So we finally got a decent Saturday with a little sun here. It's been a while. We still got chased off the lake by incoming thunderstorms, but that wasn't until nearly 4 in the afternoon, so that's not too bad.
No one else could make it so it was just Christina and I, but we had a good time anyway since we can swim now. Hung out at Sandy Beach for a while and beached the boat for the first time too. Had lunch at Dockside. Got too much sun. The usual...
Bah, I can't believe I'm sitting here at work on a nice Friday - this place is a ghost town because of 'flex' hours where everyone and their brother is taking Fridays off this Summer. And there is a Skip Day on the Lake party today that the local rock station in town does from time to time. Handful of boats, music, the Vault Girls (promo stuff), and a couple of the local DJ's hanging out this afternoon at one of the islands on the lake. It's their 6th time doing it, but it's the first time since we got the new boat and finally felt like we could go.
But no, not only do I sit here in this quiet, empty building, but I believe I'm expected to do work also. It's like a form of torture really.
Although honestly I expected Robert to be in already... hah! Well, no I didn't... but he needs to work 12.5 hours today in order to hit 20 for the week on his first week of reduced hours... isn't that just icing on the cake? He worked 20 hours/week when he first came back and hit 13 on average... he worked 32 hours a week the last month and a half and hit about 25 on average... and now that he's back down to (???) 20 hours a week which still makes no sense he hits probably 13-14 total.
And even worse, being out on the lake right now would be even more fun since I finally bought a new tube the other day. A three seater:
Had a nice birthday weekend. No real plans or trips this year, after Germany and being sick for a couple of weeks, nothing was really coming together last minute. Plus, the weather here wasn't that great this weekend in SC, so beach trips were out also.
Had friends over Saturday night for dinner, a movie and a game night and had a good time. Needed a drink or five anyway after finding out Robert's been approved to go back down to 20 hours/week just one day after the three of us met with his boss about how he can't make his hours he's supposed to work (32 hours) and doesn't really do much when he is in. So despite her saying it can't go on like it is going now and that she'll talk to him and get him to start checking in with her when he arrives each day... she goes and pulls this and reduces his hours. Sort of the exact opposite of what needs to happen. Anyway, made for a very pissed off Friday night, that's for sure. Ah well, at least Saturday night was fun.
Today we ended up going out on the lake for a little bit. We weren't out long since there were thunderstorms building in the area, but I wanted to get our registration numbers and stickers on the boat. We also got a chance to clean up the boat a little from last time we had it out. Had I known it would be a month since we last were out, I would have cleaned it up better last time. We also got bit for the first time on gas - $225 later we have a full tank again. Prior to that we had what the dealer put in plus $80 I put in before we first launched it at our marina. So, that was a bit of an eye opener today.
So this post is nearly a week in the making. Between going through my 863 photos and Christina's over 200 photos and being sick the last two days, it's taken a while to get everything edited and uploaded and ready.
The trip to Germany was great... it completely changed my mind on travel. Honestly, I had always put Europe and most other foreign countries lower on my list of places to visit simply because there are so many great places here in the States I haven't seen yet. However, after being over there and finding out how different and interesting so many things are from big to small, I have to say it was an even better experience than I thought it would be. It was fun to learn some of the language, great to see such historical places, and interesting to see the small things that are so different like street signs, how you flush toilets, paying for things with funny money (Euros), etc, etc.
We stayed with Christina's Aunt Gerlind and Uncle Hannes. I really enjoyed staying with them instead of a hotel like the others because it made the experience much more immersive. We talked about German and US politics a little, education systems, etc. It was nice to see Christina's Oma (grandmother) for a good bit each day also because she lives there with them.
We crammed a lot of things into one week over there. I think as I post the story of the trip, I'll reference the approximate page number of the photos that correspond with each day as I go.
The flight over was great - seemed to go very quickly. We left Atlanta around 4:30pm on Sunday and it was dark relatively soon into the flight. By Ireland the sun was rising - very strange feeling, that's for sure. (pics Page 2) But, just an hour and a half nap after getting to Gerlind and Hannes' house and I was more or less on German time the rest of the week which was very nice.
The first day we took a short walk with Christina's Oma (Grandmother) through the neighborhood where they live. (pics Pages 4-5) Then we took a walk through Ladenburg with Gerlind. (pics Pages 6-8) Ladenburg is one of Germany's oldest cities and there were a lot of old buildings and cobblestone steets there. Some put in by the Romans about 2000 years ago or so. We were walking distance to Ladenburg so we got to see the area a few times while we were there and ate dinner there a couple of nights also.
The second day we took a bike ride with Hannes around the countryside North of Ladenburg towards the city Neckarhousen and the locks and ferries on the Neckar River. (pics Pages 9-11) Then we went to Mannheim that afternoon to see that city with Gerlind and met up with the others for dinner in a revolving tower restaurant called Skyline. (pics Pages 12-16) Mannheim was a very busy city with a very old University so there were pedestrians and tram trains all over the place... a very bustling city.
The third day we took a trip to Goddelau, Germany where Christina's parents lived with her and Nicki for 3 years. (pics Pages 16-18) We got to see the house they lived in and we visited with their neighbor they knew well while they were there. He had an amazing rose garden with over 240 varieties of roses. On the way back from Goddelau, we drove along the Neckar River to the city of Oppenheim, Germany. (pics Pages 19-23) It was (yet another!) a quaint little village with two cathedrals and a nice market square where we had lunch. Also had an intereting "bone room" behind the main cathedral where 20,000 people's bones were exhumed and stacked on top of one another.
The fourth day we took a trip to Heidelburg, Germany to see the castle there and buy some souveniers. (pics Pages 23-30) Heidelburg is a very touristy type town because of the castle and the marketplace area. The castle was fascinating and covered quite a bit of ground. We bought a few things in the marketplace in the city... I got a couple of beersteins there. We finished that day with dinner in Ladenburg when we got back.
The fifth day we took 3 hour trip North up to Koln, Germany. (pics Pages 31-40) We met Christina's cousin Achim and Hannes' sister Christa who both live in Koln. Koln has about 10 million people in its metro area, so it's quite a big city. It's famous for its absolutely massive Cathedral in the center of town. Construction on it began in the year 800 I believe and it wasn't finished until 1880 because of centuries where work stopped here and there. We walked around the cathedral for a while, had a nice lunch at a cafe nearby, toured inside the cathedral where supposedly the bones of the 3 wise men are kept in a golden ark inside. After that we took a double decker bus tour of the city of Koln, so a lot of the pictures from that tour have reflections from the front glass. But, we were there early, so they're front row top level seats so it was a very unobstructed view. Starting around page 38 on the photos is where Christina, Achim, and I all climbed the 509 circular stairs up to the top of one of the towers of the cathedral. Much, much, much higher than I thought it would be when we started! That night when we returned to Ladenburg I took a few night photos there of the old city wall and some buildings in town.
The sixth day was our last full day there and we went to a castle nearby to Ladenburg for a birthday lunch for Oma. (pics Pages 41-42) It is her 90th birthday in August and she was the reason we all made the trip over. Lunch was wonderful there too and it was a nice setting for the event except for all the kids running around. There are greenspaces all around the castle and they had a huge children's festival going on that day making parking a complete mess of course. After lunch Hannes made my trip even better and said "let's go drive the Autobahn!" (pics Page 42) I mean, how could you visit Germany and not get on the Autobahn, right? Well, traffic and a massive rainstorm kept the speed limited to 160... kilometers/hour, not miles/hour! We drove up to (yet another!) castle to see the view out over the Ladenburg area and to see the newly terraced vineyards.
The last day we had to get up at 5am to get to the airport for our flight out of Frankfort. (pics Pages 43-44) Up at 5am, 10.5 hour, 4,800 mile flight, ~400 miles of driving between getting to Frankfort and to drop off Nicki and Anna and get back to Columbia, and we crashed at 9pm US time (3am German time) when we got home. 5,000+ mile, 22 hour days really take it out of you!
There are so many things I can't even cover here though. Germany was beautiful - everyone takes such good care of their lawns. Even the smaller apartments in Koln had flowerboxes on all of the balconies. The birds in Ladenburg were non-stop. The cities are very clean. There were countless quaint villages tucked in between mountains and rivers with vineyards, castles, and cathedrals. I've told people since I've gotten back that I kept waiting for someone to yell "Cut!" and roll away the movie sets because it just seemed that nice and perfect.
There are lots of cute photos of Anna in the galleries, it was nice having such a photogenic subject! Gerlind and Hannes made Christina and I feel at home staying with them and I am glad I got to meet Christina's Oma also. It was also really nice to meet Achim as well since I had heard so much about him through the years with Christina.
The food was very good, the beer was great... everything from Pils to Weissbier to the fresh top-fermented Kolsch in Koln that comes out in 0.2L glasses as fast as you can drink them.
Overall the trip was one I will remember for a lifetime that's for sure. And if I ever have any trouble remembering it, there's always the billion or so photos I took over there, right?
Speaking of which, here's the link to the photo gallery if you're still with me after this book-sized post:
Excellent trip - I'll write up more on it later. Still trying to trudge through the 863 total photos I took over there. Once I've gone through those and selected a handful to put online, I'll post here about the trip and give a link to the photos also...
Just wanted to post to let folks know we did get back to the U.S. just fine. Though of course, starting today I think I'm coming down with a cold. I guess better now than last week, eh?
