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December 31, 2010 - 6:50 pm
(11:50 am CT)
Munich - Happy New Years Eve
everybody!
Wow it is crazy that we
celebrate New Years Day at midnight, go to bed, wake up for our
morning train and people in Minnesota will just be celebrating
the New Year. Alas...Today we finally got to see the sights of
Munich. It is very easy to see the main sights in a day as they
are so close to each other. We started by walk down from
Karlstor Gate to the Marienplatz (Mary's Square), stopping at
St. Michael Church along the way. All the churches in the
center of Munich were destroyed during WWII and rebuilt. All
the churches have photos of what they looked like after the
WWII. AMAZING! Next we walked to Frauenkirche (Church of Our
Lady). This is the Cathedral for the Archdiocese of Munich.
Pope Benny XVI was the Archbishop here in 1977-1982. For being
the cathedral it is rather plain compared to the other fabulous
churches in town. We finally got to Marienplatz just in time
for the daily "jousting" of the glockenspiel on the New Town
Hall. After that we hiked up the 306 steps of St. Peter's
Church to get the best view of the city. It was your typical
hike up....2 way traffic on a single lane stairwell. The view
was great! We check out a couple more churches and had some
lunch and then hoped on the train for Dachau. Dachau
Concentration camp is surprisingly only 10 miles away from
Munich. Crazy to think of what was happening so close to this
great city. It is a very somber experience. It hasn't changed
since the last time I was here 10 years ago. After that we
hopped on some trains and head tours the Olympic Park. Munich
hosted the 1972 Summer Olympics. We saw the swimming pool arena
and the olympic tower which only cost €4.5 to go up a whopping
186 meters (~600 feet). It was dark by the time we go up there
so there wasn't too much to see. We could see the stadium but
it was dark....you would think it would be some what lit
up...but NO! They were preparing a skiing hill for some ski
championship thingy happen in January 2nd. Right now we are
watching some "Die Simpsons" in German (Eric is so happy...the
Simpsons) Yesterday it was Family Guy in German. Next is Two
and a Half Men. We are going to head down to the Marienplatz
later for fireworks. This place LOVES fireworks. Every where
we go we see people carrying huge bags of fireworks (most of
which I think are banned in the US) and you can hear them going
off all over the place. But Simpsons are done now, time for
dinner. Ciao! Glückliches neues Jahr!
December 30, 2010 - 9:47 pm
(2:47 pm CT)
Munich
What a long day! We started
out by going on an 11 hour tour of Royal Castles of
Neuschwanstein and Linderhof. So we were up early this morning
and got on a packed bus with the most scatter brained guide.
Apparently there were more people wanting to go on this tour
today than usually. They normally have 2 busses but today that
had at least 5 that we know about. It was so crazy the amount
of people fighting to get on buses for the tour. Unfortunately
we ended up on the worse bus. For some reason they decided that
our bus should do the tour backwards. So we went to the
Neuschwanstein Castle first. Well that caused our tour guide to
go into frazzled mode as she didn't know what to do about lunch
and the other stops along the way. We had the stuck up
Chicagoans next to us. And a group from Singapore. I thought
Japanese tourist were bad, well this group from Singapore are
whole other level. Our guide told us to be back at the bus
immediately after our tour. The group from Singapore demanded
an exact time to meet back at the bus and they ended up being
the last people on the bus....15 minutes late. How
frustrating! They wanted a time and then didn't even make it
back in time. The hike up to the castle was a work out. It is
1 mile straight up on a snow packed walk. You could ride a
horse drawn carriage but the line for that was ridiculous long
and we had plenty of time to walk up. The weather didn't
cooperate at all. It was so foggy we could barely see the
castle!!! My pictures show what we were dealing with.
Thankfully after our tour on the way down the clouds lifted long
enough for me to get some pictures. So the tour was fine.
There are 4 floors but not many rooms are finished as Mad King
Ludwig died before it was done. They are such Nazis about
photos...not allowed. I snapped a few of the last room when
everybody had left. I've gotten quite good at taking secret
pictures. After that we went to another castle, Linderhof,
which was tiny but still very interesting. It was so cold
waiting for the castle tour. Finally we stopped at the tiny
town of Oberrammergau for some shopping. Very cool town...google
it! Beautiful Cuckoo clocks and a Christmas store. We made our
way back to Munich by around 7:30. We went to Hofbrauhaus for
some oom-pah music and beer. Very historic beer hall, just like
I remembered. We grabbed some lunch and are now chilling in the
room. Tomorrow we will actually do some tour around the center
of Munich. Because the castles are closed tomorrow we had no
choice but to do that tour today (along with the rest of the
world).
December 29, 2010 - 8:45 pm
(1:45 pm CT)
Munich
Today was a pretty easy day
for us. We had a 4 hour train ride (which we almost missed).
Long story short, it was slow at the grocery store and hence we
almost missed it. Thankfully we didn't, we would have to wait 5
hours for another train and we would have to pay a lot for it.
Anyways, the train ride was fairly boring. It was fog/misty the
whole time so we couldn't see much. We got to pass through
Austria though and around a big lake. We got to Munich about
1:30 and after checking into the hotel we headed to the
Deutsches Museum. Funny story on the tram. Eric got up to sit
by me and this old guy drinking a beer was asking us questions.
I think he finally understood we were from America (he kept
saying Canada) and that we lived in Chicago. I figured it was
the closest major city that he may have heard of. Very funny he
continued to talk to us in German and then when we got off he
shook Eric's hand and patted me on the back. Weird! Back to
the museum...I remember it being much cooler than it really was,
but then again the historically train display, the musical
instruments display and the bridges display were all closed for
renovations. Shucks...hun Dylan? Also all the information on
the displays were in German. Makes trying to figure out what
everything so hard....how lame! So we did the mining display,
aeronautics and astronomy. After that we wandered around the
city center by the train station and the Karlstor Gate (the city
has four old gates to the city). Stopped for some pizza and
then went shopping at Karlstadt...the Munich equivalent of
Macy's. A very huge department store. Everything here is still
decorated for Christmas which is very awesome. They have an
outdoor skating rink setup in the square near the train
station. We picked up some very delicious pastries called
Trimmi? and we are now just chilling in the room. Eric is
watching the Chelsea/Bolton game which is live from Chelsea
Stadium in London. Announcers are speaking in German so Eric is
talking to himself as he watches the game. Ha ha. Tomorrow is
Castle time.
December 28, 2010 - 10:10 pm
(3:08 pm CST)
Zurich
We had a very eventful day
today (after a very restless night) I fell asleep at about 6:30
and walk up a few times and at 1am I was wide awake. Couldn't
get back to bed. I watched a movie and eventually fell back to
sleep. But yet when the alarm went off this morning it was very
hard to get up. Anyways, we did a walking tour of the city of
Zurich. Not really much to see here except a few churches. In
the afternoon we took a tour of Swiss Countryside and
Liechtenstein. We spent an hour in Rapperswil, a cute little
town on the Zurich Lake. I had the best Quiche Lorraine there
with real swiss cheese. Then we stopped a few small towns on
our way to Vaduz, the capital of Liechtenstein. What a neat
little town in a little country. We made our way back to Zurich
at around 7pm and did some shopping along their famous
Bahnhofstrasse. Tomorrow we make our way to Munich. Yeah!
December 27, 2010 - 6:06 pm
(11:06 am CST)
Zurich
I apparently like right at 6
past the hour. Hum. Well I can say I'm very pooped. I've been
up for 28 hours straight with maybe a little cat nap on the
plane to Zurich. Eric is snoring away as I'm updating my
pictures and facebook status. I've had a lot of Birthday wishes
on Facebook and it isn't even noon back home yet! So today was
very eventful. Here is pretty much a recap of the last 10
hours. Flight to Zurich was uneventful. Wow the KLM Flight
Attendants are beautiful and VERY friendly. Sure beat the old
bags from Delta. No issues with the luggage, we scooped them up
and head for the train station. Fortunately for me Swiss Rail
has the "Happy Birthday Pass." I get unlimited travel today for
only 33 Swiss Francs (SF)!! To put that in prospective, Eric's
one-way fare to Lucerne was 27 SF. Score me! Switzerland is
VERY expensive. A locker at the train station was 8 SF
(thankfully all of our stuff fight in one locker). A Big Mac
Meal and Mc Royal cost us 18 SF. And that was the small drink
and fry that Eric I shared. Yes kill me, we ate at Mc Donalds.
We were starving and it was the first thing we saw that wasn't
very confusing. Remember we are operating on very little sleep
and I don't speak any German and all the other places had their
food listed in Germany and I was too tired to figure out what it
all meant. We went on a walk...a very long walk if you ask
Eric. He at one point said that next time he is going to
suggest some where warmer. I'm thinking its ok, except for the
slipping on snow cover esclator on the way down to the train
station. We got to see the nice sites of Lucerne including
the and Chapel Bridge. We made our way back to Zurich and are
now relaxing (or sleeping in the case of Eric.
December 27, 2010 - 8:06 am
(1:06 am CST)
Amsterdam
The flight from MSP to AMS
was uneventful. I tried sleeping but it was going to
happen. Eric is proud of the fact he watched 4 movies.
So we are half way through our 3 1/2 layover before we catch our
next flight to Zurich. Nothing really exciting going on.
I have noticed, however, that all the signs, ads, and billboards
are in English and most of the time only in English. Have
we left the USA? BTW Happy Birthday to me! :-)
September 9,
2010 - 10:56 PM CT - MILWAUKEE -
Not my camera! :-(
Very sad day for me. We woke up very
early to get to Mammoth Cave for the first tour of the day. Before
the tour started I dropped my camera in water...ok I'll admit it, it
fell out of my pocket into the toilet. Laugh if you must, I
actually did at first. Yes it was clean water!!! But than I almost
cry....well ok I did cry. My camera is toast. My precious camera,
the thing I love more than life itself! After I freaked out, Eric
calmed down and I realize I still have a camera on my phone.
Granted the quality is pure crap, but none the less I can take
pictures and that is what is the most important thing. So the
pictures aren't up to my standards, but its the best I can do with
what I have. So after that we drove up to Lincoln's Birthplace.
That was cool, it was a school field trip day there so there were
people dressed in period clothes and even a very life like Abe with
the beard and all! But this also meant millions of little rug
rats. Apparently I'm a teacher because I heard kids say Mrs.
Williams all over the place. We stopped briefly in Louisville to see
the Louisville Slugger Museum and Factory with the gigantic bat
outside the front. From there we made our way through Chicago (at
rush hour no less) and made it to Dylan's apartment by 7:30...just
in time to see the Vikings get smacked by the Saints. Boy this day
as a whole pretty much sucked. Tomorrow we make our way home.
Hooray. I can't wait to see Swirl again but that also means I'm one
day closer to school. Oh yes, school again. I can't wait to be
done. Ok, time for bed. Nighty Night.
September 8, 2010
- 6:25 PM CT - CAVE CITY, KY -
Where is the road???
Yesterday we drove on the Blue Ridge
Parkway on our way to the Great Smoky Mountains. It was very
beautiful but like the name says very Smoky...hazy. We hiked up the
Clingman's Dome which is the highest point in NC at 6,632 feet. It
was a 1/2 mile hike straight up hill. It was the longest 1/2 mile
hike of my life. Then we made our way down to Gatlinburg, TN. Very
touristy for my taste. We walked around a little bit and had some
dinner. It was pretty busy for a week night after the summer
season. We checked out where we need to go for the tramway and
suck. BUT today started out crappy....Rain, Rain, Rain. So we had
planned on a cable ride to the top of the Gatlinburg...but obviously
that wasn't happening! So we decided to head out. We ventured up
I-75 to Knoxville, TN and across the Kentucky border, drove up 11
miles, turned around and drove back into Tennessee to get the silly
Tennessee sign. Then we went to Cumberland Fall State Park for the
Niagara of the South. It was a nice waterfall but no Niagara. We
ventured over to Big South Fork NRA to do some hiking above the
beautiful gorge of the Cumberland River. We decided to head to
Mammoth Cave. This is where it gets interesting. Our AAA map, Rand
McNally Atlas, Google Maps and my phone's GPS told us to go on KY
State Hwy 9008. There were no signs for KY 9008, nothing. We
continued driving for a few miles and this stupid road was no where
to be found! We saw KY 80 which eventually intersects this phantom
highway in 14 miles and after we couldn't find KY 9008 we eventually
figured out that it was the "Cumberland Parkway." It never said
9008. None of our maps said that the other name was Cumberland
Parkway. Very stupid! On our way we listened to Betty Bath on the
Trader on the Radio. Very funny old women dj. She loved to say the
word V-HICK-ALL (vehicle) we cracked up at the various things
people were trying to trade/sell (bunnies, "hard worker" looking for
some work in the Tobacco fields and many many V-hick-alls). I think
Kentucky folk is funny. We finally got to Mammoth Cave at 5:30.
The last tour was at 4:30. Oh well, we get up early for the 8:30
tour. We are back in central time zone so it should be easy. Cave
City is a bit of dump. I'm glad to not be spending much time here.
Now Eric is watching some local Country Blue Grass music on the old
color tv...Eric don't like country...I mean doesn't like country.
Here are some "vital" statistics as of right now; Miles driven:
2,290, cops seen: 75, states/prov. seen: 48
September 7, 2010
- 3:18 PM ET - I-26 somewhere in NC.
I-26 in NC
It is very interesting what a day
makes. Sunday driving through Myrtle Beach was crazy. Tons of
people on the streets, all the places are open until 11pm or later
and it is overall a hopping town. Last night after we watched the
Season Finale of Eric's favorite show, The Secret Life, we decided
to hit a mini golf place. (because the 36 holes that we had already
played for the day wasn't enough). The place was closed!!! 9pm!
They really take the seasonal hours seriously. We found one that
was open but as soon as we paid he slapped the "Closed" sign on the
door. That was the quickest round of mini golf ever. We were the
only ones on the course so it was great. We drove down the main
street and again...DEAD! I kind of liked it. Now our hotel had
quite a few cars still and we saw a lot of school aged children
around so apparently they don't go to school (or they are home
schooled...don't know). I dragged myself out of bed at 630 for the
sunrise and I'm glad I did it was great. I hung around the beach
for about an hour. I found this awesome seashell and put it by my
shoes as I waded in the ocean....somebody took it! Seriously who
low must you go to dig in a shoe to get a stupid shell? I pretty
much collapsed into bed and tried to sleep again. We packed up and
said our good byes to the Atlantic. The beach was very DEAD, they
didn't even put out the chairs and umbrellas! We are now on our
way to Great Smoky Mountains. We should be there soon. How
exciting!
Here are some "vital" statistics as of
right now; Miles driven: 1,854, cops seen: 59, states/prov. seen:
44 (wow more cops than states!)
September 6, 2010
- 8:00 PM ET
Rip
currents are fun
Oh so sleepy. Today was great.
I love the ocean! The waves were very high. There were rip current
warnings and I could definitely feel the current tugging me away.
It was fun! And I certainly learned a lesson last year and wore a
shirt so I wouldn't get burned. I got a little on my neck so it was
a good thing I wore the shirt. We spend most of the day in the
ocean and pools at the hotel. Around 4pm we went to Boardwalk at
the Beach and played 36 holes of mini golf in the blazing sun. It
was hot! After that we made a trip to Wal-Mart for new swim trunks
for Eric. It was quite exciting...we saw two young pretty Lindsay
Lohan-type girls getting arrested for shoplifting. Handcuffed
behind their back and everything. Cool! They had pink
purses....need I say more? We came back to the resort to chill out
for a while. Eric has to watch the Season Finale of Secret Life of
the American Teenager...he loves this show. Then we are going out
for more mini golf. Eric loves mini golf...
September 6,
2010 - 6:21 AM ET - Myrtle Beach.
Ocean is my calling
It is 6:21 in the morning and I'm
sitting on the deck waiting for the sunrise. But that doesn't
happen for another 30 minutes. Why am I up so early then? I had a
dream I missed it and woke up at 5:56 am in a panic. How lame! And
of course my body says...I'm Up, I'm up why are you still in bed.
So alas I'm out on the deck. Eating Golden Chocolate Oreos (first
thing I could easily grab), drinking water, listening to the waves
and writing. Awesome! Let see, Duke was interesting. Lots of
skinny people running. The campus looks very regal. I suppose if
you pay a fortune to go there you expect that. We tried to check
out the chapel....but ran into a incident. There was a wedding but
it was over by the time we got there. The bride and groom and all
the guests were standing around outside and getting in the limo. So
I, along with a bunch of other people went in the side door and were
standing in the vestibule. This very rude woman said "You need to
leave! You can't be in here there is still a wedding going on" (the
church was empty they were all outside). She then said the wedding
party still needs to take photos (you mean the dress fancy people
that just got in the limo?) If I was cleaver I should have told her
asked her if she was St. Peter at the Perily Gates! So I peaked
inside...I didn't go up the steps or nothing I just turned my torso
to see the main stain glass window and she pushed me! I'm like
seriously women? get a grip. So anyways we all got kicked
out....literally. I also was tempted to say...well it's no St.
Peter's anyway so I'm not missing much...but I was nice about it.
So we left Duke kind of late and headed south. I must say Google
maps had us going some random route. My hubby and I were going a
long Sunday drive on NC back roads and I mean back roads. But when I
looked at the map, there really was no other way to go that didn't
involve a lot more driving. Oh it is 5:39, the sun is suppose to
rise in 13 minutes but it doesn't look like it! Very
cloudy...hum...disappointed!
September 5, 2010
- 3:32 PM ET - on I-40 East near Durham, NC!
WV is actually beautiful
We have been having an excellent day.
We drove some mountains, saw some high bridges, deep valleys,
waterfalls and rivers. Wow West Virginia is beautiful. We took the
Midland Trail (US Hwy. 60) from Charleston, WV. The Midland Trail
was commissioned by our very own George Washington! SO it is old!
The views were amazing. Good thing Eric drove as I would have
stopped every 5 miles to take pictures. The roads were twisty curvy
and not much keep us from going off the edge. We stopped at Eagle
Nest State Park and got a great view of the New River Gorge.
Shockingly we saw a long train carrying coal...imagine that in West
Virginia...how strange...HAHAHA. We drove across the US 19 New River
Gorge Bridge. This bridge is the longest single arch bridge in the
western hemisphere (so the sign says) and at the time it was built
it was the tallest. Seriously tall, the pictures don't do it
justice. Every year they close the bridge and people parachute off
it so you know its high. After that we drove down the gorge under
the bridge...this was the old road and it was a single lane most of
the way but the view at the bottom was great. After that we decided
to skip the tollway and head down the state highways to Babcock
State Park so I could take a picture of the Grist Mill. According
to them it is the most photographed spot in West Virginian so of
course I had to have a picture. After that we dropped down some
more mountains to Virginia. The most exciting thing about Virginia
was $2.45 a gallon gas! Considering we have been seeing
$2.75/gallon this was awesome. Lets see we also were traveling
north and south at the same time. Weird thing. We were on I-77
South and I-81 North. Granted we were actually going east but I
thought it was cool so I took a picture of the signs. (I think the
only other person that would find this cool is my nephew Dylan....we
are atlas/map crazed people). We are currently on our way to Duke
University for my Duke fanatic husband. Then we make our way south
to Myrtle Beach. Ciao for now!
Here are some "vital" statistics as of
right now; Miles driven: 1,322, cops seen: 44, (16 in OH I thought
WI was bad!, states/prov. seen: 39 (wow more cops than states!)
September 5,
2010 - 7:03 AM ET - West Virgina
CRICKET!!!!!!
Ok so I know I'm suppose to be up
already but we have another resident in our room that keeps me from
getting just a few more winks of shut eye. This annoying cricket
that keeps making that cricketing noise. Oh how annoying! Recap of
yesterday, drove through Illinois - Corn, drove through Indiana -
more corn, drove though Ohio - State Troopers, 16 in all!
Thankfully all buy 3 had somebody stopped. Crazy! We finally got
to our destination of Charleston, WV. We stopped at this tiny town
gas station that had the cheapest gas in miles and I had the feeling
they were going to tell me "we dun't like yer kind har" But alas the
people seem very nice. We swung by the capital building. It looks
like most others. The grounds were very nice with fountains and
flowers. That was the excitement for the day. Exciting, eh? Oh
now I hear a train...Nice hotel, except for the cricket, in a weird
part of town. Hey the cricket stopped...it must be all my typing has
intimidated him....Ha!
September 4, 2010
- 1:15 PM ET - 15 miles west of Indianapolis.
East bond and down
Well we have been making good time.
We got to Rockford, IL by 10:30 last night which is amazing
considering the 90+ mile thunderstorm we drove through. I actually
had to slow down to 50 mph on I-94! We decided to avoid Chicago
like the black plague and drove south on I-39 to I-74. So like I
said we are about 10 miles now from Indianapolis. Lets see what fun
have we had so far? Well how much fun can you have driving through
Illinois and Indiana? We saw a lot of corn, semis and fibs (if you
aren't for 'consin you probably don't understand). We also have
been listening to the tunes. We belted out "Sweet Caroline" when
the local station had a Neil Diamond Marathon. Reminds us of old
times at the Dome. Ah...memories. Hum, we just past Jeff Gordon
Blvd. Apparently they really like NASCAR here, I wonder if we will
see the brickyard? Who shot MLK? Just wondering....Eric said Jack
Ruby. I had to remind him, no that was Lee Harvey Oswald. Weird
topics of discussion.... Here are some "vital" statistics as
of right now; Miles driven: 656, cops seen: 13, (6 of which were
last night in WI!), states/prov. seen: 31....well we are in Indy so
time to help Eric navigate! Love ya!
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