10 JUL - Final Day (Day 33)

Today was my last day as a tourist. Tomorrow, I am a traveller and then it is back into the world of corporate BDUs.

I have to say that this lovely lady helped keep me awake last night as I was updating the blog. I listened to the ol' IPod and kept this on mute.


Here is a shot of my room here in A'dam. My bag seemed to have exploded over the desk. I was very grateful that Zaccheus had purchased snacks on our way back to Weimar. I had a hankerin' for some last night and I had plenty from which to choose.


The hotel where I am staying has the most lovely dining room. The breakfast is a bit expensive so I have been skipping most mornings.


I took a bus tour to nearby town call Edam. It was a nice opportunity to see the countryside and an operating windmill.

This gentleman was one of the tour guides for one of the other tours. I liked the way he dressed and that he was smoking a cigar. I don't terribly like cigars but it annoyed the hell out of this REALLY annoying New York lady. Instead of asking politely if the cigar smoker would move, she so rudely asked if it was absolutely necessary for a cigar that early in the morning. It's people like her that give Americans a bad name abroad.


This lake is man made. A dike was built around it and over the course of a couple years it went from a salt water body to a fresh water body. I was very impressed with that.


We took a walking tour of Edam. I guess there is an Edam cheese for which the region is known. We saw some lovely houses along the canals though as well. I really liked the covered gazebo that this one had.


I loved the garden that this house had. The drawbridge and the garden and the canal were all so picturesque. It looked like a postcard.


I would love to live on a canal like this. It reminds me of living on a canal off of a lake in northern Indiana.


As we continued walking through Edam, I was surprised at how small some of these houses were and I'm sure that they aren't cheap. I guess you build what is necessary and what you can afford.


This little girl was really funny. I think the combination of sunglasses and fooler is an excellent choice for babies this summer. She was a pretty good through the tour, no crying or anything. Actually, her parents were the ones holding up everyone at the end of tour. I guess they can't tell time since the tour guide said to be at the bus at 13:00 and they weren't there. They must be special.


This row of house faced a lovely garden. I'm not sure that I could live in a row house though. They tend to transmit sound and I'm sure that I would be annoying to my neighbours with my odd hours and they would be annoying to me by playing Top 40 pop music all the time.


After the tour through Edam, we hopped on the bus again and made our way to a little town called Saen Chans. It is a little village dedicated to preserving traditional Dutch culture in wooden shoes, cheese and windmills. On the way there, I saw this road sign. I think the street department in this area was inspired by the road sign in MASH.


It takes 3 - 4 hours to make a pair of wooden shoes by hand. It only takes 3 - 5 minutes with machines as this gentleman is showing. They are made from very green poplar. So green that at the end of the creation process, he blew into the inside of the shoe and water literally ran out. I'm thinking of purchasing a pair of these shoes online just to wear around the house.


These people can really crank out the shoes. It seemed that they had every color and decoration. Most of these probably aren't hand painted but the shear number on display was staggering.


A lot of people were having fun with this huge wooden shoe outside of the shoe factory. It reminded of the poem about the old woman who lived in a shoe. If I had had my photo buddies, we could definitely had some good times with this. You could play race car or white water rafting.


I have been including pictures of my feet in different locations. I couldn't help myself with this one. You know what they say, big feet ... big shoes. Another chap was striking some very sexy poses with these boats. It was quite humorous.


I caught site of this chicken just outside of the cheese making display house. I thought to myself, "I always wondered how they made cheese." I guess you just squeeze a chicken and, voila, cheese. Those little cheese ball are pretty tough though. The milkmaid beat the hell out of one and it didn't break. That doesn't make it anymore appetizing. There were samples of cheeses available.


Someone did a real number here. I took a shot of this in homage to my Uncle Jim. I thought I should hop in and help with my extensive knowledge of pulley and tackle physics but I didn't think that they would be amused. They finally got it unstuck though.


I couldn't understand why these people would stand RIGHT behind a stuck truck as it is being pulled out of the mud. I always try to make a point to stand near a 7ton truck that might jerk out of the mud at any moment. Dumba**.


There were two operating windmills in this little town. I am definitely going to have to do some research on the inner workings of these things. It's so impressing to see such a complex piece of machinery still operating for over 400 years.


Compared to the other two windmills, this one was definitely dressing with style. I bet the other two windmills were talking amongst themselves wondering how the neighborhood could go to he** so quickly.


Here are the millstones at work. I HAVE to figure out how they got these 2 x 5000kg stones up there. What an amazing feat.


Here is the gearing and control mechanism of the windmill. It's like looking at oversized model of a car engine.


I took a picture of this guy to give you a relative sense of the proportion of a windmill. I never knew how big they were.


The surrounding farm lands and canals were so serene. All I needed was an easy chair and a glass of lemonade. I could have sat there for hours watchin' the big chickens (read cows) munch on grass getting ready to make cheese.


I'm going to hit the sack now. I have to be up in a few hours to make my way to the airport. I hoped you liked Knuckles travels in the Dutch countryside!

Packed, racked and ready to make tracks!


Knuckles

09 JUL - Trekkin' (Day 32)

Well, I'm back and with some pictures this time. Sorry about the last couple of posts. I just didn't really do anything exciting and I didn't take any photos.

Here is a picture of the square in front of my hotel. Bicycles are VERY big in Amsterdam. They even had their own roads.



Here is a picture of the same square from my room. This square is a natural gathering place for people watchers, students, street musicians and protesters. There always seems to be an interesting mix of these different type of people in the square and I mean ALWAYS. I can see why the management of the hotel provide ear plugs for their guests. It doesn't bother me though. The curtains work VERY well and I have slept very well here.


Today, I took a long walk to the Rijksmuseum (read rikes-museum). Along the way, I snagged a few shots that I think you will enjoy. I'm sorry for the impersonal nature of the photos but I thought you might enjoy them anyway.

I would be SO afraid to park my car this near to the canal without a guard rail. I used to be a pretty good at parallel parking but this would be a hard lesson to learn trial by fire.


I really liked the look of this beautiful canal with the standard tour boats. Canal boats are a big tourist business in A'dam. They sit low in the water, are about 45-50 feet long and have glass roofs.


In case you didn't know, most of A'dam is built on pylons. They reclaimed a lot of space from the sea but the ground isn't strong enough to hold the buildings so they use pylons. Overtime though the buildings start to sink. This one is a classic example. What I find interesting, is that the people accept the sinking and have custom windows made to match a home at a skewed angle.


I took a nice walk down to the National Museum. Once I came across the bridge, I was awed by the immensity of the building itself. It is currently undergoing renovation but the is still a very impressive building.



Since most of the building is under construction, they also have limited the number of exhibits. I will definitely have to come back in a few years and visit again. I seemed to be chasing a LARGE group of Asians through the museum. I tried to keep ahead of them so I could stand close to the paintings but they always seemed to catch up with me. Curses! I haven't ever really paid attention to art before. I was awe with the method by which most of the paintings in the museum were made, oil on panel. I could barely see any brush strokes. I can hardly imagine the amount of practice it would take to be able to paint the still lifes that I saw with such attention to detail.

Once I finished a nice tour through the museum, I took a few minutes in the park behind the museum. There are several art museums in the area in including the Van Gogh museum. I'm not a big fan of his work so I didn't go to that museum. Sorry to disappoint those art fans out there.


As I was sitting on a bench, I kept hearing these bing-bongs, kind of like church bells. Behind me was a small playground and one of the pieces of equipment was some kind of buried musical instrument. The kids would jump on a certain section of the square and a single note be struck. It is a really cool idea. I caught this kid in mid-song.


I also had a good time watching these kids and their dog play in the fountain. I am always amazed at a dog's tenacity. He might have been tired but he was magically impelled to continue chasing the ball into the middle of the fountain.


Willow trees always make me feel relaxed. They look so relaxed themselves and, in the fall, they always seem to have a hazy look due to the cotton balls that they release. This park across the canal looked like a nice play to relax away from the hustle and bustle of a typical day in the office.


The normal canal boats are nice but I was enticed by these bigger boats. They seemed more classic and old school.


Being a connoisseur of beer, I was obligated to take this picture since I was so close.


I so wish that I had had a partner in crime when I came across this sculpture. We could have had some real fun. My immediate impression was that it was a goalie jumping for a goal. It could also have been someone to spoon with. Alas, my picture buddies were thousands of miles away.


I really liked this little street. There seemed to be more foliage along this street than most others. I appreciate foliage. That's why I let my yard grow so tall at home.


After my little jaunt to the museum and back, I had a nice nap in preparation for tonight's BIG MATCH, France v Italy. I have been getting 8 - 9 hours of sleep a day so I don't understand why I needed a nap. I'm not going to argue though.

I thought it was an AWESOME game even though France lost. France controlled the ball a lot but they couldn't seem to put the ball in the net. I think the first mistake they made was taking Ribery out of the game and then taking Henry out of the game. Of course, the problems were exacerbated when Zizou was ejected although that was head-butt to the chest was INCREDIBLE! It's too bad that the line judge saw it. I was disheartened as I made my way back to the hotel.

Even though we were miles and miles away from any World Cup stadium or Italy, there were still Italian fans to celebrate the victory. I grabbed the camera and made my way into the square to see what was happening.

I really liked what the camera caught on this one. It shows the Italian fans in the background but a couple of French fans walked into the frame at the very end of the exposure time giving a ghost image of France fans over the Italian fans in the background.


Long exposure times are fun. Here is one. There were several scooters circling the Italian fans. You can only see their light trails though. I thought that was fab.



There weren't really that many but they could sure make a lot of noise.

Here is a picture of my hotel from the square at night. As you can see by looking at the monument in the middle, there are plenty of opportunities for fun photos here.


I'm going to sign-off for the night. I'm off on a tour of the country side tomorrow so I should have some nice landscape shots for you. Maybe I will find a photo buddy so I can provide those classic Knuckles' photos that you have come to expect. After the tour, I need to return the truck. It is just sitting in the garage racking up parking fees. I'll just take a taxi to the airport on Tuesday. Type at you tomorrow evening!

Rockin' and rollin' all night
and partying every day!

Knuckles (woo-hoo!)

07/08 JUL - Pulled over ... again (Day 30/31)

The last two days would be very boring to explain. After I checked out of the hotel in Frankfurt, I spent a couple of hours in the lobby updating the blog. I had paid for 24 hours so I was going to do all that I could. I hope that you enjoyed the updates. After that I drove to Amsterdam.

There is nothing exciting to explain about the drive to Amsterdam except for one thing. Just as I passed the border, I got pulled over ... again. Luckily, I wasn't speeding. It was apparent from the traffic that the speed limit was enforced in the Netherlands. I noticed that there were two motorcycle cops on the side of the road. As I passed them, I knew I was in trouble when I saw one of them start up his motorcycle. I knew he was after me. Sure enough, I saw the flashing sign "VOLGEN". Lucky for me it was just border patrol and they were doing random checks. Of course, they pulled ME over because they didn't recognize the plates. All they did was check my passport. If I had had someone with me, I would asked them to take a picture but, alas, I was alone.

I got lucky in finding the hotel. Unlike most old German cities, I was able to drive right to the hotel with no problems. I parked the car in the lot and parked myself in the hotel.

The only thing I did the first 2 days was go on a canal tour of Amsterdam. It was nice since I was able to get my bearings in the city. Couple of interesting facts for you about A'dam. The city is build on the river Amstel hence the name of the dam. There are over 1000 bridges and 100 km of canals. If you looked at a map of A'dam, you might almost think that the canals are the streets. Actually, most of the streets run perpendicular to the canals since the roads have to cross the bridges.

Tomorrow, I am planning on doing a little more tourist kind of things.


Poised and ready to rock in A'dam.

Knuckles

06 JUL - Another marathon day (Day 29)

There really wasn't anything separating today from yesterday. We didn't get back to Weimar until 10PM last night. That means that I got to see the last of the France v Portugal match. Zizou ROCKS!

After the match though, we had some serious packing and cleaning to do. Zaccheus was by far the most experienced packer that I have ever seen. She had her stuff packed in less than an hour it seemed. I couldn't believe how much she was able to pack into those 2 bags. After she was done, she helped me pack. I wasn't leaving as soon as they were but I could leave most of it packed and just put my dirty clothes in the bags at the very end. I really appreciated her help.

Not only did we have to pack but we had some cleaning to do. We didn't really have to cleanse anything. We just had to clean out the refrigerator really. Zaccheus was upset at how much food we throwing into the bin. I didn't think it was that much really. All we really had was a couple of bottles of jelly and Nutella and some packages of meat and cheese. All of our empty bottles we put in a bag so that the owners could get the deposit for them.

Rocco was lucky that Tah Dah was there to pack for him. He spent the entire evening trying to guarantee a flight today. He had already transferred his flight to London -> Chicago so now he had to get to London. He bought a flight on Orbitz but wasn't going to be able to verify until later this morning.

I think everyone got to sleep around 02:00 and we had to be on the road around 06:30. Luckily, we had put the big bags in the truck before we went to sleep. The REAL excitement happened at 06:00. I was carrying a bag to the car. Everyone was outside the apartment. As I stepped out the door, the door closed. The bad thing about that was EVERYONE was outside and ALL the keys were on the inside. I had really stepped in it. Of course, our apartment was on the 3rd floor so there was NO way we could crawl into an open window. I even looked for a ladder but to no avail. The only option was to start knocking on the door of the owners.

It took about 10 minutes to get their attention. Zaccheus was the one ringing the bell which I think did the trick. They immediately took her to the SECOND FLOOR apartment. Ooops! They caught on rather quickly though. Thank goodness that Rocco and I had left a key with them.

Disaster averted, we were on our way. Of course, no one ate any breakfast. There were still some bread, cheese and meat available but I think everyone just wanted to get on the road.

We had to drop Rocco at the airport first. His possible flight was at 11:30 so we made sure he was there at 09:00. So I left him and then took the girls to the other terminal. I didn't think that they were going to have any problems since they had a confirmed flight at 14:00. They could maybe catch an early flight on stand-by. I went back to Terminal 1 to make sure that Rocco got on his flight. I was really surprised that BA (British Airlines, not Bad A**) confirmed that Rocco had made his flight to London. I was on my own.

This is when it gets boring. I went to a hotel in downtown Frankfurt, checked in and stayed in the hotel for the next 24 hours. Boring but just fine by me!


Foot loose and fancy free in Germany!

Knuckles (a little dragging)

05 JUL - Flats in the Belfry - (Day 28)

Today was kind of the capstone of our Germany tourism. Munich is in the heart of Bavaria. When most people think of German culture, they think of Bavarian culture. This is where the traditional dress is lederhosen. In addition, this is where the yearly Oktoberfest is held.

We started our trip by going downtown to Marienplatz. This is where a very famous clock tower is. It's called the Glockenspiel. At 11:00, 12:00 and 17:00, it plays an elaborate show. Here is a shot of the clock tower and also picture of the clock tower and beautiful statue in the middle of the square.



As we were watching the Glockenspiel, I noticed that some of the bells were out of tune. It's kind of surprising.

I did see Spike Lee in the crowd though. He was alone which seemed odd. If he wasn't Spike Lee then he was a very good impersonator.

After the performance at the Marienplatz, we went to the local department store, Kaufhof, for some shopping. I wanted to pick-up CDs of the songs that we had been hearing on the radio. I'd like to make a DVD collage of our photos including music. I was able to find all of the songs but one. I have to tell you. Zaccheus is a shopping master. I think that she has found gifts for everyone on her Christmas list in the last 2 days.

Next, we started walking toward the locatin of the bus tours. Since we didn't have a lot of time to find the highlights ourselves this seemed like a good thing to do. As we were walking we saw several painted lions. I think that Munich did the same sort of fund-raising thing that a lot of cities have done but they did it with lions.



Just across from the bus was the Palace of Justice. I thought that it looked more like the Hall of Justice. Any minute, I expected Aquaman to come running out of the front and sending out those sounds waves to the whales in the river.


The bus tour was very nice. Munich has so many different sites. There are very historic buildings and very new art buildings. It's all very impressive.


These arches were built by father of King Ludwig II. It must be nice to have enough money to build something like that.


This very intimidating building is for the top college students in Munich. They are provided housing, spending money and new shoes every year.


After the bus tour, we made our way to another of Munich's landmarks, Hofbrauhaus. HB is one of the main beer makers during Oktoberfest. Zaccheus and I decided to take the train back towards HB and Rocco and Tah Dah took a taxi. I thought that we could beat them but we got lost once we got off the train.

HB was full of Portugal fans. Of course, they were celebrating their win the previous night. This nice French fan had the moxy to walk through the crowd and shsh the crowd.


Here are couple of photos of one of the rooms in HB.



Here is a picture of your jolly host to prove that I was really there!


After our jolly adventures in Munich, we made our way to Weimar. Rocco decided to cut his vacation short so we had to swing through Weimar to gather his stuff. He was going to fly out of Frankfurt at the same time as the girls.


Beginning a long day,

Knuckles