Back to Colorado

But every good thing has to come to an end... especially a two weeks vacation in Germany. And what a great vacation it was... meeting so many of my friends, driving the Autobahn in my buddies Corvette with 260 km/h (160 m/h), sightseeing Rothenburg, Munich, Regensburg and Nuermerg, visiting my parents and my brother, and doing soo much more.

But after a 9 hours unspectacular flight I found myself back in my new home, Colorado. While Germany was warm but a bit rainy, over here they had more then 20 days above 90 F (32 C) without any rain. The perfect place to relax from my long trip through Germany :o)

Till the next time! I hope seeing you all over here in Colorado in one stage!

Edersee and all the rest

And finally I made it to my parents who are still living in my home town of Nieder-Werbe, located in the principality of Waldeck (around 200 km nothern of Frankfurt). Its funny that in 25 years I never really noticed in which beautiful place I grew up. But that explains now why we have so many tourists staying in this area in the summer time while in the winter time you are under the impression of live at the end of the world.

Being a tourist myself this time, Torsten and I did the tourist thing over here too. Nieder-Werbe is located on the shores of the second biggest man-made lake in Germany, the Edersee. What better to do for us to take a bike tour around the lake which is around 60 km (37 miles). After that I noticed that its quite a while ago that I was riding the bike ;-)


On the other hand we got rewarded by different views of the lake I know like the back of my hand... like seeing the Edersee dam from the sea side, discovering some remote camp sides or getting lost on forgotten trails in the woods. A great place to go and I am looking forward to do the bike tour with Torsten again... next year... and with a bit more preparations from my side :-)

Nuremberg

After seeing my friends at the class reunion in Roemershild, visiting my old university in Schmalkalden, meeting Birthe in Regensburg, my friends Andre and Hans-Peter in Munich, James and his family in Rothenburg, I had to see Torsten in Nuremberg too. Beside the new subway connection connecting Torstens flat with the ciy center (well... you still have to walk 20 meters or so which is around 65 feet) there was plenty more to see.

Like Rothenburg from the previous post this city has still its entire city walls which is very unlikely for a city with Nuernbergs size. But while Rothenburg is still the medieval style town Nuernberg has a mixture of modern buildings and transport systems which makes it a very interesting city to visit.

After doing the tourist thing in Nuernberg with Torsten where he showed me the old castles and cathedrals of the town (please note: all city wall towers in Nuernberg look alike! I had to learn this the 'hard' way) we packed our stuff and went together on the last part of my round trip through Germany... heading back to good old Waldeck, my home town to see my folks.

Living Museum

It is not that often that you get a chance to go back in time... but in
Rothenburg ob da Tauber you have the chance to see a medieval city with original city walls, dungeons, castle, cathedral and lots of old (and touristy) shops. Another plus was that it is more-less on the way from Munich to Nuremberg and... my friend James and his family from Ireland were on vacation in this area... at the same time when I was passing through! I am still amazed about this big of a coincidence! Even if you wanted to plan something like that you know that it would never work.... impressive :o)

And to complete the list of coincidences... there was an American big band from Iowa on their European tour playing at the main square.

Even though this was my third time there it seems like this city has lots of surprises left for me :o)


While his little kids Toby and Zara were exploring the medeival town James and his wife were enjoying some of the local specialties... like 'snowballs'. This might be the driest Danish you ever have eaten in your entire life! So another great reason (beside James) to visit this fantastic city.

My parents were delighted when I bought three snowballs for them ;-)

Munich

The next stop on my 'Grand Germany Tour' was the city of Lederhosen and Oktoberfest: Munich. Funny enough is this old traditional city the center of high tech industry in Germany now. That's the reason why you can find people from around the world in this traditional place... a very nice contrast I have to say.


One of the most poplar landmarks of Munich is the Frauenskirche with its two tall towers. And just across the road is the Irish pub where I met my friends Andre and Hans-Peter... having a nice Guinness and going down memory lane ;-)

Of course this is not the only landmark of the city. There is plenty more to see like the city hall or the city palace of the Bavarian kings. And if you get a chance you have to see Schloss Neuschwarnstein just a few miles outside of Munich... the original to the Disneyland fairies castle. But obviously I didn't had time for that... I was already on my way to Nuremberg :o)

Class reunion and Regensburg

The first stop of my journey through the 'old world' was a class reunion with my friends from university times. It's amazing to see that everybody seems to jump on the marriage band wagon lately. Man, you leave the country for a few years and look what happens! So for most of my friends this 'beers and BBQ weekend' was vacation time too ;-)

After that I visited a good friend of mine in Regensburg, an old traditional city in the south east of Germany. After touring so many states of the US it was definitely a change for me to see places from the early middle ages and even earlier. Birthe did a fantastic job as a tourist guide and even introduced me to 'Dampfnudeln' which is a traditional dish over there.

I also saw the palace of the princess to Regensburg, one of the most famous royalty in Europe: von Turn und Taxis. Interesting enough is her palace twice as big as the Buckingham palace and is still the biggest operational palace in Europe. Doing the tourist tour we even ran into her and I could see her from up close with her two daughters. Here is my chance to jump on the band wagon too I guess :-)

Welcome home!

Two weeks vacation in Germany and the welcome was quite wet... no wonder that everything is that green over here.
But the main reason for this trip isn't the weather or the green landscape... I am over here to meet my friends in southern Germany (where they still are wearing lederhosen and dirndels). That means lots of driving with my little car over there... 1.4 L engine (the biggest one you cold get for that model) or 2.5 times smaller then my American cars engine ;-)

But at least we have the Autobahn over there. Especially in the eastern parts of Germany where you have brand new ones its a blast. 100 m/h (160 km/h) gets you around quite quickly.

A pity though that I didn't have my American car with me. It is quite annoying when you're driving your max speed and still have BMW, Mercs and Audis passing by all the time :-)

Don't be silly 2

And again another case of 'do you really think somebody is stupid enough to do that'. And the simple answer is (like for all posts of this topic: YES) because somebody seems to be afraid of getting sued over that. The US is the country of the free, unfortunately that includes the lawyers too as it seems :o)
But what do we have here now? A sticker I found in the hotel room safe at my last trip to DC, stating that there is a suffocation risk when using this safe. First of all I was simply amazed that this sticker wasn't bigger, with a picture of what not to put in there and only written in English! Maybe that was my chance of getting rich and I blow it! Something along this lines... honey, can you pass me our small dog? I put it in a REALLY save place! How was I suppose to know that this safe is not made for animals? There was no warning in German! And now you owe me $10 million... please ;-)

Renaissance Festival

When you ever have been to a historical festival in Europe you might understand what I would expect to see on a 'Renaissance Festival'. For example on medieval market in my hometown back in Germany everybody tries to present the trades and craftsmanship of that time as accurate as possible. Or the Baroque festival is a place where everyone is running around with funny wigs and fancy dresses listening to the music of its time.


To make a long story short... the Larkspur 'Renaissance Festival' is nothing like that :-) At first you notice the medieval castles and knight joust and you think... ahhh... it is a renaissance AND medieval festival. But then you keep on wandering through this really nice decorated middle ages type-of-city they have constructed just outside of the town of Larkspur when you are runing into...


some belly dancers, elves, cave women (I am not kidding) and pirates. And then you realize that the terminology 'Renaissance' is not as literally taken over here as in Europe.
Over here it is more like a 'fantasy festival' which is lots of fun too. And very nice is that everybody in the audience seems to get into that too! At least half of the visitors are dressing up for that so the line between actors, employees and visitors is disappearing.


Even if you forget to bring your own costume don't worry! There is a costume renting place in front of the theme park where you can get your proper armor and sword for the day.

And if you like this place so much that you want to make it a special day... why not getting married in their very own wedding chapel?!

The only thing I am wondering about is if you get a group discount when you bring your relatives with you... and what my mother would say if I send her an invitation to my wedding at this place ;-)

Happy 4th of July

There are lots of different things to do on the 4th of July holiday... and this year I thought of doing something really traditional after watching a Rapids soccer match for last years Independence Day. My good friend Christine, her little baby girl Jasmina and I went for a picnic in Westminster's city park. We had a lovely day with lots of sunshine, sandwiches and lovely cheese cake lollipops!



But not all of us made it to the firework display... even though Jasmina was quite excited by all the people in the city park it was a long day for her too :o) But she was awake for the grand finale.

A happy 4th to all of you!

Second place!

Oh well... all the Germans in this German pub downtown Denver would have loved to see Germany win... including me. A good match and Spain deserved to win, but getting to the final and winning the second place is still an outstanding achievement!
Two years ago in the World Championship in Germany we won the third place, now the second place. You can easily see where we are heading for the World Championship in South Africa in two years!
Till then... go, go Germany :o)