Auf Wiedersehen, Deutschland!

After Patrick and Bree's visit, we had just a few days left in Germany. Patrick and Bree left town on Tuesday morning, a day which also saw movers come to pack up our apartment, and Erin work her last day in Singen. After being moved out of our apartment, we'd spend three nights in a hotel right in the heart of Konstanz's old town.

Despite living pretty much right in the middle of Konstanz for a long time (3.5 years for Erin, 1.5 years for Tim), the town seemed a little different while staying in the hotel. We got to see the city through the eyes of a tourist, and we realized all over again what a beautiful town it is, and how much we'd miss it.

In between checking in on the cleaners and painters touching up our apartment for the turnover to the next tenant, we were able to spend some time touring the city one last time. We walked through the old town, walked along the Rhein, and had some nice meals at some our favourite restaurants in town. It would have been nice to have a little more time to soak in the town before we left, but unfortunately we had to leave early Friday morning to move to Cleveland.

Our move to the USA is one we're making with mixed feelings. On one hand, we're excited for this next adventure in our life, and to be in a culture way more similar to our Canadian way of life. On the other hand, we will miss some facets of European life that we really grew to love, and we will definitely, definitely miss having all these amazing travel opportunities right at our doorstep. In less than four years, we've seen more beautiful and amazing places than most people get to see in a lifetime, and we've gotten to meet a number of wonderful people that have become great friends. We've had some great experiences here, and we're truly lucky for that.

Konstanz Oktoberfest (with some visitors from Canada!)

This most recent update is coming to you from our new (temporary) home in Beachwood, Ohio, just outside of Cleveland. It's been a busy couple of weeks, but we are starting to get things in order here. More on that to come soon, but first we'll go over our last days in Germany.

Our friends Patrick and Bree were visiting family and friends in England in September, and had mentioned that they had hoped to come visit us for a few days in Germany if we were able to find the time. We had to make sure their visit wouldn't interfere with the movers coming to our house, and after organizing and cancelling their vist a few times, finally we were able to arrange everything, and Patrick and Bree arrived in Konstanz on the Friday night.

Those of you who were at our wedding will remember Patrick as one our MCs; specifically the one with the odd sense of humour. He worked with both Erin and I at our last job in Canada, so we both know him well and were happy to have him and Bree visit. On their first night, we made them a cheese fondue before heading into Konstanz for a couple of drinks; all in all a pretty quiet night.

On Saturday we showed them around the town. We showed them the usual tourist sites of Konstanz: the cathedral, the old town, the waterfront, and the statue of Imperia. They absolutely loved the town.

That evening we went to the local Oktoberfest. It is tiny compared to the one in Münich, but it is still a huge party. We had a number of other friends show up as well: Scott from Tim's German class with his girlfriend Nina, our friends Chastity and Mark, and a number of friends from Erin's work as well. We had a great time drinking the giant one-litre beers, eating pork knuckles and listening to German music while wearing our lederhosen and dirndls.

Sunday we showed Patrick and Bree around town a little more, and Bree, inspired by the night before, went and bought her own dirndl for future Oktoberfests. We took advantage of some nice September weather and had a couple of beers on Konstanz's waterfront beer garden before having a nice dinner on a restaurant on the Rhine.

Monday we were back to work (Tim's last day teaching English and Erin's second-to-last day in Singen), so Patrick and Bree went down to Zürich for the day. They enjoyed it, but said they liked Konstanz much better -- great praise considering Zürich is generally considered one of the nicest cities in the world. For dinner we went to a local Brauhaus to get some traditional German food and beer. We sent Patrick and Bree off to a friend's apartment in Kreuzlingen across the border, as we needed to do some preparations for the movers coming the following morning.

Patrick and Bree were off back to England Tuesday morning, and the movers came and cleaned our stuff out of our apartment. While it was a hectic few days to have shortly before our move, it was really great to see our friends and show off our life in Germany. Three days later we would leave Germany. More on that next entry...

Our First Anniversary, One Year Together in Germany

August 2, 2009 marked our first anniversary. Since we had just gotten back from our trip to Vienna and Budapest, we didn't do anything big to celebrate. Instead we just had a nice weekend around Lake Konstanz.

On the Friday night, we went to the Konstanz Weinfest (Wine Festival). Imagine a mini Oktoberfest, only outside and with wine instead of beer. It was just a few blocks from our house, and was a lot of fun. They filled up a square in town with tables, stands from probably dozens of local wineries, and a stage with for live music. It was a lot of fun.

On the Saturday, we took a ferry to the city of Meersburg, where we finally got around to using a wedding gift from Erin's colleagues, a wine tasting and gift certificate at the Meersburg winery Staatsweingut Meersburg. While it was very nice, we may not have picked the best day to go there. After indulging at the Weinfest the night before, sampling a bunch of wines early the next afternoon probably wasn't the most pleasant thing for our palates. After the tasting we strolled around Meersburg, which is a really beautiful little town.

For dinner that night, we went to one of our favourite restaurants in Konstanz: a little tapas restaurant called La Bodega. We filled up on delicious food, including our personal favourites: bacon-wrapped dates. This was our "big" anniversary dinner, as on Sunday, our actual anniversary, we took it pretty easy and stayed home most of the day, watching an ill-timed summer rainstorm most of the day.

So with one year of marriage in the books, our next milestone was one full year together in Germany. That day came the next weekend, August 9th. Last year when we arrived, it was during Seenachtsfest, a local festival that concludes with a big fireworks show over Lake Konstanz. Last year we were dead tired and didn't go to the festival, but saw the fireworks show from out balcony. This year, we again didn't go to the festival, but this time it was due to yet another ill-timed summer storm that kept us from wanting to go and stand outside all day. So we again watched the show from our balcony, and thought back on the great year we've had together in Germany. Hard to believe our time here is almost over...

Mainau - die Blumeninsel

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.

Cruisin'

Weekend #2 of Keri's visit was more of a relaxed weekend for us. Instead of running ourselves ragged trying to see Europe by train, we decided to spend the weekend in Konstanz and the surrounding area. We'll get back to living on trains this coming weekend.

Keri returned from a quick Italian trip to Milan and Venice early Thursday afternoon and was understandbly tired. Her overnight train from Venice to Münich arrived in Münich late, and because of that, she missed her connection to Konstanz, and what was supposed to be an already long 10 or so hour trip turned into a 12+ hour trip. But she was a trooper, and after a couple of hours to refresh her self, we went out to enjoy the sun, see some more or the town, and partake in a quintessential German experience, the biergarten.

Friday and Saturday were more of the same. The weather was great, and we spent lots of time touring the town, enjoying the sites and some local beer, ice cream, and on Saturday night, a nice dinner at a local Turkish restaurant that we really enjoy.

Sunday we decided to take a cruise down the Rhine River from Konstanz to Schaffhausen, Switzerland. The boat ride was about 3.5 hours long, and just slowly bounced between the shores on either side of the river between Germany and Switzerland. The scenery was gorgeous; small village after small village among the rolling green hills and vineyards of the area. The sun was shining and we enjoyed a couple of beers during the ride, as well as the company of a beautiful Bernese Mountain Dog named Carlo. After we departed in Schaffhausen, we took some time to check out the town before catching a train back to Konstanz. All in all a nice, relaxing weekend.

Early on Monday morning, Keri hopped on a train to Amsterdam and is there as we type this. She'll be back on Wednesday, and on Thursday, the three of us are heading out to Paris for Easter weekend, not to mention Erin's 30th birthday. If this weather holds up, not only will we have a great time, but great tans to start the summer as well.

Bavarian Weekend

This past week has been a busy one. Last Wednesday, our friend Keri arrived from Vancouver for a three-week visit. We welcomed her with a traditional cheese fondue dinner, and after showing Keri around Konstanz on Thursday, we hopped on the train Friday and spent the weekend in Bavaria. We spent Friday and Saturday night in Münich, and made trips to Dachau Concentration Camp on Saturday afternoon and the castles of Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein at the foot of the German Alps on Sunday.

Münich was a lot of fun. It's a great city with lots to do. On Friday night we walked around the city center, through Marienplatz with its famous "Rathaus", or City Hall. After that, we went to the world-famous Hofbräuhaus for some giant beers and traditional Bavarian food. Check out the giant pretzel and pork knuckle! It was cool to be in the most famous beer hall in the world. Hofbräuhaus was founded in the late 1500s, and has seen a lot of history, including early rallies of the Nazi Party in the early 1920s.

On Saturday morning we checked out a little more of the city, including the Frauenkirche Cathedral and the Viktualienmarkt public market before heading out to Dachau. Dachau was kind of surreal. It was hard to fathom the atrocities that were committed on the very spot we were standing. We saw a lot of the expected horrible images of what went on in the camp, as well as recreations of the prisoners' barracks and the original creamatoriums, gas chamber, and entrances to the camp. It was an interesting, valuable experience, but not something we'd probably want to see again.

Saturday night back in Münich we went out for a nice Indian dinner at a restaurant we'd discovered our last trip to Münich for Oktoberfest, and off to a Paulaner Beer Hall for a nice hefeweizen before calling it a night.

With daylight savings time beginning Sunday morning, and an already early wake up call to catch our train to Hohenschwangau and Neuschwanstein, we were quite tired but still looking forward to seeing these famous castles. The trip consisted of a two-hour train ride to the small town of Füssen, and then a short bus ride to the town of Hohenschwangau below the castles.

The castles Schloss Hohenschwangau (Castle of the High Swan Country) and Schloss Neuschwanstein (Castle New Swan Stone) were property of the Royal Family of Bavaria. Hohenschwangau was built in the early 1800s, and King Ludwig II commissioned Neuschwanstein to be built, starting in 1869. Building of the castle continued until 1888, when Ludwig was declared insane and died under mysterious circumstances the very next day. Over the course of building, Ludwig had not only built one of the most amazing castles in the world, but also racked up a huge debt to finance it; a debt that, according to our tour guide, took the Bavarian Royal family over 40 years to pay off.

While the castles were quite impressive, definitely the most extravagant that we've seen, our day was hampered a little bit by a surprising late March snowstorm, which nullified the beautiful views that help make these castles so famous. Still, the insides of the castles, especially Neuschwanstein, still made the trip worthwhile. Even though the castle was only 1/3 finished, the rooms that were finished were amazing. From marble columns, to intricately carved beds and chairs, to mosaic floors with over two million tiles, to an artificial cave built into a passageway between two rooms, you can see why this castle was the inspiration for Disney's famous castle logo, and also how it completely bankrupted the Bavarian royal family. Unfortunately, pictures are not allowed inside either castle, so we can't share any with you.

We're now back in Konstanz. After learning the ropes of riding the rails with a quick trip to Zürich yesterday, Keri headed off to Milan and Venice this morning for a quick trip of Northern Italy.

We're looking a taking a short weekend trip this weekend, maybe to Lugano or Lake Como, and we've booked a trip to Paris over Easter Weekend. Easter weekend coincides with Erin's 30th birthday, and we've decided to celebrate it in style by checking out a show at the Moulin Rouge. Should be lots of fun.

Karnival in Konstanz

The end of February is Karnival time in much of southern Germany. This marked my first, and Erin's third Karnival experience. The locals here go all out for it. All day street parties, elaborate costumes, and of course, lots of drinking. For at least a week, the whole town is taken over by Karnival. We had a great time going out with friends on Schmutzige Dünstig ("Dirty Thursday") and watching the parade on Sunday. Here are a few pictures.