Travel

I wrote yesterday, that we have an Toyota Prius as a car. Forget this ... this car stands at the Monterey Airport now. We had to swap it. Somewhere near Gilroy the windscreen of the car cracked. 20-30cm crack on the drivers side. At least Avis swapped the car without questions asked and now it´s one of this SUV, a Hyundai Santa Fe.

Nevertheless it was a really interesting day. The Monterey Aquarium is really must-see albeit it was really loud as it was Sunday and many parents visited the aquarium with their parents:



When you are already in Monterey you should really visit Carmel-by-the sea. A great beach. A nice village. And obviously you should drive back to San Francisco via the Highway 1. A time consuming way to get to SF but it´s a great trip. You drive right at the side of the pacific shoreline.



BTW: One of the difficult things in the US is refueling ... at least when you are accustomed to the european variant without prepaying the fuel.

The first day with a rental car. I´ve decided to take a Toyota Prius, as neither my brother nor I wanted to spend the whole planed cash money for fuel for a big SUV. And ... after all: We drove to Stinton Beach as a Plan B as the queue of parking vehicles for Muir National Monument would be a 20 minute hike to the entrance alone I´m really glad that i didn´t had to steer a SUV along all this curves. It was fun ... for me ... but did you ever sat on the front passenger's seat on such a tour - that´s not so funny . After all .. we made it until Nova Albion near Point Reyes.



We drove to the east afterwards until we hit the Highway 101. Was really a nice day.

Now i know how the bicycle messenger feels in a big city. We drove from our hotel to the Presidio up to the Golden Gate Bridge and up the hill. After some kilometres i got sandblasted at Ocean Beach. A sand beach and strong winds aren´t a good combination. On the way back to the hotel we took at first the Golden Gate park and after this the Market Street to the Ferry building. That´s quite an experience ... i would try to drive on the streets in Hamburg ... but it seems that the people in California have a more laid-back attitude at driving through the city, so you can survive it in San Francisco In total the trip was 30 kilometres long.

(click here for photoset)

Luggage is ready, my family doing vacation in my apartment in Hamburg is instructed about the strange usability of my washing machine and the alarm clock is set.

The next 14 days will be a little bit quiet in this blog. I´m away for a longer vacation. My next articles will be travel reports from California. But this time i won´t publish them at the end of vacation. I will try to write a little bit about my experiences in Califoria every few days.

Normal blogging will resume mid of April.

I was in London yesterday. Thus i had no time to blog yesterday. Was a good day over there. I really like this city. I would even like to work there for a while.

But there is something don´t like about this city: The delays at the airports. After a breakdown of airtraffic control over Great Britain many flights were cancelled and almost all were delayed. My flight should have departed from Stansted at 20:05 but at 20:30 they told us that the aircraft operating our flight had just departed from Bremen. Fsck. I was finally in bed at 02:30 and i´m still so tired.

This wasn´t the first delay over there. I can´t remember a single flight that wasn´t delayed by at least 15 minutes. So Cousin Avi in Snatch should say:

Avi: Yes, London. You know: fish, chips, cup 'o tea, delays at airport, bad food, worse weather, Mary fucking Poppins... LONDON.

I´m back from my trip to Toulouse. I had great weather there. On Friday we were in the center of Toulouse. Saturday was filled with a trip to Carcassone (the upper city is really great), Narbonne (just a short drive-by) , Agde (with a great inner city with small streets) and finished the day at Cap d´Adge at the beach. On Sunday i tried a totally new concept: Driving to the atlantic coast and taking a sunbath at the beach of Ondres-Plages.... or the Moellenkamp-Variation of it ... as i´m a creature of the night a sun blocker with LPF 50+ and a sunshade is essential. To summarize it: It was a really nice weekend. A big thank you to the people who tolerated me in their house for a weekend ... again

I´m just waiting for the aircraft to Toulouse. I´m looking forward to the better weather, the nice landscape and visiting friends there ... I don´t know if i find time to blog there but i start to like the concept behind the word "vacation"

As there was the question of a reader in my mailbox about the trip to London: It was a private trip. I invited my mother (my father can´t use the plane anymore), my brother Florian and my sisters Solveig and Taz for a day in London. Before you think: Does this guy have to much money? The fuel for driving to the airport in Bremen was almost as expensive than the tickets for 5 persons to London and the train tickets from Stansted to London were definitely more expensive. It´s ridiclious: A train ticket from Hamburg to Berlin than a aircraft ticket from Bremen to Stansted. Strange.

For Florian and Taz this flight was their first flight. And they had much less fear of flying then i had on my first flight, despite of all the horror fairy tales i´ve told them before takeoff

25.07.2008

No, this isn´t the first day of my vaction in NY. But a journey doesn´t begin with the pushback at the airport. A journey begins with a decision, with an idea. And this journey began last year.

At this time in 8 days i´m in New York. I´m really looking forward to a week of vaction. This will be a real vaction. I won´t take my notebook with me (at least i hope i will not take with me ) My business telephone will stay in Hamburg (that´s easy). I´m eager at reading my travel guide at the moment (besides writing an architecture paper for a death march project). I´m sure this will be 7 cool days in NYC.

PS: Two non-touristic things are on my list at least ... going to the Apple Store and watching Wall-E ... it´s just to long for me to wait until it´s premiere in germany

Mit besten Gruessen an meine Schwester Taz und meinen Bruder Florian, mit denen ich im August nach London fliege. Fuer beide ist es der erste Flug...*evilgrin*:

I travel to New York end of this month for one week. Does anybody knows a good and affordable hotel in New York? I know, both for itself is not a problem, but i want both in one hotel ... Iiknow the Waldorf Astoria is excellent but this busts the budget of a poor SE

Ich war ja nun am Dienstag in Wien und ich habe ja noch versprochen, einige Gedanken zusammenzufassen über den Tag:

• Ich muss unbedingt noch mal nach Wien, dann aber vielleicht zwei oder drei Tage. Ich glaube, das ich bisher nur einen kleinen Überblick gewonnen habe
• Der Stephansdom ist wirklich eindrucksvoll. Von aussen, aber gerade auch von innen. Besonders interessant war der Besuch in den Katakomben des Stephansdom. Ist nicht fuer jeden gut ... denn da unten liegen noch Knochen und vor 4 Jahren ist das letzte mal dort unten jemand bestattet worden. Creeeepy ....
• Die Damenuniform der Austrian Airlines ist wirklich nett ... aber die roten Nylons irritieren dann doch ein wenig
• Ich habe ja schon gelesen, das die Menschen in Wien ein wenig merkwürdig sind, aber irgendwie hatte ich bei den Menschen im dienstleistenden Gewerbe den Eindruck, das sie desinteressiert sind und jede Frage als Beleidigung auffassen. Mag täuschen. Für Trinkgeld wird sich für meine Begriffe zu überschwänglich bedankt (Ironie kann das eigentlich nicht sein, denn ich halte mich an meine 10% Regel). Wer denkt, das Norddeutsche eigenartig ist, sollte man die sich mal die Leute in Wien angucken.
• Irgendwie waren alle grossen Plätze mit PublicViewing infiziert. Der Hofgarten war leider gesperrt. War vielleicht auch eine bloede Idee, Wien zur EM zu besuchen
• 13,2 km gelaufen ... war wirklich schoen. Viel gesehen. Viel photographiert.
• Wetter war traumhaft. Ich hab mal wieder einen Sonnenbrand davon getragen von der kurzen Zeit zwischen Katakomben, Bemerken des traumhaften Wetters und Besuch einer Drogerie. Aber es sieht doch glatt diesmal so aus, als sollte ich wirklich mal nicht pellen ... braun geworden würde ich das aber immer noch nicht nennen wollen.
• Irgendwie ist es ja schon seltsam, das man sich so darüber freut, automatisch via SMS über eine Flugverzögerung informiert zu werden, das man ganz vergisst sich über die anderthalb Stunden Verspätung aufzuregen.
• Ich habe eine neue Sucht seit Dienstag: Mango Passion Fruit Frappuccino Blended Juice Drink bei Starbucks. Gut, das keiner auf meinem Weg von und zur Arbeit liegt. Denn eigentlich ist das Zeug in venti obzön teuer.
• Zotterschokolade ist gefährlich. Habe ich in einem Laden im Flughafen gefunden. Weisser Mohn mit Zimt ist besser als Sex. Ein Glück, das ich nicht die geringste Ahnung habe, wo ich das Zeug in Hamburg bekomme. Und nein ... ich will es besser auch nicht wissen. Ich wuerde sonst das Zeug nur noch essen ...

Alles in allem war das ein sehr schoener Tag ... ich ueberlege schon, wo der nächste Eintagestrip hingeht ... ich tendiere momentan zu Prag.