London

London itself is a very nice place to visit.  I don’t know if maybe I was just missing hearing the English language.  While there I did the bus tour that take you to all the hot spots.  This one had a boat river cruise also.   The main attractions to London was to see Buckingham Palace.  This is where the Queen works Monday through Friday.  I got to see the changing of the Guards a couple times.  Once was in the evening when there was no one around.  It didn’t have the big calibration with the band, and all the formalities but it was still neat to see.  The next day I went to the main one and there were tons of people there to see it.  

The Westminster Abbey is the church where all the royals get crowned to be king or queen.  Most recently it is where Prince William and Kate got married.  

The Tower Bridge is what I thought was London Bridge but it isn’t.  Actually London Bridge is just a plane bridge and despite popular belief its not falling down.  HaHa.    

The Tower of London or “Her Majesty’s Royal Palace and Fortress” is the original home of the Royal Families dating back to 1066. It has been used as an armory, a prison, a treasury, the home of the Royal Mint, a public records office, and the home of the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom.  

Big Ben and the House of Parliament is where the government of England works.  

London Stock Exchange

The London Eye, located on the River Thanes, was built to calibrate the new century in 2000 and was suppose to be torn down after 5 years t but it has been a big hit and all day long I saw lines to get on it. They say there are approximately 3.5 million people ride it a year.   It is 443 feet tall, is continuous moving, and it takes 30 minutes to travel one revolution around it.

The London Cabs are very unique and something to see.  The only strange thing is they along with all the rest of the people drive on the wrong side of the road.

Trip to London Part 1

I decided seeing I have never been to England to take a trip over there on one of the four day weekends that we have in Germany.   I figure it’s a much shorter trip from Germany than it is from the United States.  I flew into London and that is where I stayed.  I took a bus tour on my first full day there.  It was a guided tour that went to Windsor Castle, Stonehenge, and to the town of Bath.  This tour left at 8 am and from where I was staying it was a hour and twenty journey to the point of departure.  Once there we loaded up on a double decker bus and headed off to Windsor Castle.  This was about a 45 minute bus ride and the guide we had really enjoyed his work and talked almost the whole time.  He was very informative and had lots of stories some relevant and some just because I think he liked to talk.  The castle quite interesting especially seeing it is still used as the weekend getaway for the queen.  (for more pictures and description go to Windsor Castle ) 

We toured us around the yard of the castle.  It was very nice and we learned that if the royal flag was flying that meant the queen was on the grounds.  There are two living areas in the castle one is where the queen lives and the other is where the public gets to see this is called the state rooms.   The first area you get to go into was the doll house room.  This doll house was a replica of the castle.  They made it to such an exact that it had running water in the faucets, gas combustion engines in the cars.  They didn’t allow any pictures to be taken in this area but it was definitely something to see.  Its hard  to imagine a doll house with all those things but yes it was there. (for more description and picture see the following: Doll house  1, Doll House 2 )

The next area that we got to see was the  State rooms.  There were at least 50 rooms that  had tons of pictures, antiques, and guns.  They had rooms and rooms full of guns that were displayed in an artwork arrangement.  It was something to see. ( See the link for pictures of the state rooms:   State Room Pictures )

Then we got back on the bus and took another 45 minute drive to a pub for lunch.  I got to sit with the rest of the singles and shared stories of what we were doing and why we were there.  It was interesting to hear the stories.  One was from Australia, one from Philippines, one from US except his folks were from Taiwan, and me.  Then from there it was only a 10 minute ride to Stonehenge. (For information about it click on the link Stonehenge )  This is in a big open field with a bunch or rock in it.  It was suprising to see how many people were actually there.  At the site as part of your admission you were given a cell phone type devise that would give you the history of it and theories of what it was used for.  The big thing that got me is that it was build way before the invention of the wheel but the rock had to be hauld some 250 miles to this point and lifted into place.  They said some of the rocks weighed 50 tons.

 This is what they think it looked like way back when.

Then the last stop we made was the town of Bath.  This town had a river running through it with a waterfall and a bridge.  It had an old church and it was most famous for its hot spring baths that were used from the romans days.  We didn’t get to tour the baths (For information on the town of Bath see this link Bath

Then was for the ride home.  It was a 2 ½ hour bus ride through the England county.  In all this tour took about 11 hours.  I think the guide talked for all time on the way back as well.  Then I went for a walk in London to see some of the sights with the lights on it.  The it was off to the “tube” (subway) and walked back to my hotel for the night.  I think I actually got back to the hotel about 12:30 at night.  Very long fun filled day.

Heidelberg

A few Sunday’s ago I took a hour drive to a town called Heidelberg..  I found this destination from a book that I got called “Daytrips in Germany: 50 one day adventures”.  This book is pretty good because it tells you about the city history, what the highlights are, and a walking tour map.  This town has a market square, a couple of churches, a castle, and a bridge.  The walk started out by walking past the oldest University in Germany it dates back to 1686.  There have been expansions but it was still a very small school.  There are stories about the school jail.  This is where the school rowdies who got to spend anywhere from one to five weeks on bread and water for their misdeeds.  Actually serving time was considered a mark of honor and given the cleverness of the student the water usually turned out to be beer.  As the story is told.

  I walked by a few churches that were nice but not to the grand scale as I have seen on other trips but this one called the church of the Holy Ghost.  It was built in the 15^th century and made it through all the wars.  The interesting fact about this church is that from 1705 to 1936 it was both a protestant and catholic church with the two faiths being separated by a wall.  On the outside of the church you can see the merchant’s stalls that have been in use since the medieval days.

  I got to the base of the hill that the castle was on and had two choices, go up a long winding trail or go up the stairs.  I picked the stairs.  When I finally got to the top I saw on the side of the steps that they had a number and I was on 315.  Not to bad but defiantly a workout.  The castle had a great view of the city and had some interesting things to see from the courtyard to the world’s largest wine cast.

I walked down the winding trail and walked along the Neckar river to one of the old bridges. 

I am always surprised to see how many people are out walking around on a Sunday when there are no shops open but there are bakeries and coffee shops that are open.

Heidelberg

This past Sunday I took a hour drive to a town called Heidelberg..  I found this destination from a book that I got called “Daytrips in Germany: 50 one day adventures”.  This book is pretty good because it tells you about the city history, what the highlights are, and a walking tour map.  This town has a market square, a couple of churches, a castle, and a bridge.  The walk started out by walking past the oldest University in Germany it dates back to 1686.  There have been expansions but it was still a very small school.  There are stories about the school jail.  This is where the school rowdies who got to spend anywhere from one to five weeks on bread and water for their misdeeds.  Actually serving time was considered a mark of honor and given the cleverness of the student the water usually turned out to be beer.  As the story is told.

  I walked by a few churches that were nice but not to the grand scale as I have seen on other trips but this one called the church of the Holy Ghost.  It was built in the 15^th century and made it through all the wars.  The interesting fact about this church is that from 1705 to 1936 it was both a protestant and catholic church with the two faiths being separated by a wall.  On the outside of the church you can see the merchant’s stalls that have been in use since the medieval days. 

  I got to the base of the hill that the castle was on and had two choices, go up a long winding trail or go up the stairs.  I picked the stairs.  When I finally got to the top I saw on the side of the steps that they had a number and I was on 315.  Not to bad but defiantly a workout.  The castle had a great view of the city and had some interesting things to see from the courtyard to the world’s largest wine cast.

I walked down the winding trail and walked along the Neckar river to one of the old bridges.  I am always surprised to see how many people are out walking around on a Sunday afternoon.

House Concert

This past Saturday night I was invited to go to a house concert.  I was interested to see if this was going to be like in the college days when a band would play in the back yard until the cops came and broke up the party.  Well it wasn't it was at a guys apartment and he had food and drinks and I ended up talking to his Dad for the longest time.  He worked at a company that makes breweries and he was telling me about the many times he went to St. Louis to the Budweiser plants.  He told me a joke that he said was told to him by the head of Budweiser at the time.  It goes like this:  Do you know what a couple having sex in a canoe and American beer have in common?  Answer is they are both f*cking close to water.  Everyone got a big chuckle out of that.  The people (about 25-35) at the party were all very nice and talked to me so that I felt comfortable.  When the music started it was a two person band with the vocals all being done by Joanna Chapman-Smith.  She is from Canada and is touring Europe right now. 
http://www.myspace.com/joannacs
and listen to some of her music.  If you hit play on the first one it will play all six of the songs.  They played all of these at the concert.

They played for about an hour then took a break so we could go fill up our beers and then they played for about another hour.  As you can see from the pictures it was a very quaint setting.  This ended up being a lot of fun.

Apartment

Now that I have lived in Germany for 5 months and have been in my apartment for about 3 ½ months it is time to show it off.  Ok its nothing special but it works.  I live in an apartment complex that has three other apartments.  On my floor is an older gentleman from Poland.  He is in the same situation as me.  His family and friends are in Poland but the work is here.  The only difference is he told me that in a few months he is going to Singapore for a year.  The apartment above me is occupied by a single mom and her 15 year old daughter.  They are all nice but we don’t see each other but maybe once a week if we are leaving at the same time.  So the apartment is about 310 square feet based on me pacing it off and not counting the coat closet.  The main room when you come in from the common entrance is the kitchen/dinning room/living room.

The kitchen has a two cook top burners, a sink, a college dorm room size refrigerator, and a toaster oven.  Everything works but it took some time getting use to.  The refrigerator doesn’t have a freezer in it but I have learned that if I put things to the back and on the bottom they will actually freeze.

The living area is nice now that I negotiated a larger TV.  I have this set up so I can watch movies through it.  It also has a door that goes out to a deck that it nice.

The bed room bed is ok.  I did bring some sheets and blankets from back home.  The ones that were on it and normal for Germany were a couple of inches short all the way around.  Closet space is limited but I added a few storage boxes to help out in that area.

The bathroom is nice.  It has everything that you would need.  It is also where the washer is located.  The washers in Germany are a bit different than in the USA.  They run a lot longer,  the shortest wash I have found has been about 40 minutes with the normal one for cotton is 1 hour and 30 minutes.  They don’t have dryers so everything is line dried.  This took a little getting use to, you just have to plan better and don’t think you’re going to wash something and wear it that day.  

The nice thing is it is only 10 minutes to get to work and the shopping area is close by too.  It has some nice area to go walking.