HONEY, I AM HOME

I got back last night 6/7/07, and received a call today telling me that I am to leave for Minnesota to work on Tuesday. The company sure knows how to spoil a wonderful vacation.

I will be posting pictures as soon as I can and will let you know the web address to take a peak.

Here a sneak peak of some of the pictures. The first one is me in Amsterdam. Yes, to get the sign all the way in one of the ladies on the tour had to get way back, that is me between the "I" and the "A".

This is me on a Rhine cruise in Germany. We had just left St. Goar where we hiked up to the Rheinsfels castle. That is St. Goar in the background. We were on our way back to Bacharach our home base for this part of the tour.

This is me in a beer hall in Munich. Okay, that is someone elses beer. I tried the beer that was suppose to have lemonade in it but it still taste like beer so I did not drink it. I have never been able to like the taste of the stuff.

My son has my pictures from Cinque Terre, Italy to Paris. He is suppose to put them on CD and bring them to me on Monday before I leave for Minnesota. At that point, I will try to get them up so that you can see the beautiful scenery.

Would you believe I took over 2000 pictures? I did lose about 100 of them by having them put on CD instead of DVD. It was my fault that I did not look to see what the last picture was. I lost my pictures of Germany's Bavaria including my tour photos of King Ludwig II's ornate Neuschwanstein Castle which was spectacular and me on the luge ride. I have my memories. I could ask other people for pictures of that castle but on my camera was a picture of me in front of it. I only had about a half dozen pictures of me and I lost 2 of them. You will have to take my word that I started my amazing journey in Haarlem, Netherlands, then went to Bacharach, Germany; Rothenburg, Germany; Reutte, Austria; Venice, Italy (should have thrown my passport overboard there; Florence, Italy; Rome, Italy; Cinque Terre which is on the Italian Rivera, we stayed in Monterosso, Italy and was free to explore the other 4 towns-I remember the evening I sit on the beach drinking wine while gazing at the sun setting-okay, back to reality; we next went to Stechelber, Switzerland where I rode a gondala and hiked to the next town. They had a foot of snow the day we arrived, It was hard to believe that the day before I was sitting on the beach-quite a shock, no one had clothes for this; next stop Beaune, France where we were treated to a wine tasting and had dinner in a cellar where monks used to store their wine; on to Paris-my son met me after the tour and I have to admit, we had a great time. 26 days that I will never forget.

Yes, I got some knitting done. That was my pastime on the bus going from place to place. I actually got one sock finished and was half way through the second. I brought yarn in Venice to make a pair of socks which will be called my Venice socks. I also brought yarn in Florence. I stubbled on this little shop and after the owner and I gave up on trying to communicate with words and me pointing at my socks, I just walked around until I found something I liked. After I paid and was walking out of the store, he stopped me and put a pattern book in my bag. The pictures are beautiful but it is all in Italian. Looks like the internet language translator and I will be close buds if I want to try some of these patterns. I will take pictures of the yarn as soon as I can.

I am heading out to spend the night with my daughter, TeAntae, and give her the presents I brought back and tell her all about my trip. It was so hard to do so by email or over the phone.

Would I recommend Rick Steves Europe Through the Back Door Tours www.ricksteves.com ?

In a heartbeat. Yes, there is lots of walking but you can op out of any thing that you do not want to do. However, if you do not go on the excursions, I can bet you that you will be missing something spectacular. This is the first trip I have ever taken that I ate constantly and when I got home and got on the scale I had lost 3 pounds. One of the ladies on the trip had a pedometer and she said that she was averaging 14000 steps a day. As long as you are not a complete couch potato you would love the trips. Also be prepared that to beat the crowds and other tourist, we had breakfast at 7:15 and was out the door by 8:15 most mornings. As we were leaving the museum, etc., the crowds were just arriving. We had the rest of the day on our own to explore.

I am checking out my trip for next year...yes, I am going to take another one.