September 18, 2011

Day 12 - Vienna to Altaussee, Austria

We had our last breakfast in Vienna, packed up the car and got on the road to Altausee. It was about a three hour drive through some beautiful scenery. About halfway we entered the mountains. Lots of tunnels plus lots of impressive peaks.

We arrived at the Seevilla around 3pm. It was pretty cloudy when we got here. About 20 minutes after we got here it started pouring. I'm going to post some photos we took from our balcony before and during the rain. The rain brought cooler temps and before we settled in, we settled down for a nap. Ah, this is what vacation is about.

When we woke up we went down to dinner in the hotel. It was in an inviting dining room with windows on three sides. Had it been light we would have had the same view as our room.

They had a pretty extensive salad bar with all kinds of marinated veggies and salads along with the ingredients to make a green salad. There were three entrees. Thank goodness for a vegetarian option since the other two dishes were veal and fish.

We started with a cream of caraway soup which was like drinking delicious rye bread. My meal was breaded cauliflower, roasted red pepper rings, and chopped hard boiled eggs. It could have fed a family of four. It was wonderful. Rick had the fish which was perch from a neighboring lake on a bed of noodles and chopped spinach. For dessert they served poppyseed mousse with sour cherries. I have mine in my room, not hungry enough to try it yet.

We're here for three nights. There is a 100% chance of rain tomorrow. At some point we are going to take a tour of salt mine. The other thing Werner suggested we do is take a walk around the lake. Hopefully the weather will cooperate.

September 17, 2011

Day 11 - Vienna

Another lovely day. After an earlier breakfast we started walking through Vienna to find Gustav Klimt. But first we thought we would stop off at Mozart's house which happened to be next door to our hotel! His house is the white one and our hotel is yellow. We decided not to go in since none of his original stuff is in it.

Rather than try to figure out the public transportation system we decided to walk to the

Belevedere Palace, former home of Prince Eugene of Savoy, a Frenchman who conquered the Ottomans. There are several more famous palaces in Vienna but we chose Prince Eugene's because it contains one of our favorite paintings of Klimt's, The Kiss.

It was quite a walk but of course enjoyable as we saw more of Vienna. We went through a lovely park that had a statute of Johannes Strauss that was fenced off because it was under repair. We got a kick out of the barrier they had up.

The palace is actually made up of two huge buildings, the upper and lower. We only toured the upper on the advice of Rick S. It definitely was just the right amount of palace for us. All the rooms had artwork from the different art movements in Vienna through the years. They also had drawings of how each room was used and how it looked when it was used as a palace. It took a few hours to do our tour of the palace and grounds. Here is a photo of the outside since we couldn't take pictures inside. The flowers in this garden looked much like a Klimt painting.

We walked back to our hotel realizing we were pretty much done with Vienna. Unfortunately, we wandered into the touristy area. My idea of hell. Millions of people, a McDonald's on every corner, and the whole place smelled like horse pee since this also was where the horse and buggy tours originated. We were accosted by one two many guys dressed up like Louis XIV trying to sell us tickets to the opera. We hadn't eaten since breakfast so we grabbed a slice of pizza to go and headed back to our hotel.

We're now in our hotel room and after taking naps we are watching reruns of The Daily Show on Rick's computer, too lazy to go out to dinner. Tomorrow we're outa here to a hotel on a lake three hours away from Vienna. I'm looking forward to some peace and to rest my blistered tootsies!

September 16, 2011

Day 10 - Vienna

I don't know why I wasn't that excited about coming to Vienna. I really like it here! It reminds me very much of Paris but feels more approachable. There seems to be a sophistication yet it's not intimidating.

We slept in today. Our hotel is quite civilized about breakfast. It lasts until 11:30 and we showed up at 11:15. So far all of our hotels have included breakfast with the price of the room. The ones we have been to are not like the US breakfast buffets. Here they have had few hot items but mostly cheese, cold cuts, fruit, yogurt, cereal, lots of dried fruits and nuts, jams and jellies, and a wide assortment of different breads, croissant, and rolls. Some have had different kinds of pickles, a few sliced veggies, and some sweets. One thing different for me here is that I have coffee with hot milk every morning. At home I'm a Diet Pepsi woman but here the diet drinks suck and the coffee is fabulous!

Rick was in charge of the day. We left Rick Steves in the room. My Rick had mapped out four destinations for us but we only made it to two. We did try to go to the Jewish museum but silly us, we showed up late Friday afternoon and go figure, they were closed!

This impressive building housed the 

Austrian Dept. of Children and Families

While Vienna has the usual incredibly great city transportation system, we chose to walk. Actually, Rick suggested walking and I had no idea how far away we were going, so I agreed. On our way we walked along the Danube canal, saw some pretty impressive government buildings, and lots and lots of stone buildings that looked like they could be office buildings or apartments.

We were on our way to the Museum Hundertwasser (Kunst Haus Wein) Am I the only one who has never heard of Friedensreich Hundertwasser? He is one of Rick's favorite artists. I've known Rick for 15 years and he never introduced me to him.

There are many things about his artwork that struck a chord with me; the colors, the movement, the intricate simplicity. His philosophy about art and architecture got me though. The museum contained four floors that demonstrated who he was, his evolution, politics, and vision for a world where people and nature would co-exist. We couldn't take pictures inside the museum so go to the website and take a look.

He hated the architecture of his time and designed the museum as a studio and living space. The  photos I'm posting show you the outside and a section of the floor in the entry way with an explanation of what he viewed floors should be like. As you can tell, he really resonated with me. I didn't want to shlep around some of his posters and books but I plan to buy some and even use his writings in my work with clients.

I dragged Rick away from Kunst Haus Wein after about 2 1/2 hours because we still had places to go. We walked along the canal some more and found the Jewish Museum but it was closed as I mentioned before and then after another 20-30 minutes of walking we found our way to Freud's house.

Officially described as the Sigmund Freud Museum, it was the building he lived and worked in for 47 years before he had to take his family to England to escape the Nazis. Just prior to their having to leave Austria, a famous photographer and taken pictures of all aspects of his consultation room and office. In the museum each room had the photos going around the room up the wall about 3 feet and then above them were display cases with photos, personal papers and objects. The entrance to his office was separate from the entrance to his family's apartment. His waiting room contained the original furniture donated to the museum by Anna Freud.While psychoanalysis is very much different than the way I practice and some of his theories are not what I believe, I was very moved to be in the presence of the spirit and energy of this amazing man.

When we finished our exploration, my back and feet were shot. It was a gorgeous walk back to our hotel. We stopped by St. Stephen's Cathedral. It was pretty impressive dating back to 1300. We were able to go into the entryway of the nave (more than a football field long and nine stories tall). They were having a mass so we couldn't go any further. There was an organist playing which really was cool!

The cathedral was just a few blocks from our hotel, hallelujah! We got back at dusk. Rick promptly took a nap and I did some laundry (much needed) in the bathroom sink. I had a Luna bar for dinner and Rick went out later, got a bratwurst for himself and some gelato for both of us. We sure ate better when we traveled with Susan and Werner! Between us, we're too lazy to search for a good restaurant and then make up our mind which one to choose!

September 15, 2011

Day 9 - Salzburg to Vienna

Note: Rick was able to set up a way I could send you this blog directly to your e-mail rather than your having to remember to check it. I don't want to be presumptuous
though, so if you get this and you don't want it in your e-mail box, just let me know and I will remove your name. I promise it won't hurt my feelings.

We left Salzburg around 11 this morning. I think Salzburg was a little too crowded and touristy for either of our liking. We didn't see much of it but what we saw was enough!

We drove about 30 minutes south of Salzburg into Germany again to a lake we had originally planned to visit, Konigssee. We missed a turn the "lady" told us to make and ended up taking the scenic route through the mountains. Because of this, we passed the Eagles Nest, a headquarters/vacation spot for Hitler during the war. For me it was creepy to be so close to a place Hitler actually visited and brought back the uncomfortable feeling of the day before.

Actually, I'm kind of upset with myself for generally feeling uncomfortable in Germany. I keep looking at the elderly people and wondering if they were Nazis. I know that people my age or younger had nothing to do with the Holocaust but I still am triggered by just the thought of what happened here.

This the hotel we were going to stay in had our plans not changed.

Konigsee is a gorgeous Alpine lake and tourist attraction. They have boats that take you around the lake because there are hardly any places to land as the mountains come right down to the water. Our boat was filled with a tour group of elderly German tourists and the man who did the commentary only spoke German. He must have been pretty funny because he kept everyone laughing. It was weird being with about 100 people, not understanding a word anyone was saying and wondering if they were talking about us. Okay, now I'm getting a little paranoid here, right? Well that explains the mood I was in on the boat, trying to enjoy the scenery and not feel too weird.

The big lake and St. Bartholoma

We got off the boat at the end of the lake and hiked about 20 minutes to another lake. The whole area is a national park and really is quite beautiful. The hike and the scenery changed my mood and I totally enjoyed and appreciated the rest of the day! I've put in a few photos to give you an idea of the beauty. The little lake was like being in an impressionist painting.

The small lake Salet Obersee

Had to have a KROG pic! I do hiking and like it.

After we left Konigssee we drove to Vienna. It was supposed to take three hours but we didn't get here until 10pm because of a major traffic tie up on the highway. Our hotel seems to be in a pretty hip neighborhood and is really beautiful. I'm looking forward to exploring tomorrow.

September 14,2011

Day 8 - Rothenburg ob der Tauber to Salzburg, Austria

Today was another travel day for us. We started out on what's called "The Romantic Road" which is Germany's way to attract tourists to some of its lesser known medieval towns. We saw a couple from the road but decided that Rothenburg was enough for us.

A spur of the moment thing we chose to do was try to find the Displaced Persons Camp my first husband, Max, was born in and lived until his family was able to move to the US in 1950. We did a Google search and saw that the location of the town was just an hour out of our way. There was no information about the location of the camp but a few things we read indicated that that Allies moved people into the barracks of a German Air Force base. All the holocaust survivors were moved to other locations by 1950 when the American Army occupied it until 1955 when it was given back to the Germans.

We found the German Air Force base and of course we couldn't just walk in. We pushed the intercom by the locked gate and explained what we were looking for. The person speaking to us indicated that he didn't know whether it was the location of the camp, he didn't know where we could find that out, that we couldn't come in for a look around, and that we couldn't take pictures. Go figure?

We spent a little bit of time driving around the town taking some pictures and also sneaking some of the base. I've included some for you to see.

This last one was a deserted field next to the base and where Rick thinks the camp was.

Being there was very emotional for me. I've seen Max's baby pictures and his birth certificate and it felt amazing to be in the vicinity of where he was born. Then I started imagining what it was like for all the traumatized people who lived in the camp, each suffered so much during the war and then each spent years in limbo not knowing what was going to happen to them. The social worker in me wanted to know if they were offered any counseling or help in dealing with their losses, memories, and experiences. I think I have some studying to do when I get home.

We were considering going to visit Dachau but this was enough for right now.

After we left Lagerlechfeld, we got on the Autobahn and while Rick drove a speed I don't even want to know, I slept on the three hour drive to Salzburg.

After a few tries we found our hotel, which incidentally is right around the corner from Mozart's house, and then headed out to explore and find some dinner. We happened on a little restaurant with some English speakers sitting outside eating an amazing wooden slab of food. It was the nightly special and they said it was good so we ordered it.

I thought it was veal so I didn't want to eat it but the veggies, rice, and fries were good. Then Rick informed me that it was actually pork shnitzel, so I ate it and it was good. I guess I don't feel as sorry for pigs as I do baby cows!

Tomorrow we'll explore a little more of Salzburg before making our way to Vienna.

September 13, 2011

Day 7 – Rothenburg ob der Tauber

It was a beautiful, cool, partly cloudy day today which made exploring the city delightful. This was the third largest city in Germany in the Middle Ages because it was on two trade routes. After the Thirty Years War, hard times hit and the city was frozen in time from 1648 until the late 1800s when it was rediscovered and became a tourist destination. My first impression is that it is so big and the buildings are so tall. I’m just going to put in a few pictures for you to see. Most of the structures are from 1400!

 Our hotel.

The city is completely walled and has a beautiful garden where the castle once stood. It is filled with tourists and every shop caters to them/us. Beer steins, sausages, a Christmas decorations seem to be the biggest draw. Oh, and the Schneeballs, a ball of pie crust sold in most shops that carry food. We sampled one and even I, who loves pie crust, didn’t like it!

The best part of our stay here for me was the Night Watchman’s Tour. It was recommended by Rick S. About 100 English speaking people gathered in Market Square at 8pm (the German speaking tour was at 9:30. http://www.nightwatchman.de/index.php?cat=147&cl2=141&cl3=147&sprache=ENG

I thought it was going to be quite hokey but it really was interesting and fun.

We had a nice German dinner served by a guy from Seattle who moved here 10 years ago to be close to his ex-wife and daughter. He definitely wishes he was back in the US. He would be such a great client if I lived here!  

The Adventure Begins!

Well, as in the past, we have had frustrations with internetconnectivity on our trip. The hotel in Zurichkept promising it would be fixed but it never did get repaired during our stay.Therefore, I worked on my blog diligently on a Word document. We are inRothenburg ob der Tauber, Germanyright now. This morning I transferred all I had written to the blog program(took about 90 minutes to get everything formatted and the photos downloaded)and then when I pressed publish the program crashed and I lost it all! So now,several hours later, I will try again!

September 7-8, 2011

Days 1-2 - Kansas City to Zurich

We left today with the usual mixed feelings: excitementtempered by worry (fear of being so far away from loved ones). This time I feltsad too. This will be my first trip to Europewithout Werner and Susan. Each time we have traveled it seems as if Werner hadsome health emergency shortly before we were supposed to leave. He always madea quick recovery and was able to join us, even if a little late. This time, atage 93, with an unknown diagnosis of his symptoms, it was the reasonable choicefor Susan and Werner to cancel their trip. Since we don’t travel together, itwas easy to pretend that they would be meeting us at the hotel in Zurich as we had planned.My fantasy faded as we landed in Zurichand made our way by train to the Sonne.

When Rick and I learned that Susan and Werner wouldn’t bejoining us, we tried to figure out some way to have them with us in spirit. Wecame up with the idea to bring their likenesses with us. You’ll notice photosof them as we share our experiences with them. Although we did take a pictureof them in bed at their favorite hotel in Zurich,the Sonne but that one is for their eyes only!

For some reason, I couldn’t sleep on the plane. When we gotto the hotel our room wouldn’t be ready for another hour or so. It wasaround10am so we left our bags and walked around the village. Kusnacht is asuburb of Zurich on the shore the Lake Zurich.We walked to a supermarket. I love visiting supermarkets in Europe.It’s so interesting to see the different products, the prices, and how thingsare displayed. We bought a big bottle of water and a baguette and then sat onthe dock of our hotel until our room was ready.

We collapsed when we got to our room. Didn’t even get ashower. Just passed out. We woke-up periodically during the day, looked out atthe lake and then went back to sleep. One of the times I woke up was at sunsetand luckily I was able to capture it. Good timing, huh?

We dragged ourselvesout of bed around 9pm, got dressed and went out to find some dinner. Therestaurant we found served outside. The one server spoke no English and themenu was in German. The one word I could figure out was pizza. So go figure, myfirst meal in Switzerlandwas a Margherita pizza! Rick had a Greek salad and roesti (Swiss hash brownscooked in a pancake shape) that tastes better than any hash browns the US has to offer.We were both so thirsty, we ordered the biggest beers we could.

It occurred to me that I make quite a transition when Itravel to Europe. It’s as if my senses go onoverdrive. Once the thoughts of work and the voices from home fade, my eyes seethings differently, I hear more acutely, I’m even drawn to touching things tofeel their texture, smells seem more intense, and so do emotions. I also seemto have “deep thoughts” more frequently. I’m wondering if it might be themindfulness that seems to escape me at home.

September 9, 2011

Day 3 – Zurich

This morning we woke feeling much better. We slept until9:30 which may have had something to do with it. We took the train into Zurich which took about10 minutes. There we decided to try our old pal, Rick Steves, walking tour of Zurich. We started at thetrain station. This photo is of the blue angel, Zurich’s guardian angel who protects alltourists.

Rick S. suggested a trip through the Swiss National Museum. I’m glad we tookhis advice. It gave us a history of Switzerland in two hours throughexhibits that were interesting, moving, and beautiful. One of the laterexhibits depicted Swiss design. It had rooms from the 1920s to the present. Thefurniture, accessories, and art had a “coolness,” that exuded what modern wasat the time. It totally reminded me of my dad, an artist/designer whoappreciated and introduced us to whatever was new/avant-garde in design. He andmy mom went to Europe in the 50s and 60s andbrought home photos of what I saw in the museum exhibit.

After the museum we had lunch at Hiltl VegetarianRestaurant. Susan and Werner had suggested it. It was pretty hot here today andI think I was still dehydrated from the trip. I wasn’t hungry but had a largeginger lemonade. Rick had a semolina soup. We both had around eight glasses oftheir “free” tap water. Apparently in Zurichmany restaurants charge for tap water. We’re going to go back for dinnertomorrow so I’ll tell you then about their amazing vegetarian buffet.

We followed the walking tour visiting a couple of tinyparks, wandering into some incredible toy shops, taking in the Fraumunsterchurch with its Chagall stained glass windows, peered into the ruins of Romanbaths discovered in 1984, and walked down the fanciest block of theBahnhofstrasse (the Rodeo Drive of Zurich). My son, Daniel, would have lovedall the designer clothing. I loved peeking into the shops to see who wasactually buying things. Unfortunately, it didn’t seem like they had manycustomers.

Those of you who read my blog last time may remember myamazement at how many strikingly tall, beautiful Italian men there were in Rome. Well, Zurich has its owncontingent of strikingly tall, Swiss men, decked out in their impeccablytailored dark suits, who were as beautiful as some of the art and design we sawin the museum! I’m thinking some of my single, women friends might beinterested in the Tour de European Men I think I’ll invent. Do I see a newcareer in my future?

We took a wonderful boat ride back to our hotel on Zurichsee(Lake Zurich). Had a fun dinner at sunset atthe cafeteria-style restaurant in the garden of our hotel at the edge of thelake. I ordered meat loaf and French fries as a departure from my usual pizza.Rick got the food from the line while I saved our table. When he arrived withmy meat loaf, it turned out to be what had the texture and taste of a hot dogin a meat loaf shape. Very interesting. It was good. Not the fancy fare that myfoodie friends would have appreciated. Everything here is incredibly expensive.My food reporting may get embarrassing.

The sunset was lovely again. Our room doesn’t haveair-conditioning so we decided to wander around Kusnacht after dark to let ourroom cool off a little. We still don’t have internet access. I’m beginning tothink it is a clever, European scam to offer wifi and then when you arrive atthe hotel, it just happens to be broken. It happened to us many times lasttrip. This doesn’t seem like such an auspicious start!

September 10, 2011

Day 4 Zurich

Woke up early today because we wanted to check out a fleamarket in Zurichthat Werner suggested and we weren’t so sure how long it lasted. It was verylarge and filled with all things that I don’t want or need. Unlike some fleamarkets at home, this one only had used/old items rather than inexpensive newthings I usually don’t want or need.

We then crossed the Limmat Riverinto the Niederdorf neighborhood. The first stop was the Grossmunster Church.Like the Fraumunster, it had its beginnings as a Catholic church but during theReformation, it was stripped of everything Catholic and to this day is verygray and austere with just its stained glass windows offering color. We werelucky to come at a time when someone was playing or practicing on its huge pipeorgan which really set the mood and was beautiful.

The Niederdorf is a much more quirky, artsy neighborhoodthan on the other side of the Limmat. It was fun wandering the narrow streets,looking into shops and galleries. It was still really hot so we decided to takea riverboat, picture a low lying city bus for a few stops to catch a breeze andrelax. It didn’t go fast enough to cool us down so we hopped off and caught atram to the tram museum. Rick was in heaven. It was a large car barn filledwith the history of trams in Zurichwith actual cars that you could climb into. I was in heaven because it wasright next to a supermarket where I got a cold Diet Coke and a frozen “softice” which is soft ice cream put in a plastic cup and sold at a supermarket.

Rick is amazing at negotiating the public transportationsystem. He is fearless and figures out quickly what we have to do to get wherewe have to go. Totally sweaty and hot we decided to get on one of the big lakeboats to see if the breeze would cool us down and it did! We also got a nice“kleine rundfahrten” which is a shorter roundtrip of the lake rather than the“grosse rundfahrten.” German is the best language to give me the giggles. Ithas lots of fahrt and gasse signs and I’m having fun taking photos of them foranyone who shares my juvenile humor.

Rick had a surprise for me at 7pm which required us to takeyet another kind of pubic transportation, a funicular—a little cable car thattakes you up a little mountain. I was amazed that it was totally run by acomputer with no sign of a human in sight. It took us to Rigiblick. The sun wasgoing down, it was cooling off, and exactly at 7pm (the Swiss are nothing butpunctual) all the church bells in Zurichstarted ringing at once! They were welcoming in the Christian Sabbath and itwas awesome. It also lasted exactly 15 minutes!

We finished the evening off at Hiltl for dinner. Mostly fortheir good food but also for their internet!

September 11, 2011

Day 5 – Zurich

Today we decided to just hangout at the hotel. We slept in,had a good breakfast, then went back to our room, opened the windows to thelake, and read and dozed for several hours.

Around 4pm we took a walk to find Carl Jung’s house. Rickhad read in a history of our hotel that he lived down the street and thatpeople from far away would stay at our hotel while they consulted with him. Thehouse is privately owned now with the Jung Institute located in Zurich. Jung lived inthis home from 1906 until is death in 1961. It was about a twenty minute walkto his house.

After we took some pictures we explored some more ofKusnacht, including two parks on the lake shore filled with families with kidsplaying in the lake and on playgrounds. It was lovely to sit on a bench andjust let the lake and the cool breeze envelop us. It’s interesting how I’vegotten used to not listening to peoples’ conversations since I don’t understandthem. Every once in a while I’ll hear a few words in English but it’s at such alow level of consciousness than I’ve noticed my other senses are so muchstronger. My eyes seem to notice more detail, color, textures. I hear peoplesounds but I’m just aware that they are there, not interested in what they aresaying or doing. I guess it's that mindfulness thing again!

Shortly after we got to back to our hotel, a storm blew in.I went back to the room to close the windows and decided to stay in. Rickstayed in the garden under a thick tree. It was nice to have 30 minutes or soby myself. One of part of the our trips that is difficult for me is not havingmuch alone time. We had some good togetherness since Wednesday. It was good tohave alone time!

It’s odd to be here during the 10^th anniversaryof 9/11. The only English speaking television we get is CNN. Selfishly, Ihaven’t wanted to watch their non-stop coverage. We’re watching a Swiss stationas I am writing this. They are doing what looks like a documentary on 9/11. Iwish I could understand their spin on it.

Tomorrow we leave for Rotenburg, Germany. We’rerenting a car. The drive should take about 4 hours. Hopefully we’ll have betterinternet so I can actually post this!

September 12, 2011

Day 6 – Zurich to Rothenberg obder Tauber

After taking a few final photos of the view from our room, we left our luggage at the hotel and took an hour long boatride to Hertz in downtown Zurich.We were almost the only ones on the boat at that time in the morning and it wasdelightful!

Once there we took a tram to Hertz. I had to take a photo of howpunctual the trams are. At most stops in the downtown area they have electronicsigns that show the time the trams are to arrive. They are always on time!

After picking up our luggage we started on the way to Germany. Wedidn’t know that the Prius we rented would come with a GPS so we brought oursfrom home. Of course Rick decided to use both. We had dueling “ladies” for ourtrip on the Autobahn. I had heard that people go fast on the Autobahn. OMG, Ididn’t realize how fast! Thanks to the metric system on the speedometer, Ididn’t know how fast Rick was driving. I really missed Susan when we were inthe car. She and Rick usually take turns driving and I sit in the back seatpaying no attention to the quality or speed of the driving. Between the two“ladies,” the speed, the umleitung (detours), and the cars passing us at like150 mph, I white knuckled it for four hours!

We arrived and checked into our hotel and then got back inthe car to meet some old friends of ours who now live in Germany. We metthem at Schwabisch Hall, a town about 50 minutes away. We had a delightfuldinner with. Besides catching up with them, it was so nice to have an extendedconversation in English with someone besides ourselves.

After dinner we stopped for gelato. We asked the serverwhere he was from and he said Italy.Of course, I couldn’t resist trying out some of my Italian on him and before Iknew it, I was saying, “da le eh da me,” which means “your place or mine!” Thepoor guy blushed and started giggling. Unfortunately, he didn’t have enoughEnglish and I didn’t have enough Italian for me to explain that I was justjoking. Needless to say, we had a different server bringing us our gelato!