Last day
Ok, so today is our last full day in Italy. We are going to see Bologna! We are going to do something! Get up, shower, go to breakfast. Eat a little bit more than usual because we are going to walk a lot. Get up to the room. Exhausted! Lennart says trains leave every 15 min, so time enough to take a little nap and then we can head out. Lennart wakes me up at 11am! Says if we are going to go, we need to do it fairly quickly. I'm like UG! No energy what so ever. I finally get to Italy and I can barely make it back to the room from breakfast!
So wonderful hubby that he is, Lennart dashes out to find me sustanence before he rambles off to Bologna. He is not so keen on going without me, but DARN IT! SOMEONE is going to see more than this hotel room! Not only did he bring back bread and cheese from this wonderful little bakery we found down the street, but he popped into the meat and wine store two shops down and picked up a sausage and bottle of wine. Yes, David, I said SAUSAGE! It is the air dried kind so needs no refrigeration. The wine he got for Landon is from the Muscat (?) grape which is the Italian version of the German Reisling. Sweet stuff. We haven't tasted this particular wine, but I have had a wine from the same type of grape before and loved it, so I hope Landon likes this one.
So, even as I type, Lennart is in Bologna seeing the sights and taking lots of pictures...hopefully...he better! It is an hour by train and then he will get on a bus tour. We have had good luck with bus tours in the past. You get to see a lot of a city with a lot of history. The buses typically stop at major points of interest so you can get pics or go inside churches. Sometimes you can buy a jump on/jump off ticket so you can get off only at the places you want to see and get back on when you are done, well, when the next bus stops by.
Hopefully he will have bologna in Bologna. ;) He was kind of looking forward to that. I won't get to taste the sauce that is famous in Bologna (I cannot spell it, so I'm not even going to try. You know the one I mean!).
Lennart will have to finish writing this post.
Hopefully tonight, we will get skype on this computer. Of course, we forgot to get Heather's phone number. I would love to take you on a tour of the bottom level of the hotel via skype and even out the front door so you can see the shops across the street and the train station. Maybe even get to see the two gattos (cats) that live in the hedges. Very cute little half grown black fuzz balls. I got one of them to sniff my fingers, but wouldn't get close enough for a proper pet.
Well, I think I am going to have my bread and cheese, then maybe a nap. Being sick sucks!
Day 4 and 5
I'm sick! UG! This is not fair! I spent most of these two days in bed sleeping or reading on my trusty note book.
Day 4 did have a high note. Wed night is special at dinner. We had an amazing 5 course meal, complete with the chef coming out to carve the side of veal that was wheeled around the restaurants with flames coming out of cones of tin foil surrounding it. Wish I could have gotten pictures! No buffet tonight, just five wonderful courses. I kept the menu!
We have met the lady that is sitting on the other side of the man that is sitting next to Lennart. She is from Baja CA and speaks no English, so we have been using our poor waiter to translate for us along with the little translator computers, which only translate one word at a time. We found out that the lady that sits next to me is in some sort of computer soft ware business that has to do with the amounts of food factories produce. Weird, but I guess someone has to take the order data and turn it in to production figures. He also does something with computer security systems. I don't know if it is strictly for his industry/software or if it goes further than that. The father is retired, but I'm not sure from what. I do know that at some time he had some military experience. The Mexican Lady is in the mortuary business. Yup, she sells headstones, coffins and any other accessory you might need when you are dead. She is here for a mix of business and pleasure. She is attending a conference in Venice, but she is staying an extra week to see the sights and spend time at the spa here.
The Mexican lady is getting to know the family on the other side of her, so when the toast round came, we lifted our glasses, the guys beside us clinked with us and with the Mexican lady (cannot remember names) and the family past her lifted their water glasses. We thought that was cute, so all of us put our Champaign glasses down and toasted with water glasses. It was a fun evening.
On day 5, I did manage to get out enough to go to lunch at the place the guys recommended. It is a little local restaurant/gelato bar, whose claim to fame is the Myna bird that sits out front and talks. Had some wonderful mushroom risotto there. Comfort food. Just what someone with a full blown head cold needs.
Ok, days blurring together. Did a very little shopping on one day. Got a massage yesterday and spent some time in the pool/spa area. Sauna, steam room, aroma therapy room (didn't stay there long, other people came in and changed the smell to lemon...pledge...). There are these shallow pools with rocks in them. You stand on these big rocks and gentle spray comes out and hits your ankles. So massage your feet on the big rocs while your ankles get a hot and cold treatment. I was silly enough to try it. Just about needed to borrow Heather's cast. Good thing there is a handy wall to cling to when the stones roll unexpectedly. There was this one shower area that had a "tropical rainfall” and "forest mist". Pretty cool. The tropical rainfall one is hot shower coming down from all these holes in the ceiling. Then you walk through the arched tunnel and push the button for the mist and this cool mist comes down all over. We also went into one room that is supposed to sweat any illness out. The seats and seat backs are heated. I mean really hot! We put our towels under us and I pulled mine over my back, but it was so hot we couldn't stay in there for long. Maybe if we had had our heavy robes on it would have worked. I did sweat though.
Day 1
Should have guessed that when my vacation started at 5pm on Friday the 13th, that there would be major problems. Got in a fight with my hubby Friday evening. Patched it up, but it kept us up late. Got up at 6am to finish packing. Got that taken care of ok, and got over to Heather's to say good bye to the kids and have Heather drive us to the airport. Told Heather I wanted to be able to Skype from Europe. She tried to log me on to their home network with no luck. They have a long complicated password, so I thought that was the problem and I would just figure it out along the way.
When we got to the airport, we found our plane to Amsterdam had been delayed by half an hour. Ug! We only had 50 min to get from one plane to the next, so we just hoped the plane would make up some of the time on the way. Nope! We got into Amsterdam, and of course, we are seated near the back of a very large plane. By the time we actually get off the plane, it is time for our next plane to depart already. We find a kiosk to check in at and hope since we have checked in that our new plane will wait for us. But wait, we have to go through security! Of course our plane is way at the other end of the air port. We run, but have to stop for Security. A lovely group of 4 people want to talk/question/argue with the security guy that is inspecting passports. It takes so long, that two lines are opened. They take everyone behind us over to the other two lines and things move rapidly. By the time we realized that the line behind us has been moved, the other lines are way long, so we just stay put.
We finally get to the gate 20 minutes late, and no, they haven't waited for us. We find an information person for that airline and they put us on the next plane at 3pm. It is now 10am. Bleah! A 5 hour wait! The airline was very nice. They gave us vouchers for 10 euros off food, a phone card good to call anyone...in Amsterdam, and money off our next ticket with their airline.
Most of those are no good and when we finally decided to find something to eat, we forgot to use the food vouchers. We are hoping we can use them on the way home. It was a very nice airport with lovely comfy furniture, so at least we got to sit down in nice surroundings. Oh, and there was a Chocolate Cafe, so we had a decadant large chocolate.
While we were at the airport, we thougth we had better get in touch with the hotel in Italy because they are supposed to send a shuttle to pick us up in Venice. So, I pull out my trusty, brand new laptop, and we cannot connect to the free internet. Apparently there is something wrong with my network card and I am unable to connect. Unfortunately, since the laptop was able to connect at home and work, I neglected to bring along the card that has the geeksquad info on it, so I have no way to get it fixed. Heather, the info is on my desk, please e-mail it to me.
We had to pay to use the airport internet computers, but we got the message out to the hotel to send the shuttle for us at the new time.
Well, departure time rolled around. We are standing in line. The monitor says boarding starts at 14:30 and gate closes 14:50. Departure time 15:00. 14:30 comes and goes. 14:50 and still nothing. Around 15:00 the plane starts boarding. Once everyone is boarded, a flight attendant starts handing out little orange juice boxes to everyone. We think, this is kind of weird, getting beverages before the plane even takes off, but ok, it's Europe. What do we know. Maybe this is normal. I am just finishing up my OJ when the pilot starts talking. Due to the Germans having over booked their airspace, the airport won't let them take off for at least 40 min. Lovely! To help compensate for the delay, they are giving us juice and a snack. The chocolate covered cookies were yummy, but what is going to happen to the shuttle that is going to pick us up at the other end. Well, we hope that since the shuttle has our flight info, they will wait around.
No such luck. We are in Venice! Wow! Except that we have no way to get to the hotel in Montegrotto. So we ask around and get a bus ticket for 5.40 euros each. Cheap, since the Shuttle was going to cost us 50 euros each. Then we found out that there is a 30 min wait for the bus to get there, a 2 hour ride to Montegrotto, then we have to find a cab to get us to the hotel. That was the final straw! I had been up for 28 hours (cannot sleep on planes) and there was no way I was going to wait another 2 1/2 hours! I was practally in tears and demanding that Lennart ask various bystanders with vans to take us. He was a little more sane than me. He sleeps on planes just fine. I finally talk him into asking some taxi's to see if they will take us to the hotel. He found one that would take us for only 130 euros. EeeeK! That is a lot of money and we already have bus tickets. I didn't care. I wanted a hotel, a shower and a bed!
The cab driver was a lovely little old Italian man that spoke no real english, but I stuck the paper with the hotel address in front of his face and said "I want to go HERE! very slowly, loudly and many times. Like that is going to make him understand me. He finally looks at the paper, gives us a big smile and starts grabbing luggage. Lennart looks in his wallet and says I need to get more euros and takes off into the airport. The sweet taxi driver looks at him, looks at me with a puzzled look on his face. I say MONEY. He went to get EUROS! The guy shrugs and loads up the next suitcase and opens the door for me to climb in. I guess he figures, he's got the luggage and the wife, the guy will come back evetually.
So, driving in Italy! They seem to see lanes as more suggestions than something to be adhered to in a hard and fast way the americans do. I discovered that all vehicles in this part of Italy have brand new turn signals on their cars. They never use them! Cars and busses share the road with motorcycles and scooters, but the two wheeled vehicles don't even see lanes as suggestions. They drive on the shoulder, inbetween lanes or into oncoming traffic. Cars just veer around them as if they are mearly moving trees or shrubberies in the road.
We finally get to the hotel, after driving down a few wrong streets in Montegrotto. It was so worth the 150 euros to get there in under 45 min. The hotel doesn't look like much from the outside, but the inside is nice. To the right of the door, there is a large arch that opens into the dining room. Tables are set with fine linens and candles. We are informed that diner startes in 10 min. I get this desperate look on my face and whine "but I really wanted a shower!" Ok, now it is 29 hours in the same clothes and the planes were hot! ICk! The lady at the counter says, "Eh, dinner starts for you in 20...30 minutes." I say, good!. That I can do.
Small but nice room with minimal closet and miniscule shower. Tiney Tiny balconey. So cute! View of trees.
Dinner! Finally something other than airline food! And it was wonderful! You get escorted to your table by a debonair older Italian man that says everything in Italian then english, so you kind of get to learn things. He hands the wine list to Lennart, the menu to me, lights our candle and bows himself out. We see bunches of people milling around in the center around a buffet but we have the menu and no idea of what wines to get, so we are wondering aloud to each other how things work. There are two gentlemen at the table next to us that look over and say, "Oh! you speak english, too!" and start chatting with us. They have been here a day already, so explain a little how things are done and that the food is great. About then our dashing younger, but not too young waiter shows up and explains that we pick one thing off the top of the menu and one thing off the bottom of the menu and we have access to the buffet items - veggies, salad, apitizers and breads. Later, there is a fruit, cheese and desert buffet put out. Yum! Lennart picks the Chef's Suggestion for both. I'm not that easy. I pick the pasta with gorgonzola for the first item, which just happened to be the Chef's Suggestion and the Veal. The Chef's Suggestion was a turkey dish.
On to the buffet. Both ceveches were wonderful, The first had salad shrimp and radicio in a lemon/briney sauce. The second had salad shrip, scallops and some white fish in a lime type sauce. Not all chopped up with a ton of cilantro like mexican ceviche. Had a large slice of grilled eggplant that was ok. The cooked veggies here are very overcooked! Had tastes of a couple pasta salads - Eh - and a tiny slice of "pizza", thin crust with mushrooms and cheese. yum.
Then the pasta with gorgonzola came. Oh, my! Best mac and cheese EVER! The veal was amazing, veggies, not! Lennart said his turkey was very good. The guy next to Lennart (the father) had chicken in a orange crust? Turned out to be orange squashed baked around the chicken. He said it was very good. They guy next to me (son) had swordfish. He said it was a little dry, but the flavor was excellant. He said most of the swordfish he has had is a little dry. Apparetly it is hard to keep it moist.
I ordered Lambrusco to go with the meal. They brought the bottle. Apparently, you don't buy a glass. You buy the bottle. Lennart wanted something else, but they didn't quite understand, so he drank my lambrusco. They guy at the next table had the same Lambrusco and we all enjoyed a lot of it. ;)
We chatted with the guys at the next table all through dinner. They were a lot of fun. They are from Philidelphia The son has traveled all over, but to different countries than Lennart. The father did his traveling many years ago in the army. The son is somewhere around Lennart/my age and the father is this nice little old guy. They look so much alike! We left together. They are on the same floor and we got into the elevator with another couple around our age. We were still were chatting and the guy in the elevator asked what floor in english. The dad says "Oh, more english speaking people!" The guy in the elevator says yes, but we are Portugese! We were all on the same floor and chatted all the way down the hall.
The bed is hard. There are not enough pillows. It was heaven!
I'll write about today, tomorrow.
Day 2
Woke up just in time to take a shower in the mini shower and grab breakfast. Lennart had bread and meat and cheese. I had fruit and cheese and yogurt and grapefruit juice. Looks like this is the regular meal.
Went back to the room and sat out on the tiny deck reading our books and relaxing. Still so sleepy. So I went back for a nap around 10am. At 1pm, Lennart wakes me up and tells me the time. We should get some lunch and do something so we will be able to sleep tonight. Ok, just let me read a little to wake up. He rolls over and falls asleep. I read for a bit, then crawl in bed beside him and am out like a light again.
Wake up! It's 4pm! we really have to stay up or we won't sleep tonight. By this time we are both hungry, so we decide to brave the town to see what we can find. The two guys that had dinner next to us last night also had breakfast next to us this morning and were kind enough to tell us how to get to the train station, the gelato stand, a couple pizzarias and the roman ruins. So we wandered. Lots of little shops. I restrained myself. Want to see what is in the other Italian cities before I buy all the shoes in town.
We wandered to the roman ruins. We couldn't go into the excavation area, but they had a sign outside showing what was what and giving some history of the place. Unfortunately the sign was in Italian...and German. Lennart had a fun time trying to remember enough german to get the meaning across. We got the basic idea. We stopped by a gelato stand on the way to the ruins. I had chocolate and Lennart had mint chocolate chip. YUM!
I was still feeling a little hungry so we stopped by a bakery on the way back and picked up a big bottle of water and an oversized round bun studded with raisans. We still had a bit of string cheese and some beef jerkey left from our train ride, so this made a nice snack. Unfortunately, we didn't realize the water was the fizzy kind. Bleah!
Wandering around the town was a lot of fun. Lots of cool shops.
Dinner was again quite an occasion. We get to our assigned table and our wine bottle from the night before is there as is the bottled water. We pour the remains of both in our glass and get ready to order some new. Same plan as last night. Wonderful debonair head waiter gives us the menu and light our candle, and the younger attractive waiter stops by to take our order. He has decided we (I) need to learn a little Italian. How are you tonight? Motto Bene! Means very good...I think. He has me say it three times until I get it right.
Lennart orders the pasta with red sauce and the pork chop. I order paella with seafood something in it. I know it was seafood because they didn't get all the shell out. I think it might have been crab. It was yummy! Lennart and the two guys next to us had the spiral pasta with red sauce and pronounced it good. Then Lennart's pork chop came and I got eggs and tuna. I was a bit disappointed. Two boiled eggs cut in half and tuna out of a can. It was ok, but kind of blah. The guy next to me had ordered Salmon something. Come to find out, it is not salmon, it is trout that is salmon colored because of the orange sauce. I so would have gotten trout. I just don't care for salmon and I don't do pork. Bleah. The deserts were yummy, though. and there was the fruit and cheese to go with the deserts. Lots of cheese here.
Came back to the room, wrote out the Day one blog and crashed hard. Not much of a day, but at least we got to get some yummy bread in a shop and see the roman ruins.
Tomorrow, Venice!
Day 1
Should have guessed that when my vacation started at 5pm on Friday the 13th, that there would be major problems. Got in a fight with my hubby Friday evening. Patched it up, but it kept us up late. Got up at 6am to finish packing. Got that taken care of ok, and got over to Heather's to say good bye to the kids and have Heather drive us to the airport. Told Heather I wanted to be able to Skype from Europe. She tried to log me on to their home network with no luck. They have a long complicated password, so I thought that was the problem and I would just figure it out along the way.
When we got to the airport, we found our plane to Amsterdam had been delayed by half an hour. Ug! We only had 50 min to get from one plane to the next, so we just hoped the plane would make up some of the time on the way. Nope! We got into Amsterdam, and of course, we are seated near the back of a very large plane. By the time we actually get off the plane, it is time for our next plane to depart already. We find a kiosk to check in at and hope since we have checked in that our new plane will wait for us. But wait, we have to go through security! Of course our plane is way at the other end of the air port. We run, but have to stop for Security. A lovely group of 4 people want to talk/question/argue with the security guy that is inspecting passports. It takes so long, that two lines are opened. They take everyone behind us over to the other two lines and things move rapidly. By the time we realized that the line behind us has been moved, the other lines are way long, so we just stay put.
We finally get to the gate 20 minutes late, and no, they haven't waited for us. We find an information person for that airline and they put us on the next plane at 3pm. It is now 10am. Bleah! A 5 hour wait! The airline was very nice. They gave us vouchers for 10 euros off food, a phone card good to call anyone...in Amsterdam, and money off our next ticket with their airline.
Most of those are no good and when we finally decided to find something to eat, we forgot to use the food vouchers. We are hoping we can use them on the way home. It was a very nice airport with lovely comfy furniture, so at least we got to sit down in nice surroundings. Oh, and there was a Chocolate Cafe, so we had a decadant large chocolate.
While we were at the airport, we thougth we had better get in touch with the hotel in Italy because they are supposed to send a shuttle to pick us up in Venice. So, I pull out my trusty, brand new laptop, and we cannot connect to the free internet. Apparently there is something wrong with my network card and I am unable to connect. Unfortunately, since the laptop was able to connect at home and work, I neglected to bring along the card that has the geeksquad info on it, so I have no way to get it fixed. Heather, the info is on my desk, please e-mail it to me.
We had to pay to use the airport internet computers, but we got the message out to the hotel to send the shuttle for us at the new time.
Well, departure time rolled around. We are standing in line. The monitor says boarding starts at 14:30 and gate closes 14:50. Departure time 15:00. 14:30 comes and goes. 14:50 and still nothing. Around 15:00 the plane starts boarding. Once everyone is boarded, a flight attendant starts handing out little orange juice boxes to everyone. We think, this is kind of weird, getting beverages before the plane even takes off, but ok, it's Europe. What do we know. Maybe this is normal. I am just finishing up my OJ when the pilot starts talking. Due to the Germans having over booked their airspace, the airport won't let them take off for at least 40 min. Lovely! To help compensate for the delay, they are giving us juice and a snack. The chocolate covered cookies were yummy, but what is going to happen to the shuttle that is going to pick us up at the other end. Well, we hope that since the shuttle has our flight info, they will wait around.
No such luck. We are in Venice! Wow! Except that we have no way to get to the hotel in Montegrotto. So we ask around and get a bus ticket for 5.40 euros each. Cheap, since the Shuttle was going to cost us 50 euros each. Then we found out that there is a 30 min wait for the bus to get there, a 2 hour ride to Montegrotto, then we have to find a cab to get us to the hotel. That was the final straw! I had been up for 28 hours (cannot sleep on planes) and there was no way I was going to wait another 2 1/2 hours! I was practally in tears and demanding that Lennart ask various bystanders with vans to take us. He was a little more sane than me. He sleeps on planes just fine. I finally talk him into asking some taxi's to see if they will take us to the hotel. He found one that would take us for only 130 euros. EeeeK! That is a lot of money and we already have bus tickets. I didn't care. I wanted a hotel, a shower and a bed!
The cab driver was a lovely little old Italian man that spoke no real english, but I stuck the paper with the hotel address in front of his face and said "I want to go HERE! very slowly, loudly and many times. Like that is going to make him understand me. He finally looks at the paper, gives us a big smile and starts grabbing luggage. Lennart looks in his wallet and says I need to get more euros and takes off into the airport. The sweet taxi driver looks at him, looks at me with a puzzled look on his face. I say MONEY. He went to get EUROS! The guy shrugs and loads up the next suitcase and opens the door for me to climb in. I guess he figures, he's got the luggage and the wife, the guy will come back evetually.
So, driving in Italy! They seem to see lanes as more suggestions than something to be adhered to in a hard and fast way the americans do. I discovered that all vehicles in this part of Italy have brand new turn signals on their cars. They never use them! Cars and busses share the road with motorcycles and scooters, but the two wheeled vehicles don't even see lanes as suggestions. They drive on the shoulder, inbetween lanes or into oncoming traffic. Cars just veer around them as if they are mearly moving trees or shrubberies in the road.
We finally get to the hotel, after driving down a few wrong streets in Montegrotto. It was so worth the 150 euros to get there in under 45 min. The hotel doesn't look like much from the outside, but the inside is nice. To the right of the door, there is a large arch that opens into the dining room. Tables are set with fine linens and candles. We are informed that diner startes in 10 min. I get this desperate look on my face and whine "but I really wanted a shower!" Ok, now it is 29 hours in the same clothes and the planes were hot! ICk! The lady at the counter says, "Eh, dinner starts for you in 20...30 minutes." I say, good!. That I can do.
Small but nice room with minimal closet and miniscule shower. Tiney Tiny balconey. So cute! View of trees.
Dinner! Finally something other than airline food! And it was wonderful! You get escorted to your table by a debonair older Italian man that says everything in Italian then english, so you kind of get to learn things. He hands the wine list to Lennart, the menu to me, lights our candle and bows himself out. We see bunches of people milling around in the center around a buffet but we have the menu and no idea of what wines to get, so we are wondering aloud to each other how things work. There are two gentlemen at the table next to us that look over and say, "Oh! you speak english, too!" and start chatting with us. They have been here a day already, so explain a little how things are done and that the food is great. About then our dashing younger, but not too young waiter shows up and explains that we pick one thing off the top of the menu and one thing off the bottom of the menu and we have access to the buffet items - veggies, salad, apitizers and breads. Later, there is a fruit, cheese and desert buffet put out. Yum! Lennart picks the Chef's Suggestion for both. I'm not that easy. I pick the pasta with gorgonzola for the first item, which just happened to be the Chef's Suggestion and the Veal. The Chef's Suggestion was a turkey dish.
On to the buffet. Both ceveches were wonderful, The first had salad shrimp and radicio in a lemon/briney sauce. The second had salad shrip, scallops and some white fish in a lime type sauce. Not all chopped up with a ton of cilantro like mexican ceviche. Had a large slice of grilled eggplant that was ok. The cooked veggies here are very overcooked! Had tastes of a couple pasta salads - Eh - and a tiny slice of "pizza", thin crust with mushrooms and cheese. yum.
Then the pasta with gorgonzola came. Oh, my! Best mac and cheese EVER! The veal was amazing, veggies, not! Lennart said his turkey was very good. The guy next to Lennart (the father) had chicken in a orange crust? Turned out to be orange squashed baked around the chicken. He said it was very good. They guy next to me (son) had swordfish. He said it was a little dry, but the flavor was excellant. He said most of the swordfish he has had is a little dry. Apparetly it is hard to keep it moist.
I ordered Lambrusco to go with the meal. They brought the bottle. Apparently, you don't buy a glass. You buy the bottle. Lennart wanted something else, but they didn't quite understand, so he drank my lambrusco. They guy at the next table had the same Lambrusco and we all enjoyed a lot of it. ;)
We chatted with the guys at the next table all through dinner. They were a lot of fun. They are from Philidelphia The son has traveled all over, but to different countries than Lennart. The father did his traveling many years ago in the army. The son is somewhere around Lennart/my age and the father is this nice little old guy. They look so much alike! We left together. They are on the same floor and we got into the elevator with another couple around our age. We were still were chatting and the guy in the elevator asked what floor in english. The dad says "Oh, more english speaking people!" The guy in the elevator says yes, but we are Portugese! We were all on the same floor and chatted all the way down the hall.
The bed is hard. There are not enough pillows. It was heaven!
I'll write about today, tomorrow.
We decided this year to put off our Christmas celebration until New Years Day to allow everybody to take advantage of the after Christmas sales. Very smart I think.
This year we started a whole bunch of new traditions. It started out with trying a Turducken for Christmas dinner! It was very interesting, somewhat bland, but a great expirience. Gwen did a great job cooking it, but everybody agreed if we did it again we'd have a butcher bone the birds and she'd do the stuffing herself.
When the kids first arrived Gwen told Heather there was a gift that had to be opened immediately. A new Camera! Heather was overjoyed. Danny was overjoyed. Over 400 photos were taken! Yes, they are uploading now in to the photo section. Have fun watching the chaos ensue. We hope your New Year will be full of joy and prosperity.
Our good friend Lizzy Shannon had a party for the debut of her second book Time Twist. We hadn't seen her in a while, and she of course looked Fabulous!!! Here's a pic!
Here's her webpage!
Vegas Trip and Wedding Pictures added!
Saturday we held our end of summer BBQ! All the family came along with our friends Bill and Athena and David's two friends Colin and Eric.
We had some great burgers and sausages, we even tried lamb sausage.
Our granddaughter Nemi scooted around on her little push car and got a lot of oohs and ahs from the guests.
It was an altogether success!
We had a lot of family members asking us to visit so we decided to take it all on at once and have an extended vacation with both of our families. We started by flying to Michigan to visit Gwen's parents who were celebrating their 50th Wedding Anniversary. The whole family came together and we had a fun weekend honoring them. We then flew to Finland.
Day 1
First impressions: Pink Granite! As we were coming from the airport I noticed that the hills that were cut away for the road were made mostly of pink granite. When we got to the hotel, the sidewalks are made of pink granite cobblestones. Pink granite is ground up and put in the asphalt for the roads. We pay a fortune for pink granite and here they line the streets with it! Hellsinki is a very neat city with parks and little plazas here and there and lots of nooks and crannies to go exploring.
Day 2
We are having a great time. Wed we walked and walked and walked!!! The architecture here is wonderful. So much detail. In Helsinki, no building is allowed to be more than six stories high, so all of them are six stories high. Lennart calls them Legos. All blocks. We got to see the oldest stone building in Helsinki which was done in the mid 1700s. Older than the US. Last night went to the opera. Had dinner at Lennart's mom's first. Great food. Lennart got a veal recipe from her that I can't wait to try. The opera was wonderful. Wish you could have been there. Funny! Mozart had a real sense of humor. Every one in "love" with everyone else. Everyone playing tricks on everyone else. The music wasn't bad either
Day 3
The country was wonderful. On the way back to the train station, we stopped by a church that was built in the 1400s with a graveyard around it. We couldn't get into the church, but got some good pictures of it and some old graves. Today we took a boat tour of the harbor and surrounding islands. Very nice. Got bunches of pictures. We just got back from an art gallery. Some nice Finnish artists. Now we are taking a nap before taking Lennart's mom to dinner at a very nice restaurant.
Day 4
Lazy day. Did some shopping. Found a clothing store that didn't charge a fortune. Tried to go to a movie, but nothing much interesting playing that we haven't already seen. Mostly I slept or read or watched National Geographic. It is the only english channel we get here other than CNN. We went to a Nepalese restaurant for lunch. Good food if a bit odd. Went to a chinese place and got soup for dinner.
Day 5
Took an overnight boattrip to Stockholm.
The boat trip was uneventful. I was not sick even though the sea was a bit choppy. The buffet was so-so. The twin beds were horrible!
Day 6
We are in Sweden now. The hotel room is small but so much better than the boat! We are about to go do bus and boat hop on hop off tours of the city. Can`t wait to see the royal palace. We already got pictures from the taxi of the city hall which is where the Nobel Prizes are given out. Very cool.
Day 7
We got a ticket for a hop on hop off bus/boat. We got a tour of the east half of the city and the main lake area. We stopped off at the palace for lunch. We explored some small back streets and wandered through some galleries. Found a little hole in the wall "bar and kitchen" for lunch. Got on the boat and off at the Vasa Museum. Spectacular ship called the Vasa from the early 1600s. It is the only fighting boat that has been preserved from that time. The carvings were amazing. Of course it was not a very good boat because it capsized before it even got out to sea. We spent an hour or two there and got through maybe half of the museum. It is huge boat.
Day 8
Today it is raining. We were going to go to the amusement park, but that is not so good in the rain. We are thinking more bus tours and maybe see inside the palace. There is also the aquarium and zoo along with other historic buildings. We`ll see what we wind up doing. Lennart is still not feeling 100% so we may spend part of the day lounging in the room.
Day 9
We have discovered how to get around in the city on the mass transit. We did the hop on hop off bus around the other part of the city...well most of it. Lennart wanted to go to the children`s museum that specializes in Pipi Longstocking. Apparently the author was from around here. We had lunch there. It was geared to kids. Not great.
Then we went to the Nordic History museum. We expected viking stuff. Boy were we wrong. It is a history of how people in Sweden lived from the 1700s on. There were plates, silverware, a large exhibition on chairs, pipes, clocks and even doll houses. There were samples of rooms from actual people`s houses. Very interesting, but not what we were expecting, so a little disappointed.
For dinner we went across town to the Hard Rock Cafe. Great drinks and much better food than lunch! Lennart even picked up a t-shirt.
Day 10
We walked and sat in the park for quite a while. Got to watch a lady with four dogs. The park below acts as an off leash dog park. It was fun to see three of them race around. She had them very well trained.
We wandered around the neighborhood and found a hole in the wall sports bar with good food at a very decent price. Love finding those little local spots. For dinner we stayed at the hotel and had sandwiches and drinks at C&Cs in the lobby.
Day 11
Washington DC!
Long plane ride. Watched three movies. My behind hurts from sitting in a not very padded seat for so long. We have been up for about 18 hours now and are about ready to crash. I've got some laundry in Merja's washer. Clean clothes tomorrow!!! Oh, we saw Greenland from the plane. It was white. We also celebrated our Niece Anika's birthday by the pool.
Day 12
Nils took us to the Library of Congress and the Capitol Building. Library of Congress is amazing! I just wish I could have gone through the stacks, but you have to have a special library card to get in. I got a picture of the Gutenberg bible before I knew you weren't supposed to take pictures of it. ;) We went on a tour and there was so much info on all the mosaics and statues and paintings. Every thing has meaning and is so beautifully done. The tour guide even explained how they got all the mosaic tiles on the ceiling.
The Capitol was not as amazing, but still interesting. Did a tour of that too. Every state has two statues of two of the most important people to the state. We saw one of Oregon's. No one I knew of. I don't remember seeing any of Washington's. The statues are scattered all over the Capitol building. We got a couple books about the buildings' history and art.
Merja made Beef Wellington YUM!
Day 13
We had chocolate last night. A neighbor stopped by with a box of chocolates and a bottle of wine, which led to a bottle of Finnish berry liquor. Very good, all of it.
Merja has out done herself with the food. She left us a mac and cheese casserole the first night we were there. Beef Wellington Saturday night and last night it was rack of lamb!!!
We're heading home today!