arcturi's place

Interlaken & Cheese Fondue

Posted on September 25, 2010 by Arcturi

After leaving Schilthorn we drove to Interlaken where we spent the afternoon looking around before meeting Simone at the train station. Apparently it’s a tourist centre and I could believe it with shop after shop selling Victorinox (Swiss Army knives), cuckoo clocks and yodelling marmots. Continue reading →

Posted in Birthdays, Europe Trip 09 | Tagged cheese, chocolate, fondue | Comments Off

Schilthorn – the Big Day arrives

Posted on September 24, 2010 by Arcturi

The reason we rushed from Hamburg down to Switzerland was because I wanted to go on the cable-car up Schilthorn (Piz Gloria in the James Bond movie “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service”) and we had to make it before their summer season ended and they closed for maintenance before the winter season began. Sunday 8th would be the last day they were running and they wouldn’t open again until after we left Europe. We were cutting it fine, because if it was cloudy/misty/raining on those last two days we wouldn’t see anything and there wouldn’t much point in going up, so I had been praying for good weather. Continue reading →

Posted in Christmas, Switzerland | Tagged Christmas, James Bond, Schilthorn, yodelling marmots | Comments Off

Switzerland and Simone

Posted on September 23, 2010 by Arcturi

On Friday 6th we left Tübingen reasonably early and drove through the Swiss border to Winterthur where Simone was living. I was very excited about seeing her again and she’d taken the day off work for us. We collected her and she suggested we go to a vegetarian restaurant in town for lunch before carrying on – she said it was different to what we get in NZ and much more choice and she was so right! They had all these amazing salads and hot dishes and little bits and pieces laid out as a buffet and you just take a bit of whatever you want then take your plate (or takeaway dish) and they charge you by weight. It wasn’t cheap, but then my plate was pretty full too because I wanted to try all the yummy-looking food! So we had a delicious lunch before we decided to drive to Lucerne and have a look there before heading to her parents near Interlaken. Continue reading →

Posted in Europe Trip 09, Switzerland | Tagged Switzerland | Comments Off

Lauda & Tübingen

Posted on September 10, 2010 by Arcturi

After we left Hamburg the GPS navigator said we’d get to Lauda about 4.30pm, but in the end there was so much roadworks that it was just after 6pm. There were quite a lot of places where the motorway was cut down to one or two lanes in each direction and I got so sick of crawling along in first or second gear. We didn’t stop anywhere on the way other than driver changes and toilet breaks and I think we even ate lunch on the go.

Lauda was full of cool old buildings like these, I'm sure they've actually been "renovated" to look like this though, as we saw an ad in a window for it and they look far too fresh and clean and new.

When we got to Lauda it was dark but the navigator took us straight to our hotel in the centre of town (a very small town!) and the guy was expecting us and very friendly. Continue reading →

Posted in Europe Trip 09 | Tagged brass band, breakfast | 2 Comments

Germany & My Birthday!

Posted on August 28, 2010 by Arcturi

We arrived in Hamburg late afternoon on Monday 2nd November. Reece’s sister and brother-in-law had rented an apartment within walking distance of town, so we were able catch up on washing which was great, and they had dinner organised for us too. Continue reading →

Posted in Birthdays, Europe Trip 09 | Tagged birthday, kartoffel salade | Comments Off

Nederland Part II

Posted on November 25, 2009 by Arcturi

Roadside Snack Stand at Lauwersmeer National Park in the freezing cold wind

After our second night at Monnickendam we headed north and drove along a huge dyke at Waddenzee, then started tiki-touring to to find somewhere for lunch (it was Sunday and everything was closed) and finally stopped at a little roadside stand at Lauwersmeer National Park at the start of another dyke. We climbed up the dyke and had a look along, it was quite high and the wind was absolutely freezing! So we warmed up with frites and hot chocolate from the snack stand before carrying on to Groningen where we were staying the night. Reece ordered a “Big Frik” which made me think of Scrubs and was basically a long sausage with sauces, and not as good as the picture looked either. Continue reading →

Posted in Europe Trip 09 | Tagged Big Frik, frites & mayonnaise, mustard soup, windmills | 1 Comment

Nederland Part I

Posted on November 23, 2009 by Arcturi

Op De Horsten - our B&B near Amsterdam

After finally leaving Chris and Maurice’s place in Belgium we headed on to Holland, Chris had booked us into a B&B in Monnickendam on the north side of Amsterdam. It was great having her to organise it because she could speak Dutch to them and get it all sorted, their English was a bit limited (better than our Dutch though!). When I’d looked for accomodation on the internet we were going to stay in Amsterdam itself but I couldn’t find anywhere that had free parking included, and Reece had looked at places but not actually got around to booking anything. If we stayed somewhere in the city and had to park on the street it was going to cost the equivalent of NZ$40-60 per day!

Continue reading →

Posted in Europe Trip 09 | 1 Comment

Beautiful Belgium – Westmalle and Bruges

Posted on November 12, 2009 by Arcturi

After escaping Brussels we arrived in Westmalle about 5pm to stay with Reece’s friends Chris and Maurice. They are Belgian (or should I call them Flemish? Not sure…) but lived in Australia for a while and are good friends with Reece’s sister in Sydney. They were very welcoming and it was great to sit down and relax. We had tea, put some washing on and then went out to the “Cafe Trappisten” which is basically a beer cafe specialising in beer made by the Westmalle trappist monks. There are only seven trappist brands of beer (brewed by monks) in the world, and six are from Belgium. Continue reading →

Posted in chocolate, Europe Trip 09 | Tagged Belgium, chocolate, frites & mayonnaise, Westmalle | 4 Comments

France and Belgium

Posted on November 2, 2009 by Arcturi

We got up early in Dover and caught the taxi down to the ferry terminal seeing as we hadn’t booked, no problem getting on the 10am sailing though. Reece had organised a rental car for us to collect on the other side, but when we got there the office was closed for a 2-hour lunch so we had to wait for 1 1/2 hrs anyway, and then they gave us a way bigger car than he’d asked for, but we couldn’t even use the extra size because there was two extra seats in the boot. So we made the guy give us another, now we have a VW Caddy which is perfect 🙂 Continue reading →

Posted in Europe Trip 09 | Tagged Belgium | 9 Comments

Back to London, dramas with my lost luggage

Posted on October 30, 2009 by Arcturi

The last few days have passed by in a whirlwind!

On our last night in Krakow Dad texted to say my pack had turned up and would be couriered to our hostel in London, fantastic news! On Friday flew in to Gatwick with Reece then we split up – he went to the Isle of Wight for a family birthday and I headed in to London to meet Mum and Dad. Over the weekend I dragged them to all the places I wanted to see – The Red House and the William Morris gallery (I so love his wallpaper and fabric designs), Wesley’s Chapel, Shakespeare’s Globe, we also walked across the Tower Bridge and saw the Changing of the Guard at Buckingham Palace, although we were only close enough to see them marching in and hear the band, not to actually see them do the changing around inside. Also went to Harrod’s, I didn’t realise how huge it is! Only had enough time for a quick walk through the food market and a look around their Christmas shop, loved their displays but I have to say looking back I prefer the French and German wooden decorations than the fancy sparkly balls.