Hiking Hoher Kasten...

Happy Labor Day! I hope you're all enjoying your 3-day weekend. :) Unfortunately, Germany isn't celebrating Labor Day today, so Brian had to head to work today... And I think he's questioning where exactly the weekend went... It literally flew by!!

We managed to pack quite a bit into the weekend. We spent Friday evening at Becky and Matt's apartment... They invited a group of friends over for dinner and drinks, and we celebrated their recent marriage (they just got married on August 8th!) and move to Germany. What a fun evening! :)

On Saturday we headed off to Switzerland to do some hiking in the Alps. What a gorgeous day that turned out to be! The weather was perfect and the scenery was absolutely stunning! We couldn't have asked for a better way to spend the day on Saturday. :) After hiking all day, we returned home and grilled out with our friends, Katrina, Benjamin, and Maciej... We spent the evening enjoying great company, tasty food, and our new deck furniture! :)

We headed off to the Bodensee Players "End of the Summer" picnic on Sunday... It's always fun getting together with everyone in the group... It's such a diverse mix of people! We come from such a wide variety of backgrounds (Scotland, London, Abu Dabi, Switzerland, South Africa, U.S., etc...), and the one thing connecting us is that fact that we're all English-speakers. :)

Well, I'm off to the grocery store and to run some errands... Fun, fun! I hope you have a wonderful Labor Day! :) Miss you much!

Oh, and here's a few pictures we took while hiking on Saturday... Enjoy!

The is the area through which we hiked... We started on the lower right side of the photo (where the trees are) and walked up to the lake, around the lake, across the river (behind the lake), up to the point of the mountain (the peak surrounded by the large grayish clouds), across the ridgeline ( we literally crossed over the top of the line of mountains on the left side of the lake) to the point that we took this picture from... It was quite a hike... 5 1/2 hours! :)

Getting ready to head out for our hike... The day was somewhat chilly... Perfect hiking weather! :) (From left to right - Maike, Anna, Maciej, and me....)

A cute little fire hydrant we passed... :)

A Swiss chalet that we hiked past...

One of the many waterfalls we passed...

Brian felt great being back in the mountains... And actually being able to hike through them! :)

Anna, Maike, and I heading up a very steep portion...

This is the lake that we hiked around... It was absolutely gorgeous!!

The Swiss are great when it comes to signage... You can always find your way around while hiking in Switzerland! :)

The view from behind the lake... See the highest mountain peak behind the lake? That was our destination...

Everything was so lush and green... :)

Taking a breather and enjoying the view! :)

Maciej, Maike, and Anna taking a break...

A very cool looking tree...

Doesn't this almost look like a painting?? :)

The view of the other side of the mountain (the Rhein valley)... That's Austria and Switzerland...

So, we made it to the top of this peak... Now, all we had to do was hike 2 hours across the ridge line to get to our final destination (Hoher Kasten)...

Part of the trail we hiked as we crossed over the ridgeline...

The view from the top... Amazing! :)

Loved the face they carved into this tree stump! :)

The view of the other side of the mountain... Notice all of the paragliders/parasailers flying around? They're the black dots in the clouds... There were alot of them up there!

The view from the top... With the Swiss flag waving in the corner... :)

Wow! What a Week...

Wow! What a week it's been! Between moving people and meeting up with friends, I've definitely kept myself busy this week! :)

On Monday, our friends Matt and Becky moved over here. Matt is a coworker of Brian's in Detroit, and he's been sent over here to work for 4 months, and he brought his wife, Becky, along with him. So, Monday and Tuesday were spent picking them up at the ferry and trying to help them get situated in their new place. In the meantime, our other friend, Maciej (who also worked with Brian in Detroit, but is now working over here for the next two years), moved from his old apartment (actually the same apartment we lived in when we first moved over here! :)) to the apartment upstairs from us... Pretty cool! So, we also helped with his move this week. I'm just thankful that we didn't have to move anywhere... I'm pretty happy with staying in one place for a while. :)

On Tuesday, my friend, Alex, invited me to the local Strandbad (public beach) for the day. We also were joined by Becky and Lindsay (another American woman who is over here with her husband, who also works in Detroit but is working over here for the next two years... We just recently met them and we're really happy that we did... They're a really sweet couple! :)). The day at the beach was great! The weather was absolutely gorgeous! The four of us spent the day alternating between swimming and sunbathing... What a great day! Towards the end of the afternoon, Brian and Matt joined up with us and we spent the rest of the late afternoon/early evening swimming and hanging out on the beach... We were definitely in our own little world... I'm sure we were the only group of English-speaking expats on the entire beach! :)

Wednesday was spent cleaning and running errands... Oh joy! However, the most exciting thing about Wednesday was when Becky and I went down to the local Volkshochschule (adult education center) and signed up for our German language course. We signed up for an intensive course which meets for five weeks, for five days a week, for 4 hours a day... Yikes! :) It begins on September 21st... Should be interesting! :)

Yesterday was spent bike riding to Lindau (about 33 miles round trip) with Becky and Theresa (another American expat I've met over here). It was a great ride... I loved riding through all of the bike trails that take you through the orchards... All of the apples, pears, and plums were in full bloom! :) The weather was pretty nice, but we did run into some rain and high winds every now and then. It just helped to make the ride that much more exciting! :)

By the looks of things, the weekend is going to be just as busy for us. Brian and I are going to join Maike for a hike in Switzerland tomorrow morning, and then we're hoping to be back in the afternoon so that we can head over to the Messa where they are holding the Eurobike show this weekend (For all of you that have been keeping up with the blog since the very beginning, I blogged about Eurobike last year. Click here to see it...). And Sunday we have plans to head over to Immenstaad's Abenteur Park for the Bodensee Players (the English speaking theatre group that I'm a member of) "End of the Summer" picnic... Should be a fun afternoon of grilling, visiting with friends, and going through the adventure park. :)

And now I'm off to the Friday Farmer's Market... I have to make sure that I get stocked up on fruits and veggies for the weekend! :) Hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Miss you much!

Biking to Birnau...

Last weekend, Brian and I hopped on our bikes and headed out for a 25 mile bike ride to Birnau. The weather and scenery were beautiful, and we simply enjoyed taking advantage of one of the few remaining days of summer... Because, as we all know, summer is fading and fall is quickly approaching...

Here's a few pictures from our journey... Enjoy!

One of the many vineyards in the area...

Passing through downtown Meersburg...

The Meersburg Castle...

The small village of Uhldingen...

Our destination... The church of Birnau...

Me taking a break, while Brian snapped a few pictures as we headed back home... :)

Back to Zams...

While Brian was on his most recent vacation, we decided that we would head back to Zams, Austria... Back to the beginning of Brian's leg injury. Being that it's such a charming little village and Brian stayed there for a 10-day stretch and never once saw the actual city, we thought it would be nice to go back so that he could experience the city himself (rather than through all of the pictures I took of it! :)). So, we hopped into the car and headed into Austria for the day.

Now, Zams isn't all that big of a town, so it doesn't really take long to go through (i.e. if you blink as you drive through, you just might miss it. :)). It's a lovely little village, BUT, the most significant thing about the town (in our opinion at least) is that it has a cable car that takes you up to the top of the highest peak in the area... And that was what Brian wanted most of all... To get back into the mountains (without having to risk harming his leg again)! :)

So, upon our arrival in Zams, we drove through the downtown area so that Brian could see it, and then headed straight for the Venet Burgbahn, where we hopped onto a cable car that carried us up into the mountains...

We spent most of the afternoon hiking around the smaller trails at the top and taking in the beautiful scenery. (Actually... I took in the scenery, while Brian took bazillions of pictures of it! :)). And, I have to say, it felt so great to be back in the mountains!!

We've really gotten spoiled since living here... It's so easy to just head into the mountains for the day. I'm amazed at how quickly we became accustomed to this lifestyle, and how much we've both missed being in the mountains over the past few months. On a good note though, Brian's leg is healing up quite well, so we're hoping to be able to get back into the mountains for a few hikes before the end of summer/fall... Let's keep our fingers crossed! :)

Here's a few pictures we took of our day in Zams... Enjoy!

The view from the cable car at the top...

Gorgeous! :)

While I sat and enjoyed the scenery, this is what Brian spent most of his time doing... Taking lots and lots of pictures! :)

He was so happy to be back in the mountains! Although, I have to admit, it made him a little agitated to have to take the cable car up... He wanted to be able to hike up... All in due time! :)

Brian with getting creative with his photography while we were up there! :)

We both felt like little kids in a candy store while we were up there! :)

The beautiful serenity of the mountains... Love it!

Our Newest "Surprise"...

The other day we received quite a surprise from our landlords... We walked outside and found this on our deck...

Apparently, within the next week, they will be delivering a red cushion for this chair and footstool... Very nice!

The view of our yard from our new deck chair... Love it! :)

Pretty impressive, huh? Needless to say, we're feeling quite spoiled over here! :) We feel so very fortunate to have such wonderful landlords... They are some of the sweetest and most generous people we've ever met!

And, now I'm off to go read in my new deck chair... Trust me, we're taking full advantage of our new deck furniture! :)