Chalet Alpengruss apartment in Wengen

Haven't been keeping up, but need to upload some pictures.
Chalet Alpengruss, studio apartment in WengenThis is the front of the chalet as you approach from town. The front door faces out over the lower part of town. The door to the studio apartment is the light brown wood door on the bottom left.


The Chalet from the other side, with my husband standing in front of the studio apartment.


DH in front of the Lilliputian kitchen area. I'm standing in front of the bed/sofa



The bed/"sofa" - it's a regular twin bed with a normal sized/thickness mattress, and a full sized trundle underneath that comes up to the same level. Extra comforter is stored in the bookshelf to the side. I'm standing next to the small table and chairs in front of the window while taking this picture.



Little dining area. The shutters are down in the window.

Bathroom.

Dirt cheap! 70 CHF per night, and that was in July.
Website: http://www.alpengruss-wengen.ch/

Hello everyone!  I will try to post more often, now that I have a super nifty computer, and a nifty new little Blogger widgit where I can make little posts all the time without having to log into the website. 

The weather is fabulous fabulous fabulous in Brussels today; Mike and I must have brought it back wiith us from Normandy, where the warmth and sunshine was such a welcome relief after MONTHS of cold, dreary, wet weather in Belgium.  This nice wether should last through the weekend at least, highs in the high sixties to mid seventies, lows in the 40s or 50s according to my neat little Weather Widget.

3 cheers for Petite Suisse! (and the internet!)

So I've recently fallen in love with these little Petite Suisse yogurt things. They are very dense and high in protein, and they work really well for me as part of my breakfast. They're really strange; they come in these little plastic tubs, only about 60 - 80 grams each. When you open the top of the tub, the yogurt-y stuff is wrapped in a little piece of paper. I didn't know what to make of them, or where they came from, but I found a very informative website that told me all about them!

This is from http://www.chocolateandzucchini.com :

Les Petits Suisses
[Little Swiss Cheese]
Un Petit Suisse, literally "a little swiss", is a fresh cow milk cheese, shaped like a small cylinder. It was originally invented in Normandy in the 1850's, at a milk farm held by a Madame Hérould. One of her garçon-vachers (an employee who tends to the cows, literally a cowboy), who was from Switzerland, suggested she enrich her cheese with cream, like they did in his home country. She followed his advice to excellent results, and named the cheese in his honor. A certain Monsieur Gervais got interested in the product, and helped develop its production, shipping the cheese to Paris on the brand new train line, to be sold extra-fresh every morning.
Originally, a white strip of paper was wrapped around each cylinder, and the petits suisses were packed by six in little wooden boxes. This has evolved into a more modern packaging, in which each petit suisse is in its own ribbed plastic tub, like a yogurt. However, the modern production has cleverly kept the paper wrapping, which really marks the identity of the product.
This used to be a 60% milk fat cheese, but it is nowadays more commonly sold in its 40% version, or even 20% or 0%. Since it is very fresh and not salty at all, it is a very versatile product that can be used for savory recipes (seasoned and mixed with fresh herbs, or added to a spread to make it nicely creamy), but is also widely consumed as a dessert, like yogurt. It is especially popular among kids, because the small tubs fit right into their hands, and because unwrapping them is so much fun.
Here's how you do it. After removing the lid, you turn the little tub upside down onto a plate or bowl. Gently push onto the bottom and sides of the tub, coaxing the petit suisse into falling out. Notice I said "gently" : if you're not careful enough, the petit suisse will be squished and will stick to the sides, and eternal shame will befall you and your offspring for seven generations. Once the petit suisse plops out -- a personal achievement which amply justifies a small yelp -- you have to locate where the little strip of paper begins, so you can pinch it between your fingers and unwrap the petit suisse. Again, utmost caution is in order, because the wrapping paper is very moist and likely to tear. Real satisfaction comes from successfully freeing the petit suisse in one sweeping gesture, keeping the strip of paper whole. Repeat with a second petit suisse if you feel up for it.
You can then sprinkle the petit suisse with sugar or strawberry jam. Some people mix the sugar or jam into the petit suisse with their spoon, but I like to keep the topping separate, to better enjoy the different textures.
I've mentioned that the modern packaging has the petits suisses stored in little plastic tubs, but you have probably noticed it is not the case on the picture above. The petits suisses on the picture are from a traditional milk farm in Saint-Malo, which produces excellent yogurts and petits suisses, packaging them up the old-fashioned way. Those petits suisses undoubtedly come at a higher price than their Yoplait counterpart, but they are also much tastier, with a thicker and more interesting feel, and they are probably closer to the original 1850 version.
Posted by clotilde on May 6, 2004 01:09 PM

Springtime in Budapest

I'm back from a 5 day/5 night trip to Budapest; I left Mike and the critters alone and struck out on my own for the first time since we moved to Europe! Here's a quick recap of my activities; I'll type more detail later:

• Tuesday night 4 April: Arrived in Budapest (LATE)
• Wednesday 5 April: Segway tour, walking tour of central Pest, St. Istvan's Basilica, Hungarian dinner
• Thursday 6 April: Great Synagogue, Great Market Hall, walk across Freedom bridge, shopping, folk music Dance House
• Friday 7 April: Terror museum, Heroes Square, Szchenzya baths, soaking and massage; Zoo; Castle Hill, Opera
• Saturday 8 April: Szentendre old town and Open Air Folk Museum
• Sunday 9 April: Massage at Gellert salon, Palm Sunday service at Cave Church; museums in Obuda, cake at Gerbaud, fly home.

So for this entry I'll just type some general information.

• * Budapest is a big city. I was really happy with the minimal touristy-ness of it. During this trip I think I finally realized what exactly that phrase means (to me, at least). You know how you feel when you're talking to a sleazy car salesman, where he just seems so fake and unctuous, and it's always obvious that his main goal is to take as much of your money as possible? vs. the really good ones, who are helpful without being overbearing, who mostly let the strengths/characteristics of the car speak for itself, but are there to streamline the process, give you helpful information, and they make you feel comfortable? Well, parts of Budapest felt like a sleazy car salesman (quickly for the record, Castle Hill, Vaci utca, and Szentendre (although I still enjoyed Szentendre; the touristyness was less obtrusive)).

• * I stayed at an apartment in central Pest (http://www.budabab.com) that was just delightful. Ryan and Ron, 2 American professors living in Budapest for the last 4 years, have a fantastic 4th floor (yes, there's a lift) apartment with high ceilings and big windows. They're so friendly and helpful, always offering guidance when needed, about shopping, public transport, sightseeing, local culture...the list goes on and on. They loaned me a towel and bag for the baths, and Ron even bought me a special cottage cheese treat because he knew I liked cottage cheese! It was so nice, like staying with old friends, which was perfect for me travelling by myself. It was a lot less lonely that way. The bathroom is shared, and the room is on the street, so there can be some street noise, but there are shutters that can be drawn that can shut a lot of it out. Floors are pretty creaky but I thought it added to the atmosphere. Breakfast was wonderful whole grain bread with a selection of meats and cheeses, coffee/tea, orange juice, and a variety of jams and spreads for the bread. And of course good conversation about the plans for the day! There are 2 rooms, 1 small with a single bed and sofa, and 1 large with a double bed (maybe a sofa too, I didn't go in that room). I paid 25 euros a night.

• * Toilet paper in Budapest was the worst in the world! Oddly I think the paper towels were softer.

• * I like to think of myself as a language immersion-type person. I usually try to communicate in the local language whenever possible. For the life of me, I could NEVER remember even words as simple as Yes, No, Please, Thank You, Where is..., Good morning, "Do you speak English?" or anything. The extent of my Magyar knowledge: Egy (one), Hallo (can mean hello or goodbye), and szia (pronounced "see ya") which can also mean hello or goodbye. Oh and kavehaz (coffee house). that's it. Magyar is rough. I can't even pronounce most of the place names. I wonder if it's because I was by myself so I didn't talk about things to anyone....?

• * The weather was crummy for 2 days, and fantastic for 3. Can't complain* I could easily fill another 5 days in Hungary. There's no shortage of things to do.

Where have I been?

I thought this was neat:


States I've visited



create your own visited states map

Countries I've visited (The detail's not that great)



create your own visited countries map
or vertaling Duits Nederlands

For anyone who likes very small things...

I'm sure there's some mental disorder characterized by an abnormal affinity towards little miniature sized things, but it's something I can live with. I just found the cutest website, where you can buy individual travel sized packages of almost everything under the sun, from mouthwash to cereal, salad dressing, soy sauce, Crystal Light, laundry detergent, toothpaste, etc. etc. etc. Adorable with a capital A :) http://www.minimus.biz

Ireland trip report, Sunday

Our flight didn't leave until very late (around 8 p.m.) so we had the better part of the day to continue sightseeing. Our plan was to leave the luggage at the hotel so we could go hiking along the coast. The best laid plans......

So we got up, took showers, got dressed, and only then realized how FILTHY the room was. Seriously, there was actual dirt in the sheets, and all over the laptop we'd taken out the night before.....there was mildew in the bathroom, and the worst water pressure I've ever ever experienced. It would have been better if I had just had Mike run the sink, get a wet washcloth and wring it over my head.

We went downstairs and rang the bell to see about leaving our luggage. Again, no-one around. We left to find some breakfast. We did find a really cute little coffee shop that served full breakfasts with eggs, as well as French toast and other yummy delights. After pumping ourselves up with breakfast and coffee, we returned to the hotel. Tried again to find someone, but alas, apparently we were the only people in the whole building, or so it seemed. I waited downstairs while Mike went up to gather up our things. He found a cleaning lady (much to my surprise - see description of room above) who, not surprisingly, was from some Eastern European country and didn't speak fantastic english, and had no idea about whether we could leave our bags there. When the cleaning lady came downstairs to start vacuuming, suddenly about 4 people appeared to hang out with her while she did her work, but none of them seemed to work there. They seemed fairly bemused at the idea of the manager being anywhere to be found before mid afternoon. At this point I figure that if we left our stuff here this random gang of "the cleaning lady's friends" would probably be more than happy to take all of our things and sell them on the black market or something. I just wanted to get OUT of there.

So.......we went for a short walk along the pier in dun Laoghaire, then lugged our stuff back to the train station. Not surprisingly, the train frequency was even less on Sunday morning than it had been on Saturday evening. So of course, we wait. Train finally comes, and we head back to the train station in Dublin, since they have a "left luggage" service according to our map.

We get off the train in the station, follow the signs for left luggage, and end up at a bank of about 12 lockers. All full. You're not surprised, are you? I wasn't, at this point. I go to the information desk, ask if there is any other place we can leave our stuff. He says no, not really, maybe I could ask his friend who works at the bar. So I go to the bar and the girl who works there says, somewhat reluctantly, that she can't guarantee the safety of anything we leave there, but there is a second bar area that's not open to customers and if we want to leave our bags behind there they "should" be ok. At this point, we don't really feel like we have much choice, but we're dangerously close to just hopping on a bus back to the airport and sitting and reading for 8 hours........but we leave our bags. And then - surprise - wait for 20-30 minutes for the NEXT train to take us back to where we started.

We got off in Dalkey, actually, which was an adorable little town, with a cute little town center with a couple of castles, and several pubs, shops, and restaurants. Of course, no cute shops open on Sunday. We stopped and had a pint to boost our spirits. Then we took a really nice walk along the coast south to Killiney. It was really neat; some of the steep hillsides and their villas had a very Mediterranean feel, while looking out at the fishermen and the island with sheep and castle ruins felt very Irish. There were a ton of people out walking with their kids and their dogs on some really nice paths with great views of Dublin bay. We climbed up to the top of a hill with really nice views, then clambered down and walked into Killiney. We stopped at a pub called the Druids Chair, which seemed to be very popular. The only food they had was toasted ham and cheese sandwiches, but it was way past our lunchtime and I had no idea if there were any other food options in Killiney (we had already found out the night before that there weren't any lodgings, I wouldn't have been surprised if there was no food either) So we had our toasted sandwiches and our cider and guinness and people-watched. Not so much craic here, at least not for foreigners like us. We weren't sure how far we were from the train station, so we set off walking. Made it to the station, then - surprise - waited for 45 minutes for the DART, which took us back to Dublin where we picked up our luggage, safe and sound, and went off to find the bus that would take us to the airport. Once we got to the airport, we met up with the sister of a Brussels friend who was sending St Paddy's day paraphernilia back to Belgium with us, and enjoyed a leisurely food court dinner of Pizza from Sbarro before doing some last minute shopping at the gift shop and somehow ending up running to catch our plane.

I hope Mike enjoyed his birthday trip as much as I enjoyed mine!

found in Dun Laoghaire

Not sure if I should be offended by this or not....

Ireland trip report, Saturday

Saturday was one of those days that we sort of thought "where did THAT day go?" which I always forget to factor in when planning. We got up and enjoyed a nice Irish breakfast in the downstairs pub; we were quite alone because all the other guests were part of the hen party from the night before and I can only presume they were sleeping off their hangover. We only saw a couple of them before we left. We headed straight to the train station and headed back to Dublin.

We arrived in the early afternoon and since we were very close, we decided to put our luggage in storage and walk over to the Kilmainham Gaol. It was a very interesting guided tour, because the jail was in the center of some of the biggest events in Irish history. After the 1916 rebellion (the Easter Rising) in Dublin, many leaders of the rebellion were jailed here and several were executed. The public response to the treatment of these prisoners really changed the sentiment of the general public and led to the development of Ireland as it's own country. There's a really nice museum in the jail as well, with several artifacts and exhibits regarding Irish history and freedom and ethics worldwide.

Unfortunately there's not much else around there. (well there is a big museum but we weren't in the mood for a museum.) So we walked back to the train station and had a sandwich for lunch, then took the light rail to another train station where we could catch the DART out of town.

Unfortunately, we hadn't planned on the fact that as the day got later, the frequency of the DART trains got less and less. So we just barely missed one, and then had to hang out for about an hour before the next one. THEN we happened to hit a particular train station right when the Ireland v. Scotland rugby match was letting out, and so we just sat on the tracks for almost half an hour. It was raining, but we were able to see some of the beautiful scenery south of Dublin, and we were excited about checking it out, but by this time it was like 7:00 at night and so we were just looking for a place to sleep. The main area we wanted to see in the morning was the area between Dalkey and Killiney, and the places I'd seen on the internet in Dalkey were really expensive, so we got off in Killiney, only to find out that there wasn't SQUAT in the way of B&Bs or hotels in Killiney. Mind you, we had just gotten off the now-only-hourly-or-even-less-frequent DART train. So we had to decide whether to go further south to Bray, or backtrack and go back towards Dublin. I was worried about finding accomodation the closer we got to Dublin because of this giant rugby game, but the train going back that was was coming sooner (mind you, we still had to wait half an hour or so). So, we waited in the cold for the train to come, and we took it back up to Dun Laoghaire. By this time it's almost 9 p.m., it's freezing cold, raining, windy, and I'm more than a little cranky. And of course I have some names and addresses of a couple of places but no phone numbers. So, we start walking up into the town from the train station, and we stop at the first place that says "hotel" and doesn't say "no vacancy." We head into the downstairs pub and I proceed to wait for like 20 minutes for someone to come to the hotel desk. (Yes, I took that as a bad sign but what are you going to do? :)) We got the keys to a room for 80 euros, which didn't include breakfast. Took our stuff up to the room and tried to get something to eat in the pub, but the kitchen was closed. At least the bartender was nice enough to recommend a place a few blocks away that had good food. We went off walking in the rain to finally get some dinner (and it was good, too), and we of course had another Polish waitress. :) Headed back up to the room, collapsed into the bed and fell asleep despite the thudding of music from the partying downstairs. Long day.

Ireland trip report, Friday

Friday, 10 March 2006

We woke up on Friday morning, ate breakfast and checked out of our hotel. (Oh, and the toilet broke in the middle of the night, which was annoying.) The front desk person said that the train station, our next stop, was too far to walk with luggage. Our initial plan was to get back on the tourist bus and ride it around town to the train station, but the bus was taking a really long time to show up, and the line of tourists for the bus was getting longer and longer. I was worried that we would continue waiting, and then the bus wouldn't let us on with our luggage, or we would miss our train. So we decided to take another cab. This cabbie wasn't quite so chatty. I think he was Romanian or something.

Immigration in Ireland
Which brings me to my next interesting observation about Ireland. Apparently, when several eastern European/former Soviet nations joined the EU a couple years ago, Ireland was one of just a couple of countries that allowed residents of these countries to come work without a visa. The result has been a huge influx of immigrants from Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, etc. They are ever-present in the service industry especially, working in hotels, restaurats, etc. Sometimes we had a harder time communicating and asking questions than we do in Belgium or France!! Not sure if this is going to be good or bad for Ireland; we very frequently heard native Dubliners lamenting about how different the town is from just a few years ago. Most people weren't overtly prejudicial but it seemed to be only thinly veiled. Just some interesting dynamics that don't really show up in the tour books.....

Kilkenny
Anyway, we went to the train station and bought tickets to Kilkenny, a small, medieval town a couple hours south of Dublin. The tickets were about 25 euros for a round trip. The train wasn't particularly comfortable, but it could have been worse. Mike finally got to see a couple of sheep from the train, which was nice :) It was lamb season, I couldn't get enough of the bouncy, pouncy little baby sheep, they crack me up! We walked from the train station to the center of the little town, found a pub with a B&B upstairs (The Rafter Dempsey's - have no clue what the heck that name is supposed to mean) and had a fish and chips lunch. The room wasn't cheap (40 euros per pers0n) but it was very clean, fairly quiet, with a decent private bathroom. We unloaded our stuff. Then, off to the castle.

Kilkenny Castle is a nice Medieval castle dating from about the 13th century. Fairly extensively remodeled in the 1800's and again during the 20th century. Excavations still go on now, uncovering stuff from the original wooden castle from the 12th century and maybe even earlier.

It was a castle. Eh. Nice way to spend an hour or so; plus, apparently Fridays in March the castle's free! Which made it a lot nicer. There are only tours once every hour, so we had some waiting time to wander around the grounds, and check out the Kilkenny Design Center across the streets in the old castle stables. They have high quality Irish crafts and gifts (books, pottery, jewelry, music, sweaters, soap, all kinds of stuff). Fun for me, not so fun for Mike.

Then we walked across town to see the other "big" sight in Kilkenny, which is St. Canice's Cathedral. somehow, in this tiny little town, we got lost, but it didn't really matter because when we got to the cathedral it was closed and had been closed for a while (darned off season hours). But I got some nice pictures of the cemetary and the exterior of the church and the "round tower."

Not sure what the big deal is with the "round towers," they're really old and all over Ireland. I don't know if they just stand up to the test of time longer than other buildings because they're not sued as much, or maybe it's the structure, not sure. This one is from about 1100.

I really liked spending time walking around the town itself. The old town center is very very well kept up, buildings painted really cutely....all sorts of really quaint pubs. We stopped in a couple of them on the way back from the cathedral. The Anna Conda (cute name eh?) was really neat looking, but it was totally dead (then again, it WAS only like 5:30.) the bartender, however, was very friendly and suggested I try some black currant in my Strongbow cider. Not bad at all. Then we went to another place, Kyteler's Inn. Very old building, used to belong to a witch they say.....fantastic atmosphere but *zero* craic. We had a couple of drinks, then took off.

We had a nice dinner in a fairly expensive kinda-French restaurant, I think it was called del Sol...we had the menu which included a bottle of wine and it wasn't too bad. Service a bit slow, and it was odd that nobody spoke excellent english in this little restaurant in a little Irish town.(the two people we encountered who worked there were a French man and a Polish girl) It was a sweet quaint little place.

After dinner, we headed back to the pub where we were staying. It was karaoke night, and there was a big bachelorette party from Dublin (They call them "Hen Nights" over here). Apparently they're not allowed in Dublin so everyone always takes the train out to some other town for them. It's big business. Carrie sang "Crazy" by Patsy Cline, and we turned in.

Ireland trip report, Weds & Thurs

Oops, not being very good about updating. But nothing really exciting has happened in the last month or so. February was certainly the most boring/uneventful month since we've moved here. So Mike's birthday was last Wednesday, 8 March (The big 3-0!!) and we spirited off for a short trip to Dublin.

Wednesday, March 8
Flew into Dublin, arrived around 7:30 p.m. Took the Airlink bus to O'Connell St (5 euros), and walked to our hotel, Cassidy's Hotel. This is in central Dublin, across the street from the Gate theater at the top of O'Connell Street. The hotel lobby was really nice (much nicer than we needed,) with a bar, restaurant, nice fancy reception area, and elevator. The upstairs was a bit more tired, as was the room, but it was clean, and acceptable. We groaned to think of how much extra we were paying for the room service when we noticed the menu!! But I had gotten nervous about finding a place for our first couple nights because the first several places I checked had no availability, and pretty much nobody had rooms available in central Dublin for the weekend, so I freaked and got the first thing I could find for the first couple nights.

The area was safe and very lively, so it was a fairly easy place to catch busses, get food, find a bar, etc. Not really *far* from major attractions, but a bit of a hike. I would choose to stay on the south side of the river by St. Stephens Green next time, I think. I thought it was odd that with mixed reviews on Tripadvisor, the overriding comment was "great location!" and I thought that the location was its major downside! *shrug* Different strokes......

Anyway, after we checked in, we started walking to an area around the 4 Courts towards a couple of music pubs that had been recommended to us. The first, M. Hughes, was really quiet (hey, it was Wednesday night,) and had zero craic (that means "good conversation and atmosphere, fun time" in Irish). So we headed over to Cobblestones, which had some fantastic music but unfortunately a TINY listening area with no room even to stand, let alone to stand, so we ended up hanging otu chatting with some Dublin guys on the back patio. We had a really nice time, shut the place down around 12:15. Then on our way back to the hotel we stopped at a bar by the hotel called Frazers, had a nice time chatting with an Aussie who now lives in Dublin, and an Irish girl who lived more than half of her life in Boston. Turned in very late, probably close to 2:30 a.m. Collapsed into bed for a good nights sleep. Happy Birthday Mike!

Thursday, March 9

Got up pretty late (hey, we were on holiday, er, vacation) but managed to throw some clothes on in time for breakfast (which ended at 11) which was very good because they replaced the traditional black and white pudding normally in an Irish breakfast with hash browns, and I certainly wasn't complaining. They had these yummy little sausage links, which I totally loved, because unfortunately one of the things I hate about Belgian food is that their sausage is all nasty and boudin-y. They also had scrambled eggs, baked beans, tomatoes, "bacon", as well as cereal, yogurt, fruit, etc. And they brought us some white toast and coffee/tea. Not bad. I was just happy to be in a place where they eat a real breakfast instead of a croissant with some coffee. One of the major non-negotiables in my food plan is having a very high protein breakfast and it's often a challenge when travelling in Italy, France, etc. Germany and Ireland so far are the best.
Anyway, we left our hotel and jumped on a Hop on/Hop off bus which drove us over to the area around Trinity College, St. Stevens Green, and the shopping areas. We were really enjoying ourselves, sitting up on the top of the bus but underneath the little "awning" in the front, when a big group of people got on and sat right behind us and were talking and laughing and I couldn't hear the commentary. I felt like a big nerd for being upset about it, but Mike suggested we get off and wait for another bus, so we did. We had noticed a Starbucks on the street so we went there and had our fix of cafe mochas and frappuccinos...

Walked backwards to St. Steven's Green and walked around for a while. The flowers were just starting to bloom and it was such a peaceful place to be right in the middle of the city. We went in because we were trying to find the "garden for the blind" that we had heard mentioned on the bus tour. We both giggled a little bit at the idea but we were intrigued. It was actually kind of neat, a little island that you walked around and it had plants that had interesting textures, and when some of them are blooming they have interesting scents as well.

Anyway, we then waited for the hop on bus for what seemed like an inordinate amount of time for a bus that was supposed to come every 10 minutes, finally got on it and headed further west. We passed some important castles and stuff, but my memory of that stuff is so bad. We got off at the Guinness Storehouse, one of the only "must sees" on Mike's list.

It was interesting enough; a quick lunch of sandwiches and chips was retardedly expensive but c'est la vie. Basically you pay however much (too much) and go around this kinda multimedia "experience" to learn about the Guinness company, how beer in general is made, what makes Guinness special, etc. Some of their attempts at "cool innovative interactive technology" were painfully lame (the "send a video postcard" thing took a picture that looked like it was taken with a 1991 web cam) but certain parts I thought were cool, including

• The "tasting lab" where you got to taste regular Irish Guinness and a couple of different types of Guinness that are the predominant type sold in other places in the world. One of them is more bitter, more the "original" recipe, and one of them is actually *carbonated* so it tastes like Guinness flavored soda.
• The exhibit of advertising memorabilia which also included an extensive collection of TV ads and some background information on the artist who drew all of the animal ads in the past. (John Gilroy) Had some original sketches, etc.
• The kind of cute paperweight thingy they give you as your "admission ticket" as well as your "free parting gift" which consists of a piece of plexiglass/plastic with about 1 mL of Guinness in it in a little air bubble.
• The "Gravity Bar" at the top with a complete view over Dublin with markings on the map of what exactly you're seeing on the skyline (monuments, buildings, etc). It was way too crowded though. But you do get a pint with your admission to the um, museum?

Anyway, we stayed there for a couple of hours, just in time to miss the last Hop on Hop off bus of the day which was around 5. We headed to the bus stop to get back to our hotel in time to get our jackets and directions to the meeting place for our ghost tour that we'd reserved for that evening at 7.

A note about buses in Dublin. They are everywhere. And they are big. Seriously, at any point if you look down one a street you will see 1-2 bright yellow double decker buses every 40 feet or so. In addition, you have an almost equal number of Hop On/Hop off buses that are either Yellow, Red, or green/cream colore. It's almost comical. So, when we look at the schedule and see that a bus that goes to the street where our hotel is arrives every 10 minutes or so, we're happy to experience Dublin Public Transort up close and personal for a mere 90 cents or something. So we wait. And we wait. And about 3 buses pass us that are either not in service or are on a different route. And we wait. It is now about 6 o clock on a friday evening, traffic is not super great, and we're thinking we'd probably BE at our hotel if we'd just kept walking instead of stopping at the bus stop, but it was cold. And well we've waited so long, ok lets wait a little more. Finally we realize the futility of this exercise and we hail a taxi.

Taxi drivers in Ireland like to talk. At least, if they're Irish (more on that later). The cab driver starts chatting us up, and we tell him we need to get to our hotel and then back to the place where we think the tour starts by 7 and he tells us that we're SOL. Oh well, nevermind, we'll keep thinking positively. We get out near our hotel (rather than wait in traffic another 10 minutes to go the next half block), gladly pay the 7 euros or whatever, and run to the hotel. Luckily we needed our jackets because I was COMPLETELY wrong about where I thought the tour took place, but unfortunately the place where it DID start was about halfway between the Guinness storehouse and our hotel. Ok so we don't always have the most foresight. So, I call the contact number for the tour, tell him we'll be late, and he tells us where we can meet up with the group. We get another cab (this one has an equally chatty driver) and zip back to Dublin Castle to do this walking ghost tour that I've read such fabulous things about. We actually make it there only about 5 minutes late, but there's nobody there. So we are racing around the perimeter of this castle trying to find the street the contact guy told us to meet them on. We find it, behind the castle, but there's nobody there either. I think "ok if they're walking even faster than WE are, maybe this isn't the tour we wanna be on!" and I call the number again. He directs me to the guard shack at the castle and tells me to ask those guys where the group is, because they're probably not out of the castle grounds yet. So, we do that, find the group hanging out on the side of a hill, and everyone looks at us really strange. It's also a really big group (almost 30 people) which surprised me because it seemed like kind of a small outfit when I made the reservation. But we just ignore the stares and try to enjoy the storytelling. It soon becomes obvious that everyone on this tour besides Mike and me knows each other. The tour was cute enough, lasted about an hour and a half, took us into some dark alleyways and consisted of one guy who was the leader/storyteller and was supposed to be blind, and another guy who would show up in silly costumes acting out the part of someone in a story the blind guy had just told. It was ridiculously fake but it was supposed to be, and particularly after a spooky story about a legend of a monster haunting this one particular area who ripped people to pieces, when this guy comes running out in a furry suit with a pig head saying "Roar, Grrrr", I almost fell down laughing it was so silly. Ok so maybe you had to be there. It was certainly not a 5 star activity (which I think was also made worse by the fact that it was a HUGE group, and that they all had fun joking and laughing and telling inside jokes etc and then there was us...) BUT it was only 10 euros and I thought it was not a bad deal. Many many people recommended that we take this Ghost Bus tour instead, but 1. I had already reserved this other tour, and 2. the Ghost Bus is like 25 euros. But if you have the choice I can at least say that the bouncer and the cab driver independently told us that we should do the Ghost Bus.

The tour is called the Zozimus Experience, and again, you might want to give it a chance if you're in the area, particularly if the Ghost Bus is too rich for your blood or if you prefer walking to buses.

Strange, my most vivid memories of Ireland (and certainly the biggest laughs) are from things I never even saw, but people seemed to be so into! I guess ordinarily I think that people who actually live in places like Dublin just roll their eyes at stuff like the Guinness factory, etc, but it seemed like everyone we met was like "Oh hey, you're in Dublin? You should really check out the Ghost Bus tour!" It reminded me of when Katie and I were in Dingle, and *everyone* kept saying "Well, there's this Dolphin.....have you seen Fungie the Dolphin?.....you're going to Dingle, make sure and see the dolphin......You were in Dingle? Did you see Fungie the Dolphin.....? For the record, no i did not see Fungie the Dolphin, nor did I take the Ghost Bus tour, and I still loved both of my trips to Ireland. Go figure :) I did see an otter in Dingle and I figure next time we go I'll see a new statue of Bert the Otter......

Anyway, after the ghost tour we had fish and chips at this Dublin institution, Leo Burdock, which is actually just a take-out place but there was a really nice guy there who let us stand at the counter and eat our fish and chips and he showed us how to use the vinegar (the trick is, you break up the crust on the fish, and sort of use your fork to cut little slits in the meat and kinda half way through it, then put the vinegar in the little holes so that it soaks into the meat.) They have a silly-long list of celebrities who had eaten there; somehow I doubt we will make it onto the list.

Walked back towards our hotel, stopped in the same pub as the night before, where they were having karaoke but we were tired and they didn't have the songs I usually like to sing, so we headed back to the hotel and to bed around 12.

Venice Trip report, part 1 - Thursday 26 Jan

AN INTRODUCTION TO VENICE

I think this is an interesting picture, helps you get an idea of the layout of Venice. The straight thing at about 11:00 is the bridge from the mainland which carries the cars/buses and the train. In the grayish area at about 10:00 is where the train station, industrial stuff, and parking garages are. This is the only place where you'll find cars, and it's as far as the buses go. The big inverted S of water cutting the main island in half is the Canal Grande described below. The splotch of white at the tail end of the S and inthe center of the bottom of the main island is the Piazza San Marco, where the San Marco Basilica and the Doge's Palace are. Our hotel was just to the east of that. You can see only a teensy bit of the southern tip of the island of Murano just above the square island at 1:00. (the square island is the location of the city cemetery)

Venice is located in a lagoon created by a longer island (south of this photographed area) called the Lido. The water is quite calm.



So we arrive at Venice Treviso airport around 12:00. This is not the main Venice airport and is only used for charter flights and RyanAir. Not much to it. We got our luggage and purchased a round trip ticket for the ATVO bus to Venice's Piazza Romale for 9 euros each. The bus left the airport at about 12:30 and arrived at Piazzale Roma about 1:30. We were really hungry so we stopped and ate a standing lunch at one of the bars near the train station. (I had a pizza wrap for about 4 euros, Mike had a slice of pizza and a turkey sandwich. With 2 coke lights the total was bout 11.50.)

Then it was time to get on the vaporetto (water bus). These have various routes around the city; normally they are 3.50 one-way, unless you take one that goes down the Canal Grande; those are 5 Euros. You can buy a 24 hour pass for like 10 euros, or a 72 hour pass for 22 euros. We opted to take our chances and go without a pass.

A trip down the Canal Grande is a good way to get your first look at Venice, so we happily shelled out the 5 euros each. We sat up front to get a good view, but it was insanely cold. I felt like we were riding on a Disney World ride, taking this boat down the large canal lined by buildings, no sidewalks, and water lapping at doorways that had no discernable purpose...

It was just like I had imagined it except with less background accordian music....

So we take the #1 Vaporetto all the way down the Canal Grande to the San Zaccharia vaporetto stop. I had directions to our hotel but I didn't really understand them so we just started walking. It was only a couple of blocks away so even though we went down the wrong street we found it pretty easily.

"Locanda Al Leon" was a very nice little hotel at what I considered a STEAL at 66 euros per night for a double. It was about 2 blocks away from Piazza San Marco just behind the Basilica. It was right next to a little square called Campo San Filipo e Giacomo with a nice bar. We rang the bell and checked in, with the nice lady at the desk taking us up the stairs to show us our room. There was no elevator, and we climbed 3 full flights of stairs to get to our room, which wouldn't have bothered me too much if the stairs hadn't gotten steeper as you went up. It was disconcerting. But our room was lovely. Double bed, lovely handpainted furniture, wood beam ceilings, and a bonus little patio large enough for a small table and 2 chairs, with a view overlooking the neighboring rooftops. Not very scenic but I thought it was nice and authentic. The bathroom was nice sized with toilet, bidet, and corner shower as well as a sink and mirror and window onto the little patio.
There was a really pretty murano glass light fixture on the wall as well.

We dropped off our things and got really bundled up, as it was FREEZING outside. Once we had on our thermal underwear, scarves, hats, coats, and gloves, it was time to explore the city.

Now we had read/heard that one neat thing to do is to "get lost" in the city. That sounded quaint and pretty, but let me tell you, it's not something that someone has to "suggest" to you. It's pretty much a fact of life there. None of the roads are straight, half of the time they dead end into canals or private gardens, they change names, and go around in circles. Here's a satellite picture of the area of venice near where our hotel was.
It's really a laugh, because the buildings are all so tall, you have no landmarks to follow; there are intermittent signs directing you towards major sites but they are inconsistent and confusing. So as far as I can tell there's pretty much no way to NOT be lost while wandering around Venice. You just get a good compass and try to keep wandering in vaguely the right direction and you seem to pop out somewhere you recognize when you least expect it. Loads of fun :).

I might add at this point that it started snowing. Yes, snowing. Here we are, enjoying Venice in a snow flurry. I have no idea how often this happens but I was torn between being disappointed and feeling very priveliged to get this very un-typical view of Venice. It must happen more often than, say, in Baton Rouge, because before it got dark there was a guy out with a little hand held salt spreader tossing salt on the sidewalks.

While it seems kind of obvious once someone says it or once you see it, but there are NO cars in Venice. None. Every street is pedestrian-only, and some are just barely wide enough for 2 people to walk down at one time. This is the street where our hotel was (Hotel awning is burgundy, on the left)


And I'm now going to start defending the bad reputation of my adopted home of Brussels as the Dog Poop Capital of the world. I've never seen nearly as much dog poop as there was in Venice. And it's really unfortunate, because you have to be constantly looking around you because a. it's pretty, b. you're always freaking lost. Makes Venice dog poop more dangerous, IMHO. I mean, I guess I understand that there being no grass, all the dogs have to poop on the concrete, but jeez. The vast majority of dogs I saw were not even on a leash, and owners seemed to have no qualms about letting them poop wherever they darned well pleased.


So we had a lovely time wandering around in the snow flurry (not much of it stuck on the ground, but a little bit did). Looking at the myriad souvenir shops, there was so much glass, so many masks, etc. It was neat that I thought that even the cheap crummy stuff was fun to look at! We walked to the Piazza San Marco and got our first look at the Basilica, which was quite impressive, but I'm sure ti looks nicer when the weather is good and it's sunny.

We continued walking and stopped at a nice cozy wine bar near the Campo San Bartholomeo by the Rialto bridge. I didn't catch the name of the bar, but it seemed to have a Jazz theme, which was a nice reminder of New Orleans.

Something very big in Venetian culture is chichetti. Chichetti are small appetizers, sold by the individual portion. During happy hour, everyone goes to their local bar for wine and chichetti and some good conversation. You just order whatever you want and the bartender keeps track of what you've eaten and drunk and you pay at the end. (Il conto is the word for the bill) A piece of cheese may be about 80 cents, a skewer of meat may be 3-4 euros. At the wine bar, Mike had a couple pieces of spicy sausage and some peppery cheese.

We left the bar after the happy hour crowd thinned out and set off to find somewhere to eat. The first place we tried to find (guidebook recommendation) was closed for the season. We then tried a Time Out guidebook recommendation called Al Portego (Calle Malvasia, near Campo San Bartholomeo). The front was packed with late happy-hour-ers enjoying wine and chichetti (they had zillions of things to choose from!). There are about 8 tables for dining (most of the people I saw eating dinner here were tourists); the waitress was very helpful and spoke very good English. We shared a large plate of assorted chichetti for an appetizer, which included some very interesting local specialties. (Green olives wrapped in sardines, Fried green olives stuffed with meat, bread with a creamy fish paste spread (baccalá, I think), skewer of fried zucchini and cauliflower, fried mozzarella, bread with pancetta, bread with anchovies and butter). For our main course, Mike got eggplant parmigana, and I had homemade gnocchi with a shrimp, artichoke and tomato sauce. For dessert we had mediocre pre-frozen tiramisu. The house red wine was very good, and only 5.50 euros for a liter. We also had a bottle of water. The total for the meal was 52.50 euros.

It was getting late, so we headed to one of the only bars open late (Devils Forest, an English pub style place with pints for 4 euros), had a couple pints of irish beer and cider, then headed back to the hotel for sleeping. It had long since stopped snowing. Magical happy first day!

Anywhere in europe for 2 cents.....

So for my birthday (I'm now officially old and 30) Mike surprised me with tickets to Venice for the weekend. This is my attempt to record all the good stuff before I forget or can't interpret my scrawls in my notebook.

So our flight was from Charleroi to Venice Treviso via Ryan Air at 10:30 a.m. We left the house a little before 8, stopped for some breakfast, and arrived at the airport with plenty of time to park our car in the outdoor long term parking lot (which is SOOOOOOOOOOO far away from the airport) and take the shuttle back to the terminal, and check in.

I cannot begin to explain how freaking rude people (meaning other travellers) are at Charleroi. The other passengers are soooooo pushy! The seating on Ryan Air flights is a giant free-for-all, and so there's just this sea of people pushing to make it through the ticket-check and onto the plane. They will elbow you and just shove in front of you like you're not even there. They do the same thing when trying to get off the plane and again when getting their luggage.

And you're supposed to get priority seating if you're one of the first 65 people to check in. Instead of first class, etc, their boarding order is "families with children" and "numbers 1-65", then everyone else. But the mass of RyanAir humanity forms this giant crowd in front of the gate like 10 minutes before boarding (like clockwork, it's really sort of interesting to watch it happen), and NONE of those people doing the "pre-boarding aggregation" either have children OR a boarding card with number 1-65 on it. If you have any concept of the occupation of space, you will probably grasp that it is difficult for anyone to get themselves through these people up to the front when they begin calling (like they ALWAYS DO) for families with children, and numbers 1-65 without a teleporter. Which leads to this giant mosh pit, and the pitiful fools like me with number 26, standing what I think is patiently in line behind some other people who are boarding, only to have 92843 people shove past me and get on the plane before I realize that the guy standing in front of me is NOT one of "the 65" but rather trying really hard to take up space in the most inconvenient spot for me imaginable. *sigh*. I know, it seems impossible that 92843 people could collectively hold cards 1-65 but when I was at the back of the line I'm fairly sure that's how many people were in front of me.

Anyway, we get on the plane, and get ourselves situated. One thing I really hate about RyanAir is that their planes have 3 seats on each side of the aisle. On "real airlines," Mike and I are usually really lucky and get a set of 2 seats, him with the window and me with the aisle. But with RyanAir, one of us has to be unhappy. And because of my self-sacrificing issues, it's always me. I think I will have to let Mike be the one to suffer in the middle next time. Of course, when we sit down, I always secretly hope that nobody comes and takes the aisle seat, but that doesn't seem to happen very often.

If you've never flown Ryan Air and are curious as to how they differ from "real airlines,"(I can't speak for other low cost airlines, RA is the only one I've flown) here's what you get for your $0.04 ticket:

-a strict checked baggage limit of 1 bag/15 kg (about 35 lbs) and a charge of 8 euros for every additional kilo. Carry on baggage has a limit of 10 kg (22 lbs) but they seem less observant about that, and only weigh your bag if it looks like it might be heavy.
-the plane is a real plane, which I was happy about. I don't know what I expected, something made of wood, or plastic?
-Like I said, 3 seats on each side of the aisle. Boarding takes place from the front and back of the plane.
- No reserved seats. They also always seem to have some seats "off limits", I don't know if that has something to do with balancing the weight of the plane?
- No pillow things for headrests
- They dont clean the plane between flights so sometimes you can have a bunch of crumbs on the seats. Icky
-the flight attendants who apparently drew the short straw (or maybe it was the long straw?) and speak over the intercom have the weirdest, worst accents. The guy on the Charleroi - Shannon route was truly creepy wth a totally unidentifiable accent that sounded like a cross between dracula and that little dude that was Dr. Frankensteins helper. (Iago?)
- You get about 3 inches between the seats for your legs, leading the larger "emergency exit rows" to be in high demand (maybe that explains the pre-boarding crush of humanity)
- No free drinks, no free peanuts or pretzels.
- The "emergency card" usually in the seat back pocket is actually glued onto the headrest in front of you, all in pictures like the directions at IKEA.
- No magazines in your seat back pocket either. They do come down the aisle and ask if you would like to read one of the RyanAir magazines.
- Drinks and snacky things are offered for sale; before you take off they ask if you would like a "menu."
- After drink and snacky time, then they wheel the duty free cart up and down and try to sell you perfume and stuffed animals.
- After perfume and stuffed animal time they try to sell you scratch off game tickets for 2 euros, where you can win a car or some money or something.

Unfortunately they are just as anal about stupid stuff like not letting you take your swiss army knife on board, leaving your window shade up, your armrest down, and not playing your ipod during take off and landing. Whatever.

Ok just thinking about that tiny bit of legroom on the Ryanair flight has made my legs feel all antsy. I have to get up now, and I'll actually write about Venice in another sitting.

Latest updates

So when I got back to Belgium I had a phone message from Dr. Wentz, the Army vet at the NATO/SHAPE base in Chievres, saying that the job there may in fact pan out after all. I feel bad because I had no way of checking my messages while I was in the states, but I left a message for him today and will try to call again tomorrow. That would work out well, I think, it would be 2 days a week or something. Worth a try, see if the drive is too much a pain in the neck. It would probably be a good idea to get back to work, even if it's just basic stuff.

I hope I can get a hold of him this week, because next week I have to decide what I'm going to do about French and Dutch classes etc. this spring.

I got my iPod back from the SECOND replacement in 1 year.....I guess that's the last repair I get, so when it breaks again it's curtains (only a 1 year warrantee). I don't know if this model I have (the 40g click-wheel) is just a lemon or if I should just stay away from iPods entirely. I really enjoy having it when it works! But it seems stupid to spend 400 bucks on something that can't even last 6 months.....I will get a case for it, in case it's me that breaks them by dropping them or banging them or whatever, but I don't really see how ti's going to make a big difference unless I get a giant pillow as a case or something.....

I ate terribly this holiday season. Luckily I didn't have a bunch of big gorge-yourself holiday dinners but I didn't abstain from desserts etc. like I have in the past. I feel like I need to "detox" again. I haven't had the nerve to weigh myself yet. *cringe*

Also this month I'm planning on getting involved with production of the 5 women play with the ATC (mentioned earlier.) I'm going to be helping with set painting etc. as well as coordinating publicity, which will be a new one for me.

And, my vet school buddy Katie will be coming to visit in a week or so. That should be fun as well. But I feel like I walked from my holiday back into a big web of activities, and I don't have the energy to prepare for it yet!! Alas, Mike goes back to work tomorrow, and I guess I do too. Get the icky crap out of the way so I can move on to the fun stuff! Wish me luck

Pictures!

I've uploaded my pictures from Christmas in Deming and Victoria.

Also, Pictures of Mike and me in Paris for our 5th wedding anniversary and New Years.

I decided to put them up on my Kodak gallery and just link to them from here....

Hopefully this link will work. Please email me if it doesn't.

http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=10951nof.bwk91jvz&x=0&y=-ox691j

We had a wonderful time!! But now we're back in Belgium, back with our puppies and kitties and fishies and our house......

And just look at all that milk, all fresh and icy-cold....who knew there was any other way?? :) 

Back from the States

Back to our regular old life in Belgium after a busy few weeks. Took a couple of pictures at the Super Wal-Mart that struck me as so different from shopping here in Europe. I don't have a picture of the "cereal" aisle at the store here, but I can assure you it's about 5-6 cereal boxes wide. I just had to laugh when I saw this endless aisle of cereals....(and there's Mike saying hi at the end of the aisle...)