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Nuremberg, Germany

We started the day with a quick German breakfast, Colin is a wreck until he’s had his first cup of coffee, and then off to Nurnberg to take in the sights. The train system in this country is the best, the high speed train here is fantastic and even the “milk run” was fast. We got off at the Hauptbahnhof and walked across the street and into the Altstadt, the old walled city. The city was pretty much flattened in 1945 but many of the original buildings have been rebuilt and its an amazing city. The walls are massive, thick, and most impressive. Its a lot of what you would expect in the typical German city. To the poor folk in Ottawa, the first thing we noticed when we arrived was the sky was blue, no rain clouds in any direction and almost no humidity. We walked through the old city following the directions of the LP walking tour, sort of, with Elke’s knowledge of the city filling in the blanks, for example, where to find the best bratwurst. We took in a walk up to the Konigsburg which looks out onto a beautiful city. We saw quite a lot in a short bit of time and walked until one of us was pretty tired, and then back to Neumarkt.

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Ottawa, Canada

Pager delivered and we’ve wrapped up all the cat details and headed to the airport. Elke’s Mom is driving us up so we won’t need to worry about transport or where to store the wheels etc. All four of us are excited about the trip to Germany for all sorts of reasons. Noam is looking forward to seeing his homeland and getting a photo or two taken to send to all of his friends back in Canada. He’s probably the most excited of us all, smiles constantly and won’t stop waving. We’re on a direct flight from Ottawa to Frankfurt, thanks AC, but who knows how long before they deem it unprofitable and we have to go back to the trips to TO and Montreal to catch the flight. It’s fantastic to be able to fly out of Ottawa. Elke’s Mom treated us to a delicious pre-flight meal and then we said our good byes had a photo or two taken and passed through customs to the waiting area. The take off was smooth and once we got into the air we settled into seats of average comfort, lucky people who got to sit in the ridiculous “bath tub pods” at the front of the plane. They make me think of the ads with the people afraid to fall so they buy the sit up tubs. Oh well, private tellys for all. Food not bad, flight uneventful, landing smooth and professional, you’d almost think the pilot had done it before. And so began our trip to Germany and the rest of Europe, locations to be determined later.

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