Friday, May 13
It was interesting to see the sunrise above the clouds as we headed across the Atlantic Ocean. Don’t know when it became Friday technically but I’m sure it was somewhere along the way. Breakfast was served about an hour before we landed – croissant, yogurt, orange juice. We could see the Irish and British countryside by this time, and landed at London Heathrow about 9 a.m. local time. Must confess to a faux pas – thought the blankets and pillows were complimentary and disposable, so told Steve we might as well take ours, at least the blankets, because they were just going to throw them away anyway. Not sure where that idea popped into my head as we noticed that night at the hotel that there were tags attached that said “Property of American Airlines. Please do not remove from aircraft.” Oops.
At Heathrow, we had to change terminals, from terminal 3 to terminal 5. That involved a shuttle bus and our only chance to technically be on British soil other than an airport terminal. Once at terminal 5, we had to go through security again. Had to send my bag of electronics through again but it went ok.
Next stop was the shops – I really wanted to get a William and Kate souvenir as the wedding was just two weeks ago. Ended up with three souvenirs – two commemorative tins and a commemorative wedding magazine. One tin had Walker shortbread in it, the other has tea. Fun to see the British foods and expressions again after two years away. Told Steve we should plan on some London time next trip…if I’d planned this a bit better maybe our layover could have been long enough for a short tour of London. Oh well.
Another case of hurry up and wait – we ate shortbread, drank coke/diet coke, people watched (me) and slept (Steve.) Our gate was finally announced and we made the (thankfully) short distance to the gate. We were again allowed to pre-board because of Steve’s cane, and settled in for an hour’s flight to Frankfurt. A good portion of the passengers were German, so interesting to hear all the conversations, not understanding much but still interesting. The kid behind me kept kicking the seat, I wanted to turn around and say, “Halten sie, bitte” but wasn’t quite sure it was the right German phrase to get him to stop so didn’t. Knew he was German from listening to his conversation with the parents.
By the time we hit the ground in Frankfurt I needed a bathroom. Of course we had a really long taxi to the terminal, and bumpy too. What fun. Not. Needless to say the first thing we did when we finally got off the plane was to find a bathroom. After that we went through immigration, then walked through the customs area marked “nothing to declare” and there was nobody to declare nothing to, so we walked on through. Went to the main area and discovered we needed to take a shuttle bus to terminal 1 to get to the train that would take us to downtown Frankfurt. Did all that, then had to figure out the ticket machine (with the help of a woman who knew English) and buy train tickets. They never did collect them, Steve said we could have ridden for free, but I reminded him that they can and do check and it would be a big fine if we were caught. An uneventful trip downtown, then walking through the train station and down a block or two to our hotel, the Hotel Europa.
For 56 euros we got a small room with two double beds, a bathroom, TV, wireless internet, and breakfast. Not too bad for downtown Frankfurt. By this time Steve admitted that he was getting a cold despite his best efforts to stave it off. Apparently it’s been going around work….bummer. And it was classic Steve attitude, “I shouldn’t have come, it’s going to suck because I have a cold, etc.” to quote him. I know some of it was not feeling well, being disappointed because of that, and being tired from the long trip. After dropping off our stuff (did I mention we were on the 7th floor?) we went back to the train station for something to eat. Steve decided he wanted Burger King and that’s what we got. Would have liked something a bit more authentically German but choose your battles, right?
After dinner, I tried to find a geocache that was located at the train station. No luck. GPSr never got a great signal because of all the buildings, and there were a lot of people around. And when I turned back around the corner, the Poliezi were talking with someone. About what, I don’t know. But didn’t feel it would be wise to continue to poke around. So we went back to the hotel. Steve went pretty much right to sleep in our non air conditioned, no screen on the window room. Thankfully it cooled down. I decided to try to stay awake until the normal time for German bedtime and managed to last until 9:30 p.m., watching British CNN and working on the Ipod. The code that I was given for wifi only worked on one computer so I was out of luck on the netbook. Suppose I could have gone down and gotten another but I was just too tired to deal with it.
Slept about 4 hours until Steve woke up, miserable because of his cold. That woke me up and I was afraid I wouldn’t get back to sleep but managed and got in another 3 hours or so.
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
May 12 - Thursday
May 12 Thursday
Leaving day! I woke up at 4:30 a.m. – after watching most of a movie with Eric and not going to bed until after midnight. Made for a very short night! Last minute packing, and waiting for a check from Dad C’s fund so we could take care of Heather Hills payment. UPS brought the check, then shortly afterwards we left, first for the bank then for Heather Hills. Then a short stop at the insurance place to do some paperwork, and then a stop at Steak & Shake as Steve was hungry. We went inside and it was senior day – at both ends of the spectrum! There was a tour group from a nursing home taking up one very long table, and shortly joined by a group of seniors – class of 2011 – at the adjoining long tables together. Pretty weird! Then on to the airport. Eric hung around until we were through security, then he went home to Max.
We had a couple of hours to wait until we boarded our plane. There was another flight at the same gate, which was delayed in leaving because of weather in Dallas, so our plane didn’t get a jetway and we had to walk out to the plane. Did get priority boarding because Steve decided to bring the only weapon he could – a cane. Which meant he had to use the thing. Really dumb in my mind but it was his choice. And I know he was motivated by trying to protect us.
Flight to Chicago was short and uneventful. Then a four hour layover in Chicago. First realization that those suitcases are HEAVY! Our arrival gate was close to the USO club – so thought we’d make the attempt to go in since we were headed to see Scott. The guy actually let us into the adjoining American Airlines lounge. We spent a peaceful hour and a half there, much quieter than in the actual airport areas. Finally left as we were getting bored. Walked to the next terminal to see the Butch O’Hare exhibit, then stopped for food – Steve got a sub and I got a pina colada smoothie. Then down to Gate K16 and another wait. Finally got on the plane and got settled in.
Nice entertainment system on the plane – could choose from about 8 movies, TV shows, games, and music. Also a button to show where the plane was at the time. Drink and snack served shortly after takeoff, then dinner not too long after that. We had beef and mashed potatoes, a salad, roll, cheese and crackers, then a brownie for dessert.
Later, most of the passengers settled down for a nap, including Steve. I tried but no go, even using my first class sleeper and eye shades, as well as soft music playing on my Ipod. You’d think after only four hours the night before….
Sunday, May 15, 2011
Thursday, May 12, 2011
Here we go!
It's May 12, 2011. We are sitting at gate B3 at Gerald R. Ford International Airport, Grand Rapids, MI. Waiting to depart for Chicago on the first leg of our trip to Germany! We're packed, repacked, and packed again. I don't think we've forgotten anything...
Steve is sleeping right now, and I am (obviously) using my computer. We should start boarding in about 20 minutes. An uneventful morning, tying together loose ends, then Eric took us to the airport. Now his bonding time with Max begins - ha-ha! That is the greatest gift he could give us, seriously, the freedom to be able to travel.
He seems hopeful about his appeal, BTW. And we're going to look at him going over on his own trip to see Scott this summer, if that works out with both of them.
But for now, here we go!!!!!!!!
Steve is sleeping right now, and I am (obviously) using my computer. We should start boarding in about 20 minutes. An uneventful morning, tying together loose ends, then Eric took us to the airport. Now his bonding time with Max begins - ha-ha! That is the greatest gift he could give us, seriously, the freedom to be able to travel.
He seems hopeful about his appeal, BTW. And we're going to look at him going over on his own trip to see Scott this summer, if that works out with both of them.
But for now, here we go!!!!!!!!
Monday, May 9, 2011
It's Plan A! (A.2 anyway)
It's plan A as we leave in just three days for Germany. Scott made a quick call yesterday to wish me a happy Mothers Day and gave me the best present - his presence in Spangdahlem! Didn't have time to find out many details, but he's back and that means we're headed for Spang on Saturday, after arriving in Frankfurt Friday night and picking up the car Saturday morning. (Really too late to start messing with the rental details at this point, plus with jet lag we're better off getting a night's sleep first.)
I wrote "A.2" since we have pretty much decided to make one minor change - we had talked about visiting the spa at Baden-Baden after watching the Rick Steves video where he went. We'd been talking about changing those plans for several reasons, and knowing we're going to see Scott has made that decision easier. We'll now start off for the Black Forest on Monday morning instead of Sunday morning, and get to spend the whole weekend with Scott. He'll be in a training class starting Friday anyway, so his weekday time will be quite limited. We're heading down to the Alps from the Black Forest, and will be gone about a week or so then headed back up Scott's way to spend the remainder of the time with him, as much as his class will allow anyway.
We both have our toiletry bags packed and the plan tonight is to work on the suitcases. Steve hasn't flown since before 9-11 and so the 3-1-1 bag was a new thing for him...thankfully now we'll have access to the commissary at Spang so he can buy bigger sizes of shampoo, shaving cream, etc.
My Tuesday night scout dinner was cancelled so that frees up some badly needed free time to get stuff done. We are done, too, with getting Dad's house ready for the remodeling to begin. So these last few days can be concentrated on getting ready for the trip. Our house is still looking like a storage warehouse, but that will be remedied slowly but surely when we return.
Did I write that it's only three days until we leave? : )
I wrote "A.2" since we have pretty much decided to make one minor change - we had talked about visiting the spa at Baden-Baden after watching the Rick Steves video where he went. We'd been talking about changing those plans for several reasons, and knowing we're going to see Scott has made that decision easier. We'll now start off for the Black Forest on Monday morning instead of Sunday morning, and get to spend the whole weekend with Scott. He'll be in a training class starting Friday anyway, so his weekday time will be quite limited. We're heading down to the Alps from the Black Forest, and will be gone about a week or so then headed back up Scott's way to spend the remainder of the time with him, as much as his class will allow anyway.
We both have our toiletry bags packed and the plan tonight is to work on the suitcases. Steve hasn't flown since before 9-11 and so the 3-1-1 bag was a new thing for him...thankfully now we'll have access to the commissary at Spang so he can buy bigger sizes of shampoo, shaving cream, etc.
My Tuesday night scout dinner was cancelled so that frees up some badly needed free time to get stuff done. We are done, too, with getting Dad's house ready for the remodeling to begin. So these last few days can be concentrated on getting ready for the trip. Our house is still looking like a storage warehouse, but that will be remedied slowly but surely when we return.
Did I write that it's only three days until we leave? : )
Friday, May 6, 2011
Six days and counting
It's now six days and counting until we leave for Germany. Will it be plan A - heading for Spangdahlem on Saturday (the 14th) or plan B -heading south towards the Black Forest? Time will tell.
Today was supposed to be get it organized day. Hasn't quite turned out that way as we finally connected with people to pick up the two couches and three air conditioners that we were giving away. So I'm now on my third trip into town, using wifi at the deli near Dad's house.
I have accomplished one major thing, though - been to the bank where my savings account from the first trip is, made sure my ATM card still works, then transferred money into it from our joint account so that it can be our primary ATM source for the trip. This was with Steve's blessing, this way if for some reason the account is compromised it doesn't touch our main funds. I also bought some Euros and have some Swiss Francs on order to pick up on Wednesday. It'll get us started anyway. Steve has called his credit card company - I still need to call mine - to advise that we will be using the cards out of the country.
So the major tasks still to do are to pack, and to make sure our travel information is organized. So what's on the agenda? Tomorrow I have a Wood Badge Staff meeting, thankfully only until 1 p.m. Then comes Mothers Day on Sunday. Monday I work all day, then need to go to the troop meeting and meet with a couple of scouts about a merit badge. Tuesday I also work all day, then we have our district awards dinner that night. Wednesday - I don't work, but I have a dentist appointment, so Max will be at the groomers while I'm getting my teeth "groomed" and then I'm going to Craig's Cruisers with the Awana kids for the book finishers party. Yeah, I know, insane the night before I leave, but it's long been on the schedule. Then Thursday we leave.
This weekend, I need to accomplish as much as possible. That means I'd better get off the internet and get home, eh? It's probable that my next post will be from an airport somewhere (we have about a five hour layover at O'Hare) so look forward to it!
Today was supposed to be get it organized day. Hasn't quite turned out that way as we finally connected with people to pick up the two couches and three air conditioners that we were giving away. So I'm now on my third trip into town, using wifi at the deli near Dad's house.
I have accomplished one major thing, though - been to the bank where my savings account from the first trip is, made sure my ATM card still works, then transferred money into it from our joint account so that it can be our primary ATM source for the trip. This was with Steve's blessing, this way if for some reason the account is compromised it doesn't touch our main funds. I also bought some Euros and have some Swiss Francs on order to pick up on Wednesday. It'll get us started anyway. Steve has called his credit card company - I still need to call mine - to advise that we will be using the cards out of the country.
So the major tasks still to do are to pack, and to make sure our travel information is organized. So what's on the agenda? Tomorrow I have a Wood Badge Staff meeting, thankfully only until 1 p.m. Then comes Mothers Day on Sunday. Monday I work all day, then need to go to the troop meeting and meet with a couple of scouts about a merit badge. Tuesday I also work all day, then we have our district awards dinner that night. Wednesday - I don't work, but I have a dentist appointment, so Max will be at the groomers while I'm getting my teeth "groomed" and then I'm going to Craig's Cruisers with the Awana kids for the book finishers party. Yeah, I know, insane the night before I leave, but it's long been on the schedule. Then Thursday we leave.
This weekend, I need to accomplish as much as possible. That means I'd better get off the internet and get home, eh? It's probable that my next post will be from an airport somewhere (we have about a five hour layover at O'Hare) so look forward to it!
Sunday, May 1, 2011
May day, May day
The title could be taken many ways. One, that it IS May 1st....another, that it is just 11 days until we leave for Germany. I think the most appropriate right now though is the state of affairs around here. Specifically the STUFF.
Since Steve's dad went into the nursing home, we've been working on getting his house ready for major updating - carpets, paint, fix basement walls, etc. That has taken up a lot of our time, and now the stuff is taking up a lot of our house. Some is very nice stuff, for sure. But other stuff is just meaningless. But Steve wants to save it all (or so it seems sometime.) I'm trying to help him understand that if he doesn't remember the story behind it or it doesn't have meaning to him, why do we need to hang on to it? It's working - a little - but we still hauled home a lot of stuff to go through yesterday. To top it off, we went over Friday night and found that the basement walls were leaking....and we had water on the floor. Yep, lots of boxes on the floor.... now the contents have been salvaged and the empty, wet boxes are out on the back deck waiting for next Saturday's Ada clean up day. Too many to go in our regular trash.
With all this, we decided it would be good to put our own funeral plans in place. So last Monday night, we met our "new neighbors" - picked out our plots in a nice little rural cemetery in the township. That's more than a little creepy in some respects, but to flip it up, guess it means we're doing ok together to be dealing with stuff like that.
Haven't done much with the trip with everything else going on. Driving me crazy to be this close and not feel so ready. I'm more ready than I think, I know, but still. And we don't know if Scott will be there or not. We have plan A and plan B in place, so we're ok either way, but would really like him back in Germany. Working on packing (mentally anyway) and all that stuff. Will have to take time to just sit down and get it all organized, plus the stuff like calling credit card companies, etc.
Have a new toy to help in the travel....finally bought an ipod touch. It has been wonderful so far. Much easier to check email and facebook. Just can't figure out how to do this blog on it. Think I'll still be taking this netbook because of the blog issues and downloading pictures.
Take a deep breath -- 11 days to go!
Since Steve's dad went into the nursing home, we've been working on getting his house ready for major updating - carpets, paint, fix basement walls, etc. That has taken up a lot of our time, and now the stuff is taking up a lot of our house. Some is very nice stuff, for sure. But other stuff is just meaningless. But Steve wants to save it all (or so it seems sometime.) I'm trying to help him understand that if he doesn't remember the story behind it or it doesn't have meaning to him, why do we need to hang on to it? It's working - a little - but we still hauled home a lot of stuff to go through yesterday. To top it off, we went over Friday night and found that the basement walls were leaking....and we had water on the floor. Yep, lots of boxes on the floor.... now the contents have been salvaged and the empty, wet boxes are out on the back deck waiting for next Saturday's Ada clean up day. Too many to go in our regular trash.
With all this, we decided it would be good to put our own funeral plans in place. So last Monday night, we met our "new neighbors" - picked out our plots in a nice little rural cemetery in the township. That's more than a little creepy in some respects, but to flip it up, guess it means we're doing ok together to be dealing with stuff like that.
Haven't done much with the trip with everything else going on. Driving me crazy to be this close and not feel so ready. I'm more ready than I think, I know, but still. And we don't know if Scott will be there or not. We have plan A and plan B in place, so we're ok either way, but would really like him back in Germany. Working on packing (mentally anyway) and all that stuff. Will have to take time to just sit down and get it all organized, plus the stuff like calling credit card companies, etc.
Have a new toy to help in the travel....finally bought an ipod touch. It has been wonderful so far. Much easier to check email and facebook. Just can't figure out how to do this blog on it. Think I'll still be taking this netbook because of the blog issues and downloading pictures.
Take a deep breath -- 11 days to go!
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