Weekend trip to Münich

This past weekend a good friend of ours and former room mate, Adam, was in Münich for work.  He didn't have to be there until Tuesday, but we had arranged to meet him Saturday morning in town and spend the weekend there so he came out a little early.

Saturday morning we got off to a great start.  We were packed & out the door 20 minutes before I estimated we needed to be to be in Münich by 11am.  We dropped the dogs off at the kennel, and for the first time Murphy didn't stand at the gate staring at us as we drove off.  He & Milo ran off and started playing with the other dogs, so we felt good about that.  We hope we can find a kennel like this back in the US when we move back home, the dogs absolutely love going there because they have all day to run around in a giant fenced in field and play with other dogs.  We hopped on the A8, and just had to stay on it all the way into Münich.  About 30 minutes in is when we hit a problem.  We came to a complete stop on the Autobahn in a traffic jam that stretch as far as I could see.  After 45 minutes we'd only moved about a kilometer.  At that point I pulled out my phone and found an App that gave Stau (German word for Traffic Jam) information.  The traffic jam we were in stretched for 6KM and so far we'd only gone 1.  According what I could read (it was in German) they had closed a section of the A8 off entirely for construction and were routing traffic through several small towns.  So you had all the traffic that drives on one of the busiest stretches of the Autobahn being singled down to a one lane exit that had a traffic light.  So you can imagine how slow going this was.  We eventually made it through, but thank goodness I could email back & forth with Adam because there was no way we were making the 11am meet time.  We didn't end up rolling into town until about 1:45.  What should have been a 2 hour drive ended up being 5 hours.  It ended up sort of working out, though, because it meant Adam could take a nap to fight off some of the jet lag.

Once we checked in to the hotel and met up in Adam's room, we hit the town.  First up was lunch, we were all hungry.  I'd checked on the map the day before and found an Augustiner Brew Pub around the corner, so we went there.  It was busy, but the food was delicious.  I had a quarter duck, quarter chicken and a kartoffel knoedel.  It's hard to describe the kartoffel knoedel...in fact, I've re-written this sentence five times trying to describe it and I just don't have the words other then it's a ball...made of potatoes.  How about a picture?

After that we took the train to the BMW museum.  The first thing I noticed about Münich's U-Bahn & S-Bahn system is how huge it is.  True, we were in the heart of the city, but the trains and the stations were enormous.  MUCH bigger the Stuttgart's.  Eventually we made it to the museum.

Shanna & I aren't big car people, but we both wanted to visit the "Big 3" while in Germany.  We'd been to Porche and Mercedes, which were located in Stuttgart, so now we had the last one to visit, BMW.  It was a neat museum.  If I had to rank the three, the Mercedes was by far the most impressive, then the BMW one, and finally the Porche museum.  One of the neat cars that stood out to me was this one below, the car Pierce Brosnan drove in the 1999 Bond film The World is Not Enough (notice the license plate).

At the end of the museum the had a special temporary exhibit where they had given BMW cars to artists and basically told them to use the car as their canvas.   They even had one that Andy Worhol had hand painted.

After the museum we went to a Paulaner restaurant.  I'd read that they were having a big Starkbier festival, but when we got there, it didn't seem like anything special was going on.  We had one drink, then decided to leave & head back to the hotel.  Once back at the hotel we asked the staff about the Starkbier fest.  Apparently it's outside town and only accessible by cab or car.  At this point it was almost 8pm and we didn't feel like going that far out when there was a good chance it'd be too packed to get in.  So I'd found a Hacker-Pschorr brewpub right around the corner.  We went in and this place was HUGE.  It also had a fancy sports bar in the back.  They had a special seasonal beer on tap called a Helles Weizenbock that was DELICIOUS.  One of the best German beers I've ever had.

After dinner we walked to the back where the sports bar was and caught the last 20 minutes of the Germany Vs. Kazakstan soccer game.  There was a pretty big crowd in there watching.  I'm not a big soccer fan, but when you're watching any sport with a passionate group it's hard not to have fun and cheer for Germany.  We ended up staying there the whole night because the service was fast, the beer was great, and it was nice to sit and catch up with Adam.

The next morning we got up and headed down to the S-bahn.  Adam had heard about a "Science Museum" he wanted to visit.  After doing some research I found it was called the Deutsches Museum and wasn't too far away.  This museum was absolutely enormous.  There wasn't enough time in the day to go through the entire thing.  It would easily take several trips.  They had some neat things in there, including Sputnik 1.  I'm not sure if it's a replica or the same thing...there was nothing on the sign to indicate it wasn't the real thing, but I've heard (and read on Wikipedia) that the real one is in the UN Building in New York.  They also had a training plane that the Wright Bro's used.

One of the neatest things there was the desk used by Ernest Walton and John Cockroft when they split the atom for the first time.

We were in the museum all morning and a large chunk of the afternoon.  Afterwards we decided to have a late lunch since we hadn't eaten yet and headed over to the Marienplatz.  That's the location of the famous Hofbrauhaus.

We were lucky and got a table immediately despite it being packed.  Lunch was great beer and traditional German food.

Afterwards we walked around the Marienplatz for a bit, but since it was raining we didn't stay long.

That was it...we headed back to the hotel, said our goodbyes to Adam, then drove home.  Thankfully the trip home didn't take nearly as long, only the expected 2 hours.  But we did drive by the same spot we got held up at, and it was still backed up for just as long.  I was glad we didn't have to sit in that both directions.

Click here to see the pictures, or any picture above.  There are more coming.  Adam took pictures with his camera, so when he gets back home and uploads them I'll merge them with our pictures and post an update that they are available for viewing.

Trip Home Part 2

We landed in Shreveport, LA, right on time despite the delayed take off.  The weather was GREAT, but I had dressed for the cool DC temperatures that morning and was a little hot in the 80 degree weather in Shreveport, but it sure was a nice change of pace from the cold temperatures we'd experienced so far.  As soon as we exited the secure area of the airport we went down the escalator to the baggage claim area and saw Shanna's parents, her sister Nikki, and all five nieces & nephews waiting for us.  They had all wanted to come meet us at the airport, so they took two SUV's to meet us.  After our baggage was unloaded we loaded them up in the cars and headed to dinner.

As I've said in previous blogs, the two types of food we miss the most are Mexican & Seafood.  We'd gotten our share of Mexican back in DC, but with us landing in Louisiana, we couldn't pass up local seafood.  We stopped at a Joe's Crabshack on the way back for dinner on the Shreveport waterfront, and it was delicious.  It's been years since I last had good crawfish.  After dinner we headed back home to Texarkana.  It was evening by the time we got back to her parent's house, so we called it an early night.

The next day Shanna's brother picked up his kids to take them home and we spent the day with Nikki and her two kids, Alex & Alyssa.  Alyssa, Nikki, Shanna, and her Mom went shopping while Alex, myself, and her Dad stayed behind to watch March Madness.  After all the running around we did in DC visiting as many people as possible, it was nice to just sit around with no one to visit, watching my Bracket slowly get busted game after game.  I can't believe I picked Louisville to go to the championship game...  When they got back home, in addition to getting some clothes & shoes for Shanna, they even picked me up a pair of nice brown shoes.  I couldn't believe they had found size 14 in the store, but they had, and the shoes fit great.  That night dinner was good old fashioned steaks on the grill.

Friday was the day the kids had been the most excited about...making German donuts.  Shanna had taken a German cooking class last month and one of the things they made were Berliners, a.k.a German donuts.  She saved the recipe, and before we left we bought all the ingredients that you couldn't get in the US and brought them back with us.  Friday morning after Shanna's brother Scott came by with his kids, they all made the donuts.

For those that have heard their names and want to put a face to them, the boy in the blue shirt on the far right is Alex.  Heading around the table, next to him is Ryan, then Shanna, Alyssa, Cody (in the green shirt), and the youngest, Brady.  The person behind Alyssa is Shanna's Mom, Pattie, and you can see Shanna's Dad in the background on the left.  The donuts turned out great!  That afternoon Scott & his wife Amy came over, and we had one of the most relaxing afternoons of the trip...sitting on the back porch, sipping a beer in 80 degree weather, and just talking about anything & everything.  The kids even convinced me to go out & push them on the tire swing in the backyard.  One thing they'd been doing the entire time we were there was asking us how to say words in German.  When I was pushing them on the tire swing, when it was getting time for someone else's turn to swing, I'd count down pushes left start at 10.  Then I started counting down in German and they loved it, repeating the word every time I said it.  Dinner that night was hamburgers on the grill outside.

Saturday was just another lazy day watching basketball while the girls went out shopping.  That afternoon we showered, got cleaned up, and headed downtown to Zappatta's.  It's a great little Mexican restaurant in downtown Texarkana that we usually go to everytime we are back there visiting.  We met up with Shanna's friends Kimber & Josh and Matt & Amber.  Shanna has known Kimber & Matt since at least high school (I think maybe even longer), so it was good seeing them again.  Matt & Amber have two kids, Addison and Mason, but they were staying with Amber's Mom while we had dinner.  Afterwards they left a little early to go pick the kids up, and we all met back up at Matt & Amber's place.  The last time we were there was last March after they had just bought the house.  The previous owner was an older lady who smoked, and you could tell that as soon as you walked in.  They hadn't moved into the house yet as of March of last year, so it smelled smoky and looked like it hadn't been updated in a long long time.  This time, though, the house looked completely different.  The smoke smell was gone and everything looked new & fresh.  We had gotten Addison and Mason some spring toys and they couldn't stop playing with them.  They are literally hand carved animals attached to a spring that makes them bounce up & down.  The picture below is a friend in DC's daughter who we also got one for playing with hers.

We ended up spending most of the night there, not leaving until around midnight.  When we walked outside the huge super moon everyone had been talking about was out.  It was so bright outside that the birds were confused about the time of day and were chirping left & right.

The next day, Sunday, was our last full day in TX.  We started the day running some errands, then went to the retirement home to visit Shanna's Grandpa.  I've met him several times before, and always enjoy talking with him.  He has a great sense of humor, and is fun to talk with.  I even got to help him out with his computer because he wanted to do something on it, but wasn't sure quite how.  That afternoon Scott, Amy, and their kids came over for Sunday dinner (a delicious roast with biscuits and mashed potatoes), and we said our goodbyes to all the nieces & nephews.  We packed up for the next morning, and headed to bed early since we had to be up early the next morning.

The trip back to Germany wasn't too bad, but it WAS long.  No matter how much you bring with you to occupy the time, 9 hours still is a long time to be in an airplane.  We got lucky with the exit rows, though, because we were able to get exit row seating for both of us on both legs.  After having breakfast at the airport with Shanna's parents we flew to Atlanta.  We had a 5 hour layover there, so we spent it enjoying the last bit of American cuisine we could...we ate lunch at the Sam Adam's brewpub in the terminal and enjoyed some Sam Adam's specialty beers.  Then, at 5:35, we took off, heading back to Germany.

While in flight we could see the moon outside our window.  It was huge, and lit up the entire Atlantic Ocean.  Unlike Shanna, I can't sleep on planes, so I was awake almost the entire time.  While it made the time go by slowly, I did get see some neat things.  I tried taking a picture of the moon from our window.  I thought with how big it was outside it'd turn out, but you can barely see it.  As we flew over Ireland they had a plane tracker up on all the screens in the plane showing where we were.  It showed us being right over Belfast, so I looked outside and you could see the sun starting to come up and clouds below us leading right up to the city, then the clouds broke and all the lights in the city were still on.  It was a beautiful site, I just wish I could have captured it on camera.  We finally landed at 7:40am local time (2:40am EST).  All of our luggage made it back in one piece, then we took the train back home.  After unloading at the house, we went to pick the dogs up.  It was great seeing them after two weeks away.  Our friend who looked after them the last part of the trip had to take them to the kennel Friday because they were barking so much while she was at work that the German's were threating to call the police for animal cruelty.  So when we got to the kennel, they first brought Milo out.  He flew up to us and was so excited he didn't know who to jump on.  First he jumped up on me, then Shanna, then back to me.  Next they let Murphy out and the dogs were practically falling over themselves trying to jump up on us.  That evening we cracked open the beer I brewed from the kit Shanna bought me for Christmas.  It wasn't bad...there wasn't a ton of flavor, but it was carbonated and definitely beer.  Considering it was made from a pre-fab kit, and it was my first time, I'm considering it a success!  I can't wait to start batch #2.  After a long day of making our selves stay awake, we finally went to bed around 6pm last night and slept all through the night.

Over all it was great seeing everyone.  It was weird getting used to "the little things" that are different in the US, like not having the metric system, seeing road signs on the interstate that are green with white lettering (they are blue with white lettering here) and of course, the biggest thing, seeing & hearing English every where.  It was such a weird experience when we walked into the first store when we were back and heard people only talking in English.

We're not sure when we're going to be back next, but we're both counting down the days to when we can see everyone again.  In the mean time, keep checking the blog for more adventures over here!

You can click on the pictures in this post or here to see all of the pictures taken.

Trip Home Part 1

I have some down time while Shanna, her sister, niece, and Mom are out shopping, so I thought I'd put up a post about the first half of our trip home while it's still fresh.  Our trip home was from March 9th to March 21st, with the first half being in DC where my family lives, and the second half being in Texas where Shanna's family lives.

Our flight to DC was a long one.  The flight out of Stuttgart was delayed by an hour, and we had a short layover in Amsterdam, so I was nervous.  The last thing I wanted was for us to be stuck over night in Schipol Airport.  We made up time in the air when we finally took off and ran across the airport to get to our gate.  We got through the passport section and the flight crew was literally waiting on us before they closed the door to the plane.  Our scheduled lift off time was 2:10pm, and we walked on the plane at 2:05pm.  They told us as we boarded that the odds of our bags making it on the plane were slim, but we still held out hope.  The flight time should have been 8 hours, but due to strong head winds over the Atlantic, and being redirected around DC because the air space was full, it added an extra hour to the trip.  We finally landed 9 hours after takeoff.  Our baggage did not make it, but we were told it would be there the following evening.

That night was just a relaxed night.  We stopped at Walmart on the way home to get a few essentials that we would need to hold us over until our luggage arrived, then came home to American beer and home cooked tacos...a great way to end a long day of travelling.

The next day we hit the ground running.  We had lunch at the Buffalo Wing Factory (I've missed good wings in Germany), went to the Army/Navy club to pick up some golf clubs for Dad, then went down to DC to visit our friend Abby and her new born son Phillip.  Her husband, Paul, was at work, but at least we got to play with Phillip and see Abby.  Phillip has the biggest eyes I've ever seen on an infant, but he was in a good mood and was all smiles and playing.  I think Abby enjoyed having adult conversation for a few hours too.

After spending some time there we headed back home for dinner with my parents and my brother.  That evening we got a call from the airport at 7pm saying our luggage had arrived and would be there within 2-3 hours.  We were still jet lagged, but I wanted to stay up to make sure all the bags arrived.  Eventually at midnight the bags showed up.  All our luggage made it safe & sound, including some specialty Belgian beer we'd brought back.  This particular kind of beer can only be sold at the brewery that makes it, but we were able to find some at a hole in the wall store in Amsterdam.  We bought some for ourselves, as well as for several friends back home who had requested it.  They weren't cheap, costing approx. $20 per 11 oz bottle.  The bottles had to survive a flight from Amsterdam to Stuttgart, then a month later from Stuttgart back to Amsterdam, then on to DC.  Thanks to the creative packaging material used to get it to Stuttgart (diapers pictured below), and lots of bubble wrap for the flight to DC, every bottle made it safely.

The next day we started on our trip to Snowshoe, WV.  We made great time getting there, arriving in a little over 4 hours.  The problem then became getting to the house.  For some reason the town of Snowshoe is determined to make finding anything there as difficult as possible.  No roads have street names, just wooden signs to indicate the name of the area you are in.  That means you can put your GPS away...it's useless.  The friend of ours who planned the trip had provided a map, but unfortunately marked landmarks incorrectly so it was impossible to use it to find the house.  Cell phone coverage is also practically non-existant there, so we ended up driving around for close to 3 hours before we finally found a general store where the guy behind the counter let us use his phone.  We had a phone number for the house phone, and called that.  Eventually it all worked out, and we made it to the house.

It was great seeing everyone.  It's been a year since we last did, but as soon as we arrived it felt like no time had passed.  It was technically a ski trip weekend, and about half the people at the house went skiing/snowboarding over the weekend, but we were just there to relax and spend time with everyone.  There was snow on the ground the day we arrived, but the next day it got up to 50 degrees and almost all of the snow melted.  Below is a picture I took from our bedroom window before it started to melt.

We got there on Friday, and left Sunday morning.  In that time it was great catching up with everybody, as well as meeting some new people.

Sunday morning we left a little early because we had someone to meet in the afternoon.  The trip back went slower because we went a different route that took us up & down mountains.  We eventually made it back in to NoVA and stopped at some old friends house.  I've known Jeffrey since 6th grade, and his wife Erin since 11th grade.  We've been friends for a long time, and after years of trying, they finally had a baby boy, Jordan, last October.  While it didn't work out this way, for awhile the doctor's projected due date for them was October 17th, our anniversary.  Jordan was Mr. Playful.  He kept trying to jump around in Shanna's arms, and made a million expressions with his face the entire time we were there.  It was also good to talk with Jeffrey & Erin again.  Eventually it was nap time for Jordan, and we could tell it was also nap time for Jeffrey & Erin.  We said our goodbyes, then headed home.

A year or two ago a friend of Shanna's & mine, Patrick, was here by himself for Thanksgiving, so when my parents found out, they invited him over with us.  They liked him, and when it came up that he had recently gotten married, they wanted to have him & his wife, Janelle, over for dinner.  So Sunday night they both came over.  If you recall back to a previous blog post, Patrick was the friend I met up with in Luxembourg while he was there for work.  He might be in Lithuania for work in a few months, so if that happens, I'm definitely meeting him up out there.

Monday we got started early by meeting a good friend and former co-worker, Justin, at the Dogfish Head Alehouse.  Dogfish Head beer is one of my favorites, and their tavern in Chantilly has an amazing sandwich called The Steak Bomb.  So we met up with him there for lunch.  We talked about work, where I got caught up on all the changes of the past year, as well as what he's been up to.  His birthday is in May, so since I knew I wouldn't be here for it, I brought him back some German beer.  There was a three pack I picked up with some of the strongest German beers available.  Two were %13, and one was %16.  Next up Shanna wanted to visit Target.  Some of the little things in life that we used to take for granted (Target, Walmart, etc...) are places we can't wait to visit now.

Seafood is a hard thing to find in Stuttgart.  The Germans aren't real big on putting preservatives in food and transporting them around the country, so unless you live up north around Hamburg, Bremen, etc... where it borders water, it's hard to find seafood.  One of Shanna's favorite places to get crabcakes is Chadwick's in Old Town Alexandria.  I like the place because they have a good beer selection.  Monday night we met up with a group of friends I know through Shanna there for dinner & drinks.  Some people from the ski trip were there, as well as some people who hadn't been able to make the ski trip.  Abby even made it out with her husband, Paul.  I was glad they did since we hadn't been able to see Paul a few days prior when we went to their house.

Tuesday was our last full day in Northern VA.  The day started with Shanna taking a trip down to Potomac Mills to the oulets to go shopping.  I stayed home and a friend I've known since high school, Tim, picked me up to head out to lunch.  Before we moved I'd been keeping up on a new brew pub that was scheduled to open in the Falls Church area.  We left before it opened, but now it's been open & running for a bit.  Tim liked both the beer & food, so I was excited about trying it.  When we got there we were the only ones there.  I started off with a Scotch Ale, and it was DELICIOUS.  They had a great deal on beer samplers, where you got four 4 oz glasses of beers of your choice for $6.  One thing I miss living in Germany is good American micro brew, and this place sure hit the spot.  The food was delicious too.  I had a pizza for lunch that was topped with bacon, pepperoni, goat cheese, Parmesan cheese, garlic slices, and hot sauce.  In addition to the good food & beer, it was also good catching up with Tim over the beer.  After lunch Tim dropped me back off at home & I took a nap.

That evening we drove out to Tysons to meet up our friends Pat, Luzette, their daughter Marella, and that group of friends.  All told there was about 15 people there.  Ever since we moved to Germany I've been looking for some utensils to get for Marella.  When my brother & I were little kids we had neighbors from Germany who got us these things that we called "Pushers".  They look like little "garden hoes" but are used by young kids before they can use a knife to push food on to a fork or spoon.  It took us forever, but we eventually found a set a few weeks before our trip home.  Marella took to the pusher immediately!

It was great seeing everyone again, including our friends Ryan & Christina who I mentioned in a previous post because they visited us in Stuttgart while they were in Germany on vacation back in December.

Like all vacations, Tuesday night came to a close and the vacation in Northern VA came to a close entirely too fast.  The next day we went out to lunch with my Mom and then drove to the airport.  We had some delays flying to Texas, but by the time we landed we were only a few minutes late, so it ended up being no big deal.

We are still in Texas enjoying 80 degree weather and seeing family down here.  I'll post all about this part of the trip next week when we are back in Germany.

The pictures above will take you to a larger hi-res version if you click on them, and the two places where I mentioned "previous blog posts" are clickable links to those blog posts in case you want a refresher.

Weekend Update

I thought about posting about Valentine's Day last week, but figured I'd wait until after this past weekend to combine it all into one post.

For Valentine's Day Shanna & I decided to stay local and cook at home.  She had to work that day, of course, so I ran all over Stuttgart finding things for dinner.  First I went to a Blumen (flower) shop near our house and bought some Orchids.  I left that in the car and hopped a train to the center of town.  There's an indoor year round Market Hall where vendors from all over Europe and Asia come to sell food.  You can get anything there, and it's amazingly fresh.  They have butchers, dairy farmers, seafood, you name it.  It's not cheap, but you can't beat the quality and taste of their food.  We don't shop there often because of the cost, but for special occasions (like this) it was worth it.  I picked up some Filet Mignon and cheese stuffed peppers.  Next I headed to Conditorei and picked up some chocolates.  And finally, when I went to pick Shanna up from work that day, I got a few bottles of wine.  That night the menu consisted of bacon wrapped Filet Mignon, baked peppers stuffed with cheese, and some veggies.

Dinner turned out great, although there was a momentary hiccup when we couldn't figure out how to set our oven to "broil".  There's no words, only images, on our oven and no instruction manual.  With the assistance of Google, though, we figured it out.  That was it for Valentine's Day...we kept it pretty low-key this year.

This past weekend a lot got done.  On Saturday morning I had to take the car in to get an oil change, then I picked some people up from the hotel on base.  Shanna's been tasked with being a sponsor to a new employee, and with how bad our sponsor was, we didn't want someone else to have to go through what we did.  Her name is Arlynda, and her and her husband and 2 kids are great people.  It's interesting see how wide eyed they are at everything.   I didn't realize how comfortable Shanna & I had become speaking & reading  German, navigating around Europe, and just living here in general until you interact with people who just got here.  We empathize though...we were exactly like they were 10 months ago.

After I picked them up, I drove them back to the Marienplatz near our house and parked the car.  Shanna had done a lot of work over the past week taking them to get their kids enrolled in school and showing Arlynda the ropes of the job, but in those two weeks they'd been here, there hadn't been time for them to really see things off base.  After we parked, we headed over to the U-Bahn station and showed them how to use the trains, how to read the map, and everything they'd need to know in the short term about the U-Bahn, S-Bahn, and Deutsche Bahn.  We took the train down to the Rathaus and showed them the Market Place I mentioned earlier in the post, as well as the Schlossplatz, the Hauptbahnhof, and various other places in the downtown area.  We even ran into a massive group of people protesting Stuttgart 21, the initiative to overhaul the main train station.

The picture I took above was on the outskirts of the protest...the last thing I wanted to do was pull my phone out and snap pictures in the center of the mass of people.  We also took them to Zum Paulaner, which is the restaurant we always take people here for the first time to.  They have English and German menus, their staff speak perfect English, but most important, their food and beer are excellent.  As the afternoon drew to a close, we hopped on a train and took it back to the Marienplatz, and I drove them home.  They had a great time, and I told them not to worry about feeling overwhelmed now.  We felt the same way 10 months ago, and look where we are now.

Sunday we had tickets to a Wine expo in Strasbourg, France.  It was actually a really good deal, for 30 Euros a person you got a bus ride back & forth, breakfast & lunch, and entrance to the Wine Expo.  We'd found out about it from our friend Jenny.  She and another friend of ours, Michelle, as well as a few of Michelle's co-workers, were all going, so we figured why not.  The bus hit the road around 9am, and we were in Strasbourg by 10:30.  The wine expo, as you can see from the picture below, was HUGE.

Once the bus was parked, we headed into the Expo center, got our tasting glass, and started walking up & down the rows.  They not only had wine, but also champagne and cognac.  Some of the XO Cognac was amazing, and dirt cheap compared to a bottle purchased in the US.  Of all the Cognac we tasted, one in particular really jumped out at us.  It was from an independent family owned business, but the taste and smoothness was outstanding.

Since the bottle above is not mass-produced, it wasn't possible to make a direct comparison of cost in the US to cost here, but I got a rough idea by comparing the bottle size and quality to a similar bottle sold in the US.  The above bottle would go for about $150 in the US, and we got it here for 45 Euros.  With the current exchange rate, that's about $65-$70.

One stand we stopped at had great wine.  The style caught my eye, Grand Cru, because that's also a beer style I like.  It was a red wine, and Grand Cru was all they sold.  The only difference between the bottles they sold was the year.  We decided on a 2005 bottle that tasted fantastic.  Below is the vineyard's name.

They also had chocolate vendors, and all kinds of stands set up selling French cheeses, bread, etc..  It was a lot of fun, but the most interesting vendor by far was the last one we visited.  Things were winding down, and he was in a talkative mood.  He asked us about where we lived in America, and we told him the cities we had moved here from.  We don't like to tell people we live in Europe because it invites questions and it's not a good idea to mention you work for the US Military or Gov.  Someone in our group asked if he sold his wine in the US, and we got an interesting look into why none of the smaller vineyards at the expo sell in the US...it's all because of the distribution system in place for alcohol.  Our current system makes it cost prohibitive for all but the largest brewers, vineyards, and distillers to sell their product in the US.  He gave an example, if he sold his wine for 1 Euro to an exporter, by the time it reached store shelves and everyone along the way had taken their cut, the final cost to the consumer would be about 5 Euros.  Then you factor in the exchange rate, and it jumps to about 8 dollars.  Of course the wine wouldn't be sold for 1 Euro, it'd be more, so you'd have to multiply the cost he'd sell it at by 5, then adjust for the exchange rate.  Large corporations can sell for cheap rates in bulk so that it's not too expensive in the US, but the smaller guys can't.  It was really interesting, we ended up talking with this guy for a good half hour.

Once the expo closed, we all got on the bus and headed home.  Sunday night it snowed here, so Monday was just a lazy day of shoveling (there wasn't too much) and relaxing around the house.

There weren't too many pictures taken, so click on any of the above images to see a larger, higher resolution, version.

So that's it for the past week...Shanna has a German cooking class Saturday, then next week we're dog sitting for some friends and in two weeks from today, we'll be on a flight home to DC.  It's hard to believe it'll have been just about a year since we moved here.  We're both really looking forward to seeing family and friends again.

See you all soon!

Weekend Update

Things are pretty slow around here now, which is why the blog posts have slowed down.  We're saving up for our trip back home in March, plus it's REALLY cold around here now, which is not conducive to travelling and being outdoors for extended periods of time.  We did manage to take a day trip Saturday, though, so I thought I'd write about it, plus other things going on around here over the past week.

Last week Shanna was in Schwetzingen for the week for training.  I had considered taking the dogs and coming up with her, but a few days after we got back from Amsterdam my foot started to really hurt.  There was no visible swelling or bruising, but I could barely stand on it.  The strange part was it would hurt more if I was laying down.  It had improved, but was still pretty sore the Sunday Shanna was driving up to Schwetzingen, so I stayed home.  That night it was feeling better, so I walked down to the train station and went in to town to meet some friends who were going to watch the Bears/Packers NFC Championship game.  All season I'd been trying to find a bar in town that showed NFL games, and finally found this place.  It's an Irish Pub, and most Irish Pubs are popular with Americans in the area due to the fact that the bartenders are all Irish, so they speak English, and they have a different variety of beers instead of the usual German beers (although they have those too).  It was fun, it was nice watching the game with a group of people, even if the crowd was much smaller then you would have found in a bar back home.

The rest of last week was pretty boring actually.  I didn't have the car, and since my foot was in a lot of pain, I couldn't really go out either.  Shanna got home Friday afternoon, and by then my foot was feeling much better.  It was still a little sore, but I could much more easily walk around on it.  Since that was the case, we headed up to Schwetzingen on Saturday.  Shanna had found a few places in the area she wanted to visit, and a brewery.  The brew pub had some really good food.  I ordered the Texas Burger, which was by far the best burger I've had since we've been here.  Shanna had the Mexican Flammkuchen, which is basically flat bread with cheese, jalapenos, and mexican spices on top.

The beer was really good too, and we were both proud that we were able to order food, converse (in small sentences) with the waitress, and pay, all without speaking any English.

After lunch we walked around town.  We had considered walking through the Schloss, but it wasn't cheap and it was FREEZING outside.  We decided we'd come back in the Spring time when things were warmer to take the tour.  We walked around town for a bit, stopping in various shops, then headed home for the day.

Sunday was a lazy day, but one thing I finally got around to doing was brewing beer with the kit Shanna got me for Christmas!  It came with two different kinds of beer to brew, and Shanna bought me an extra pack to brew an IPA, which is my favorite kind of beer.  I figured I'd start with what came in the package first, then my next brew will be the other packet that came with the kit.  That way I'd get to practice and when I felt I had it down, THEN I'd give the IPA a shot.  It was a lot of fun.  My first brew is going to be a Blond Ale.

It wasn't as difficult as I thought it would be.  I'm sure as I get more comfortable with the brewing process I'll branch out in to more complicated brews, but for my first one I wanted to keep it simple.  The keg it comes with is plastic, but it makes cleaning pretty simple.  Who knows, if I really get into it, I'll probably buy a metal or wood keg.

Once the beer was done, I put it in our basement in a room that never sees sunlight and only occasionally has artificial light turned on.  The instructions said to let it sit for 14 days, but I might just let it sit for 21 instead.  Then I bottle the beer and let it sit for another 14-21 days, and it'll be ready!  Actually by the time it's ready we might back in the US, but that's ok, the longer it sits the better it'll taste.

That's about it, not much else going on.  Sunday night I'm meeting some friends who don't have work on Monday out for the Super Bowl.  It's starts at 12:30am (technically Monday morning), and all of the bars on base are having something for it.  It should be fun!

Amsterdam

This past weekend we made a last minute decision to fly to Amsterdam with some friends of ours.  Last weekend Jenny & Chris had found a good deal where we could get airfare and two nights hotel in the city for $200/person.

Saturday morning I dropped the dogs off at the kennel, drove back home, and Shanna & I hopped on the train.  The nice thing about living near a train stop is it's easy to get around, including to the airport.  With Airport parking costing around 50 euros a day, this saved us big time.  Once we got to Stuttgart Airport, check in was a breeze.  What a nice change from Dulles and National airports in DC.  Total time from when we walked off the train at the airport to when we were at our gate was 15 minutes.  Jenny, Chris, and Katia had already gotten there, so we met them behind the security checkpoint and grabbed breakfast.  The plane took off at 11:20am and we were in Amsterdam by 12:30pm.  Once we gathered our bags, we hopped on the train and went to the hotel.

The hotel wasn't bad, and for the price we paid, we weren't complaining.  In looking at the weather, we saw that it was going to be overcast Saturday, nice & sunny on Sunday and a light rain on Monday, so we decided tonight we'd just walk around exploring the town.  There were two places on our "to visit" for the first night.  The IJ Brewery, because it's built into a windmill, and the Beer Temple.  There's a store in Amsterdam called the Cracked Kettle that I've been in contact with before because I've ordered beer from them.  They sell beer from all over the world, including American Micro Brew, which is impossible to get where we live.  I had asked them if they knew of any bars that sold that kind of beer in the Amsterdam area, and they recommended the Beer Temple.

First up was the brewery built in the windmill.  We had arranged to meet one of Shanna's friends from her college days here based on his recommendation.  Sjoerd (pronounced "shord") lived in Rotterdam, about an hour & a half away, so he'd taken the train down to meet us.  Beer straight from a brewery is always great, and this place was no exception.  It was so fresh you could taste the Wort right in the beer.  Wort is basically "young beer".  It's what beer starts out as before anything else is done to it.  The taste is hard to describe, but very distinct...once you've tasted or smelled it, you never forget it.  Below is a list of their beers...as you can see, it was dirt cheap.

The percentages you see next to each name was their alcohol percentage.  So not only were they cheap, they were potent.  Sjoerd eventually showed up, so we headed next door to grab some dinner.  After dinner, while waiting for our check, two little boys were having fun running around near us, and eventually started climbing under our table.  The father came over to profusely apologize, but we didn't mind, we were having fun grabbing at them as they ran under us, and of course the boys were having a blast.  Once we paid and walked out the door, they ran outside to say good bye to us.

Next up was the Beer Temple.  This was place was everything I'd imagined and more.  It was like going to some of our favorite bars back home.  Of course the prices were significantly higher, but for one night, we thoroughly enjoyed it.  Eventually we called it a night and headed back to the hotel.

The next day we got to experience what days are like in the winter when you're that far north.  In Stuttgart we're pretty far north with our latitude being equal to that of Canada, just north of North Dakota.  Amsterdam is a 6 hour drive further north.  The sun didn't rise until 9am, and by 10am it looked like a typical day in DC at 7am, in terms of the sunlight out.  By the 3pm the sun had started to set, and it was dark out by 4pm.  So all told, only about 6 or 7 hours of sunlight in the day.  Another thing you couldn't help but notice were the bicycles.  EVERYWHERE.  I've never seen so many bikes in my life.  They were chained up all over the city.  There was a bicycle parking garage near the Central Train Station that held, on average, almost 3,000 bikes.  On Monday, a normal work day, I'd estimate about half the city was commuting to work on bikes.  They have dedicated bike lines and bike traffic lights all over the city.  When you see our picture gallery you'll see a picture Shanna took of a bike traffic light.

Since Sunday was going to be the nice day, we did our outdoor things then.  We started the day by taking a canal tour of the city.  That's always neat because you see the city from a different perspective then when you walk around.  It took about an hour and we got to see a lot of the major areas of the city.  The rest of the day was spent mostly walking around the city, stopping in stores and seeing what they city had to offer.  We even stopped in a cheese store where they made cheese right there!

Towards the end of the day we made our last shopping stop at The Cracked Kettle.  This store was amazing, but I'm sort of glad we don't have one near our place in Stuttgart...it'd be financially detrimental.  They even carried a beer they technically aren't supposed to.  Westvleteren is a Belgian beer that is only supposed to be sold at the brewery itself in Belgium.  They require you make a reservation, promise not to resell it, and you're limited to one case per license plate per month.  But this store had a case.  We picked up some bottles for ourselves, as well as friends back home who had asked for some.  We also picked up a bunch of other beer that I can't wait to try.  As we walked out of the store, we heard music coming from the nearby canal.  When we walked over to investigate, we saw this guy in a boat puttering around.  He was propelling the boat by turning a hand crank and using his other hand to hold a trumpet as he played it.

When you go to the pictures section you'll also see a video I took of it.  After that we walked back to our hotel, unloaded, and went to dinner.  I'm usually in favor of finding local restaurants and not eating American food when we're travelling, but I don't mind making an exception for the Hard Rock Cafe, which is what we did for dinner that night.  The Hard Rock Amsterdam was a 5 minute walk from the hotel, so we went there for dinner.  We couldn't believe it when they offered something we took for granted in the U.S....unlimited refills on soda.  That's unheard of over here.  When we got back to the hotel, we started to pack up since we'd be checking out early the next day.  As we started to pack, I realized we'd bought more beer then we had clothes.  When we buy beer, or anything fragile, we always wrap them in clothes if we are flying home to keep them protected.  Since we didn't have enough clothes, I walked to the local grocery store to see if they had bubble wrap, or anything to protect the bottles.  I couldn't find bubble wrap, but did think of something I thought was rather ingenious...diapers.

The first one gave me trouble until I got the hang of it.  By the end, I was wrapping them like a pro.  When kids come along, I'll be ready to put diapers on!  Assuming the kids are only 12 ounces, of course. :)

At 6am Monday we got up and started with showers, and were walking out the door by 8:30am.  The Anne Frank house opened at 9am, and there's ALWAYS a line, so we wanted to get there early.  We ended up getting there 15 minutes before it opened, and while there was a line, it wasn't long, and we were able to walk right in when the doors opened.  One of the neat things about living over here is we get to see in person all the things we read about in history class growing up.  This was one of those things.  Everyone knows the Anne Frank story, so to actually be in the house was surreal.  We walked around the normal part of the house, then through the hidden door behind the book case, into the attic area where they hid for almost 2 years.  Towards the end of the tour they had a low-lit area where the actual diaries were on display.  Finally, at the very end of the tour, they had some memorabilia, including a letter dated 1977 to Otto Frank.  The person describes how they had just visited and how moving it was.  As you get to the bottom, you see who it was written by...a very young (at the time) Bill Gates.

After we left there, we headed over to Central Train station and bought our tickets for the bus tour.  Shanna & I had done the tour the last time we visited back in 2008, and the difference between a summer tourist season tour, and the winter off-season tour, was like night & day.  When we toured 3 years ago, we had a personal guide who walked us all around the city explaining every detail.  For this tour, it was on a bus, there was only an audio guide, and it just lasted an hour.  The tour was billed as an hour & 45 minutes, but 45 minutes of it was them dropping us off at a diamond factory in town where they gave us a tour.  That was actually interesting, though.  Under heavy security they showed us 3 different diamonds that are examples of what they sell.  They ranged in price from 85,000 Euros up to 150,000 Euros.  It was neat to see the process for how they take a rough diamond and get it down to the kind you see in stores.

Once the tour was over, we headed over to the Dutch Resistance museum.  This was actually really interesting.  The size of the museum was not large, but there was a LOT of information, so it took some time to go through it all.  They talked about the guy who was the "banker" for the resistance and how he moved money all around through shell accounts, and kept each account separate, so if one was compromised, it wouldn't compromise all of them.  It talked about the illegal newspapers, the way the Nazis tried to act friendly to the local population, and in later years of the war, turned brutal.  It talked about what happened to collaborators as well as the women who dated the Nazi soldiers after the war.

Once we left the museum we were just about done for the day, but hadn't eaten lunch yet.  Across from the Heineken brewery was a restaurant recommended by someone at the tourist office, so we went there.  We got to enjoy a traditional Dutch treat, Poffertjes.  They are basically a mix between funnel cake and pancakes and are DELICIOUS.

Once we finished we walked back to the hotel where we had a cab waiting, and went to the airport.  So over all, this weekend was a lot of fun.  It's nice to be able to take impromptu trips to European cities for the weekend and not pay through the nose for it.  Oh, and for all those wondering, every single beer made it back safely as you can see from the picture below.

I'm now a believer in diapers for packing material. :)

To see the pictures, click on any picture above or here.

Weekend Update

Not a whole lot happened last weekend, but a few things did.  Saturday during the day was pretty relaxed, we just watched a few of the College Bowl games that had aired over the previous few days.  That evening, though, we met our friends Jenny & Chris for dinner & a movie.  India House is a place we visited when we first got here because it was close to our hotel, and while we liked it, we hadn't been back.  Jenny & Chris loved the placed too and it was right next to the theater, so we decided to meet there at 5pm when the place opened.  Or so we thought.  Turns out the place opens at 5:30, so we had 30 minutes to kill.  Across from the restaurant is a little hole in the wall dive bar, so we decided to head in there for a bit.  We ordered a round of beer (in German, of course) and took a seat.  This was obviously a "locals" bar with an older clientel, but when they heard us speaking German with our American accent, they were curious and started talking with us.  They were nice people, all from the area, and the bartender ended up bring us a round of Schnapps shots on the house.  The Schnapps in Germany are not like the ones in the US.  In the US they are typically low-alcohol and generic, but German Schnapps are different in every city, and are typically rather potent.  These were pretty good.

At 5:30 we headed over to India House for dinner and started talking about various trips we had wanted to take over the next few months.  Shanna & I mentioned that we weren't really up for anything more then day trips because we are flying home in March and it won't be cheap.  That's when they sprung their idea for this upcoming weekend on us.  They'd found a deal online for airfare from Stuttgart to Amsterdam, as well as two nights hotel, for $200/person.  We decided a weekend in Amsterdam sounded like fun, and that's not too expensive, so we agreed.  After dinner we went to see The Tourist with Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie.  It was ok...the scenery was pretty and definitely bumped Venice up on the list of "places to visit", but the story was predictable and far-fetched.  Not bad for a Friday night rental, but I wouldn't waste money to see it in the theaters.

Not much happened Sunday other then we booked our trip for this weekend, but on Monday Shanna wanted to visit Ramstein Air Base.  I've heard the Exchange there is practically a mall, so I was curious.  Ramstein is about a 2 hour drive from us, so we hit the road around 9am.  When we got there, it was lunch time and the food court had...ready for this?...a Johnny Rockets and a Taco Bell.  It's the only Johnny Rockets and Taco Bell in all of Germany.  We haven't had a good burger (aside from what we make at home) since we got here, so we couldn't wait.  After that we walked around the various shops, as well as the Exchange itself, then headed home.

So not much to report from last weekend, just a fun night out with friends and a trip to Ramstein.  Check back next week for my post on Amsterdam!