Dystopian Paradise

Two quick notes tonight, before I head off to bed. First, my first trip to Las Vegas was last month. Wow. What a crazy city. Afterwards, while still decompressing I ran into a friend who said that Las Vegas was a look at all of the American vices, and while I agree with him in principle, I found it very interesting that there were two things that were verboten in Las Vegas. First, prostitution. Sure, there are plenty of erotic dancers, and girlfriends for an evening, whatever you want to call it, but the fact is that the county Las Vegas sits in has made prostitution illegal, unlike most of the rest of the state of Nevada. Secondly, it turns out that while you can do just about anything else while gambling, saying the “F word” is not OK. Granted it was well past 2am, and we’d all had enough to drink to loosen up the tongues, but I was still very shocked at the response of the pit boss to two slips of the “F bomb.” Oh well, I guess they have to draw the line somewhere, right?

As for rediscovery, I have recently been introduced to two old friends by way of their blogs, and I can’t tell you how excited I am to continue to catch up on what they’ve been up to these last five years plus.  I cannot believe that Kassy & I have been here in Austin nearly five years already.  Time flies, and speaking of that, I have got to get to bed.

So I finally grabbed the hard drive (after losing it for a few days), and started uploading photo’s like crazy. The batch I uploaded tonight include shots from our time in Baden-Baden after Germany beat Argentina, traveling to Strasbourg to accidentally see the Tour de France, time in St. Goar & Lorelei with Andreas, and finally Heidelberg castle. These were the shots we tried to upload for the second batch during our trip.

Rather than do a shotgun of stories in this post, I’m just going to draw out one story for now. I may come back and tell others later, but for now, I want to talk about having the Tour de France dropped in our laps.

Originally, we had intended to travel to Baden-Baden for the day, and then in the evening move to Strasbourg, see a bit, and stay the night before traveling back to St. Goar to meet our friend Andreas. After arriving in Baden-Baden and relaxing in the mineral baths there for several hours, we came out just in time to catch the penalty kicks between Germany and Argentina. It was our first (of many) experience with European soccer celebrations. It was awesome! Basically, an instant parade erupted with cars, people, & flags. Here is where we learned of the first lessons on our trip. When there is soccer involved, don’t expect buses to run on time (or at all).

We met a charming German couple who showed us around while we waited for the buses to start back up, always thinking full well that we’d travel on to Strasbourg that night. Fortunately this was not to be. After having a wonderful dinner with this couple, we barely made it into the hostel in time, but made it all the same. The next morning we got up and headed for Strasbourg, however, when the train pulled into the station it seemed unusually full, especially considering the previous train, in the opposite direction had taken fans toward the Englad soccer match later that day.

None the less, we boarded the train and headed off. Here we met a young American family who lived in Frankfurt and were also travelling to Strasbourg, and happened to mention some of the hullaballoo regarding doping on the eve of the Tour. When we started chatting about the Tour, and the fact that we we’re from Austin, they pointed out to us the fact that we were in fact on our way (inadvertantly, and without any doing on our part) to the Tour de France.

So, after riding two extremely full, sweaty trains to Strasbourg, we got off, and set out to watch the prologue, which again couldn’t have worked out any better had we tried, because in that stage the riders are staggered by one minute intervals. This means that there is a consistent stream of riders passing by, no matter where you are.

Ultimately, however, this was just the first of many opportunities for God to reveal what we were learning by going on this trip. I’ll spend some more time really explaining what I mean by that soon, but suffice it to say for now, it changed our perception on a lot of things.

Got Kassy’s new computer, so now I can get some time to upload more pictures. Yeah, we’re way behind. Heck, I’ve been back 2 weeks now, and I haven’t even posted to say so. Oh well. I’m saying it now. I’ll post some photos tomorrow night.

‘Til then!

Internet cafes are common, but finding the time to stop is harder. We´re waiting for the Germany/Italy world cup game to start, so we thought we´d post an update. The link for the photos has been fixed, and new photos should be up shortly.

After several recommendations, we went to Baden-Baden and visited their spa. It is fed from natural hot springs, and it was a very nice relaxing day. That night Germany won the soccer match, moving on the quarter finals, and we were stuck in Baden-Baden celebrating the win. It was a very exciting evening.

We had planned to visit Strasbourg that night, but since we were stuck in Baden-Baden we put it off until the next day. Turns out the next day the Tour de France began in Strasbourg. It was very exciting, and a lot of fun to watch the prologue to the tour.

That night, we met up with an old friend from high school who now lives in Nuremberg. He met us in St. Goar, and the next day we visited Burg Rheinfels. At this castle they allow you to explore the tunnels beneath the walls, and to really get a feel for the fortress. It was very fun.

After visiting with him, he drove us by Loreley to see the great view of the Rhine river, and then on to our hostel for the night. That night we stayed in the tallest tower of Burg Rheinfels. With our room on the next to top floor we had a great view of the Rhine again. We wandered around the castle for a few more hours until it was dark, and then went inside for a beer. Inside, we met 4 Flemish gentleman who taught us a fun, international, game called “Ooops, Miss.”

Finally, yesterday we went to Heidelberg to see a castle where an ancient relative of Kassy’s was supposedly bestowed a position of nobility (von Hauser). The castle was amazing, and some actors were preparing a play for the upcoming castle festival. Kassy got some hilarious photos of them. Speaking of photos, the site is giving us trouble uploading new photos tonight, so we’ll send some more up soon, but for now, it’s time to go watch some füßball!

A rough start to be sure. We were delayed quite a bit getting into Newark and missed our flight to Köln by quite a bit. After getting into Newark around 9pm, we waited in a line to get a hotel and food vouchers from Continental. The hotel was decent, and Tuesday morning we headed back to Newark International Airport to get more vouchers because we were now booked on a flight on the 28th. After getting standby tickets for Tuesday, we headed in the city (NYC) for a quick 1 hr visit.

We managed to see Times Square, and the Empire State building, and definitely got the feel for NY life. It was great!

Tuesday at 6:45 we left for Germany, and once we arrived looked around a bit of Köln before heading to Cochem. We´ve decided to skip France, as it was going to make the trip too busy and quite a bit more expensive. We´re staying a second night here in Cochem tonight, and we really enjoyed hiking around the city and countryside today.

Tomorrow another Schlo§ (fortress or castle) and then into Koblenz. We´ll write again soon. See the pictures at the link below, we´ve added a few.

http://new.photos.yahoo.com/rcjohnson42/

Well, we’re in MO relaxing. visiting family before we leave on Monday at 1pm. Still just a few things left to do, getting the final packing done, and picking up just a few last minute items. I jst sent the spam email to all our friends and family, and so I have to update this so that people expect reasonalby updated content. Nothing like social pressure to get someone to do something.

The biggest thing left to do is to capture our itenerary. so for those who haven’t already heard it here it is. Of course, I could have just sent this link instead:

6/27 – Arrive in Cologne, Germany 8 am – Stay in Cochem, Germany
6/28 – 6/30 – Visiting France (somewhere)
7/1 – St Goar, Germany
7/2 – Bacharach, Germany
7/3 – 7/5 – Florence, Italy
7/6 – Venice, Italy
7/8 – Vienna, Austria
7/9 – Salzburg, Austria
7/10 – Fussen, Germany
7/11 – Somewhere around Wurzburg, Germany
7/12 – Cologne, Germany
7/13 – Depart for the US at 10am

We leave in T-minus 60 hours and counting for a whilwind tour of central North America (home visiting friends and family) and central Europe (seeing the sights, maybe a friend). Not much to say except that this will likely devolve temporarily into my personal reflections on vacation, Europe, and rejuvenation, and of course: photos.

I was challenged by a friend the other day to discover just what God intended to show me while on this three week vacation, and I’ve decided to accept his challenge. I don’t know exactly what the weeks have in store for me, but I’m excited to find out.

On a more techie note, we’ve bought a few new toys lately. First was Kassy’s Canon 20D. A hefty investment for sure, but a very worthwhile purchase as it has brought her hours of enoyment already, and we haven’t even left the country yet. Next was a Samsung external DVD burner, with LightScribe. Very fun, very handy, especially for the photo-bug. Finally, today we bought an external hard drive with a built in memory card reader, so that while we’re in Europe Kassy can shoot gigs upon gigs of photos.

All of this was basically to say, watch this space for more news and photos from our trip.