The last weekend of May was yet another long weekend here in Germany (another Catholic holiday, don't ask which one), and around a lacrosse game for Tim in the too-far-away Bavarian Town of Erlangen (which took up an entire saturday), we took some time to relax and enjoy the sun.Our friend Laurence, a co-worker of Erin's who came out to Vancouver last summer with her boyfriend Fred all the way from France, spent most of the weekend with us, adding a touch of French sophistication to our normally lowbrow weekends!
The highlight of our weekend was probably our Sunday trip to the nearby island of Mainau, known as the Blumeninsel, or Flower Island. Despite being in Lake Konstanz in Germany, the island was property of the Swedish Royal Family until about 35 years ago. They used it as a private retreat, but it is now maintained as a garden island, full of beautiful flowers, manicured gardens, and a butterfly house.
The island wasn't quite as beautiful as it could be, unfortunately, due to a huge thunder and hailstorm that caused a ton of damage and flooding in the town of Konstanz on the preceding Tuesday. So, while it was still very nice, a number of plants and trees were kind of beat up from the storm.
The plant highlights were probably the rose gardens and the "Globemaster" Allium flowers, some of which are pictured below. But as usual, our favourite time was probably spent in the butterfly house. (When we way "our favourite", by the way, we are excluding Laurence, who for some reason seems to be afraid of butterflies). We spent a while in there, looking at the gorgeous butterflies, and Erin used her special charms to get a number of them to land on her hands.
Hopefully we will have the time to visit Mainau again before the summer is over. It is really beautiful, but its one of those things we often forget about doing since its so close.
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