Finishing September and Germany

This month has flown by for me. Ihave been very busy doing a lot of sewing for new babies in the family. I did sit down to add a post to finish my trip to Germany, but I can't find the pictures. Somehow my computer had deleted them completely. So as a brief note I will finish about my trip with only a narrative and no pictures. After Mike was finished for the week in Wesseling, we traveled down to Frankfurt to stay a couple of extra days.

On Friday we checked into our hotel and settled for the night. We were anxiously watching the weather by now as Hurrican Ike was headed directly for Houston. Even with the anxious undertone to the trip we managed to have a good time. We spent Saturday walking around the old part of Frankfurt and enjoying the typical Germany feel. We ate at an outdoor street festival, shopped in an indoor open market. I absolutely love the indoor open markets. They always have a great variety of foods; meats, cheeses, breads, vegetables, fruits, pastries, and on and on.

While we were down at the river we decided to book a river cruise for the next day. So Sunday we got on a tour bus and drove about 45 minutes north were we visited a beautiful resort type place. then we borded the boat for the trip back to Frankfurt. This river trip took about 8 hours. The first 1/2 to 2/3 was really beautiful. There were castles all along the bank, terraced farming and lots of beautiful countryside. Except for the fact that it was slightly cool, leaning on the cold side on deck, it was a beautiful trip.

Due to the Hurricane our regular flight for Monday was canceled. But we did manage to get a flight out to go to Dallas, then changed airlines and flew to Austin. This is where out family had evacuated to. From there we drove home on Tuesday. All in all the trip was a lot of fun, and I would love to go back sometime.

As for the hurricane. We lucked out greatly. We only had a few shingles missing from one ridge line, which Mike replaced, the about 60 feet of fence was down. We did have a number of trees leaning over, but we straightened them and now have stakes and ropes all over the back yard. We also got our power back the day we returned home.

We were blessed to have our daughter-in-law's family, from Galveston, stay with us for a couple of weeks before they could return home. It was great fun and we were very glad that we were there to help them out. Sadly all of my pictures are lost with the Germany pictures.

As time passes we continue to rebuild our lives and strive to get back to normal. The lord has blessed us greatly through this time.

Guten Tag Feunde, Part 2

On Thursday while Mike continued to work I spent the day in Koln(Cologne) shopping, sight seeing and generally having fun. The first exciting part of the day was that I had to take the regional train to Koln alone. This was fun to try to figure out, but I managed to get there fine. Luckily I didn't have to worry about getting back. I met Mike, his boss and the others guys for dinner that night.

While there I started at the Cathedral of Koln. This is a really beautiful building with a great history. From there I wandered the streets, shopped as I felt like it. Stopped to eat what and when I wanted. Sat and watch the people, or read my book and basically had a great day doing anything and everything that I wanted to do. Sadly, I was enjoying myself so much that I forgot to take very many pictures. But these are the few that I got in town that day.

More to come later of our time in Frankfurt and our River Cruise.

TwilightMom

So I finally went to see the movie. I know it is long after it came out, but what can I say, at least I made it finally. I loved the movie, thoughly enjoyed my self and would even buy the DVD when it comes out. I hope it does soon.

Guten Tag Feunde! More Travels

About a week after we returned from Phoenix we tood another trip, this time to Germany. Mike had a business trip in Wesseling and I went along for a mini vacation. We left Houston on Monday September 8th in the early evening. we had a direct flight to Frankfurt. As this was an over night flight we arrived in the morning of Tuesday. From there we had to take the train (ICE-intercity express)and then a taxi to get to our hotel.

The hotel was right on the Rhein River, and we had a room with a samll balcony overlooking the river. I spent most of the rest of that day watching the river traffic and catching up on my sleep.

On Wednesday, I ventured out to explore the town of Wesseling. I had a lot of fun wandering through the old town. I bought lunch and went to a park along the river. I spent about 2 hours just sitting there enjoying my lunch, reading a book and watching the river. That night one Mike's bosses took us out to dinner in Koln (Cologne) and to show me where the best places were to shop.

There was a lot of barge traffic on the river. I found it very interesting that a lot of the people actually live on their barges. They have a home in the back and even drive their cars onto the barge to use when they stop somewhere.