Zugspitze

We took the Tiroler Zugspitzbahn to the top of the Zugspitze, the highest peak in Germany with elevation 2962 m. 

The Zugspitzbahn is a cable car on the Austrian side the border that rises about 1730 m from Ehrwald. At the top of the mountain, they built a nice restaurant, museum, and snow exhibit. My parents explored the peak and Hendrik and I hiked down the mountain.

We followed the route for the Gatterl Tour, using the Gletscherbahn and the Ehrwalder Almbahn to help us down the mountain. We really enjoyed the hike with beautiful views of the Alps, although Hendrik was not a huge fan of the Gatterl Pass, which has narrow slippery trails and steep dropoffs on either side.

Seeing the Alps from the peak of the Zugspitze was certainly a treat. We also enjoyed looking down at the other lakes we hiked around earlier this week.

Austrian Alps

This week we are on holiday in the Austrian Alps. We are staying in Ehrwald, an Austrian resort town just across the German border next to the Zugspitze, the tallest peak in Germany. We are enjoying the hiking, perfect weather, and panoramic mountain views. Although the rest of us do not appreciate the nuance, Hendrik is enjoying what he describes as the adorable Austrian accents (when he speaks German with the locals).

So far we have hiked to the Seebensee and hiked around the Eibsee. Tomorrow we will take a cable car to the top of the Zugspitze and hike down.

Falcons and Flammkuchen

On Wednesday my parents arrived and as the Dutch would say, I killed two flies with one clap by meeting them at the airport in Amsterdam and then having them hold my stuff while I picked up my renewed passport at the US Consulate there.

We all spent Thursday and Friday recovering from colds that so far we have not managed to give each other. On Saturday we did a day trip to Valkenburg (Falcon Castle), a small town near Maastricht. 

Now we are spending Sunday and Monday in the Rhine Valley in Germany. Today we went on a boat tour of the Rhine from Sankt Goar to Bingen and saw a ton of castles including another one called Valkenburg (although maybe spelled with an F)! We also ate schnitzel and flammkuchen and drank Riesling and Spätburgunder. 

Water Wheels of Maastricht and a Visitor

This weekend we had a quick visit from Daniel, a friend from California. He is in Europe to present his research about the Ebola virus at a conference and stopped by Maastricht for a day. We gave him our standard city walking tour, which now includes two water mills!

Montpellier Photos

Here are the photos that go with the previous post now that I have real internet again.

Montpellier

Now I’m at the Montpellier airport waiting for a delayed flight back to the Netherlands so it’s time for another update. Southern France and Montpellier seem beautiful but unfortunately I didn’t really get to enjoy it because I caught a cold in Denmark and spent all of my free time in feverish sleep. Luckily the conference had one excursion to see the 11th century Maguelone Cathedral, swim/wade at the beach, and eat at a seaside restaurant so I was forced to go out and see some things. Everything was lovely but also exhausting. I hope I survive the flight and train ride back home. Also, sorry no pictures; the airport internet is too terrible to upload them. 

And now since I’m still waiting, some musings.

Linguistic intolerance: I learned about this concept from our Costa Rican tour guide in Denmark (although I can’t find any info with Google so maybe it has another name). She described it as the inability to understand a sentence with only one small vowel sound is wrong. She said this is a problem when she speaks Danish. I was pleased to learn that there is a name for the problem I have with the Dutch, or rather the problem they have with me. I think because these two languages are spoken almost exclusively by native speakers, they are not used to hearing words be slightly mispronounced, leading to their linguistic intolerance. On the other hand, I’m used to hearing English being spoken by just about everyone in the world. Basically, I thought I could handle just about any accent. However, in the last year, I have discovered that is false. I have absolutely the worst time understanding French accents!

Contactless payments: Europeans are way behind the US on many things (like making functioning websites for restaurants, banning smoking in public places, and freedom) but they are way ahead on at least one thing – contactless payments. They make almost all purchases using debit cards, but their debit cards all have chips and if a purchase is less than €20, they don’t have to stick the card in the machine and enter a PIN. Instead they can make a contactless payment which means they just have to hold the card next to the sensor for a few seconds. It is easy and totally awesome and I was so accustomed to it that I forgot how cool it was until I observed that amazement of one of my American visitors when I paid for coffee in such a manner. So that’s what y’all can look forward to when the US catches up in the future!

Danes and Rains

I’m at the airport in Paris waiting for a connection so it seems like an appropriate time to write about Copenhagen, or København. Apparently the name means “commerce harbour,” which isn’t very creative but is kind of cool to realize nonetheless. 

We flew after work Friday and met up with Marc and Ariana, friends from college. On Saturday we went on a waking tour and learned about the city, Danish history, and architecture. We also saw the Ericksen statue of the little mermaid from the Hans Christian Andersen story. Sunday was rainy so we went to the Design Museum of Denmark and learned about the important influences of Danish design on the world, especially for chairs! We also went on a canal boat tour, fortunately in a covered boat because it was still pouring. Monday morning Hendrik had to fly back to Amsterdam for an important work meeting and I got to explore Christiania, the hippie district, Papiroen, an old paper factory on an island that has been converted into a food market, and the royal botanical gardens. Copenhagen is pretty great this time of year but I don’t think I could handle the dark Danish winters, even with a good dose of “hygge,” the all important Danish concept of coziness, which typically involves a lot of candles and having everything be just so.

Copenhangout

And we’re off on a complicated holiday/business trip involving stops in Copenhagen, Denmark and Montpellier, France.

We’ll be seeing some old friends and Nancy will be doing some science. Meanwhile Hendrik will be attending a very important business meeting, so important he has to wear a tie!

Not so old friends

Our friend Juliana, who helped us survive when we first moved here but then moved back to work for DSM in the US, is visiting here for a business trip. Luckily she had time to hang out with her old friends in her free time. We got to play board games, go bicycling, and have dinner together a few times. It was good to see her and also an unneeded reminder of how precious every expat friend is when you live in a foreign country.