Be Back Whenever

Mark and Susan wander the world

A day trip to Pisa – the tower still leans

It was a Pisa sort of day and only 25 minutes from Lucca by the regional train.  After walking to the Lucca train station, we needed to buy a ticket.  Thank heavens, these ticket machines will actually print out a ticket!  A whole bunch of us got on the train we thought we needed and a nice female train driver came to tell us that they had to switch the train to a different track and we have to get off while they do it.  She kept apologizing but it was no big deal and shortly the train switched tracks and showed up again!

Lots of small villages dot the train tracks along with patches of tomatoes and beehives. Towers and big houses, old and new, could be seen in the distance. After arriving in Pisa and NOT buying a return ticket when there were no lines (more later), we walked to the Piazza de Miracoli following Google Maps and the Lonely Planet printed directions.  We would have lost a bet because no signs were posted at the train station or at a big plaza giving any indication which of many streets we should choose to walk down.  The first pedestrian sign pointing to the Tower wasn’t until we crossed the Arno River.

pisa tower sign

This is the first directional sign we saw and we were pretty close to the Tower.

Our route took us across the river and past the U. of Pisa Law School and more churches than we could count.  We stopped in one church for the obligatory visit. (No idea which church it was.)  We knew the Leaning Tower was close when the number of tourists increased dramatically as well as the number of gift shops and restaurants.

pisa Arno river

River Arno in Pisa

tower in the distance

A street scene as we got closer to Piazza di Miracoli and the Leaning Tower

The Duomo, Tower, and Baptistry are beautiful especially in the sun.  They all were bright white and, miraculously, only the Duomo still has some scaffolding on it.  Mark decided we should check out the W/C.   It cost .80 E  and the line for the Women’s room was really long – Surprise! –  but Mark just whipped in and out of the Men’s.  Lots of tour groups and individual tourists, like us, so I can’t imagine what it’s like in the summer.

Pisa Duomo

Pisa Duomo.

leaning tower and duomo

The Leaning Tower of Pisa and the Duomo.

Pisa Baptistry

The Baptistry described as a big cupcake.

Pisa leaning tower

Leaning Tower of Pisa. We didn’t do any of the pics holding up the tower.

susan with tower

Susan in front of the Duomo and Leaning Tower

We took pictures and picked up a walking map of Pisa from Tourist Information before we wandered our way through the city and the Piazzas. We didn’t visit the insides of any buildings nor climb the tower.

pisa big fancy building

This building was in one of the piazzas on the walk back to the train station.

The next challenge was getting a ticket to go back to Lucca.  All of the ticket machines in the Pisa station will only issue paperless tickets so even many of the Italians had to get out of the machine line and go use the ticket office line.  Of course, the non-Italians were all out of luck!  We queued up in the LONG ticket line, starting out with 4 ticket sellers; reduced to 3 when one of them served a guy and hung his “Closed” sign.  The line actually went pretty fast but Mark and I just commented “Full employment”.  We think Lucca machines sell tickets because the ticket counter closes at 8:05 PM.

Pisa summary – Ok for one visit but not someplace I’d go back to.  Pisa is a pretty busy city and didn’t impress us enough to want to return for another visit.

 

Tips and Tricks for Surviving Oktoberfest in Munich

History of Oktoberfest
You can thank Prince Ludwig for the annual party that hosts more than 6 million visitors a year. It all started when Crown Prince Ludwig, later to become King Ludwig I, was married to Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen on 12th October 1810. The citizens of Munich were invited to attend the festivities held on the fields in front of the city gates to celebrate the happy royal event. The fields have been named Theresienwiese (“Theresa’s fields”) in honor of the Crown Princess ever since, although the locals have since abbreviated the name simply to the “Wies’n”. (http://www.muenchen.de/int/en/events/oktoberfest/history.html)

Oktoberfest sign

If you have any doubt about where to go, these signs are posted in the U-bahn and S-bahn and along the streets. Follow the signs to Oktoberfest.

grounds welcome sign

Welcome to Oktoberfest!

Afternoon vs. Evening Session
If you have “Ein Prosit” or “Sweet Caroline” running through your head for a few days, that means you attended the afternoon session (Ein Prosit) or the evening session (Sweet Caroline) at Oktoberfest. If you have both running through your head, you probably had too much to drink at Oktoberfest. BTW, the bands don’t play “Ein Prosit” because they like it; they are required to play it every 15-20 minutes to increase the drinking of beer and, hence, the sale of beer. It works!

German band playing at Pschorr Braurosl

The German band playing at Pschorr Braurosl all afternoon.

tent in evening

Evening session in a tent. This is the floor of the tent as seen from a balcony.

Evening in a tent

Another tent toward the end of the evening in the middle of the week.

What is the difference between afternoon session and evening session ?
You could say night and day. ? The afternoon session is what you would expect – calmer, quieter, and plenty of German music. The afternoon session starts at 11:30 a.m. and last until 4:45 p.m. During the afternoon session, it is easier to find a table, especially if you have a large group and no reservation (I will talk about table reservations later). You will see people of all ages in the tent from school children to senior citizens. If you worried that the afternoon session will be like watching paint dry, don’t worry. By 2 PM or so, most people are feeling no pain and singing to the songs regardless whether they know the words or not. We saw one guy toss his lunch at 2 p.m. inside the Lowenbrau tent … sweet!
The evening session is a complete flip from the afternoon. The session starts at 5:00 and last until 10:30 p.m. The tents close at 10:30 p.m. You will hear very few traditional German songs sang during the evening session. You will hear “Ein Prosit” once in a while, but no need to play it, everyone is drinking!!!
Evening sessions can be very difficult to even get into the tent and these tents seat 6,000 – 10,000 people in EACH tent. There are 14 tents in total. They will “close” a tent when it hits capacity. As people leave, others can enter. Trying to find seating for a large group (i.e. >5) is tough. Did I tell that you need a seat to drink a beer? Yep, no seat, no beer. No self-service either.
Tip: Get to the evening session early (e.g. 5) or late (9:00). If the main floor is packed, go upstairs and look for a table. If the weather is good, head outside to the tent’s beer garden. They seat another 3,000 – 5,000 people outside at each tent.  Note: the evening sessions are VERY loud!

A tent in the afternoon

A tent in the afternoon – not crowded yet

Lowenbrau tent panorama

A panorama of the Pshorr-Braurosl tent on Thursday afternoon

Saturday night crowd

The opening night crowd in a tent – more noise and people than one can imagine!

Do I need to pay to go to Oktoberfest or to get into a tent?
No, admission is free for both.

Are there just beer tents on the Oktoberfest grounds?
No, Oktoberfest grounds look like a State Fair. There are food vendors, games of chances, haunted houses and several rides that we termed “vomit inducing rides”. Think spinning around and upside down at high rates of speed.

Can I only get beer at Oktoberfest?
It depends. In a beer tent, only beer is served. There are 2 wine tents located at Oktoberfest where you can get wine and beer. Besides beer or wine, you can get food. Food varies by the tent.

Full liters of beer (1 mas each)

Full liters of beer (1 mas each)

empty glasses

Where did all the beer go?

Is there only one size of beer? What kind of beer can I get?
The beer is only served in a one liter mug. There’s only one kind of beer per tent, a fest beer. Each tent has their own beer.

Can I eat at the tents?
Yes, there are full menus at each tent. You better bone up on your German or have someone in your group who knows German. We never saw an English menu.

What’s about reservations?
Reservations are very hard to get, afternoon or evening session, especially if you are in a large group like us (30 people). Reservations are handled differently by each tent. Requests are submitted via letter, e-mail, etc. The tent(s) will let you know if you got a reservation sometime around May; again, this varies. Check individual tents for specific information. A reservation gets you an assigned table for a specific time and day. When you walk into the tent, you find the row number on your reservation, walk up the row and look for the name of your group at the end of the table.
Tip: Reservations are made by the table size, most common is a table of 8 or 10. You MUST book an entire table.

Does a reservation cost anything?
No. But, you are required to buy a voucher for each person that includes 2 – 1-liters of beer and a chicken.
Tip: If you speak enough German, we understand you can change out the chicken. We don’t, so chicken it was!

Keep reading!

A Thursday of Oktoberfest Fun – and beer!

Oktoberfest seemed to be a success for our gaggle of 21 people – 6 Germans and 15 Americans.  If you don’t know, Oktoberfest is celebrated in Munich every year for 17-20 days and is a large party/fair for everyone who attends.  We had reservations in the Pschorr Braurosl Tent, thanks to hard work by a German friend.  Reservations are free but you must buy food and drink vouchers for 2 beers (Each beer is a liter.) and a half chicken for each person.  You can order other food and “pay as you go”.  Our reservation started at 11:30 AM on Thursday morning and we had the 3 tables until 4:30 PM.  Let’s just say everyone enjoyed the food, drink, company, and German music. I lost count of the number of liters of beer that were consumed by our group.  A few hats were purchased from the vendors, too.

pschorr brauosl tent

This is the tent we had reservations for all afternoon.

Half a chicken and part of a beer – The rest had been consumed!

Coat rack and reserved sign

Everyone hangs coats on the table legs. Reserved signs are on the table after you find the row of your table from your reservation letter.

Keep looking for more pictures.

Oktoberfest fun!

Official logo for 2017

The official logo for Oktoberfest 2017 – steins, tshirts, post cards, magnets.

Oktoberfest sign

If you have any doubt about where to go, these signs are posted in the U-bahn and S-bahn and along the streets. Follow the signs to Oktoberfest.

Oktoberfest is not just a time to have a few beers and some food.  Oktoberfest is also a big fair – sort of like the Iowa State Fair without the cows, pigs, and chickens.  The rides included ones that go upside down, up high and around in circles.  No one in our group tried any of them but the lines were long, including people who I’m sure were not really in any condition to spin or turn upside down.

Upside down rocking ride

This ride went upside down and rocked back and forth

Spinning and upside down ride

This ride spun in circles and each car went in circles, too.

Oktoberfest Midway

Midway at night at Oktoberfest

Oktoberfest has a post office set up for the event with its own cancellation stamp along with ATM machines since all purchases in the tents are cash only.

Keep on reading for more pictures

A day hike to Andechs Monastery

One day 14 of us took the S-bahn to Herrshing and then walked about 4 miles up to Andechs Monastery for lunch and an Andechs beer.  The monks make the beer – pils or dunkel – and they’ve added a schnapps-making business.

Andechs monastery church

We’ve been there a few times so we know there are 2 different paths to take up (about 1 hour walk) or you can take the city bus #951 that leaves from the train station in Herrsching 2 times an hour and take 10 minutes.  Eleven in the group walked while the other three with colds took the bus.  Naturally, Mark and I picked the hardest route up (We can never remember from year to year whether to go left or right at the sign!) but we had a nice walk up and then we came down the other path.  The walk up does involve 2 very long flights of steps – about 60 in each flight.  We missed the rain and had beer and good food as a reward for our hard work.

Steps to Andechs

The steps we walked up during our hike to Andechs. (Thanks to Stephanie for the picture.)

Monastery Group

Enjoying beer and apfel strudel after we went inside to warm up after lunch on the terrace.

Walking thru the meadow

Two routes to choose from Herrsching and one of them takes you through this meadow

Pork Knuckle and Pretzel

Pork Knuckle and Pretzel for lunch

Andechs beer

Dunkel beer from Andechs

9/14 An “Amazing Race” sort of day

Getting to Frankfurt was no problem from Dulles but when we tried to go to Heidelberg on the Lufthansa Express Bus Shuttle, it was a whole other story – best described as an “Amazing Race” kind of day.  As a preface to the story, we each had 2 suitcases with us – one hard-sided and one rolling duffel bag that we need for the safari and we wanted to go to Heidelberg to leave the duffel bags with friends until it’s time to fly to Tanzania.  Oh, it was POURING down rain in Frankfurt when we landed.

We booked the Lufthansa Heidelberg shuttle in August sometime so we wouldn’t have to manhandle 2 suitcases on the train with a change needed in Mannheim.  We knew exactly where the stop was the last time we did this about 6 weeks ago and we lugged our suitcases up 2 escalators or elevators and across from Arrivals to the train station to the stop.  Alas … a sign was posted that the shuttle pickup location (Wrong location #1) was changed as of September 1 to “P29 by the vending machine” but with no hint as to where P29 could possibly be located in the Frankfurt airport.

We knew the “P” probably indicated a PARKING location so the hunt began!  We asked a Lufthansa employee by the Lufthansa Shuttle desk and she sent us to the bus lot, involving another trek and an elevator ride.  Not there! (Wrong location #2)  We asked a Lufthansa bus driver there for help and his answer was “I get asked all the time and I have no idea.” Back up the elevator and, now, we see a Frankfurt Airport Information phone that Mark picks up and promptly hands to Susan.  After 5 minutes with the Information lady (She tried to send me to wrong locations 1 and 2 and I had to convince her I just needed to know where P29 is.), I finally got a good answer – Go to Arrivals Hall, exit the building, turn left and walk to the end of the building.

Before we manhandled the suitcases on two more escalators, Susan went exploring and found the location, we hoped, went back to Mark and we took our bags to P29. Now there are 2 vending machines to choose from, no signage for Lufthansa Shuttle although there is signage for other shuttles and we had 45 minutes to wait to see if we really found the correct location.  I called the Lufthansa Shuttle number and the guy who answered sounded like he knew what he was talking about and convinced me we are in the right location.  Grabbed sandwiches while we waited and, sure enough, the Heidelberg Lufthansa Shuttle showed up at the closest vending machine that had no cover from the rain. Yes, it’s still pouring down rain.

The driver was from York, England, and explained the whole mess with shuttle locations.  We were the only passengers and he was kind enough to drop us at our Ibis hotel when we got to Heidelberg.  Success at last but I now know how the Amazing Race players feel because we had NO idea – and neither did anyone else – where P29 is.

Frankfurt airport map P29

Where is P29 when you have no map?

After we made it to Heidelberg, we were in need of a shower, nap, food, and a beer in that order. The room wasn’t ready so we settled for food and beer and THEN a nap and a shower, a few hours later.

Kulturei Braueri beer

KulturBrauerei glass of Fest beer

Fountain at Castle in Heidelberg

Fountain in the gardens at Heidelberg Castle

Heidelberg and river

View from the castle looking on the Neckar River after a walk in Heidelberg

A visit to western Maryland

We’re finished with the family visits after 5 days in Cumberland, MD with Susan’s Mom. We went exploring and found the Great Allegheny Passage and used it for 2 days of walks. It’s a biking/walking trail that runs from Pittsburgh to Cumberland, following a rail line. Walking in 2 different directions, we found the Brush Rail Tunnel and the Cumberland Bone Caves where prehistoric bones were found about 100 years ago.

Western Maryland Mountains

Western Maryland is full of eastern mountains – highest point is about 1600 feet. It’s very green and full of trees.

Wild Mushrooms

Some wild mushrooms we found along the Great Allegheny Passage

Mark along the GAP

Mark at the start of our walk on the Great Allegheny Passage. We didn’t walk all the way to Frostburg!

On 9/10 we drove over to Shanksville, PA to visit the Flight 93 9/11 Memorial. It’s a very quiet, peaceful place and very moving. I needed a few tissues as we toured the Visitor Center and walked down to the Memorial Plaza where there’s a huge panel for each of the 40 victims.

Flight 93 Memorial Plaza

Looking down on the Flight 93 Memorial Plaza from the Visitor Center.

Flight 93 Memorial

Visitor Center of the Flight 93 Memorial

September 5 – The trip begins!

The adventure has started!  Stop 1 was Iowa via Omaha and, as Mark likes to say, the trip is all downhill from Iowa!  We started in Omaha (cheaper flight from Denver) with an overnight before heading across Iowa through all the fields of ripe corn and beans and spending the weekend in Iowa City.  Thank heavens the University of Iowa beat Wyoming in the opening game of the season or the entire city would have been filled with VERY unhappy people!

Hawkeye Fan Shop

You can find Hawkeye gear all over Iowa City.

University of Iowa ties

Just in case you need a U. of Iowa Tie

U. of Iowa sox at the Hawk Shop

Just in case you need to update your supply of Iowa sox you can find them at the Hawkeye Fan Shop in Coralville, IA.

Tailgating spots at Kinnick Stadium

These are highly prized and expensive reserved parking/tailgating spots right outside of Kinnick Stadium at University of Iowa.

 

The route back west across Iowa to Mark’s Mom’s house took us through Washington and Pella, Iowa. We went on a hunt for Susan’s long-ago relatives in Washington cemeteries and found a few 5th cousins 4 times removed. (We share great great great great great great grandparents – and, yes, the number of “greats” is correct!)

John Baker Tombstone

John Baker tombstone in Pleasant Hill Cemetery, outside of Washington, Iowa.

Pleasant Hill Cemetery

Located about 5 miles outside of Washington, IA in the middle of cornfields. We’re guessing my relatives had a farm somewhere in the vicinity in the late 1800’s.

The rest of the Iowa stop involved visiting sisters, nieces and nephews and Mom and watching Va Tech beat West Virginia University on Sunday night late!

Road Trip to the eclipse

We had a pre-trip trip when we decided to go to Nebraska last weekend to see the total solar eclipse and, yes, it was spectacularly worth it!  We’d heard the dire warnings about traffic – have enough gas, food, water, etc. so we packed up the car and left about 5 AM on Sunday for Alliance, Nebraska.  Taking the “back roads” of CO 14 to Sterling and heading north to Sidney (Home of Cabela’s who are not open at 7 AM on Sunday morning) and further north to Alliance, we made it in 4 hours with no traffic.

U. of Iowa flag flying

Mark and Vivian Payne found the Well’s Ranch who mowed a field and rented out space for campers and tents so we met them there by looking for the University of Iowa flag, set up the tent in the Nebraska wind, and hung out in the sun, watching more and more people arrive for the grand event the next day. About 850 people watched the totality in total at Wells Ranch. While the vast majority were from Colorado, people came from as far away as Switzerland, London, Minnesota, California and Texas .

The faithful long-lasting tent. This is the same tent we took to Europe for 9 weeks 26 years ago. It might be time for a more modern one!

 

Kite flying and wine drinking

We enjoyed some margaritas and wine and a cold beer with our munchies and appetizers.

 

Morning fog

Mark and I were a bit panicked at 4 AM Monday morning when we looked out the tent and saw nothing but heavy fog.  By 8 the fog cleared and by 10 we had clouds and blue skies.

Mark watching the eclipse

Susan watching the eclipse

“sunset” appearance at totality

Total eclipse

The eclipse was spectacular!  As the moon covered more and more of the sun, wispy clouds floated across the sky and made the sun look very much like the Halloween pictures you see with a witch flying across the moon.  The temperature dropped 15 degrees during the eclipse. We all agreed that those 2 1/2 minutes flew by.  Be the end, Mark muttered something about planning a trip to Chile or Argentina for 2019.  Next time, we’ll take some binoculars to see sunspots and flares during the eclipse.

The trip back to Fort Collins started about 4:30 but about 5 miles outside of Alliance we could see cars for as far as we could see so decided to run around and either put up the tent in the wind again or find a hotel room. Victory!  The Quality Inn in Alliance had a lovely room complete with a shower and A/C that worked well.  We even found a pizzeria across the street after we made a visit to Carhenge outside of town.  Tuesday morning we left at 7:30 Am and were home by 10:45 without running into much traffic until I-25 between Cheyenne and Fort Collins.

Carhenge in Alliance, Nebraska

August 13 – Panic time!

Only 18 days until we leave FC and the to-do list IS getting shorter!  We’ve met with all our important people like the doctor, dentist, and insurance agent; have ordered nice neat crisp U.S. bills to use in a variety of countries; stocked up on Pepto-Bismol and Kirkland brand of Immodium equivalent (MUCH cheaper at Costco) and put together contact information for our families and friends, including where we will NOT have wi-fi connections.  The piles of clothes are all over two bedrooms, the Tanzanian visa is attached to the passports, the Australian ETA (Electronic Travel Authority) has been approved, and the last party scheduled to drink the beer inventory in the house.

On top of all this, we’ve decided to drive up to Alliance, Nebraska to see the Total Solar Eclipse.  We’re soooo close that we couldn’t pass up the chance to sleep in a tent and huddle with the masses to see this event.  What’s one more to-do list?

Mark and I had some fun this summer in Germany and here are some pictures to enjoy.

Bad Wimpfen window box

Not bad for 3 Euros

Monastery outside of Heidelberg

We had a nice walk up the hill to the Stift Neuberg and ate delicious potato soup lunch with a beer. We bought this one at their organic grocery store.

Mark with Kulturerai beer

Matterhorn in a clear sky

Country-specific Travel Advice

We like to keep up on events that might impact our travels around the world and we use a number of different sources.  The most well-known one in the U.S. is the U.S. State Department.  They publish information about travel in many counties.  The topics include information on passports, Alerts and Warnings issued for each country, visas needed to enter the country, crime, driving conditions, etc.  I think the State Department tends to be very conservative relative to the U.K. and Australia but it’s a good place to start.

The State Department also runs a program for Americans called Smart Travel Enrollment Program (STEP) to enroll your international trips.  After enrollment, you are connected with each Embassy and they will send alerts, if necessary.

If you want another take on security around the world, you can sign up with the U.K. Foreign Office to get alerts as they are issued.  Go to www.gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice and enroll in “Get Updates” via email.  You can choose the countries you need alerts for.  I really like that the U.K. even gives information on possible travel problems due to soccer matches and other events like this. You can tell where football/soccer ranks in importance there!

One of my favorite information sources is run by United Health Care Global.  Sign up for “Daily Security Alerts” and every day the alerts will show up in your email box. In addition to the “normal” crime, terrorism, and political activities, this groups publishes information about a wide variety of strikes also that can definitely have an impact on your travel – taxi strikes in Italy, rail strikes in the U.K., airline and airport strikes, etc. – as well as a list of holidays around the world.  Can anyone say “Closed Museums”??

Hope this helps!

May 2017 Planning Update

Thank heavens for Excel spreadsheets!  I use them to keep track of where we’ll be every day, where we’re staying, flights, trains, etc.  Another spreadsheet is tracking costs and what we have left to book. I even have a worksheet to calculate how many days we need to take anti-malaria meds.

The spreadsheet is getting longer and details are added by the week.  We have most of the long haul flights organized and have organized a tour in Jordan for 8 days – seeing Jerash and Petra, the Red Sea and the Dead Sea.

The latest detail is setting up a tour in India.  We’ve decided to use Audley Travel with a driver and tour guides in each city.  We’ve been working with Byrn Woodworth at Audley Travel   and she’s been great, so far.  She gave us “homework” to do – check out hotels, make a list of cities we want to see and what we want to see in each city.  Bryn took that information and came up with an itinerary along with 3 or 4 hotels in each city for us to consider.  The tour includes driver between cities and private guides in each city along with admissions and hotels with breakfasts.  Dinners and lunches are on our own.  After some more research on our part, we’ve made that reservation!

Now it’s time to start filling in the blanks – trains, a few hotels, short flights.

Today was pretty frustrating when I tried to book 2 seats on the Indian Pacific train from Perth to Sydney on the Great Southern Railways website  www.greatsouthernrail.com.au .  I made it through the booking process but when I clicked on “Payment”, the website just sat and stared at me for 5 minutes (Yes, I timed it.) with the little message “Payment Processing”.  Finally, I checked my credit card website and, sure enough, they’d approved the transaction.  No booking number appeared, no email showed up with a booking number and I couldn’t log on to an account, even though I’d attempted to set one up.  I couldn’t even get Great Southern to reset my password.  Their site SAID they were sending me an email so I could set a new PW but that email never showed up.

I sent Great Southern Sales and Booking an email. The autoreply announced they are experiencing a greater than expected number of emails and to just hang on and wait for a reply. Wonder why??  Now, I’m sitting on hold with Great Southern trying to get this figured out.  Thanks heavens for Skype!

5/22/Update – Great Southern was really helpful after I got through the hold – a mere 15 minutes.  The booking is done – yeah! Now we have to figure out the rest of the time in Australia!

996,607 down, 3,393 to go – updated May 2017

I’m on the hunt for 1 million miles on United Airlines after joining their Frequent Flyer Club when it first started in about 1981. Mark already has 1 million miles so I can be his designated Premier Gold partner but it’s the principle of the matter. I want my own Million Mile designation!

I made up a spreadsheet with Excel and with only 47,00 miles to go as of January 25, I’ve searched high and low for flights with the most miles/dollar. Since I don’t really want to spend my life on planes, I’m searching for long flights.  Last year I went to Hong Kong from Denver but routed myself through Newark to get about 1500 extra miles for the same price. So far this year, I’ve found Denver to Tokyo to Bangkok to accrue miles and I did that trip in January.  (The miles have to be “butt in seat” on a United plane so only the DEN-SFO-NRT miles count.)

The Aloft Hotel pool – Bangkok

View from the Mo Chit BTS stop for the Weekend Market in Bangkok – cabs and buses!

Memorial to the King of Thailand who died in 2016

Year of the Rooster – Bangkok

Sushi in the United Airlines Club at Tokyo Narita airport. You won’t find this in the U.S. United Clubs.

(more…)

December 2016 – A few days in Bruge, Belgium

Time to head off to Bruges, Belgium (one of our favorite places) before we head back to Amsterdam to fly home on New Year’s Eve.  Berlin Tegel is quite easy to get to from center city – hop on the TXL bus and in about 20 minutes you are at the old and dingy airport.  We can’t figure out when the check-in desks open but the U.S. idea of checking in 2 hours before departure doesn’t exist here! Security is right at the gate because the airport is so old it has no place to do a central security.  Everyone on the flight uses ONE security line and the line does not move quickly – take off coat, put phone, computer, Kindle, belt, in the bin.  New airplane rule on Brussels Air … exit row cannot have anything under the seat in front of it.

After landing, we took the train to Brussels Midi and then to Bruges where we stayed at the IBIS.  Standard IBIS – small room, clean bathroom, excellent breakfast.  The ongoing mystery for us is why European bathtubs with showers are so deep.  People with short legs have great difficulty getting out of the tub after a shower!

Belgium and Bruges are known for beer and chocolate and that’s what this stay was about – visit to Halve Moon Brewery for a beer and Bourgogne de Flandres brewery to do the tour – self-guided with a map to hunt down the moles in the brewery.  Mark had a lovely chat with the brewer who’s working on a degree in brewing even although he has a degree in microbiology already.  The Bourgogne de Flandres house beer is brown mixed with lambic and that makes a pretty nice sour beer for me.  We also stopped at Trappist Beer Cellar (great selection of Belgium beers and knowledgeable staff) and Bieratelier Bruges -on Wijngaardstraat 13.   Bieratelier is a tiny bar with 7 beers on tap, 6 of which are Christmas beers. We tried 4 of them.  It’s a fun bar and the bartender is always helpful.

Christmas beers at Bieratelier, Bruges

Christmas cupcakes in Bruge

Bruges canal in the fog

Bruges canal in the fog

We had to buy some Neuhaus chocolate for a variety of people and make a stop at our favorite little chocolate shop in Philipstraat. We found this one in 1990 on our first visit to Bruges and have returned ever since.

One night dinner was at Malesherbes on Stoofstraat and you’ll need a good map to find this.   Maleherbes was yummy and our splurge – champagne, pigeon pate with a side of duck foie gras, lamb filet that was rare and tender served with potatoes and ratatouille. Finally, we had chocolate mousse for dessert.  This was a typical French meal – 3 hours.  The manager told us they only do one seating at dinner so no one has to feel rushed.   (more…)

December 2016 – Berlin for Christmas by way of Atlanta, Auburn, D.C. and Amsterdam!

Christmas bear in Galeries Lafayette window, Berlin

End of dinner at Entrecote, Berlin. The wine is a giveaway!

Advent wreath hanging in the Augustiner Kellar, Berlin

Gendarmenmarkt, Berlin

Nativity Scene at Charlottenburg Palace Christmas Market, Berlin

We took the roundabout way to get to Berlin from Denver. Leg #1 – We flew to Atlanta, rented a car and – Leg#2 – drove to Auburn for 4 days for a nephew’s wedding. Driving on I86 is not much fun on a Friday afternoon and by the time we got to Auburn we thought a beer would taste pretty good, but when we asked our waitress at dinner what kind of beer they have on tap, the answer was “we don’t serve alcohol”.

While we were in Auburn, Mark and I went for a tour of the university – checked out the stadium with sculptures of their Heisman winners, the book store and the student center where we were one of the few customers of the Starbucks! We drove around a bunch of Auburn, the town, spent time with friends and family, and got the nephew and his bride married!

Leg #3 started on Sunday afternoon – another drive on I86 back to the Atlanta airport where, by the way, there is no gas station anywhere near the rental car return location!

Leg #4 – the flight to Washington Dulles was delayed several times thanks to all the ice all over the country, slow luggage loading and the air start machine to start the compressor that didn’t work – the hose kept popping off. We ended up leaving 3 hours late and arrived in IAD about midnight, took the shuttle to the Hyatt and went to bed.

Leg #5 was DC to Amsterdam and this one went remarkably well except for United moving Mark without asking to a different aisle seat.   We both ended up changing seats – Mark because United moved him to accommodate a mom and son and then I changed with her husband so I could avoid sitting next to the children. Why did we fly to Amsterdam?  Cheap tickets!  I found this one for about $470 RT each and that was too good to pass up.

We saw the news about the truck crashing into the Christmas market in Berlin so everyone was sending emails checking with where we are.

The sun was actually up by the time we got to the Amsterdam Centraal station and found the hotel – IBIS Styles at Centraal Station. The only room open at 8 AM was in the basement but has a big bathroom! Had a nap and shower and walk and a pancake with ham and cheese for lunch before Mark started on some work meetings.

Dinner at the Kantjil & de Tijger (Indonesian food) – The food was good but the service was spotty.

Leg #6 the next day – Amsterdam to Berlin by train.  We had the 2 window seats in a 6-person compartment in 1st class. While we waited for the train to leave, we could hear a cat meowing in the next compartment. It turned out to be 2 Siamese cats and, when the owner let them out of the kitty carrier, they were happy and quiet. They proceeded to lay on the seat by the guy and just check out the world. Eventually, they fell asleep curled up together.

We have a VRBO apartment on Plankstrasse near Friedrichstrasse Station (more…)

November 2016 – Weekend in NYC

We had quite the adventure in New York City last weekend. We were in town for the New York City Marathon!  Mark won a lottery spot last February, trained for the event and then he had to run it! After flying in last weekend and using the train from Newark airport to Penn Station in Manhattan, we spent one day at the 9/11 Museum. We did get tickets ahead of time so we had a time slot and the line was pretty short to get in and go through security even though it was crowded once we were inside.  The museum is well-organized but it was hard for me to see some of the exhibits.  I spent most of the visit in silent tears remembering all the events on 9/11 – waking up to the news, watching it on TV, cancelling class because no one was capable of learning that day.  We had friends flying back from London and they were diverted to Halifax, Nova Scotia.  Another friend on his honeymoon was returned to Orlando and a colleague drove back from Columbus, Ohio dropping people off along the way.

9/11 Memorial, New York City

9/11 Memorial, New York City

Thanks to being a Diamond Member in the Hyatt Gold Passport we had coupons for 2 free drinks at Bar54 on the 54th floor of the Hyatt Centric Times Square Hotel on 45th Street in Manhattan.  The hotel is a great location for all things marathon related since we could walk to and from Central Park and Mark walked to the New York City Library to catch the bus to the Staten Island start at 6:30 AM.  His report – not many people on the street at that hour on Sunday morning! We timed our bar visit for sunset although we had to wear coats when we opted for seats on the deck outside.

View from Bar54 at sunset

Looking south from Bar54 at the Hyatt on 45th Street at sunset.

The next event was the Abbot Dash to the Finish 5K on Saturday morning.  The run (we walked!) started at the United Nations and ended in Central Park at the Marathon finish line. In between we got to walk down the middle of 5th Avenue on a Saturday morning.  Now, I can say I’ve walked in the middle of the Champs Elysees AND 5th Avenue!

Mark ran the Marathon along with 50,000 of his closest friends and he finished – his goal!  The atmosphere was electric – one big party for 26.2 miles with runners and spectators from around the world.  One French tour company, France Marathon, brought 1000 French runners – and lots of them were staying at our hotel. I’m pretty sure we were in the English as a 1st language minority at the hotel. I used the New York Subway system to watch him at Mile 11 and Mile 23 and then meet up at the end at Central Park West.

Mile Marker 11 in Brooklyn

Mile Marker 11 in Brooklyn

Monday was our day to go walking some more and after we visited St. Patrick’s Cathedral we ran across NBC’s setup for broadcasting for the Presidential Election the next day.  They had Rockefeller Center decked out in red, white, and blue including the ice rink.  Fox News and CBS were further along on the walk.

I am happy to report we had no problem flying back to Denver from LaGuardia – no traffic and no long security lines – despite all the horrors we’d heard about the place.

Let’s add Jordan to the itinerary.

An interesting story about Jordan on 60 Minutes gave us an idea to make a stop in Jordan for a few days to see Petra and the Dead Sea.  It would be prudent to check with the U.S. and U.K. governments for any travel advisories – travel to Jordan is a go!  The CTP (chief travel planner) looked for some tours in Jordan so now it’s a matter of choosing a good one.  Another task added to the “to do” list. Now the itinerary has grown to Rwanda … Cape Town … Seychelles … Dubai … Amman … and back to Europe.

Lonely Planet books  became our go-to travel sources ever since we found them when we lived in Australia and discovered that they include laundromat locations!  Finding a place to do the laundry is VERY important!  Now the books are offered in e-versions and, when LP has a sale, I stock up on e-versions of the books. I can always print out a few pages to take along and I don’t have to lug the whole book in my backpack.  Today, I added a book about Jordan and another one about the Arab Peninsula.  Does this mean we’re REALLY adding those countries to our plan?

We made our first reservations!

Thomson Safari Book

Thomson Safari booklet

A safari made it to the top of the bucket list and we started researching safaris about a year ago – talking to friends who’d been on safaris, reading magazine stories, checking out rankings.  We finally narrowed the list down to one country – Tanzania – and one or two companies.  After quite a few conversations and more than a few emails and dozens of questions, we finally decided on Thomson Safaris. (I’m sure Gabriella cringed every time she saw another email from me.)  We picked a date and a safari but we knew the decision was REALLY made when we made a reservation and put down a deposit last month.

Mark took a few looks at the map and said “Rwanda is the next country over. We need to see the gorillas if we are so close!”  More decisions to be made and more research to be done. The gorillas are in Volcanoes National Park along with the Golden Monkeys and permits to go trekking to see the gorillas are limited each day.  After going back and forth on dates and availability of permits and hotels, we finally added this experience to our trip – more deposits were made!  Now we have a few dates in concrete on the trip itinerary.

Deciding to visit Rwanda added one more little task to the “to-do list” – yellow fever vaccine is required to enter Rwanda.  Off we went to visit the Larimer County Health Department for a Yellow Fever immunization.  I’m happy to report neither one of us had any side effects from the experience!

10/5 Update – we made hotel reservations for the Hotel Uhland in Munich for 8 rooms for 16 of us so now we have a place to stay for Oktoberfest.  Next task for Oktoberfest is to get reservations for tables in an evening session tent and then buy  food vouchers.  I’ll be in Germany this summer and may try to get them all then.

Hotel Uhland Munich

Hotel Uhland, Munich

A change to the not firm plans

Last Friday I got an email from SRH in Heidelberg asking if I want to teach a class this coming summer for 5 weeks.  I’d like to but this throws a wrench in the plan that’s not set in concrete yet!  Since we can only be in the Schengen countries 90 days out of every 180 days,  spending 5 weeks in July reduces the number of days we can stay in most of Europe after the Africa trip.  Thanks to an amazing calculator I found published by the EU, I figured out we can stay about 7 days after the Africa trip so it’s on to Plan B.  Now we’re thinking we can drop off the duffel bags in Heidelberg, pick up our “regular” bag and head off to the UK – maybe stop in for a visit with Darcy and Kelly before we head up to Scotland to see what the whiskey trail looks like. We need to so some research to make sure the distilleries and castles are even open in December but I’m betting we could have a few places pretty much to ourselves!

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How do we pack for this adventure?

clothes on bed

What should we pack?

After working for LOTS of years and trying out all sorts of travel, we’ve decided we’re too old to do the backpacking route. While we’ll each have a daypack with computers and cameras, we are NOT lugging backpacks along and trying to manipulate them on buses while earning sore backs and shoulders – as much as I like massages!  We’ve opted for one suitcase each plus one joint duffel bag for the safari.

I can hear everyone say “You’re taking too much.”  Here’s the explanation.  We can only take a soft bag on the safari and each safari bag has a 15 kilo weight limit.  We’ll leave the suitcases with friends in Germany, take the duffel bags (One big and one small) and daypacks on the safari. After the safari we’ll go back to Germany to exchange the duffel bags for the suitcases.   We may send things we won’t need back home unless we decide we’ll be back in Germany in the Spring.  In that case, we’ll let the duffel bag spend the winter in Germany and reclaim it when we come back through.  Of course the packing gets more complicated because Capetown and the Seychelles keep showing up on our destination list after we finish with the safari, meaning we need clothes for there, too.

This would be way easier if we could plan our travels so it’s always summer but starting September in Europe nixed that idea! We did eliminate the Winter Olympics in Seoul because taking THAT many winter clothes is just too much!  We already have a few dedicated shelves for items we know we’ll need.  Stay tuned for the packing adventures.

 

 

Where are we going on our travels?

Lonely Planet books

 

A few years ago we made a list of places to go and things to see.  We kept the list and added to it as we went along and found new places we want to see.  About a year ago, we got serious about retirement and started to put dates and seasons next to some of the “bucket list”. When is the Australian Open?  When is the high season in the Maldives?  The list got longer with more details and we refined it until we ended up with a broad outline of places to go and people to see.  It helped to have lots of erasers and red pens nearby!  The list evolved into a broad plan for Round the World Travel although we probably will do some some backtracking, we suspect!

Oktoberfest in Munich is the start of the trip in 2017 along with friends. We needed to know the exact date for 2017. Simple, right?  You must be able to Google that.  Not so much!  We found several different dates and went to the source for the definitive answer – the Munich Tourism Board!  They quickly answered my email with the real dates. Oktoberfest begins on September 19, 2017.  The distribution list for folks who “say” they want to come was pretty long but the closer we got to October 2016 and having to make a firm decision, the list began to shrink.   Final count – 18 people have committed to meeting in Munich for 5 days of beer tasting, schnitzel, and sausages.  Most of us all staying together at the Hotel Uhland, a great little hotel only 2 blocks to the Oktoberfest grounds and near all the rest of the main sites in the city.  Everyone is scattering after that – a few cruises, some road trips, a visit with relatives. We’ll spend some time with Mark and Vivian in Italy before they go home to Fort Collins.  Then what will we do?? It’s a mystery until we hit the road for Africa.

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