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11月29日 Christmas market!Last night and today we went to so many Christmas markets! We were on a quest for souvenirs, glügwein, and sausages. In case you can not imagine what a Christmas market looks like, pictures a great many booths filled with Christmas-related items like ornaments and nativity scenes, followed by booths of stock stuffer type things like jewelry and candles, followed by booths of sausages across from booths with glügwein or appel cider with rum, all while strolling underneath string upon string of Christmas lights. It was lovely. And crowded.
When not at Christmas markets, we visited yet another church, ate at some good restaurants (where we discussed with one of our servers how excited we are about Obama), and ran out of time to see the palace. I am catching a cold, so we thought it best to go get some hot chocolate instead of cram in another site. Next time.
I think we will be back. John and I both really like Berlin.
On that note, I should head up and start packing. Tomorrow we head back to the States: a land of top sheets and rectangular pillows. Oh, how we missed you so.
Love,
Trina 11月28日 Man, does John love donersWe have been in Berlin about 10 hours and have visited the doner place twice. And the same guys were working, so they were utterly amused at John's relentless doner cravings.
Today we visited the Pergamon and the Altes Museum. The Pergamon was not at all what I was expecting--it was way better. They have been recreating Greek and Roman and Babylonian temples in the museum, so you can walk through and look at them in 3D. Awesome. The Babylonian exhibit was incredibly colorful. Also, there was a Dionysus exhibit that included all sorts of pottery with naughty pictures on them, which I had only previously seen in theatre history books. The Altes Museum houses Egyptian artifacts, the highlight being Nefertiti. There was also an exhibit of "Olympus" things, which was a huge deal because apparently those items disappeared to Russia after WWII and weren't returned until about 15 years ago. (I think I got that right. There were not a lot of English signs and I hate audioguides.) Regardless, there were cool to look at.
Right now we are doing laundry which is rather necessary because we've been wearing our last clean clothes for the last 2 days, and that includes a 12 hour train ride. Miraculously, we're not too stinky. Perhaps because we wear anti-perspirant. Or maybe because I am used to our funk.
Oooh! Dryer is done. Gotta go.
Trina 11月27日 Krakow and side trips Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! There is an expat restaurant that is serving turkey and potatoes and cranberry sauce for dinner, but we did not go there tonight. We're going to do Thanksgiving the right way, except it'll be on Christmas. While in Krakow, we looked at a great many churches and a synagogue. I have not been in a synagogue before, so I wasn't sure quite what to expect. Luckily they had lots of signs and information in English, so I was able to figure things out. One of the churches that we went to had one of the most beautiful alter pieces we've seen. According to the Lonely Planet, Picasso declared it the 8th wonder of the world. But also according to the Lonely Planet, there is a laundr-o-mat in town that was actually a dry cleaner (so sad to find out when you're traipsing around with two loads of laundry crammed into a shopping bag), so who knows for sure? From Krakow, we have also made trips to Jasna Gora and Auschwitz-Birkenau. Jasna Gora is a monastery that my great-grandma's sisters travelled to many years ago. We have a picture. I tried to take a picture with John in the same spot as the old timey picture we have, but there have been some additions made to the courtyard area, so I'm not sure we got the right shot. While we were there, we made brief friends with a Polish guy who grew up in Czestochowa. He walked us back to the train and told us about all the monuments on the way there. Poles seem to be really big on monuments and statues. I think they have as many as we have American flags (which, according to Kara's Australian friends, is a lot). At Auschwitz-Birkenau, on a cold and drizzly day, we had a guide who was the proper amount of brooding for such a tour. It was really, really cool in a really, really sad kind of way. In addition to a movie and photos and seeing the bunks, they have a bunch of different displays of things that were left behind in store houses that were taken from the prisoners right as they got off the trains. What really hit home for John was the pounds and pounds of human hair; what hit home for me were the many ceremonial prayer shawls. On a lighter note, John and I have noticed that the restroom symbols having been giving a lot of tourists a lot of trouble. On one door there is a circle and on the other door is a triangle. Obvious, no? Today we saw the Wawel Castle. It was cool, but the tour was a little bit strange because there was lots of discussion about how the castle was plundered and none of the original furniture or paintings survived, so instead was a lot of furniture and paintings that they imagined would have been in the rooms at the time that the monarchy used the castle. Tonight we take an overnight train to Berlin to catch the few sites we missed before we fly back to Seattle. Twelve glorious hours of train riding starts at 8 p.m. Love, Trina 11月26日 Uber TouristIt's been a while. Let me recap what we've been up too.
First, while I don't think I could look more American unless maybe I was wearing cowboy boots, people keep confusing me for being German. They speak to me in German, they bring me menus in German, one old lady even glared at me, murmured deutsche then spit on the ground (obviously she has no good memories from the WWII). Maybe I should have brought a scarf that has the American flag on it. :)
Regardless, we have been having a wonderful time. As you may have read on John's blog, one of our last days in Warsaw resulted in being denied--times 3. First we were unable to rent a car, which made travelling to Torun & my ancestors' homeland a little more time consuming than expected. Next we were unable to see the private art collection of Pope John Paul II because the museum was closed. Then we ventured into Praga, one of Warsaw's neighborhoods that didn't have the shit bombed out of it during the war and which has a promising gallery of contemporary art, but that was closed, too. Sigh. We did get to see lots of older buildings, some of which were crumbling, and we went to a crummy market where lots of people gawked at us because obviously we were 30 years younger than the target demographic and we only spoke English. John introduced me to the Carrefour which is sort of like a giant Fred Meyer or super big Super K-mart. It also had a regular mall attached to it. In the mall part was a store that seems to be the Poland equivalent of Express and that store is where I bought a nice looking sweater that I wore almost non-stop for four days. Oh, I forgot to mention, that parts of Praga is where Roman Polanski filmed much of the Pianist since it currently looks much like the Jewish ghetto looked in the 1930s and 1940s.
After our 3 times denied day, we departed for Torun. Torun was a lovely old Gothic town. Among other buildings, we visited 2 old, old churches that I think might be some of my favorite sites I've seen on his trip. The one had stained glass on each of its windows, and you could tell that the glass was from different periods in history, including some glass that was so old the color was a little off and the iron work looked rather worn. It was cool. If we hadn't been shooed away by a nun ready to lock up, I would have snapped a picture.
From Torun, we took a bus to Chelmno, which is a city that one of my ancestors was born in. As I mentioned in my last post, it was a tiny version of the other cities we had seen so far. But not in a Lilliputian way, of course, just in a smaller scale way. It had a square and in the square was a clock tower sort of building and there were vendor stalls with people selling all sorts of fruit and scarves and doilies. We also visited a church, which looked like a smaller version of the church in Torun in the sense that looked to be built in the same period with the same type of brick and with similar style artwork and statues inside. We didn't have much time as we had to catch the bus back to Torun to catch the train back to Warsaw, so that was about all we saw.
In Torun, the train were were counting on to take us back to Warsaw runs only in the summer, so we spent a couple of hours wandering around, dodging drunks, searching for an English magazine, and sharing cokes. Eventually our train came, and we had an uneventful journey back. The next morning we walked around Warsaw, took a bunch of pictures of the square and the famous mermaid statue, and then hopped on a train to Krakow.
To be continued...
Trina 11月22日 Happy Birthday! No, this isn't a repeat post. Today is my Mom's birthday. Happy Birthday, Mom! Today there is snow on the ground in Krakow. The train ride here was not too bad. I read through the entire Obama 44 Newsweek, which kept the time going. Before we left yesterday, we walked around Warsaw and took a bunch of pictures we neglected to take. And the day before that we spent our time going to Torun and Chelmno. The trip there was through farm country. What was a little bit nifty about that was at the corners of the farms, instead of their being markers of mailboxes or posts or something, there was a shrine to Jesus. Torun was rather lovely and had two really old churches with a bunch of original artwork. What was cool is how black the art work was because they were so old and hadn't been restore. Of course, what is bad is it was hard to see what was in the painting. Probably Jesus. Or Mary. Maybe St. Barbara, she seems to be a big deal out here, too. There was really beautiful stained glass everywhere that rivaled what we saw in the churches in Prague. Chelmno looked like a tiny version of the other towns we've been to. We took a bunch of pictures in the center area and went to the local church. Then we hustled back to the bus stop to take the bus back to Torun in order to take the train back to Warsaw. Poor John looks a little bored, so I shall wrap this up. Love, Trina 11月21日 Happy Birthday!Today is Johns Dads birthday (and the apostrophe stopped working). Happy Birthday! I have been quiet on the blog because yesterday we spent a lot of time on trains and buses going to Torun and Chelmno. Chelmno is where part of my family is fun. We did not make it to the other two family towns, but I am okay with that because really, what was I going to do besides stand in the middle of the square and say 150 years ago my ancestors stood here. I figured 1 out of 3 is not bad. Today we are off to Krakow. And we should be walking toward the train right now, so I am going to sign off. More later. Trina 11月18日 World DominationA long while ago, my dad used to listen to this tiny radio station called the Bear. The station house was close to my dad's work, and it was one of the rare stations they could pick up in the warehouse. A few years later, KISS FM bought the Bear, and the Bear was no more. While the Bateses were lamenting the demise of my dad's beloved radio station, my dad explained KISS FM's plans for world domination. Why am I blogging about this now you ask? Well, because I have been in three taxi cabs on this trip, and all of the cabbies have been playing KISS FM. It seems they are well on their way toward the goal my dad laid out so many years ago. While it should make me grimace with thoughts of the Bear's demise, instead it has been a treat for me because they play a LOT of Rihanna, whose album I adore and did not get a chance to add to my iPod. In the opposite of world domination, we were denied the opportunity to rent a car because we did not carry an international driver's license (which according to the LP, we didn't need, so we didn't get). Gotta go catch a train! Trina Warsaw Rising Yesterday we went to the Warsaw Rising museum. It was everything I hoped it would be. The exhibits were really well done with so many haunting pictures and good translations. It's such an amazing story. We were there with a handful of other tourists and three school groups. There was plenty of room to move about, though, so it didn't feel too crowded. I liked to observe which exhibits the school groups lingered over versus what interested me. For instance, the teacher spent probably 15 or 20 minutes discussing the arm bands the soldiers wore and took me about 2 minutes to admire them. I wonder what I miss not being from here. After the museum, we wandered around the city and ate more pierogies. This time we also tried some sweet ones, which were filled with apples and spices and topped with sweet cream. Delicious! Everyone here is quite lovely to look at. It's like being in Seoul in that way. Also many of the ladies have awesome sweaters, which I am current on the hunt for one. It shall be my Poland souvenir. Speaking of sweaters. It's COLD here. It's colder than I was led on to believe (thanks, Dad's friend from work). It's Chicago cold complete with wind so strong I can feel it through my wind-resistant coat. I am actually wearing a hat when I leave buildings. I know for lots of people, you're reading this and saying, "Duh, Trina, you went to Poland in November," but I was told to expect it to be Kentucky cold, which isn't so bad. Today our quest is to visit a bunch of oddball stuff and then have an early anniversary dinner at fancy restaurant. Can you believe John and I have been a couple of 10 years on 11/19? Can you believe that we have had Teagan for 2 years today? I had a day dream about Teagan this morning where I fed her a special cheese stick to mark the occasion. Oh, yes, it was a morning of sappy thoughts while eating my yogurt. Moving on, we are also going to attempt to rent a car to drive to the cities (or should I say towns?) of my ancestors. We shall depart tomorrow. Iglewski relatives, here we come! Love, Trina 11月16日 Whip cream: not just for pasties So hot chocolate in Prague has ruined Swiss Miss for me. Esther told me it was bound to happen, and I told her that I knew *real* hot chocolate was better than Swiss Miss but that I liked it in the same way I like Pop Tart and Chef Boy R Dee. Sure, they don't taste anything like the real deal, but they are delicious unto themselves. What sent me over the top the whole hot chocolate business in Prague was the whip cream, of which they put an ample amount on top of the chocolate drink. I don't know what magic pixie dust they put in it, but it is absolutely the most amazing whip cream and there is soooo much of it. Ah, heavenly. Today we had our first bit of Polish cuisine. At least I think it was Polish. Being only of Polish heritage and not of Polish customs, I sometimes confuse what is Polish and what might be Russian. Nevertheless, we had some borsch, pierogies, and pancakes with cheese. Lot of doughy goodness came to our table. Some of the pierogies were filled with "Russian" filling, which tasted like it was potato and onion, and the others were filled with "Meat," which tasted like potatoes and beef. The borsch was fairly pleasant considering it's made with beets. :) The pancakes were a lot like when I try to make crepes at home, which means they're a little on the thick side in comparison to Frenchy creperies. Then they were covered with "cheese," which was more like sour cream, and some sort of berry syrup. Everything was great and we reinforced the stereotype of gluttonous Americans. The train ride here weaves a tale of miscommunication that I shall let John blog about since he was the one who dealt with most of the silliness. Today we had a relaxing, figuring out what we're doing kind of day that involved a trip to a Russian flea market as well as a rather large mall. We have once again worn out a duffel bag, so we spent part of today procuring a replacement. A suitable one was found. Off to bed? Trina 11月15日 Faster than a speeding bulletEveryone here seems to move much faster. They move with purpose and speed, which I find fascinating because the roads are difficult to for me to make any sense of them, so I have trouble moving much quicker than a snail. Well, maybe a turtle--I'm a little bit faster than a snail. The transfer stations in the subway are intense. They go up multiple stories and have very steep, very fast escalators, and everyone moves very quickly between train lines. I must also move fast because if I didn't keep up, I'd get mowed over.
The magic of how the city looks still hasn't worn off. The buildings are just beautiful, and then the way the roads twist around, you visually see buildings on top of buildings like a collage of architecture. I was thinking to myself that it reminded me of Amadeus, and then I read in the LP that Amadeus was filmed here, so "duh, trina." Anyway, it's lovely. We got up around sunrise and walked around taking pictures before too many people were out. We dawdled too long taking photos, and I didn't get back to the hostel in time to do anything about the way my hair is sticking out in a hundred directions. Argh.
Last night we went and saw Nabucco and managed to stay awake for most of it. (jet lag + warm, dark spaces = sleepy) The set was sparse, but effective. I particuarly liked the set piece for the bedroom, which was decorated with sumptuous purple satin fabric and pillows, and the set piece for the prison, which was a simple grid flown in to the front of the stage. We had excellent seats, although looking around, I'm not sure there was a bad one in the house. Earlier in the day, we walked across the Charles Bridge. Part of it was under construction, and parts were crowded, but it was a relaxing stroll. There were many vendors on the bridge selling all sorts of trinkets. I reminded me a bit of the arty section of Pike Place Market. Later on, we went to the Kafka museum, which was really thoughtfully done. I was hoping they would have reproductions of first editions so I could pick up a Metamorphosis for my brother (hi, Derek!), but all they had was the same old Penguin version I can buy through Amazon, so Derek will be getting something else.
I'm not sure what it is about the neighborhood we're staying at, but I have seen more pizzerias that czech cuisine restaurants. Wacky. We enjoyed a delicious pizza last night after the opera. We were starving.
So today we're going to see Prague Castle, and if we can find it, a museum dedicated to Art Nouveau. Then tonight we're hopping on an overnight train to Warsaw, which is a big ol' change to the itinerary. Will write again once we get situated in Warsaw.
Love,
Trina 11月14日 Last little bit about Germany (and a little bit about Prague)Berlin was great. The food was delicious. The people were helpful. The sites were cool. The U-Bahn was excellent.
We finished our time there seeing the East Side Gallery on what is left of the Wall. We checked out a couple more museums, ate a few more doners, and I had some more hot chocolate before we left. I noticed that couples with babies in Bugaboos (which the new parents who are reading this know are the ultra fancy, obscenely expensive strollers) were *everywhere*. Also, families walked home at night with what looked to be homemade paper/plastic lanterns on rods, which I thought was nifty. There is a ton of graffiti on the walls and doorways all over the city, even on churches, not all of it terribly special. There are many parks all around where we were, a couple of which were rather overgrown. We passed a playground with all kinds of cool jungle gym equipment; it looked dangerous and fun! Definitely not something you'd see in the States anymore. I think we must have been in a family-centric neighborhood since I saw more families than anything else.
Dresden was beautiful. Really, I just wanted to see the view from the riverfront in person, and after that I didn't much care what we did. In spite of my ambivalence, we managed to catch most of the sites recommended in the LP. We missed the night tour/pub crawl because I was determined to make it through the day without a nap, which I did, but then I also went to bed at 8 p.m.--an hour before the night tour started. Dresden reminded me a lot of Portland.
Now we are in Prague. We stepped out of the subway, into a square, and all the buildings were lit up and it simply looked magical. The subway stop that we took dumped us into what seems to be the Michigan Avenue of Prague. Lots of schmancy shopping. We got quite twisted around, and I got quite grumpy, trying to find the hostel. We eventually figured it out after pulling out the map every time we made a turn. Once we figured out where we were, it is actually quite easy to find. We're very close to the main square, and have already seen the dancing puppets of the astronomical clock once.
This morning we did laundry, which is not terribly glamorous, but was definitely necessary. The super tourist in me really wanted to see Don Giovanni while we are here, but after looking at the options, I think we shall settle for Nabucco because the only Don Giovanni playing while we're in town is the marionette version, which seems just a little too cheeseball, even for me. Soon we plan on braving the crowds at St. Charles Bridge, checking out the Kafka museum, and otherwise getting lost and unlost. Furthermore, John declared we shall go to a beerhall tonight. More tomorrow.
Love,
Trina 11月12日 So long, Berlin!Berlin has been a beautiful city where we have had a lot of fun. But it's time now to move on to Dresden. I'll write more when it is not time to catch a train!
Love,
Trina 11月10日 Walking... a whole lotta walkingToday John and I spent most of our time walking. We took the Lonely Planet walking tour and modified it for what we were interested in. Their enitre version is supposed to take 4 hours, which I think is absolute crazy talk since it took us more than 7 hours to complete half of it. But then again we did get a bit lost and I don't walk terriblz fast lest I trip over something while looking up.
We started at Potsdamer Platz on a quest to find items 1, 2, and 3, not realizing that we were in the middle of all of them. Ha! As soon as we got off the U-Bahn, we stumbled upon some sort of demonstration. If we had a guess, we'd say a strike of some sort; however, everyone looked so cheerful, it was hard to decide. Could have been a parade, but there was no marching band or balloons or ticker tape, so perhaps no. In any event, we wandered around the area arguing about what direction we were travelling in. Eventually we got our barings and at that point we had given up on looking for items 1, 2, and 3, but found them anyway. We strolled through a small shopping area (3), took some pictures of a beautiful modern glass dome (part of 1). Then we saw some small chunks of the former Wall (item 2). We walked up Ebertstraße for a long while, stopping at the Holocaust Memorial and Branderburg Gate then on to the Reichstag. The line to go in the dome in the Reichstag was ridiculously long, so we chuckled to ourselves about those standing in the line and vowed to return at night time when the line would be much shorter. Next we meandered in the direction of an art museum (Dad would have been proud of my superior map reading skillz) only to find it was closed because almost all museums are closed on Mondays. Whoops!
Once we realized that the rest of our itinerary was museums and that they would be closed, we decided take the U-Bahn back to the hostel to regroup. But first we had to stop to see Babelplatz, which is the site of the infamous book burning, and then we had to stop at a church with a HUGE dome, and then we paused to eat, and then we had to see a square with 3 beautiful buildings (2 of which were under construction), and finally moseyed on back to the U-Bahn, and promptly got off at the next time to see Marienkirche Kathedrale on the way back. It was very simple on the inside, but still very beautiful, with many old paintings depicting different parts of the life of Jesus. Have a mentioned that we walked to all these side trips? So much walking.
After we returned to the hostel, we took a looong nap, which is a cardinal sin of overcoming jetlag, but we did a lot of walking, so I'm saying it's okay. Also, the nap was extra long because we forgot to pack the travel clock, and we haven't yet found a replacement for it. Regardless, we got our act together, strolled to a wonderful restaurant for a tasty meal, and then decided to head back to the Reichstag to go in the dome.
Although not necessarily a wasted trip, the dome of the Reichstag is exactly why I have been avoiding going on the top of the Space Needle: It's a lot of trouble for a so-so view. Nevertheless, we took the obligatory pictures of the skyline and of each other admiring the skyline, climbed to the top of the dome too look up, sauntered back down (even though John wanted to race to the bottom), observed the history of the Reichstag (which is pretty cool, actually), and headed back home. We almost crammed in going to the East Wall Gallery, but I decided to veto it when I realized we probably wouldn't finish up until after the trains stop running (which I *think* is midnight). We shall go bright and early in the morning. Maybe get some cool sunrise shots.
On that note, I should head out to plan tomorrow over some more hot cocoa.
Good night!
Trina
Oh, by the way, if you need to e-mail me, send zour message to my hotmail account: trinabates (at) hotmail (dot) com. I can't get to my trinabwright webmail for some reason. Mysterious. 11月9日 Distracted by meatWe arrived in Berlin! It was a loooonnnngggg flight, and I got quite dehydrated, so I was extremely uncomfortable for the last 3-4 hours of travelling. Then when we arrived in Berlin, my bag arrived, but John's bag did not. D'oh! (No worries--it turned up at our hostel a few hours later.)
We made our way to the hostel, which is quite nice. We're staying at Circus Hostel Weinbergsweg. From there we walked around a bit to get a sense of things. We went to a flea market, which had all sorts of delightul things; however, we did not stay too long because it started raining and we were without our rainjackets at the time. We ducked inside a place that sells a döner, which is more or less a gyro. John's friend from work, who is originally from Berlin, explained that gyros were invented here by Turkish immigrants a while back. Whatever the history, they were delicious! After that we made our way back to the hostel for a short nap, but along the way we stopped by a Jewish cemetary and looked around. It was very beautiful to see all the mossy headstones packed in between many tall trees with the leaves changing.
After our nap, we showered and then ventured back oustide. We were in search of this cozy place that makes kassespatzle. We got waaaaay off track after we had peered in a window of yet another döner joint. We looked at the enormous spike of meat, and then headed in the completely wrong direction. After a little while, we realized what we did, corrected our path, and enjoyed a delicous meal.
Now we're back at the hostel. John and I planned out what we shall see tomorrow over tea and hot cocoa.
I am very proud of myself for staying awake until 10 p.m. I am annoyed that on this keyboard, the z is where the y normally is and I have to shift to use an apostrophe since an ä is where the apostrophe is. Ah, the joys of travelling!
Love,
Trina 11月7日 Tomorrow: you're only a day away We leave tomorrow! I'm so excited. John and I were discussing how he is going to eat his way through these countries to make up for the lackluster cuisine we've dined on in other countries. I hope it lives up to his expectations! :) I have so much to do that I am procrastinating a bit by blogging. The dogs have been unbearably cute lately. It's like they know we're leaving and want us to feel guilty for leaving them behind. Mission accomplished. John and I have been missing our walks around the neighborhood and trips to the dog park because it's been raining almost constantly for the last few days. Poor Teagan hasn't had exercise beyond running around our house all week--well that's not entirely true, I took her to the theater a couple of times and she ran around eating up all the candy the kids drop on the floor. Shout out to Eric and Heidi, and Gary and Diane: Thanks for dog sitting! We still need to pack. We have collected all the things we'd like to bring, so it's just a matter of making sure it all fits in the bags. Fitting it in the bags *is* the hard part. It was funny going through our travel bags and seeing some of the items that never made it out after we returned from Tibet. For instance, John found the ticket we bought at the bottom of Tiger Leaping Gorge in order continue on the trail back up to the top as well as the laundry line and sink stopper, and I found some remnants of the Potala Palace incense that broke into a thousand pieces on their way back to the U.S. as well as the padlock and cable for securing our bags. The fact we're not packed yet reminds me of all the times that the girls and I would sit around Jocelyn's bedroom in Des Plaines and watch her pack late into the night before she'd return to school. That will be us tonight. Which is probably fine--we can sleep on the plane. I should probably carry on with the To-Do list. I am trying to usurp John's title of "List Crossing Off Slaya." Love, Trina 11月6日 Woohoo! Presiden-elect ObamaI am so excited about President-elect Obama! I was at rehearsal at the time it was announced, with 3 scenes left to go until intermission. Finally! Act I was over, and everyone spilled out into the theater for a impromptu dance party.
After rehearsal was over, and the cast members had gone home, I went back inside to watch Obama's acceptance speech on the laptop of the stage manager along side her, the assistant director, and the artistic director. It was quite a moment.
I feel relieved. I feel hopeful. I look forward to the inaugural address.
Love,
Trina  11月4日 The Specific Itinerary Oh, my goodness, we've been busy getting ready. Over the weekend we did a loose packing and realized that we have misplaced one of our luggage locks and that I don't have travel-friendly, nice-looking, black pants, so we had to do a little bit of shopping. Also in the meantime, I am lighting Robin Hood at YTN and John was working on a deployment at work from around 5 a.m. yesterday until close to 9 p.m. Oh, yeah, and we had a gas leak in the house! Sheesh. I voted today! Yay! Go vote! Okay, since more and more people have been asking, and I know my Mom secretly likes to track my every travel move (with Windows Live Maps, right?), here is the specific itinerary as it currently stands. Saturday, November 8: depart Seattle around Noon Sunday, November 9: arrive Berlin (via Amsterdam) at 8:35 a.m. We have an absurdly short layover in Amsterdam--cross your fingers we make it on time! Monday, November 10: Berlin Tuesday, November 11: train to Dresden Wednesday, November 12: Dresden Thursday, November 13: Train to Prague Friday, November 14: Prague Saturday, November 15: Prague, then night train to Krakow Sunday, November 16: Krakow (if we're not too tired, day trip to Jasna Gora) Monday, November 17: Krakow Tuesday, November 18: Krakow (day trip Auschwitz-Birkenau) Wednesday, November 19: Krakow (day trip Jasna Gora, if we missed it on Sunday) Thursday, November 20: Train to Lviv (which could be as many as 16 glorious hours! 8 seems to be the average. See why here) Friday, November 21: Lviv (Happy Birthday, John's Dad!) Saturday, November, 22: Lviv (Happy Birthday, Mom!) Sunday, November 23: Lviv to Warsaw Monday, November 24: Warsaw Tuesday, November 25: Warsaw Wednesday, November 26: Travel to Torun Thursday, November 27: Torun (and Trina’s family’s roots) Friday, November 28: Travel back to Berlin Saturday, November 29: Berlin Sunday, November 30: Fly back to Seattle, arrive 2:35 p.m., pick up the dogs and go home. |
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