Today can be seen as the day that marks the start to our very chaotic and hectic summer. This is not necessarily a bad thing at all - we are both very excited for all of the trips and travel we have planned. It will definitely keep us on our toes! On some of the trips, we will also have an additional traveling partner. As some of you know, my brother, Jef, is staying with us for the next three months.
Here's a quick rundown of what's ahead: Next week Dawn and I have a work conference to attend. Jef may or may not join us for a night or two in Weiden. Next Thursday, Dawn and I are cutting out a bit early, meeting Jef south of Regensburg, and then heading to the Munich airport to board a flight for Amsterdam where we'll be spending the holiday weekend. Upon our return from Holland, Dawn and I head back to work while Jef does whatever Jef wants to do. At the end of the week, we hop back in the car and head for southern Austria and the Brenner Pass. The next day sees us driving to Cinque Terre, Italy. We'll be spending six relaxing days in this beautiful area, hiking, biking, swimming and simply taking in this unique coastal area of Tuscany and the Italian Riviera. On the drive back to Germany, we'll be stopping in Garmisch to spend two nights camping with friends who will be meeting us there.
In August, Dawn and I will be heading to Chicago for another work conference. After Chicago, it's off to Minnesota, Dawn's home state. We will be having a belated stateside wedding reception here. About 100 of Dawn's family members will be in attendance. Me? Only two. It should be a great time, though, and I'm looking forward to checking out Dawn's home and meeting more of her family.
Anyway, the summer is going to be a busy one! Once September rolls around, we do have some other plans including seeing a concert at Neuschwanstein Castle and also attending Oktoberfest in Munich. Then, things get interesting. I have no idea what's going to happen with my job right now and probably won't until early September.
Time for me to take it easy. Sleep did not come easy last night and the 2.5 hours I did sleep was not nearly enough! Have a great weekend!
Friday, June 25, 2010
Monday, June 7, 2010
Dawn and Osu cuddling on the couch
For a dog, Osu finds some very interesting positions to sit in. This evening, he found leaning back against Dawn to be the most comfortable position and stayed this way for at least twenty minutes. Sometimes he sits certain ways that look painfully uncomfortable, but it just doesn't seem to bother him. He's our little yoga dog.
PS - Is anyone reading this blog anymore???
Sunday, June 6, 2010
A fine weekend in Germany (and finally some sun!)
A quick post here to share a few photos. I haven't gone through the photos from the BBQ we had at the house yesterday, but did go through the ones I took today so I could post the below photos. Basically, with it being so nice out again today, we decided to find a nice spot where we could take Osu swimming. We finally found a spot along the Schwarze Laaber near our house. Not only was it a good spot to throw sticks for Osu to retrieve in the water, but there was also a log spanning the width of the creek. Dawn couldn't resist testing her gymnastic prowess on the downed log, and surprisingly, Osu followed her. After successfully making it across the creek on the log, Dawn needed some room to turn around but Osu just wouldn't give her any space. So, since Osu was already wet, she gently shoved him off the log and in to the water. Later, Dawn decided to go back out on the log but Osu wanted nothing to do with it this time. However, after a couple of minutes of prodding, he finally did approach the log, eventually running out on to it to get to Dawn. Alas, in one of the funniest things I've seen this dog do, he slipped off of the log falling in to the water on his side. I didn't get any pictures as I was laughing too hard at his misfortune!
Thursday, May 20, 2010
What's up!
It’s once again been a long time since a post, especially for me. I don’t know how it seems like we got busier, but I think about posting. The last few weeks we haven’t gone anywhere far, but we’ve been getting a lot done. I’ve been going to the arts and crafts shop a few Saturdays to make frames for our new prints and paintings we bought on our ventures. Nate has been busy making posters out of older pictures he had, with a few trips in there to get new towns and vantage points. Lots of new posters to check out on the website. We counted about 104 last night!
We have a fun weekend planned for an extended Memorial weekend. Chamonix, France. I think most of you saw some pictures from last time, but we are really looking forward to this trip. We’ve been thinking about all the places we want to go back to and places we can get other good pictures. Hoping for some sunshine and pretty mountains scenes. Osu doesn’t know yet, but he’ll be excited to go too.
In other news, Nashville is not happening anymore for work. We had planned to have our wedding reception after our work conference in Nashville, but Nashville flooded. So, we are still eagerly waiting for the decision if Chicago will be happening August 23-27th. We are very hopeful, as we need these hours of flying to extend our trip to see everyone. We are supposed to know this week, but no news yet.
In other more fun news, I’m making a GIANT cake for our work SRP Conference here in Germany. It needs to feed 120 people, so it’s either 8- 8x8 cakes or 8- 10x10 cakes. They will be two layers with the logo drawn in the middle and other fun stuff around the sides. I made a tester for work this week, and it turned out really well…especially for 10 pm. Maybe I can get Nate to upload the picture for me too, the small one for now. The real test will be the last week of June when I put it together and move it from our house to Graf, a lovely hour plus ride.
I’d like to say my garden is going well, but it’s hard to tell. We’ve been having lots of rain and little sun. The strawberries are getting flowers, but the pepper and tomato plants haven’t done much. It hasn’t frozen, just lots of rain. I can’t tell much what the blueberry bushes are doing, cuz I’ve never had those before, but they don’t seem to be growing much above the ground. Hope I didn’t plant stuff too early, last year we missed the whole planting time.
One more thing before I go… We’ll have Jef out here starting June 21st. We’re really excited to have him here and do some traveling; Amsterdam for the 4th of July is already waiting for us.
We have a fun weekend planned for an extended Memorial weekend. Chamonix, France. I think most of you saw some pictures from last time, but we are really looking forward to this trip. We’ve been thinking about all the places we want to go back to and places we can get other good pictures. Hoping for some sunshine and pretty mountains scenes. Osu doesn’t know yet, but he’ll be excited to go too.
In other news, Nashville is not happening anymore for work. We had planned to have our wedding reception after our work conference in Nashville, but Nashville flooded. So, we are still eagerly waiting for the decision if Chicago will be happening August 23-27th. We are very hopeful, as we need these hours of flying to extend our trip to see everyone. We are supposed to know this week, but no news yet.
In other more fun news, I’m making a GIANT cake for our work SRP Conference here in Germany. It needs to feed 120 people, so it’s either 8- 8x8 cakes or 8- 10x10 cakes. They will be two layers with the logo drawn in the middle and other fun stuff around the sides. I made a tester for work this week, and it turned out really well…especially for 10 pm. Maybe I can get Nate to upload the picture for me too, the small one for now. The real test will be the last week of June when I put it together and move it from our house to Graf, a lovely hour plus ride.
I’d like to say my garden is going well, but it’s hard to tell. We’ve been having lots of rain and little sun. The strawberries are getting flowers, but the pepper and tomato plants haven’t done much. It hasn’t frozen, just lots of rain. I can’t tell much what the blueberry bushes are doing, cuz I’ve never had those before, but they don’t seem to be growing much above the ground. Hope I didn’t plant stuff too early, last year we missed the whole planting time.
One more thing before I go… We’ll have Jef out here starting June 21st. We’re really excited to have him here and do some traveling; Amsterdam for the 4th of July is already waiting for us.
Friday, May 7, 2010
Vienna, Austria
Well, once again we've been lagging behind on keeping this blog updated. Both of us have been pretty busy with other things and just haven't had the time. So, here's a quick recap of our trip to Vienna:
Day 1: We drove. It was kind of a boring and flat landscape - the non-mountainous part of Austria. We were pleasantly surprised by our apartment room. Very nice and spacious. Decent location. We spent the rest of that day checking out the old part of Vienna. Even took a horse and buggy ride!
Day 2: Spent most of the day exploring the old part of Vienna some more. It's a big area with a lot to see. We also went to Prater Park and enjoyed the amusement park. The weather turned beautiful that afternoon. Dawn did a bit of shopping, I did a bit of sitting outside in the sun. It was nice. That evening, we went and saw Nada Surf in concert. Very good show and they sounded great.
Day 4: All of the walking and travel from the previous days really did my gout and my back in. We ended up enjoying a nice breakfast at our hotel and then packing up and heading out early. The drive back was pleasant enough and we got home at an early hour which was nice.
Overall, this was a great trip. Vienna and Bratislava are great cities and I'd recommend seeing them if you're ever in the area. Now, we want to explore a bit more to the east and are checking in to Budapest, Hungary for a future trip.
Many more pictures from the trip can be found on my Flickr Site. Below are a couple of posters I made from the photos I took. The original photo is on the left and the poster on the right.
Day 1: We drove. It was kind of a boring and flat landscape - the non-mountainous part of Austria. We were pleasantly surprised by our apartment room. Very nice and spacious. Decent location. We spent the rest of that day checking out the old part of Vienna. Even took a horse and buggy ride!
Day 2: Spent most of the day exploring the old part of Vienna some more. It's a big area with a lot to see. We also went to Prater Park and enjoyed the amusement park. The weather turned beautiful that afternoon. Dawn did a bit of shopping, I did a bit of sitting outside in the sun. It was nice. That evening, we went and saw Nada Surf in concert. Very good show and they sounded great.
Day 3: We caught the boat early for Bratislava, Slovakia and had a great hour + long ride down the Danube. We spent that day exploring the city, a very beautiful city too, and really enjoyed our time there. The weather was once again spectacular. Oh, and we found an AWESOME mexican restaurant, the best we've found in Europe, in Bratislava of all places. The boat ride back was great and we spent a lot of time out on the deck taking in the scenery. We spent the evening wandering around Vienna some more. A great day.
Day 4: All of the walking and travel from the previous days really did my gout and my back in. We ended up enjoying a nice breakfast at our hotel and then packing up and heading out early. The drive back was pleasant enough and we got home at an early hour which was nice.
Overall, this was a great trip. Vienna and Bratislava are great cities and I'd recommend seeing them if you're ever in the area. Now, we want to explore a bit more to the east and are checking in to Budapest, Hungary for a future trip.
Many more pictures from the trip can be found on my Flickr Site. Below are a couple of posters I made from the photos I took. The original photo is on the left and the poster on the right.
Many more new posters can be found on Taku Photography and Posters
Monday, April 26, 2010
My car lives
Crazy how time flies. It's almost been about a week since my car incident. Last Tuesday was apparently going too well, got into work early to leave early, sunny skies, and a really good workout. On my sunny drive home, only about 20 minutes away, my car began slowing to a stop on B299. This road is like a county road in the states, frequently used by those living in the area and connecting several towns.
I managed to coast to a small break in guardrail and a lady helped me push my car the rest of the way onto the small patch of asphalt. We spoke in bad German and hand signals. She asked if I needed more help, a phone to call with or a number. I was al little confused about the number part, but told her I was okay. I have ADAC, like AAA, and would call them.
Hoping to spend more time with Nate that night, I left work early. I told him I'd be home about 5:30, so I called him right away to tell him I was stranded and I'd be starting my calls to Peter, the guy who sold me the car, and then ADAC. Peter was off in the woods cutting down trees, so I needed to get ADAC to check the car and then tow it to his house. Great. So, I call ADAC. I tell the lady I'm on B299 between two cities, but she doesn’t understand. I'm doing this all in German, but she doesn’t know how I can be by Pfaffenhofen and on B299. There are of course 2 Pfaffenhofens in Germany, maybe more, so I tell her the direction of two other towns near me. She becomes frustrated and transfers me to another woman. The second woman was much more helpful. I told her where I was and the direction I was traveling. Someone will be on the way, and I’m a priority cuz I'm in a dangerous location. Great! Have someone there in 30-45 minutes, maybe, then bring the car to Peter's home by 7 or 8, right.
I waited by the road for about an hour and a half before the first guy came. Either there were a lot of emergencies, or priority means nothing, I think the later. He checks the car out, broken fuel pump. Need to be towed. Nice, I asked for a ADAC truck that could tow to start with, but of course, no luck. The guy calls ADAC, says a truck should come in 30 minutes, okay, not too bad. I'm only starving and been walking in the dirt with my nice work shoes on, pacing at the side of the road bored.
Thirty minutes go by and I get a call, the truck is leaving now, and where am I? What? Where am I? I explain where I am in German again, I think he gets it and he hangs up. Another 30 minutes and he arrives, as it's getting dark. First he checks out the car again, then paperwork. After about 20-30 minutes we get the car hooked up to put on the flatbed of the truck. I think I'll be home in an hour, I call Nate to tell him I'm on my way through town, to Peter's, then the guy will bring me home.
The guy's GPS doesn't know where Hardt is...? I tell him I know the way to drive there, the way I always take. If he doesn’t know where it is, that's all we've got. We get into Lupburg, head down the hill, to find the road is closed, nice. No detour signs, so I call Nate ad he calls his boss. It's already about 9pm now, maybe later. We drive around forever trying to get there, through farms, back roads, several U-turns. We get to Peter's and unload the car, yay. Almost home. He didn't want to go back the same way thinking there was a short cut, so we get lost again for a long time. Half the time he's on the phone with his boss arguing. It's mildly amusing, but I'm tired and don't care. We finally get to the autobahn to drive to Parsberg. I have to call Nate to get me from the gas station because it took so long to get back. It's 10:30.
Nate comes to pick me up and takes me home. I have two hockey puck burgers for dinner and go to bed. Nate isn't a bad cook, just made dinner for me when I thought I'd be home at least an hour earlier.
I got to pick up the car after work the next day. Nate rode into work with his boss, so I could take his car. It's all better now, so I hope it stays that way for a while. What a pain and extra long day.
I managed to coast to a small break in guardrail and a lady helped me push my car the rest of the way onto the small patch of asphalt. We spoke in bad German and hand signals. She asked if I needed more help, a phone to call with or a number. I was al little confused about the number part, but told her I was okay. I have ADAC, like AAA, and would call them.
Hoping to spend more time with Nate that night, I left work early. I told him I'd be home about 5:30, so I called him right away to tell him I was stranded and I'd be starting my calls to Peter, the guy who sold me the car, and then ADAC. Peter was off in the woods cutting down trees, so I needed to get ADAC to check the car and then tow it to his house. Great. So, I call ADAC. I tell the lady I'm on B299 between two cities, but she doesn’t understand. I'm doing this all in German, but she doesn’t know how I can be by Pfaffenhofen and on B299. There are of course 2 Pfaffenhofens in Germany, maybe more, so I tell her the direction of two other towns near me. She becomes frustrated and transfers me to another woman. The second woman was much more helpful. I told her where I was and the direction I was traveling. Someone will be on the way, and I’m a priority cuz I'm in a dangerous location. Great! Have someone there in 30-45 minutes, maybe, then bring the car to Peter's home by 7 or 8, right.
I waited by the road for about an hour and a half before the first guy came. Either there were a lot of emergencies, or priority means nothing, I think the later. He checks the car out, broken fuel pump. Need to be towed. Nice, I asked for a ADAC truck that could tow to start with, but of course, no luck. The guy calls ADAC, says a truck should come in 30 minutes, okay, not too bad. I'm only starving and been walking in the dirt with my nice work shoes on, pacing at the side of the road bored.
Thirty minutes go by and I get a call, the truck is leaving now, and where am I? What? Where am I? I explain where I am in German again, I think he gets it and he hangs up. Another 30 minutes and he arrives, as it's getting dark. First he checks out the car again, then paperwork. After about 20-30 minutes we get the car hooked up to put on the flatbed of the truck. I think I'll be home in an hour, I call Nate to tell him I'm on my way through town, to Peter's, then the guy will bring me home.
The guy's GPS doesn't know where Hardt is...? I tell him I know the way to drive there, the way I always take. If he doesn’t know where it is, that's all we've got. We get into Lupburg, head down the hill, to find the road is closed, nice. No detour signs, so I call Nate ad he calls his boss. It's already about 9pm now, maybe later. We drive around forever trying to get there, through farms, back roads, several U-turns. We get to Peter's and unload the car, yay. Almost home. He didn't want to go back the same way thinking there was a short cut, so we get lost again for a long time. Half the time he's on the phone with his boss arguing. It's mildly amusing, but I'm tired and don't care. We finally get to the autobahn to drive to Parsberg. I have to call Nate to get me from the gas station because it took so long to get back. It's 10:30.
Nate comes to pick me up and takes me home. I have two hockey puck burgers for dinner and go to bed. Nate isn't a bad cook, just made dinner for me when I thought I'd be home at least an hour earlier.
I got to pick up the car after work the next day. Nate rode into work with his boss, so I could take his car. It's all better now, so I hope it stays that way for a while. What a pain and extra long day.
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Car troubles and a few photos from the morning
I'll let Dawn tell the whole story if she feels up to it later. On her way home from work tonight, the fuel pump in her VW Golf went out, bringing her to a standstill on the side of B299. She eventually was rescued by ADAC (Europe equivalent to AAA) and is now on her way out to her car dealer/mechanic to have the car dropped off to be fixed and then she'll be on her way home. This will end up being a long day for her. Up at 4:30 am, out the door at 5:45, work all day, then deal with this on the way home. It's almost 9 pm now and she still probably won't be home for another half an hour. I feel bad for her and wish there was some way that she didn't have to do that drive every day. When something like this happens, it just adds to an already long day leaving little to no time for relaxation for her. Thank God we've got an extra long weekend coming up in Vienna. We both could use the time off.
I also got up early this morning to go shoot some pictures of the sunrise. It was nice, but not as good as I was hoping. I also wasn't able to stay long enough to get any good morning light on the castle. I waited as long as possible, but eventually had to load the camera gear and an extra dirty dog in to the Toyota to get home and then get off to work. Perhaps I'll try this again in the summer when the sun will be up earlier. Here are a few pictures from the shoot this morning:
I also got up early this morning to go shoot some pictures of the sunrise. It was nice, but not as good as I was hoping. I also wasn't able to stay long enough to get any good morning light on the castle. I waited as long as possible, but eventually had to load the camera gear and an extra dirty dog in to the Toyota to get home and then get off to work. Perhaps I'll try this again in the summer when the sun will be up earlier. Here are a few pictures from the shoot this morning:
Osu having some fun with another dog that was out early with it's owner. Cool dog and a nice owner who was pleasant to chat with. They may look like they are fighting, but they were actually having a lot of fun playing. This is how Osu got so darn dirty. And to think, I just cleaned the RAV yesterday.....
You can see the rest of the photos on my Flickr page
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