NoNo trip turned around

November 9/ 2015  3:05 p.m.

Fast decision made....to replace our no-river Rhein-Amsterdam tour we went to our old hideout Sporthotel Leweck http://www.sporthotel.lu/ at Lipperscheid /Luxembourg. I never thought that at my ripe age I would turn into the driver, but what must must.  Navi kept telling me via Cologne, hubby kept yelling Aachen,Aachen...so in the end instead of taking the  autobahn lane leading to Belgium I took the turnoff to Aachen and told aggavated Herr H to pipe down "you wanted to go to Aachen,there you are". No big deal, one takes the next opportunity to turn,so what! Gee..might have lost 5 min!!! - I want to get there, later maybe..but there, right?

Since we had made such a short decision the hotel had been completely booked ou except for the royal suite, but according to " last shirt has no pockets " we booked it and so we had,among other amenities the luxury of 2 bedrooms...nice treat!  Our stay as usual, had been very pleasant and we had nice,for November, beautiful warm weather, once the morning fog had lifted. Food had been great and again we borrowed the hotel golf cart and went "offroad" hubby trying in vain to overturn us. I had been the waiters darling which pissed off Herr H...lol...o.tone: if you are handicapped they think that you are soft in the head too! :(.....

We took , like for the Hunsrück trip, the scooter which can be taken apart (w.o.tools) and is so much more easily handled and loaded. Our  Mini countryman is fun to drive and it is amazing what you can stow in this not soo big car.

Driving home I decided to listen to the navi which took us via a very picturesque route through the Ardennen (Eifel) fog in the valleys and blue sky and sun on the higher levels. We reentered Germany in a tiny village and out of a hidden corner were stopped by a red light waved by customs. I had to open the trunk and they asked if we had money or papers worth more than € 10 000,--.  My answer...I wish we had! ...so we were allowed to drive on.

Back home we foud out that the St. Martin's parade was to pass our house, I had goofed that up and no  deco  ready to put up, so shamefaced we hid behind the curtains . But we got a sweet man anyway today, you know, around here,we eat men!

Senior Moments

September 29/2014... 8:07 a.m.

After an absence of 2 years we are here again for a few days in Luxembourg. And the food is so excellent as ever! There goes my diet. And last night at dinner the lady of the house came up to our table and we chatted. But when I incidently looked at my wrists I was so embarrassed...I was wearing a watch on each! sneaked off one and only hoped no one had noticed, only then I had to fight a giggling fit very hard!

Our Seavoyage to St.Petersburg - Russia

Our seavoyage to St. Petersburg,Russia

To start off with must say, that it has been very interesting but did by far not beat the charm of our Virgin Islands trip last year. Going up north you must think that you end up with forrest ,lakes, sea and elks...no way! True, passing the baltic coast you see hundreds of little and big islands, lined with charming country homes, some of them have their own little harbour with sail and motorboats..still,the big harbours we visited on our trip are bustling cities with crowds of people milling around and traffic jams. St. Petersburg for example has a population of about 5 million people which almost equals the population of Estland.The capital City of Tallinn ,btw, has been the only place i could imagine myself to live..and there comes the big if....the summer would not only be 3 months and the rest long,dark very cold winter.

Now lets bring a little sequence in my report. As you might have noticed the trip started out with 2 days of Amsterdam, very nice, lively place! We stayed 2 days awaiting the ship and I started out with my mostly solo tours,which had been one of the problems of this journey. Herr H. simply could not cope with the strain of sightseeing any more ,so sharing so often was out. Once aboard it did not change much, what he loved most has been the bed. But I made the best of it, only in St.P., which I had been sooo looking forward to I was hit by dizzy spells and had to see the ship's hospital for an infusion. Tried to visit the Hermitage but had to leave after 3 rooms, the whole place started to turn summersaults around me.Besides ....being weekend,it had been very hot and crowded. But I had a marvellous river- and canal trip including the fortress of St.Peter & Paul with the great (former- museum now) cathedral( where almost all the zars have been burried) the next day. The weather played along, nice and warm...lovely! - So next it had been Estonia with Tallin and then Helsinki ,Finnland, where we had some discrepancies with our booked tour and ended up taking an hop-on-and off leaving from the harbour,which was in the end maybe the better idea, since the weather being very nice we sat on the open deck. Had some worries about being back in time on account of the traffic...ship does not wait for selfarranged tours! but we made it. Helsinki a very bustly city too with nice sights to see and very crowded. But I think up north people enjoy being out once the sun is shining. The weather had been great for sightseeing most of the time during our trip, Twenties C / sixties F.
Dissapointed I had been from Copenhagen/Denmark. First with hundreds of people we glared at the little meermaid (sits quite close to the passenger terminal) then we had a boring tour in the middle of traffic jams looking mostly at road constructions - they build a subway- and the bus was too cold on top, which did not help hubby's severe cough he had develop and still battles with.

Just notice I skipped our first harbour..Warnemünde in Germany, There we took a taxi to Rosock, a pretty,friendly little university town . We enjoyed it!

Now about our life aboard. They put us on a german table, not what we really wanted, Germans we meet plenty around here..they were ok though . Notice my black friends, there had been quite a big table of black people, but did not get to meet any of them. Matter of fact we met not many folks, one night we got stuck at the martini bar, the most highlife place aboard, hangover had been programmed next morning, all I needed with my already swirling head! At the end of the journey Mr. H. got seasick, so there I was again with my lonely meals and ventures.

So, friends, thats about it in short, the little things would take too long 

A somewhat unusual travel report

April 21/13...     6:23 p.m.

A SOMEWHAT UNUSUAL TRAVEL REPORT

dreamview at Paradise Point

I like to fly, once you made it into the plane, mind you, but after 3 hours I turn into a whining kid – are we not there yet? – well…

Atlanta airport is the airport of the long,long ways and the fast black girls pushing Fred’s wheelchair. Beats me, the young lady had been twice my size but 3 times faster! Mr. H. of course is sitting in his wheelchair like the VIP he is and me, I am trailing equipped with 2 jackets,two carry ons and a waterbottle, upon which I finally sat on the boat proudly presenting wet pants from then on. Great!

We arrived in Florida- Ft.Lauderdale in pouring rain Thursday afternoon and had the luck to find again (always seem to happen to us) the dumbest taxidriver around who did not know this really big hotel at the beachside and kept asking us for the address. As if we knew. Cooling down my thickly feet in the sea at the beach had not been possible, sky and sea purest black. Check-in aboard our vessel the next morning and security were a scream, much sterner than at immigration,which I found astonishingly friendly. But that had been maybe thanks to our “push girl” a real sunshine! In our cabin we found the electric wheelchair as ordered but no gala dinner outfit for F. Our friendly steward came up with the clothes later but unfortunately Herr Husband did not have the athletic shoulders to fit in. So we got one size smaller, which showed a little tight around the waist, will move the button a little later on. Last nite dress code had been smart casual, tonite wil be formal but we will dine at the Tuscon Grille, also dressed up. The staff is friendly all over and the passengers are a mixed crowd. To watch people is fun. We are sitting on our balcony, sun is absent but it is warm. I always have to giggle when I think of my friend Charly who just recently took a cruise and one of his hints had been – do not stick to your cabin all the time, there is much to see on the ship, mix! – hmmm…Charly!

Summing up Saturday April 6 – 1st day at sea….



St. Thomas

Trying to get familiar with the ship, gotten lost at least 3 times, the wrong steward started to call me by name, drank 2 fruitpunch, almost drunk, thought there had been no alcohol in ! And then, while dressing for dinner, I broke out into a terrific sun allergy even if I had not been frying in the sun! charming! Good thing, that the Tuscon Grille and bar had dimmed lights. Must be the long, nasty winter which made me sensitive like Dracula’s sister. The southafrican waitress had been a darling and so attractive! Herr H. is trying hard to destroy the ship with his wheelchair, first he ripped the bed from the wall, not so easy that, because he claimed the extensions cord for loading was not long enough – of course it was – then he performed his master stunt., he rammed the restaurant table and everything, glasses,dishes cutlery fell over and downs and the very decorative balsamico-oliveoil bottle crashed against the picture window. The stuff running down the glass and the broken pieces all over the place. We had to move untill our place had been cleaned up again. All the culprit had to say that he did not do it by purpose. Well,that really would have been it!. And coming out of ther elevator on the way to our cabin he rammed a pillar because he had to turn around. The music plays up front,mister! Then I had a laughing fit, in the restaurant I had been pretty pissed off. –

So, today,Sunday sunscreen 50 will go on my skin, sun or no sun. We are just landing at Basseterre/St.Kitts . It is Tuesday (the day my friend Arthur would have been looking for us at St.Thomas) April 9 and in a little while our nice cabin steward will bring our breakfast to our balcony and then we are off to hit the sugar train. About yesterday and day before I will talk later, now we watch the docking!

So, back aboard, minus driver’s licence Mr. Schultze, that he lost. Basseterre railway tour had been interesting, all those waving people at the side of the tracks gave us the impression that this had been organized. Today even number houses have to wave, tomorrow the uneven ones. The little village I liked more than Charlotte Amalie where we took an unvoluntary island tour. Actually we only wanted to take only a tour of the place, because our date Arthur did not show up and he wanted to be our guide. Turned out he had mixed up the day and the fellow at the security gate from the ship had added to the confusion. Since I asked him for help because I could not quite figure out Arthur’s answering machine, he told me I had the wrong number. As it turned out he had told Arthur that there were 2 passengers waiting for him at the pier and Arthur told him that he had ordered no packages and that must be a wrong number. As I always say – shit happens – and we finally managed to get together after all but then we had only about 2 hours left. So Arthur took us up by car to Paradise Point where also a cable car is running . He invited us to drinks and time passed too fast with getting to know each other. There had been sympathy from both sides and I had the feeling we knew each other for ages. And the view from Paradise Point had been fabulous!

So now it is Arthurs’ turn to let us show him our sights whenever he takes his trip to Paris sometime in the future.

Today we had our first tropical rain, like a warm shower it was.

Wednesday April 10

….took us to Barbados, very exciting, since we wanted to organize our own tour and I played my hamster in the wheel role to find a wheelchair somewhere for F. to get him from the shuttle to a taxi. Wow…It turned out that the el.wheelchair was good aboard but rather useless ashore, because it had not been foldable and we could not take it along this way. But our taxitour which we shared with another couple had been a success, alone from the aspect of getting to know the scenery of island life for a bit. St.John’s Church, presumably the oldest catholic church upon the islands, was impressive, especially the spooky tombs.

Thursday April 11

…led us to Dominica, the most tropic of the islands. It had been quite humid and warm of course and we decided to organize us again ourselves. Our guide, Danny suggested that we visit the Jacko Falls, which Fred could also reach by walking a few paces. This time we had taken the electric wheelchair along – bummer – useless on the terrain. Now this had been real rainforrest and we have seen our first banana plantation and I had been so astonished that Ananas grows on the ground, I had figured them growing on trees. In the evening we skipped dinner and rather watched the beautiful sunset and took a snack from the buffet which we had on the outside part of the restaurant.

Now, Friday, 12th of April gave us a beach day at Palm Beach on St. Maarten including a lousy B-B-Q at the French part of the island. The other half is Dutch. I never thought that surf can pull your feet away like that and I really hit my knee on the ground. The bad one at that. Must say that we are still learnable and therefore we took a shipside owned wheelchair along and I pushed. Of course I did everything wrong and had a very unsatisfied passenger. Our busguide had been a Texan, he was funny and helpfull - unfortunately somewhat fast in speech. His favoured words had been cool and uncool. St. Maarten seemed very clean but the island had suffered heavily from hurricanes.

Well, another two days at sea and then again Ft. Lauderdale, there we took a tour aboard the Jungle Queen through the canal region and I finally managed to get a sunburn ,well shit! And Herr H. spilled bloody Mary onto the brightwhite tablecloth in the restaurant. – end of mischief!

To top it off, never saw so many fat people like aboard and have not walked such long distances since we sent Shaylor dog to dog’s heaven.

SENIOR MOMENTS

May 6/2012....1:00 p.m.

....We have them and we live with them, one of the unpleasanteries of getting older. But sometimes they are downright funny - like this one:
We had been visiting with our young family in Hungen the previous weekend and as it happened, there had been this may festivity in Kindergarten.  Of course our little one, 4 years old, had been very excited and from the time we arrived talked about us coming along to see her performing the "fire dance".  We wanted first to check into our little country inn,a few miles from their home where we usually stay ,and unpack our bags, and..tough luck...arrived at the kindergarten too late. The fire dance had been over and our little actress had missed her stage show. Sobbing and throwing a temperfit (understandable) grandpa tried to comfort her, telling her that there would be another performance an hour later, which then we would watch etc. etc. 
 Only the kid had not been bawling, instead looking at him with big round eyes and me standing next to the scene had a terrible laughing fit, trying in vain to stop him from talking down the wrong kid. And you should have seen the face of the kid's father, he must have been thinking his kid ran into a "good uncle" and was about to grab grandpa by the neck. Only seeing my laughing efforts to try to stop grandpa made him realize what happened and he joined me laughing and grandpa finally caught on and let go of the wrong kid,claiming that wearing the same cap they all looked alike.

And,by the way, we watched our little star perform the "fire dance" and her little world had been set straight again.

Another Replacement

October 14/10 ....4:01 p.m.

It should have been the isle of Jersey in September, but the die had been cast and our trip had to be cancelled. So we decided on some quite different kind of journey.  Since we had not seen our young family for a while (they live in Hessen)  Landfrau had the bright idea to look for a comfy place in Hessen where we could meet and decided on Göbel's Schlosshotel   - good choice!

It is amazing, how ignorant we are about this region of Germany which is so full of history, not only the recent one of border region to the former DDR but history dating back much,much further. We learned that the region had been an important tradesroute connecting Leipzig/Sa and Frankfurt/Main among other things and that in Bad Hersfeld every year there is the oldest German country fair , celebrated since 852  - it has religious origin. The event took place while we had been there and the grounds are set up in the middle of town and we saw so many stoned people that they would have put the Munich Oktoberfest numbers of  boozed up crowds to shame.

Now back to our castle which is breathing history and offering the comforts of today.

We had a great time and the only regret has been that our little family could only join us for one night.  The weather played along too, it deserved its name of golden October.

Now we are back home with our memories!

SEASIDE

August 2nd/10.......8:56 a.m.

One thing is for sure, Landfrau has been very much more of an early bird during our week of vacation at the seaside. We have been the usual crew, Herr Husband, grandson, daughter (delivering and picking up grandson) Herr Hund and myself.  We frequent this place in the Netherlands for several years and how time changes you notice, when you think about the "add-ons" which had to be carried along, like games, beach ball rackets and all that stuff to keep a kid busy. Now suddenly the kid is a teenie and the most important gadget is his laptop. And take Herr Hund - he loved to run next to the bike and we made extensive tours - nowadays all he is interested in is to trail my heels , to sniff around and to "tell" other dogs "look, I am harmless". But nevertheless - on account of him I have to get up early enough to walk him before breakfast and I am telling you - nothing beats a brilliant morning at the beach. A few other dog owners, a few horsebackriders  and aside from that you have the feeling you own that wide open space where the surf beats the sand.

So, it has been a nice time once again, but I also like it to be back home - I miss being spoiled but an eternal holiday would be boring too in a while, I suppose.

Young Boat - Old Passengers

March 30/10.....7:24 p.m.

To be honest - the other way around I would prefer, even better - young boat and young people. Since we are not youngsters anymore ourselves, I prefer to encounter younger folks when I travel, this trip had a bit of a touch of an old age home. We have been travelling the river Rhine from Cologne to Bale, Switzerland and there is nothing to be said about the scenery, enjoyable, even if we have seen it times and times before. We lived at the rhineside in Oberlahnstein for two years and all major errands had to be done at Koblenz, but going ashore in Koblenz for a little sightseeing, it must have been another Koblenz we had been living close to, I did not recognize a damned corner, no deja-vu, and where I walked around it had been the old part of town,which sits there unchanged more or less for centuries. I also took a bustour to Strassburg, unknown to me up to then, I liked it very much and what really amazed me had been the nesting storks by the dozens if not more, our guide told us,they do not migrate south any more, beeing fed with chickens during wintertime,they have adapted to the easier way of life. Easy way of life you have also aboard, lots of good food, and since all servings are buffet style, you have to be careful of the ellbows of the hungry masses, must be an extended pleasure of old age..eating. I took part in one board game, called Jakkolo, a wooden board with little gates at the end, where you have to shoot kind of pucks into. And I won right away, my rivals were pissed off, especially a couple, where the wife had been the champ up to then. I had a laugh and made a big show, throwing up my arms and making the V-sign , that showed them, they took it so badly. -

The weather had been nice too, except for Bale, where we checked into a hotel and took part in the christening of the ship in the afternoon. It had been quite a spectacular affair and fortunately by then the rain had stopped. The next day we took a trainride back home and before we could even put down our bags, our daughter No.2, having kept Herr Hund showed up with Herr Hund and mad Max and now I am dogsitter in return, bad bargain, since they are gone for a week and we only had been away for 5 days. -

That's the way, the ball bounces.

EAT DRINK SWEAT

January 6/10.....7:31 p.m.

That transfers it in short words, how we have been "sliding" into the New Year. We had a terrific Sylvester dinner, after a few drinks at the bar we started dining at 8:30 p.m. and only stopped shortly before midnight. Of course the menu had been accompanied by great wines. And at midnight, everybody started kissing everybody, 3 times, the french way, even the waiters joined in, two of them reminded me strongly of butler James in "Dinner for One", they must have been hiding a bottle in the kitchen. Very funny. Landfrau sneaked out shortly after midnight, wanted to see some fireworks - big dissapointment, I heard some in the valley beneath the hotel but did not see a single one. Hope this is not a bad sign for the year to come, I am a bit superstitious. Otherwise our leasuretime had been like always, except that it was wintertime. I took my daily walks with Herr Hund, somehow the so inviting shadow spending forrest seemed sinister and dismissive, especially at night. A bit spooky. - I finished a whole book in a jiffy, here at home it takes ages, swam in the pool till I almost sank - outside, breathing that terrific clean air, there is nothing like a heated pool to swim in outside in winter, pure luxury. And I treated myself to a massage. I felt spoiled, round about. Besides that, we ate. The food at that place is out of this world. -

We had snow when we arrived, then, overnite, it had been gone and when we looked out of our window the last night, it had started to snow again. But driving home with our 4-wheel drive had been not a problem whatsoever.

Now Landfrau is back in the chaingang - such is life.

Everything comes to an End

August 25/09......9:44 a.m.

....good things, bad things and also my little report about our pleasure trip aboard the "Arosa "Stella" - river Rhone cruise. On the way back the boat speeds up and there had been only a small stop at Tournon. By then Landfrau was tempted to say "same procedure as every time, James" as far as those little provincial villages go. In a way they are interchangeable, one or two small cafes, a fort or castle, narrow little streets and oldfashioned little shops. Oh yes, this little village had a pretty pedestrian bridge, crossing over to the other shore. Well....-

The last day took us into Lyon again and there I had orders from son-in-law to hunt for "Florentiner", very tasty cookies, which he claimes he never tasted better ones than from Lyon. And imagine, I think I even found the confiserie he had pointed out. They are still sitting in my fridge now, nicely giftwraped and we will take them to Hessen when we meet end of next week. Good, that they are wrapped, they would be gone by now otherwise, I think, because Herr Husband is also a "Florentiner" lover! -

Then I took that sightseeing tour again atop that open bus, where you can get on and off at your liking. This ride is really great and it is a guided tour, where you can listen in your own language over headphones, which you get wrapped and sealed at the beginning of the tour. At night we had the last get together with our "boat friends", we had lots of laughs.-

The flight back next day had been o.k. and first time in our lives we took advantage of the invalid service, so Herr Husband had the pleasure of being pushed around in a wheelchair.Landfrau pushed the bags.

And this is now

THE END

of my little travel report. Hope you enjoyed it.

And what is next?

August 22/09.....3:06 p.m.

It's Marseille, such a grand city, have been told that you either love it or hate it, there is no inbetween. Landfrau fell in love with it right away and if I could have, I would have sneaked away from the bus crowd and might be still roaming the streets of Marseille. We went there by bus from Arles and after the sightseeing tour were driven to Port St. Louis, where our ship had arrived in the meantime.

But Marseille overwhelmed me and I did not regret having taken part in the excursion, inspite of my dislike of bus tours. Unfortunately there was a shortage of time, so we did get off the bus only 3 times, once up on the hill of the Basilika, where you had a terrific view all around all over the city. Then I walked around for a bit at the old harbour side where the fisherwomen sell the fish caught fresh in the morning and we had a stop at a place where you had a good view upon the Île d'If , where the legendary Count of Monte Christo had been imprisoned. Only the truth is, that he is just a fictionary person , invented by Alexandre Dumas, he never excisted. - We did see a lot by bus, we were lucky, our guide had been a French woman who had lived in Marseille for quite a while.

We then had quite a long drive back to the boat and there a shuttle bus had been organized, that you could drive to a nature beach and have a dip in the Mediterranean Sea. Herr Husband wanted to try his luck and come along, but when he saw the distance you had to walk through hot sand he drove back with the bus right away. Good choice for him but a shame as such, that he could not take that refreshing swim in the sea. But boy, it had been very hot and no shade and just sitting on the little beach towel was not such a comfort, so I went in for a swim, let myselft dry off ,went in again and then walked back to the busstop. The French people of course drove with their cars as far as it had been possible and then unloaded complete households of picnic baskets,cool bags,sunumbrellas, beach towels and what have you. Only thing I did not spy were portable toilets . -

At night our boat left Port St. Louis (not much to see there) for the trip back home and there had been only one more minor stop, before we reached Lyon again.

To be continued...

Creepers, I can smell the Camargue!

August 21/09......7:06 p.m.

....and I start singing: memories are made of this! We are in Arles, very old and very picturesque and close to the Camargue, where we have spent two times our vaccation. Did a lot of horsebackriding, one day -ride took us to the seaside and we galopped in the surf. Since we always have to produce our small catastrophy, daughter No. 2, who at this time must have been around 10 years old, got something into her eye at the beginning of the ride and it got worse and worse, of course rubbing did not help. So we had to cope with a bawling kid, and since it had been a group ride, we could not run back and daughter and myself would never have found the way back. The horses, maybe. At that time it still had been the cell phone less aera (good old times), so we had to live through the dilema. At the beach the guide organized some water from a picnic jeep group, but it did not help a bit to rinse the eye. When we finally came to our hotel we were lucky, one of the guests had been an eye doctor who looked at her and had the proper medication and equipment along. There was fortunately nothing seriously wrong, only an irritation. But the ride as such had been spoiled for both of us. But the little hotel we stayed at had been a gem, it was called Mangio Fango, which means "turning winds" and the owner cooked the most delicious meals at night. On one of our frequent sightseeing tours I bought a most adorable long,very comfortable dress, made out of that wonderful provencal fabric. Have been wearing it for ages till it was so threadworn that it fell apart. Well, memories...

Now Arles, on our this years tour, I took the little sightseeing train again, they are so nice, you get sights to see without having to walk around too much in the heat. Found out that the train passed the place where our ship had its mooring place and organized, that the guide would stop there on one of the next runs, so Herr Husband could get aboard ,take the tour around and then get off at the same place. The French people are so easygoing in this respect, in Germany you could never have done a thing like that, rules and regulations. So Herr Husband was quite happy again to have seen some sights not only in the display of my camera.

To be continued..

Sur le Pont d'Avignon....

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August 19/09....3:15 p.m.





l'on y danse, l'on y danse, sur le pont d'Avignon l'on y danse tout en rond.....


is an old childrens ' song and playing the music our ship approached the bridge and the passengers toasted it from the deck with a glass of champagne, very stylish. The bridge had been destroyed by a flood in the year of 1669. A chapel is sitting on it and you can visit the remaining part. Since Herr Husband can not walk such long distances, like from the ship to the town, I had the brilliant idea to order a taxi and we drove right up to the Palais of the Pope, a gothic building dating back to the 14th century. From the square in front of the palais runs a tourist train and this way Herr Husband could also see some of the sights without having to walk. After the ride he went back to the ship by taxi and Landfrau took delight in roaming the little streets in the old part of town, buying some cute gifts and was passed by a taxi in which Herr Husband sat in the fond like royalty, not taking notice of pedestrian Landfrau. Getting back aboard on a hot day always had been a pleasure. Having a dip into the little pool and a cool drink at the poolside has been quite delightful. - Starting from Avignon Herr H. managed to slip from the pool ladder every time he tried to climb in and by the end of the trip we just counted the bruises, funny kind of record keeping how often he had tried his luck. If I saw some other passenger run, it was for sure to save Herr H., who did his slipping number again. We called it his daily performance by then.





To be continued

Cobbled Streets and 3 old Men

August 18/09.....1:43 p.m.

That is what had to be seen at Viviers/Ardeche. Besides the street were pretty steep, some of them and the 3 old men were sitting on a bench looking at the tourists and the tourists looked at them, both having nothing better to do. Quite a contrast, after having been in bustling Lyon for almost two days. O yes, there had been a castle sitting on top of the hill, which I decided not to visit,too steep- too hot. After all, I was on holiday,or?

To be continued.

He deserves a post for sure

August 17/09 ....9:27 p.m.

Wo does? Monsieur Bocuse of course, although I do not think he cooked for us personally, but he has a welltrained crew. Look at the menu, it speaks for itself, what is left to say is that we really were unable to taste all the goodies offered to us. Landfrau even got a birthday cake with a candle,which I blew out with all the waiters applauding and a boy in livree playing happy birthday on a street organ, to my regret there had been no monkey sitting on top of the organ. We dined for hours and it had been a great birthday present from my daugthers. Girls, you are gems!

To be continued..

The Day I almost drowned myself and lost my Ticket

August 16/09...10:37 p.m.

This is all about our pleasure cruise aboard a vessel on the river Rhone in France. - Since we did not want to be under pressure to reach the ship for boarding at 3:00 p.m. we decided to fly into Lyon the previous day. Also there had been that Bocuse birthday dinner the night before our departure. But that is another story. So we arrived pretty early in the morning at Lyon. We had an amazing small plane, and it had been occupied about 1/3rd, gave you the feeling "daddy is going to take you flying" very relaxing. - We had booked for a night into a hotel "Cour des Loges" situated right in the old part of town, very charming and unique - but that is another story. We were lucky to have our room right away, had a leisurely breakfast and then Herr Husband decideded to take a nap and curious Landfrau decided to roam the old part of the town of Lyon. We had been in Lyon before, so I knew a bit about the whereabouts. Decided to take the "furniculaire" (rack railway) up to the hill, where the Basilica" is situated. You have a marvellous view from up there all over Lyon. Tickets you buy at the bottom and you only can enter after having devaluated your ticket. After having visited the Basilica, enjoyed the view and walked around for a bit, I decided to take the trip back down. Looked into my purse - no ticket - . Looked again and again, no ticket. Decided then that I must have lost it while taking out my camera. Started to look around on the ground where I had been walking around, found a lot of tickets, none looked familiar. By then people must have thougt there was a nut walking around collecting cast away tickets. Problem is, you can not buy a new ticket at the upper station and you can not enter without a ticket. Had a last checkup into my handbag, and what grinned at my..my ticket. Had been hiding in a side pocket. So I had been quite happy that I did not have to decend on foot in the mid day heat. - by the time I arrived back at the hotel I decided to hava a swim in the tiny pool at the roof. A nice, little wellness center, but not a soul around. Dipped into the pool, which had been extremely tiny, and found out it was equipped with a device, which you could adjust to swim against. It gave a warning that one should put it to lowest level afer usage. Well, the idiot having used it before me had left it on the highest level and idiot me pushed the button and was thrown around like in a terrific surf, thought I really would not get out . Finally managed to reach the button and adjust it. From then on it had been great and I made a mess using lot of towels and walking dripping all over the place. Punishment! And at night we dined at Bocuse, but that is another story, as I said before.

To be continued.

Seaside, a Boy and the Tour de France

July 12/09 ....10:10 p.m.

One word Landfrau put on her "bad list" : AUSREISSER !

Being at the seaside with not exactly beach weather and having a (pre) teen along, who is a sports freak, an alldaylong TV run of the Tour de France is not really my piece of cake! - Aside from that we had fun, and who is talking about the weather anyway. We went on bike rides on dune paths, had refreshments at a dune pavillion with a terrific view of the sea, went into the little village with our bikes and for a swim in the hotel pool, where I must admit that I had been the absolute coward, the outside pool gave me the shivers. And the sea only saw my feet. Our last day gave us a marvellous experience, 2 seals from a station, where they raise abandoned baby-seals made an event out of setting free two youngsters, that had been so cute, they were set in their crates at the beach and as soon as those were opened, they robbed toward the sea, dived in and were frolicing in the water. Only, after a while, they decided that it was enough and now they wanted to go home. But with all the people at the shore cheering them on they decided the peace and quiet of the wide open might be the better idea and they left toward the sand banks.-

The last two days our daughter joined us to pick up her son and we enjoyed our time together. And, oh yes, mad Max came along too, so the rat pack had been together again at the seaside and Herr Hund made a real effort to learn how to be disobidient.

Home, sweet Home?

June 13/09 ....8:09 a.m.

First of all, have found out that I really DO NOT LIKE WORK! - Being spoiled during holidays is so much nicer, friends. What Landfrau hates about travelling though, is packing and unpacking. Lets take packing - inspite of my list there were several forgotten items, like - very important- passport for Herr Hund and my own personal alarm clock I hardly can do without. Forgot to switch on the outside timing lights and was not so sure about having switched out my nespresso machine ( well, I did, but uncertainty kept nagging on me!) . Have to keep working on my proficiency, seems to get harder with age.

Enough of that. Our little vaccation has been great and really something urgently needed. Just "chillin'" , good food, good wine, massages and not overdoing activities...the early morning and late afternoon walk with Herr Hund up that steep hill behind our hotel almost did me in, but once we reached the top we were awarded with such a great view and with a path we had all to ourselves. Never met a living soul. Then you think the world belongs to you. - One evening our Luxembourg friends joined us for dinner, its always lots of laughs with them, we are friends since over 40 years. Only our headwaiter, whom we called Obama among ourselves (could have been a brother) treated them very upnosed, they refused to stuff themselves with the big menu which we ate every nite. -

And then, during our last night I lost Herr Hund, had been watching a late movie, really enjoying myself in my bathrobe together with Robert Redford, when Herr Hund decided that he had an atttack of diarrhea and wanted out, but pronto. Since our room had been at the end of a very long hallway Iwas not so sure if we could make it to the elevator. Fortunately we had a fire escape staircase right across from our room, but the door could only be opened from the inside. Landfrau in bathrobe let out Herr Hund and Herr Hund vanished into the dark of the night. Whistling calling... no dog. So woke up Herr Husband who would not trust his ears when I told him that the dog got lost, then dressed in a jiffy to look for our lost friend and by the time I was ready, a very excited Herr Hund showed up at the bottom of the fire escape. He must have run to our ususal entrance and finding everything closed, remembered where he had come from. Well, I was so glad to have him back, but by that time Robert Redford had left me. Now I will never know how the movie ended.

So that had been the exciting finish of our vaccation . Now I am back home and wish "Obama" would serve me breakfast!