Fall in Germany

October 20, 2023October 20, 2023 edithtedLeave a comment

It is the middle of October and fall is in full swing! Night temperatures reach down to the freezing point, the days are barely warmer. Rain showers shake hands with sunshine, hail knocks down some leftover flowers and heavy wind gusts blow the colorful leaves off the trees. And then it starts over again. You never know what to expect and/or what to wear.

Citymap of Ingolstadt from 1810. It is surrounded by protection buildings and a citiwall that is still intact. Nowadays the Danube on the south side of town has 3 bridges for traffic crossing over, 2 pedestrian bridges and 1 for trains… Ingolstadt was founded in the year 806 and had a busy history, being a custom point for the salt trade from the Alps to northern territories. Here, every shipment of salt had to cross the Danube, which made it a popular location for thieves and bandits.

Today my brother Jürgen and I spent a whole day together. He needed a haircut, a motorcycle helmet, tennis shoes, lunch, a walk and everything wrapped with meaningful brother-sister conversations.

On our way to the motorcycle helmet store we found this neat barber shop

With his new haircut, Jürgen bought a new helmet and afterwards we had a tasty lunch at a restaurant at a nearby lake, the „Auwaldsee“ in Ingolstadt. At this lake I learned to swim, to ice skate, I learned to play Romme, I read books, many MANY books. Back then we rode our bikes to this lake, we spent our childhood afternoons there, and for us, it was perfect! The lake seemed huge, biking around took forever, swimming across seemed impossible! And today after lunch Jürgen and I walked around the lake, 3km, 1hour, just a little afterlunch walk. And it was beautiful! And perfect!!!

Back „home“, but still not at home…

October 18, 2023 edithted1 Comment

I know it’s confusing, but when it comes to „home“, I’m kind of a schizophrenic. What is home? Where you grew up and know every sound, every smell, every little detail inside and out? Or is it the place you live with your husband, a comfortable warm place you enjoy and where you can do whatever you want? Or is it the place you want to be buried? I’m torn and never know what to answer, if I’m asked. So, I’m home now (home #1, where I grew up).

After a short 3.5hour flight from Istanbul I landed in Munich, where my brother Jürgen picked me up and we went to a fun, loud, techno dance party / concert, that left Jürgen in shock. He never was a club, dance party, techno guy, so starting this when you’re 55 years old is a stretch 😱. I on the other hand was sore from dancing the next day, I couldn’t hear well and my voice was hoarse… I always loved techno!

Home late, the next day was already packed with a 20 people family lunch at the restaurant Wild in Hagenhill – good food mixed with good company – what else do you need? So this is home then?

https://g.co/kgs/EjGmpH

And right after lunch, the whole crowd meets at Jürgen & Anjas house for coffee / tea and a variety of homemade cakes! Delicious!!! Just like home!🤩! My nieces Saskia and Tamara should get an award 💝. My family stretches from 2-month old Niklas (our Mini Schneider) up to 85-year old Helmut!

And that’s not all: last night my sister Petra and her husband Erwin took me to a lecture about the James Webb Telescope. This was so interesting! I just love it when you learn a lot while being entertained, while you can laugh and think „Uhh, Ahh, Really?“ Prof Andreas Burkert from the TU Munich is such a good talker: a big bravo to his fun, informative style of lecture! Looking at the unimportance of our home planet, how small the earth is compared to the universe. It makes you question why people think so much about themselves, how important they think they are. Listening to Prof Burkerts lecture should put you back into perspective…

And today? Home improvements are on the daily chore list. A remote garage door is needed to make the life of my mom and Helmut more bearable. So here we go, „home“ improvements. Everything involves the word „home“….. I wonder why?

Istanbul: bazaar, food, cats, etc.

October 13, 2023 edithtedLeave a comment

Walking around town is so much fun in Istanbul! An overload of stimulation from colors, shapes and smells is overwhelming! Hundreds of stores along every street, inside and outside of the markets: stores for spices, jewelry, sweets, jewelry, shoes, jewelry, clothing hangers, jewelry, leather & fur and, guess what? Jewelry! It is overwhelming, stimulating and fun!

The Egyptian Bazaar is more food oriented than the Grand Bazaar, the later being very touristy. What we really enjoyed are those areas outside the bazaars, where the locals shop and no tour guides with their flock of tourists can be seen. Household items, store fixtures, jewelry making supplies, fabrics & notions, party supplies, everything and anything can be found. The streets take us in, we float, we eat, drink, have fun!

What you can also see everywhere are cats, mostly kittens, who sleep, relax, beg for food and/or mind their own business

Ρόδος / Rhodos / Rhodes

October 10, 2023 edithtedLeave a comment

25 years ago I visited Ρόδος for the first time. A cute oldtown, a castle, 5 hotels along the beach. My friend Lisa and I rented a scooter, we drove around the island, it was a quiet, relaxing vacation.

It looks very different now, not 5, but what seems to be 100 hotels, all the streets paved, cruise ships in the port, bus loads full of tourists shipped to all the beautiful destinations.

We signed up for a wine tasting + cooking class + 10-course meal and we loved every bit of it! Together with 6 other people from our cruise we headed out to a 45min drive to a winery where our host Jason waited for us and walked us through the vineyards where his small family winery grow 7 different varieties if wine. Some from France (Merlot, Chardonnay), some old varieties from Greece. The following winetasting was delicious, informative and prepared a relaxed mood to start the cooking class. Tzatziki, dolmas, and an eggplant dip was what we made.

The 10-course meal topped off everything in the best way possible; one dish after another, one better than the previous, wine and more wine was poured – we all were very happy!

Zakynthos

October 6, 2023 edithted1 Comment

So I’d already been in Rome, Napoli and Sicily. Zakynthos, or Zaki as the locals call it, was the fist “new”. And it was a good one! A beautiful little island with lots of little farms growing mostly olive trees. The main summer income for the islanders is tourism, the main winter income is olive oil. No wonder that they sell all kinds of olive products everywhere: oil, lotions, along with honey, wine etc.

Our friends Yuki and Bill, Ted and I joined a day-long tour by bus & boat. Half of the day we drove around the island, first on the westside, where most of the 20,000 people live, then on the eastside with its high cliffs and gorgeous views.

The most famous view is down to the shipwreck beach. A group of cigarette smugglers had a problem with their ship and – instead of being caught by the coastguard – they just abandoned their vessel and ran off. The ship ended up on this beach and is falling apart ever since this happened (in the 1980s). Unfortunately the beach is closed and you are not allowed to go ashore because of falling rocks from the cliff surrounding the beach.

We had a few more stops with views to other beaches, one of which had sulfuric gases bubbling out of the water near the beach, making every public restroom small like a perfume store. But it is healthy apparently… On top of the cliff above the stinky beach is a little bar, where the people on the beach can order food and drinks, that then is transported down by an interesting gondola basket

The second part of the day we spent on a boat, moving along the coast and it’s many little beaches, coves and grottos. We drove inside a few of them, we swam in the Mediterranean we had a lot of fun!!! The crystal clear water has all shades of blue and turquoise – like heaven to me ❤️

Taormina

October 6, 2023 edithted1 Comment

Last year we fell in love with Sicily, when we visited the Aeolian Islands to do a one week long hike. But our hike organisation Macs Adventure had to change the itinerary, because the volcano Stromboli acted up and destroyed some of the hiking trails we were supposed to use. So we ended up with 2 nights in Taormina and we loved it! We wanted to come back and when we saw the itinerary of this current cruise, we didn’t hesitate to book it.

Unfortunately the day in Taormina was cut short and we were supposed to be back by 3pm. When we wanted to leave the ship by tender, this process took forever and we when we finally were on land we couldn’t find a taxi to bring us up to Taormina 🥴

It was around 11.30am when we finally arrived and we immediately rewarded ourselves with a delicious cannoli 🤩

Cannoli is a round baked philodough that is shaped into a Zylinder and filled with a ricotta cream and sprinkled with pistachios – delicious!

Limoncello Spritz for Edith, chocolate gelato for Ted

There is an image that you can find throughout Taormina: flower pots with an middle eastern looking male face. Legend has it that this handsome guy came to Taormina and fell in love with a local virgin. After making love with her, she discovered that he was a married man. So she chopped off his head and used it as a flower pot. And the herbs growing from this pot were thriving! Ever since the people in Taormina make flower pots with his image so that their herbs and flowers grow well!

Alex – honk – Alex – honk honk – Alexandria

October 6, 2023October 6, 2023 edithted3 Comments

It is loud here in Alexandria! Very loud. And very dirty. And very smelly! I wish I had Ted’s nose; his sense of smell is almost non-existent and that is a big advantage sometimes.

Today is National Armed Forces Day, a national holiday and everything is closed.

Alexandria was on our itinerary, and my brain just jumped up and screened: Bibliotheca Alexandria, but this magnificent modern library, that I always wanted to visit, is also a victim of the National Armed Forces Day and therefore closed 😱

Ok then, let’s go to the national museum then. We met our friends on the way there, they just finished their visit, so we feel safe. We know it is open, small, interesting and it has a bathroom which makes Ted happy. We arrive and the guard at the entrance tells us that it is closed. No electricity.

Egypt is not really inviting today, we are already tired of walking around and we choose to sit in a cafe and drink a coke (Edith) and a water (Ted). And it turns out that they don’t have coke. I guess maybe it has something to do with National Armed Forces Day? Honk honk honk…

Capri

October 2, 2023 edithted2 Comments

This tiny little island, just one hour boat ride off the coast in Napoli, is called the lemon-island. And indeed: lemons everywhere! Not only on almost every tree, but every store sells lemon stuff, every decor is somewhat lemon something and the food and drinks you can order has some lemon flavor: lemon ravioli, limoncello spritz, pizza with prosciutto and lemon, etc.: delicious! If lemon wouldn’t already be my favorite taste, it would be now!

And then there is more than lemons: the charm! Capris and Anacapris tiny little streets, cute little stores, bars and restaurants, everything is small, narrow, tiny! Even the garbage trucks, delivery trucks, buses, everything is small scale… cute, except you LLP want to sit in one of those buses, which don’t have any legroom 😜

The highlight of every visit in Capri is definitely the blue grotto! Getting in and out of this needle hole of an entrance is somewhat adventurous: you have to lay flat inside a small fisher boat and the sailer is waiting for the water level to go down with every wave. He then pulls the boat inside by grabbing a chain and pulling hard. As I said, all the people in the boat lay flat, kind of on top of each other, nothing sticks out higher than the rim of the boat. And then you’re inside!

There is only one street in Capri (and many walkways / hiking trails) and that one street is narrow! As a tourist, you are not allowed to drive a car on this street, only a scooter, but I wouldn’t recommend that. With an inch between upcoming traffic on one side and the cliff on the other, only the local pros can maneuver that craziness!

Dear trenitalia,

September 30, 2023 edithtedLeave a comment

I really liked you when we met; in fact it was love at first sight! We had great trips together, you were attractive, stylish, a perfect handsome italian gigolo who would be a little flimsy from time to time, but mostly reliable.

But today, I almost filed for divorce. How dare you! We had an agreement, a booking, that you’d take us from Rome to Civitavecchia, leaving at 8.15pm and arriving at 9.15pm, but you totally screwed it up!!! Our part of the commitment was to pay the fare, to show up on time, to be a good, well prepared customer. And we tried really hard! But you on the other hand, you showed up, pretending that everything works out, you even were on time, so we trusted you.

And it went downhill from there.

We made it almost to Civitavecchia, 3 more stops to go, when you decided to quit. You just stopped, no explanation, no reason, you plain stopped and left us at a station. It was late night, we were confused, but you didn’t care! We were hungry and tired and our Airbnb host was already waiting. But you just sat there, as if we never met before! What the hell?!? Trenitalia, I trusted you! You were my friend, we went through thick and thin, we had adventures together, and now that???

After a 1 hour wait, the full moon raising, we were hushed out of the carriage to switch to another platform to catch another train, your best friend so-to-speak. But how can we trust your best friend after what you did to us tonight? But our choices were limited, we hoped your friend would show up, and he did after another 15 min. But it was not the same. He tried hard, but those stops at stations without a name, those stops without opening the doors, he really tried, but how should I say, nada. Eventually he brought us to Civitavecchia and we were glad to arrive. We found our Airbnb, it is midnight, and we are starving…..

Lago di Garda

September 24, 2023September 30, 2023 edithted3 Comments

It’s never enough time at the lake, Lago di Garda in Italian, Garda Lake in English or Gardasee in German. When my sons saw the lake the first time, they called it “Caribbean”! Little did they know, they never were in the Caribbean, but the breathtaking views with the mountain range in the back and the lake with its surrounding villages in the front is just an instant love at first sight moment that grows into a lifelong love. Once you’ve seen Lago di Garda, Limone, Malcesine, Sirmione, Gargnano, just to name a few villages, you find more and more beautiful places and you want to stay forever!

And then there is Muslone, a tiny little mountain village, a 3 km drive up the street on the western shore of the lake. The street ends here, there is a church, and an alimentari store with Enzo, who knows everybody and everything. He is the local vacation home rental manager, the post office, the go-to-guy for local affairs. Enzo is the best, everytime I go there, he teaches me some words in Italian and – he has the best food in the world!

Harald, Jürgen, Ted and I are spending a few days in Muslone, because we not only fell in love with the village when we stayed here for 2 weeks last summer, we fell in love with a very special house. I’m not sure how old it is, but the village was built in the 16 hundreds…..