First Day of Second Grade

Justin was happy and excited to start as a 2nd grader at Hainerberg Elementary School. His new teacher, Mrs. Knauf, was very welcoming and happy to have him in her class. He was quick to go right in, sit down and begin getting ready. He was definitely not for us hanging around....ha ha.

Michael and I took a quick pic, and got out of there. Chris was off delivering an airplane somewhere so he missed all the excitement.

You can tell Jacob, Justin's friend, isn't quite as excited about going back to school. ha ha. Those were taken in front of our house.

Wiesbaden Weinfest

The Annual Rheingau Weinwoche, or local wine fest, is one of our favorite haunts in the summer. It is a huge thing; wineries from all over the area bring their best to the marktplatz and set up booths. Tasting is the order of the day; 2 Euro/glass allows you to find what you like without buying a whole bottle first. There is of course tons of food, live music - fun to be had by all. We headed out with the cast of crazies to be sure we experienced this year's version. We have gone every year we've been here but this is the first set of pics! ha ha.

You can see we did a credible job of tasting it all - in that last pic, we have almost as many empty bottles as we have people sitting at our table.....ha ha. It was a lot of fun, though - and a typical 'only in Germany' activity. Ich Liebe Deutschland!!

$10 personal tour

We enjoyed several tours this summer with the Youth Services program. Tours are offered for the middle school aged kids to different cities, most often for a cost of $10. We signed up whenever we could, and we able to make a couple without getting bumped by kids! ha ha. On the Heidelberg tour we were the only ones to sign up, so our neighbors and I had a personal tour. That's right - an entire tour bus just for us. It was pretty cool! We saw a lot of things I had seen before in Heidelberg but it was a nice day and we learned some new things, too.

First stop was the zoo - the day was overcast and cool and we arrived early, so we practically had the place to ourselves. Then we headed for the pedestrian zone, castle, and world-famous bridge over the Neckar. It was a nice day; we enjoyed it and you can't beat the cost.

Haus museum

On the former East German side, there is a museum about the border area, the attempts to cross, etc. It looked really interesting - they have even designed the building so the paved tracks ran right through! The exhibits seemed interesting and varied but all of them were in German - disappointing!

We got a chance to touch the Berlin Wall - there is a piece outside this museum. It is hard to think about what that represents as smiling happy tourists take photos. Again, surreal.

Border Area

We took a walk in the former border area - very interesting to see all the fencing, tank traps, etc as well as the exhibits on the dogs that were used to patrol the area. The kids played with the doghouse, and check out Michael. Obviously he's never considered any dog anything other than a pet. ha ha.

You could actually see the paved border road, too - heading off into the distance. It was very surreal.

Fulda - Guard Towers and US Soldiers

Here are few views from and of the guard tower. The US compound was really interesting and has been kept as it was then. The German government owns and manages the whole area, but there are video stations throughout with info about what it was like to be stationed there. These stations are written and voiced by the US Soldiers who were stationed there.

It is interesting to see; in this pic, Chris and I have our toes on the 'red line,' the furthest point tanks could advance without provocation. I like this pic of the boys, too - they are within sight of what once was one of the most heavily fortified borders in the world. The last pic of the tower I took from the red line - so you can see what a small, confined area it is.

These pics of the kids with these signs really say a lot to me - to think that our families are touring, and kids are playing, in what was once such a volatile area. The parallels to the DMZ in Korea were striking - all of the adults who went on the trip have visited there as well.

The Fulda Gap

We ventured forth to check out Check Point Alpha, one of the sights of the Cold War close to home. The Fulda Gap is where the Americans believed the attack from the Communists would come in an attempt to overwhelm West Germany and drive into Western Europe, so for many years of the Cold War, this area was manned by US forces. Beginning with the Constabulary right after WWII and up to the 90s, US Soldiers guarded this border between East and West. It is strange to think how much has changed in such a short time.

These are some views of the infamous Fulda Gap, and the area. It really is beautiful.

Stuttgart Zoo

Our last stop of the day was the Zoo. It was really huge; a nice zoo! Boys enjoyed seeing all the animals, and the wide open spaces. Our favorite was probably the bats, although man did they stink!!! Here are a few of the animals we saw - it was getting late in the day and many of them were going in for the night.

Mercedes Museum

This was a really neat experience - the building is very unique, shaped like a bee hive with ramps all the way down on the inside. Your journey begins with the audio guides and a ride in the pod elevators to the top floor. Then, you begin your walk down.

Stuttgart - Cannstatter Volksfest

The main event for them is coming up quick! They were building these massive tents, and advertising already for the fest. Anybody ready to come on over??

Stuttgart pit stop

We took a quick pit stop, and had a snack or so. Jim, here's yours, man! We got one just for you. ha ha.

Kids did another stealthy introduction of Jim's Guitars - here in the Schloss area, and again in the pedestrian zone. Hope you get some calls or business from these!

Stuttgart - part 2

After nearly collapsing at the top of the tower due to exhaustion, we headed down to the area of the Schloss. There was a neat exhibit of friendship bears from countries around the world - the kids really liked looking at all of them.