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Posts Tagged ‘travel’

Oh, so much.

03 Jun

It is June 4th (almost). That is the 155th day of the year. It’s almost halfway through this arbitrarily important measure of time and so much stuff is happening. It’s just happening. I’m doing some of it and you’re doing some of it, and other people are doing some of it, and ants and flowers, and universal forces like gravity are doing some of it, but it’s just all happening. I have a thousand things to write about. Some of them are Hawaii (in terms of vacations and residence), TedXMileHigh, summer, deep thoughts, and technology, among other things, but I’ll have to come back to those. First, I have 27 things to announce my gratitude and appreciation for, in order to catch up to my goal of being caught up. I left off on #128…

129. Having a friend in Maui who knows all the secret waterfalls and lava tubes.

130. Having a friend in Maui with a house, with a bedroom that we can sleep in.

131. Having a friend in Maui.

132. The University of Hawaii accepting Shad and his credits.

133. The adventure of moving to a place I’ve never been.

134. Getting out of our lease.

135. Having parents to stay with for a couple of weeks.

136. Ending a job on a good note.

137. Active volcanoes

138. Ted Talks.

139. TedX Events and the people who organize them, the people who present at them, and the people who attend them (specifically TedX MileHigh).

140. Getting to meet my nephew.

141. The Light Rail.

142. The UCD Alumni Scholarship Committee.

143. Travel Miles.

144. Hammocks.

145. Golden Birthdays (Mine is on June 28th)

146. Very large computer monitors.

147. Jeremy Bloom and the Wish of a Lifetime Foundation (donate to it!)

148. Mosquito repellant.

149. Spell-check.

150. Bamboo forests.

151. Have I mentioned my parents? Yes? Well, it’s my blog and I’m mentioning them again.

152. FTP. How else, I ask you, how else would we do it?

153. Fruit.

154. Mythology, wide ranging and fascinating.

155. Going to sleep under the stars on an isolated red sand beach in Hana and waking up to the sunrise.

 

I plan on coming back to many of the topics in this list with some context. Very soon.

 

 
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Freiburg Part Two (Last Germany Trip Post)

17 Jun

This is (basically) the last post about this trip.

We had to stop back by our future home of Freiburg. Unfortunately, our favorite hotel was full for the night when we showed up in the evening. We were forced to stay in some kind pseudo medieval death trap that we barely escaped alive. I was absolutely sure that if I went to sleep I would wake up facing a German serial killer in a subterranian dungeon.

But anyway… On our last day in Germany, we hiked further up Schlossberg and caught an even more amazing view of the city than we had previously. We drank more delicious Ganter beer. We saw the ruins of the original fortification on the hill. We also sat on a very nice bench and (literally) got lost in the woods.

Thanks for sharing our vacation with us!

 
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The Part Where it’s Just Red Squirrels and Trees

15 Jun

First thing to clarify: sometimes red squirrels are black. They are always cute and pointy eared and drove all the way back to Triberg, paid an excessive amount for peanuts and hiked up Germany’s Largest Waterfall! (hehe, it’s, like, 2 feet tall) for the opportunity to feed these adorable little critters. This entire post consists of green stuff and squirrels, with the exception of one thieving bird.

 
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One more in Augsburg

13 Jun

I forgot this picture. Again, I’m not sure what it is and I’m too lazy to research, but it’s a nice picture if I do say so myself.

You know... stuff.

 
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Augsburg

13 Jun

Augsburg was the largest city that we went to. I thought it was alright despite the fact that a pigeon pooped on my head there. Other interesting facts about the city:

  • It was founded in 15 BC under the orders of Emperor Augustus
  • The Augsburg Confession (the legal establishment of the Lutheran religion) happened here
  • A really rich guy named Josef Fugger built basically everything in the city
  • Mozart’s family is from Augsburg



Be forewarned- my captions aren’t great on this round. We were tired and uninformed while walking around there… although we did enjoy ourselves. Furthermore, I’m tired and uninformed right now.

 
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Füssen (Part 2 of 2)

12 Jun

After we finally found the trail to the castles, it started pouring and we walked anyway. We got to the base of the mountain that the castles are on and it was so touristy, we decided that we didn’t need to see the interiors. Instead, we spent a couple hours wandering through the forest on the way back to town. Beautiful. Just beautiful. I honestly thought I had taken more pictures because we spent so much time there, but I must have been more focused on enjoying the moment.

 
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Füssen (Part 1 of 2)

12 Jun

I’m posting Füssen in two parts because what we saw in town and what we saw in the mountains was very different and we took a lot of pictures.

The town is cute- a lot like the other places that we had been to, but primed for tourists because it’s the closest stopping point by famous King Ludwig II’s Neuschwanstein Castle. We found a nice bed and breakfast right at the edge of town. It was run by an old woman who spoke no English. While I don’t speak German, we had no issues negotiating a room and I believe we discussed how her arthritis was bothering her.

Then we went exploring. We tried Schneeballen, a pastry whose existence foretold to us by our friend, Greg. He explained what they were in an excited tone, and then concluded the explanation with, “They’re not very good.”  Silly me, being the tourist, got one anyway. They’re not very good.

So we went looking for the castle. We didn’t find it right away. Instead, we found the the beautiful milky azure blue Lech River. I can’t find why exactly it’s the color that it is… something about limestone’s or mineral deposits… I don’t know. All I know is that it’s not radioactive and no one seems to be worried about it.

Beyond that, we also found a Franciscan cemetery. It was still in use, but there were tombstones that were several hundred years old and so dilapidated that it was difficult to even make out the dates.

Oh and ducks. We saw baby ducks.

 
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Lindau and Lake Konstanz

09 Jun

Lindau was quaint. It is small island town in Lake Konstanz. The historic old city encompasses the whole island and it’s connected to the mainland (where the new city grows) by a bridge. It was settled as by the Romans in the 1st century and in 9th century there was a nunnery on the island. A whole bunch of other interesting events occured on the island, but you can read about them some other time over here.

Here are things that I liked about Lindau (all in the pictures below):

  1. We found an unique old guesthouse with creepy antique furniture and a modern bathroom.
  2. There is a fancy harbor with a Bavarian lion and a huge lighthouse.
  3. Rapunzel lives there.
  4. It’s in a lake!



We also caught a traditional German band in the biergarten that was part of our hotel. There were about fifteen older guys with various horns and with matching red vests. The crowd seemed like it was all locals and when the band was done, they drove away on tractors. It was kind of incredible. Sorry no pictures.

 
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The Black Forest and Triberg (Round I)

04 Jun

The Black Forest is an unlike any other place I’ve seen before. If it weren’t for human interference it would be a solid block of dense and diverse forest all the way through. It’s a bit sad to know about the biodiversity that was lost so I could drive through and look at, but on the other hand, I really liked the drive through! We drove to from Freiburg to Triberg along the greenest, cleanest road I’ve ever seen and got some postcard worthy pictures along the way. When we got Triberg we saw a kitschy giant cuckoo clock and ate some Black Forest Cake from the home of Black Forest Cake. It was meh. I’ve had better from the Russian store. We saw a giant wooden squirrel carving which made me want to go on the official squirrel feeding hike for which they charge 3.50 Euros, but it started raining so it was off to our next destination.

 
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Freiburg

04 Jun

I like Freiburg. A lot. We stayed there for 4 of the 10 days of our trip. We spent two days there at the beginning and two days at the end, and it wasn’t just because the town is conveniently located. It’s because the place is kind of awesome. True to form, here some things that I found appealing about Freiburg in a list:

  1. Ganter beer. Shad and I both tried a lot of beer in a lot of different places and 2 out of 2 experts agree that Ganter Weisbier is the most delicious.
  2. Freiburg University is one of Europe’s most prestigious schools and the college atmosphere is right up my alley. I’m not talking about frat boys and bars, but I love being in the presence of academics. By this, I mean sitting in the proximity of students at cafes and bars, because they accept something like 15% of students from all around the world who compete for admission, and I, my friends, don’t have a snowballs chance in hell.
  3. The vibrant altstadt (old city) is full of life and is basically closed off to vehicles.
  4. Schlossberg (This roughly translates to “Castle Hill”) is forested mountain that’s right at the edge of town and easy to get lost in.



Freiburg also has some very cool and unique characteristics like:

  • Bächle, a system of gutters that run water diverted from the Dreisam throughout the altstadt. They were once used to provide clean water to the city and  they were never used for sewage, as such usage could lead to harsh penalties, even in the Middle Ages. It is said that if you fall or step accidentally into a Bächle, you will marry a Freiburger, or ‘Bobbele’. I forgot to take a picture of one so see the picture below that I pilfered from Wikipedia:

Freiburg Bächle

  • Cobblestone identifiers in front of all of the business in the altstadt. I know they’ve definitely been redone over the years but they go back to some medieval trend and they’re pretty neat. An optician will have glasses in a circular cobblestone pattern, a baker will have pretzel in the stones, a jeweler will have a diamond…

In front of a jewelry store

I talk too much… here are the rest of the pictures…

 
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