11 July 2007

 

Füssen June 7, 2007

Ok, a month late, but here we are.

I had June 7 off to celebrate... umm.. blood and love of christ? probably. so i made it a 4-day weekend and did a little travelling.

It pinkled rain all the way down to Füssen. Hannes and I took the "Romantic Road" because it was in all of my tourist guides as a really scenic drive.

Well, we kept getting stuck behind semi's on 2-lane country roads. It was pretty, but the only feature that made it more Romantic than any other country road in Bavaria was the castle we drove under. but also we got to see cows, which aren't allowed on the autobahn.






the first night we were there, we set up our tent, and visited the thermal baths. we got to swim around in saline water from geothermal springs at night and look up at the lit castles of Neuschwanstein and Höhenschwangau. There were also Saunas. J think around 12 of them, we did an Aromatherapy sauna in the Panorama room. A German man in a towel told jokes and poured apple-scented water on the furnace, while 30 or so naked strangers (about 50/50 men and women) sat on wooden benches and sweat.

in this picture you can just make out Neuschwanstein in the distance, it's halfway up on the right hand side..



there was bike riding around the lakes, in the foothills of the alps.



and swimming in some really green alpine lakes..



and roman soldier chainsaw art on the side of the bike path



we took a brief stop at the cyclist gas station (beer!)



then did a little wandering around the city of Füssen proper,






when i was suddenly invested in stocks



(ooh! look! a torture device! maybe i can fit my head in there!)

good Bayrisch food (Schweinehaxe - pig shoulder with sauer kraut and a Semmelkloß - bread dumpling)



it was really relaxing. no stress, just sort of figuring our way around as we went. lots of wandering around on 2 wheels.

finally, right before we left, we took the tour of Neuschwanstein, which inspired the Disney Castle.

The tour was awesome, but they shuffled us through a bit too quickly for my taste. The inside of this castle is _really_ richly done, it was a lot to absorb in 20 minutes. Unfortunately (for me) photography inside the castle is VERBOTEN. I held off and bought the book at the end, but it didn't have closeups on the architectural details I wanted to see.

Ah well. We were graciously permitted to take photos out the windows of the castle, looking over Alpsee, and Schloss Höhenschwangau.



I didn't get a really good postcard shot of Neuschwanstein itself, my pix were a bit piecemeal.












ah well. next time i'll climb up to mary's bridge and get the postcard shots. a fairly standard tourist photo was managed, though:



on the drive home we took the autobahn. it took 2 hours less than the drive down there. and now we know. :)

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10 July 2007

 

blood sacrifice to the domestic goddess

wow. it seems that even though i've jumped on the nerd wagon with Flock, the nerdy bloggerfriendly web browser (which does tabs like firefox, yaay), my posts still don't write themselves! shock and awe.

ah well. including pictures is way easier, though.

flag cakes from my little 4th of july shindig. i had a couple of people over for Jesus Burgers (so named because i learned the recipe from a guy who looked like jesus. no jesuses were harmed in the making of these burgers).



the cakes are so from a JellO ad in Woman's day a couple years ago, but they usually go over ok.. except i couldn't find real jello, and had to substitute Quark for Cool Whip. and that was weird, because quark is some kind of yogurty cheese thing.. but it was the best i could come up with. *shrug* noone spit it out.

and these are the socks i was working on this weekend.




i grafted a toe!



right before i savaged myself with a bread-knife and got to visit the folks in the emergency room.



see what all this domestic tom-foolery does to a girl?!

i need to ride my mountain bike this weekend. or shoot something. jeez.

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01 July 2007

 

coco-coffee

i don't consider myself gifted in the kitchen; i'd rather mix drinks than cook. also, i'm typically anti- kitchen appliances, usually they just take up too much counter space and don't get used enough.

that said, yesterday i bought a hot pot. it boils a liter of water in like 30 seconds. and i said to myself, heck, if we're boiling water like that, it'd be a good idea to have a french press so i can make coffee at home (i drink a lot of tea, but coffee's a once in a while thing when i'm oot and aboot).

last thursday i saw a "wife swap" program over here, in german. it was a minor triumph that i was able to look at the lace i was knitting while watching/listening and i understood everything that happened on the show. woo! my german's improving.

ok, it was absolute trash tv, total crap.. but it inspired me. there was this enormous fat woman that swapped. talk about an amazing bad example. she was enOOORMous, fat dumb and lazy. it was like MTV's Scared Straight. it made me want to eat fresh veggies and go running more often.

in the fresh food vein: friday night i made up a little chicken tikka masala, which turned out great. ingredient remaining in my fridge: coconut milk.

see where i'm going? i know, i'm a little all over the place.. so this morning i made my first french press coffee. and i thought, "what the hell? i'll try it!" and poured the coconut milk into my coffee instead of the skim milk. MMmmm.. ok, prolly fattier than the skim milk, but sooo yummy.

ah well, it's sunday..

so that's my new brunch suggestion, coconut milk instead of cream for your coffee.

shit, look at me, i'm making brunch suggestions. aaaaah!!

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