one in Chicago was better because it had more kid stuff.

For supper we had red cabbage and Rolladen a typical German meal…. And I ate it all!

Emily.

Heidelberg

Today was our first full day in Germany. At about 10 am we drove to the picturesque city of Heidelberg and wandered down the streets. We found a massive Christmas store and dove right in, we found everything from Coo-coo clocks to stuffed animals to matchbox scenes!
Then we found a kabob place (The Turks must love us, we've eaten at so many kabob places) and ordered too much. Then we found our way up an incredibly steep path to the castle. It's kind of a ruin but is home to the largest wine barrel ever made. It is bigger then most rooms and one could live well inside it. It was refilled only 3 times in it's life, probably because it holds 500,000 gallons and they used 150 oak trees to build it! The castle was attacked two times and destroyed by fire. So it's mainly a ruin, but they have rebuilt some parts of it.
After the castle we went to Mom's cousin's house and made peanut butter chicken. It was absolutely delicious.

Josephine

Lommel

Hello Friends,

It’s been a great couple of days with Christine, Ben, Brittany and Ashley. They were very hospitable and we had an opportunity to unwind from busy traveling. I was able to help Christine a bit by cleaning the barn (she has 5 horses), making supper and helping with the horses…fun! She was having trouble with her stallion spooking in the forest when he saw people so she got me to run around in the bush and surprise him. It was a great run for me and Geo behaved himself so she was happy that he is finally learning. The highlight of the jog in the woods was that I saw not 1 but 3 Fly Agaric mushrooms! They are the red ones with little white spots on them…a very poisonous mushroom! I can now check that off my list of things I wanted to see before I die. We were all sad to leave today. The girls had a lot of fun playing with Brittany and Ashley and now they are back to boring adults. Our 4 hour drive today will take us to cousin Judith’s in Germany….a new adventure.

Belgium and racing

So we are now in Belgium and are relaxing with some friends. However we had stayed with a very nice family who lived just outside of Amsterdam. It was nice to spend sometime there. Today I left the family and headed off to a cyclocross race, and boy was that an eye openner, there was a ton of people there as well as a lot of food and beer. The course had a lot of switchbacks or what ever they are called, and a lot of little mounds to ride up or climb up. It was slightly raining and I was hopping for some falls but there were only a few, thankfully and no one was really hurt. Here are a few photos that I took. I also forgot to mention that the fans were really into the race and when the belgium champion went by as well as the world champion. I talked to some dude who I think was part of the cycling association and he was hoppig for a closer race, he beleives that the sport will lose popularity if Albert Nills keeps winning, however saying that he did have a lot of fans cheering him on. I am off to a bike store shortly to buy some funky stuff. Oh yea I went to a huge bike store on Sat and I was in heaven, they had almost every team kit you wanted as well as a ton of other cool stuff that we don´t have at home.
Drats the longer I am on this computer the more I remember and thus have to add more info. The people that we are staying with one of his clients here has a machine to see if you are sitting on your bike properly, if your peddle stoke is good, the machine can do a lot more as well which I won´t bore you with the details, if only I had my bike here...
Bye Bye from Belgium

Bikes, Windmils and wind

Today we woke up and drove to the nearby town of Edam, where we rented bikes for the day. Once they were rented and Emily and I had some food from a nearby bakery, we set of to a windmill. It turned out that the windmill was a museum.We went to it,but when we go there we found it was closed. So we climbed a hill to look at sheep, and there was the ocean! You would never know it was there it you didn't climb the ridge. We biked for a while, checked the map, turned around checked the map again and went back on the first path.
We biked for a long time and finally found a restaurant where we had sandwiches and fries. Then we started our trek against the wind back to our car. Dad had to push us a lot, but it helped, when we got into town we wandered for a while, trying to figure out where to go, but we asked, and eventually reaturned the bikes and drove home.

Amsterdam

Today we went to Amsterdam, there we went to The Street market, Anne Frank house, and the Hermitage museum. At the street market we bought a smoothie, and nuts. It was really fun. The hermitage museum is not what you would excpect. It's about the Tsars who lived in Russia.
It was very interesting to see all the clothes, Toys, and acsessories they used. The Anne Frank house was really awesome. They had all the differant rooms in the annexe but you couldn't go to the attic. Our favorite quote was " One Anne Frank stands out more than all the others who shared her fate. They are standing in the shadows, but perhaps it's better that way because if we knew all of their pain and suffering we wouldn't be able to live" . Mom said it was very moving. I thought it was very horrible how they were all sent to Aushwitz where almost everyone died.

Bye! Emily

Wonders of Holland & Belgium

Hi All,

We've been biking a bit, Emily and Mike had a neat bike where she was in the Front! Josephine and I had a normal one with me in the front, we laughed and screamed bit but eventually got the hang of it. There were a few Windmills along the way as we biked around Brugge. We are now in Holland and are biking again. We are staying at a Mennonite Your Way house and the couple is fabulous. They have cooked for us, helped us find a place for tomorrow in Amsterdam and lent us their bikes. Everyone bikes here from kids, young women in high heels to 90 year old men & women. So they opened their shed and brought out 4 bikes for us to use and there were still 4 more in the shed! Today we biked to a little town about 10 km away from Zwolle on paved bike paths the whole way - you hardly have to bike in traffic at all. They even have bike paths in the traffic circles. On our way back I got this cute pic of an old man with his clogs and ponies. Jane

Chocolate and more chocolate

Yesterday we were in Brugge belgium and found a lot of chocolate shops, infact it seemed that every second shop sold chocolate and then the other shops were lace shops. However I am getting ahead of myself. Yesterday we went and visited Ypres and the museum was moving, however there was too much to read at that one museum. We then traveled to Brugge and thus we found a fantastic town that was very friendly and great for cyclists, which is a nice change from home.
There is a lot to see in that town but unfortunately we didn't have too much time we could spend in that old town, however it would have been nice. We had to leave to get to our next stop 4 hours away. But before we made that trip we rented some tandem bikes and we rode around the town. Learning how to ride that type of bike was kind of difficult but once you mastered that it was a hoot. We rode around the town and saw some fantastic windmills however they were only for decorations. We have had some difficulties in understanding people but most people really tried to help us, except in France, not sure why they were different, oh well.
Our car is great and I am having fun driving it is different.
Oh well that is all for today.

Mike

For Don

Hi Don, this is for you because you only think the computer is good for looking at cars. Jane

Vimy

Hello everybody!!!!!!
Today we packed up and left our cool house! It was sad... then we drove for a while. Then we looked for a place to eat. Vimy the town near Vimy ridge had no restaurants!! Oak Bank has 4!!!! So we back tracked to another town we had passed before. Their food was REALLY REALLY good. Dad was full *Gasps* very very very shocking. Then BAM! we were at Vimy ridge okay maybe not that fast...
Vimy is a battle site where Canadians fought as one regiment or something like that. It was really cool they had trenches and........SHEEP!!!! They did have tunnels but they weren't as cool as the ones in Dover. We took a guided tour then drove to the Memorial. Some teenagers asked Dad for help with their English word search.After that we drove a couple seconds to the cemetery. It was depressing. The hostel we drove to after has free Wi-Fi! YAY!!!!
Bye,Emy

Chateau de Versilles

Today we went to the palace of Versailles. A massive castle only surpassed by the miles of gardens and 300 fountains. There used to be 1,500 fountains, but they where destroyed in the French revolution.
We waited 45 minutes in line before buying our tickets. Then we explored the vast palace for about an hour and enjoyed the hall of mirrors and the many drawing rooms. At 1:45 we went outside for lunch and then waited for our tour of the king's (Louie the 14th 15th and 16th) private and vast apartments.
Once we were done the tour of the sparsely furnished rooms (It was all auctioned in the revolution) we visited the spectacular gardens and the free public toilets. We spent about an hour enjoying the serenity of the gardens and many fountains. My favorite fountain was one of Apollo rising out of the water with his chariot.
In total we spent 4 hours 43 minutes and 32 seconds at the splendid palace of Versailles. (Said Versi)

Art Lesson

Today we tackled the Louvre! I had done some reading before going, Ric Steve’s Museum guide, where Ric suggested a 2 hour tour of the most famous works of arts – but it took us 4 hours! It was really hard not to get distracted along the way by the myriad of rooms filled with some of the most beautiful things. Josephine and I were like crows…attracted to shiny objects. Emily’s favorite piece was the Mona Lisa and she liked the Dutch artists , Josephine’s favorites were the painting of Empress Josephine(her name sake) and a crystal and gold dressing table, Mike liked the huge painting of Napoleon’s coronation and the apartments of Napoleon and I enjoyed Ingres – La Grande Odalisque, Delacroix’s Liberty Leading the People and the Horses of Marly. We were all awed by the vibrant colours and the size of some of the paintings…ginormous!!. The building itself was incredible as well. It was the original palace of the kings of France but was made into a museum, the first one, after the French Revolution. Although the rooms were modified the ceilings still maintained their splendor from the past. Emily had a sore neck from looking up! After resting our feet and filling our stomachs by the pyramid fountains, the girls went shopping!!!! So many clothes, so little room to carry them! Mike went to McD’s to check email, I’ve never spent so much time at McD’s in my whole life, but it’s the only place to get wifi! We then went to Notre Dame Cathedral to view the rose windows. Although the cathedrals are all starting to look the same we enjoyed the simplicity of this one. Josephine said this one was her favorite so far. After a long day and lots of walking we were all ready to head home. Tomorrow Versailles!

Sorry no pics....the connection at McD's today is super slow!!

Jane