Halloween 2007

It was a dark and cloudy night.....Halloween 2007 was a fun time for all. The boys decided to be Cars from the Disney movie. It turned out to be a great choice, as it was very cold! We headed out with a gaggle of kids from the neighborhood, to trick or treat! Boys had a great time, and we didn't see one other kid with their costumes on! Michael's class at school also let them wear their costumes - the picture is of M with Mr. Joel, one of the four teachers for his preschool class.

the Last Frankenstein Castle Run

Each year, the military community in Darmstadt has hosted a run from Cambrai-Fritsch casern to Frankenstein's Castle. Darmstadt will be closing next summer, so this year was the last one. The unit has done the run for several years, but this year, one of the other spouses and I decided to tackle it, too. It is 8 miles - doesn't sound like long and isn't really too bad until the last two miles or so, which are straight UP to the castle! Of course, being a walker - some things are predictable. That you'll be one of the last to finish. And that there will be no water left at the water stations. We got to the finish line and one of the guys mentioned the bananas. My response: 'there was food?' Oh well - a good time was had by all, other than we nearly froze to death at the top waiting on the awards ceremony! Chris' Bn Commander won the thing - in about 45 minutes. Yeah.

Heineken Experience

Our last morning, we headed off to visit the Heineken Experience, based out of the original Heineken brewery bldg. They don't make beer there anymore, but the exhibit was fascinating. I didn't know that this was, and still is, a family business. There were rides and exhibits and tons of interesting stuff - we even got a chance to 'drive' a beer delivery wagon (horse drawn!) through the streets of Amsterdam! It was a fun experience - and no, that's not beer in the boys' cup - it's a Dutch soft drink. ha ha. And yes, free beer was included - 3 per adult! What a way to start your morning.

Amsterdam, part IV

There are certainly lots of sights to see in Amsterdam. We enjoyed shopping near the Dam, the main square in the downtown area. TONS of people out; and a major Dutch dept store was having their once a year sale - we went in there and it was a madhouse. ha ha. There was a beautiful floral display on the Dam itself. The picture with all the pigeons in it is of the Royal Palace, which is right on Dam Square. We also visited a flea market, and attempted to see the Red Light district and coffee house district. We did see the coffee houses, where they have a cannabis menu along with the food menu! It is very much in the open but the drug scene isn't what you expect - it is there if you want it but you have to be looking for that specifically. It isn't in your face. We had walked almost to the red light district when Michael had to go to the bathroom. So, there ya go - foiled by a 3 yr old. ha ha. We did manage to make it to the flower market though! We also saw lots of houseboats - that is a way to afford living here, as apts and houses are so expensive, especially the canal houses. There are so many houseboats, the city has suspended issuing any more permits. Check out this parking garage near the train station - it's for BIKES. Yep, there are that many bicycles - you can see them in every picture nearly! And that doesn't even show how many we were nearly run down by........The large red building used to be a church. At one time, the Dutch were changing their thoughts on religion but instead of tearing down the beautiful churches, they kept them and turned them into office buildings, or other things. Interesting.

Amsterdam, part III

Day two started early with a huge breakfast buffet at the hotel. Nice to actually have eggs and pancakes in a European hotel - usually it's just cheeses, meat and bread but this one actually made eggs to order, pancakes (regular and the yummy little Dutch ones), waffles and had pastries, breakfast meats, cereal and a host of other things. We set off to get tickets on the canal bus tour - these are the 'hop on, hop off' boats. We really enjoyed that - there are 3 separate tour lines you can go on and you can use the boats as much as you like for 24 hrs. Great deal - the kids love boats! We saw tons of sights and the city is very interesting from that perspective.

Amsterdam, part II

This is such a pretty city, and especially with all of the beautiful fall colors everywhere. We spent the afternoon wandering amongst the canals, and also visited the Anne Frank house. That was a bit of a challenge - it is a tiny place and it was interesting to answer Justin's question - 'why did they have to hide?' As the sun went down, we headed back to the hotel and made our plans for an early start to day Two.

Amsterdam via train

We decided to check out Amsterdam for Columbus Day, and got a great deal on a train fare. It seemed logical, to avoid all of the snarls of driving in a new city (especially one where 40% of the population rides a bicycle!) as well as the $50/day parking fees by just taking the train. We headed off down the hill, everyone pulling their 'case' (as Michael calls it) to the Hauptbahnhof. We boarded the train and with only a few hiccups due to a train strike, were soon at the airport station and on our way on the high speed ICE train! Gotta love some first class travel; yes, we had this entire compartment to ourselves! In about 3 hrs, we arrived in Amsterdam. It is a very cool city; the train station is very centrally located. When you exit the station, the city sort of spreads out like a fan in front of you. We stopped at the TI to get a map (very cool - it comes out of a vending machine. The map is folded up into a small box that looks like a box of condoms......ha ha.) After getting our tram cards, we were on our way to the hotel area, and were soon sightseeing the beautiful sights along the canals.

First Day of School!!

Very exciting, as the neighborhood went back to school in late August. Justin was joined this year by several new little boys, all in the first grade just like him. Michael also got to go to 'big boy school,' taking on the Part Day preschool. He loves to go to the big center at the airfield, where he has 4 teachers and their class even has a rabbit! I don't know who he likes best, the teachers or Sandy the bunny!