Sunday Afternoon

Another Sunday with everything closed. The weather was nice for a few hours in the afternoon, so I grabbed my 111 Things to See in Duesseldorf book and suggested a quick trip on the train to the Stinderbachtal. It was described as being very picturesque.

 To make it more exciting for Sophie, we let her take her bike. There were some very hilly parts, which we did not know, so Andrew had his exercise for the day, too. 

 I agree it was beautiful. On our way to find the cafe.

 Found it and with surprisingly friendly service.

Weighed down with apple strudel, I could no longer manage to keep up with the two of them.

The More the Merrier

We had friends over for a BBQ today. A perfect way to spend a Sunday in Germany. 

 Lara, Leon and Sophie were joined by Andrés and Lina for dinner.

Then a couple of nasty wasps wanted to join in as well.

Happy Bastille Day

Cold, but mostly dry today. Good enough to go to the French festival in the courtyard of the city hall. 

We ran into our wine merchant from Geldern who gave us another good recommendation as we are learning about French wines. 

 Sophie enjoyed her crêpe with Nutella while listening to French chansons. 

 There was an excellent face painter. She actually matched most face paintings to the kids' outfits, but Sophie had her heart set on a pink butterfly. 

On the other side of the Rhine we were able to spot the annual Kirmes (fun fair), but we will save that for another day (i.e. tomorrow). 

Picnic in South Park

We are back to Germany Sundays. That usually means a lazy morning in bed followed by Zumba, i.e. childwatch at the gym for Sophie. She enjoys the play structure inside the childwatch very much. The gym borders a large park, called Südpark with a big lake and a small petting zoo (see earlier blog). As the weather continues to be gorgeous, we packed a little picnic and rode the bike to the park after the gym.

 Sophie really enjoys taking pictures. She took both of these shots.

75 Degrees and Sunshine - When in California...

Nothing like a lazy Sunday morning watching Mickey Mouse Club in Nanny's bed.

 It is promising to be another beautiful sunny day on the West Coast.

 Enjoying one of Pops' cookies and just taking it all in before we were off to the next adventure.

 We had a wine shipment that needed to be picked up from our wine club. Pops offered to be the designated driver (after only a little bit of persuasion), so we headed off along River Road down the Salinas Valley.

 Hahn Winery has plenty of space for Sophie and other kids to run around.

 Sophie playing bat upside down.

 "My vineyard."

 ... while we had some serious business to do.

 Choosing between the 2009 and 2010 Pinot Noir.

 To be followed by a picnic in the shade.

Sophie was striking poses - who was drinking the wine?

Airventure at Düsseldorf Airport

Found another thing to do every first Sunday of the month: the airport puts on an event for children with arts & crafts, plays, miniature trains, a discount to the viewing platform and free tours of the airport, etc. 

Even though Sophie had caught a little bug and was feeling a bit under the weather this morning, she absolutely insisted on going to the kids event at the airport. It was a nice day, so we gave it a whirl and hopped on the bus after a relaxing morning on the couch. And of course Andrew did not need much persuading.

 Outside on the viewing platform. It was a bit nippy, as Andrew was showing Sophie the ropes (tugs, steering bypass pin, packs, wave-off). Sophie was nodding politely, until suddenly she felt just too cold.

 Especially for all of you who had seen the 'youtube' video on bumpy landings in Düsseldorf recently - we do have nice days here.

 That's the type of airplane we flew in on from San Francisco in September (A 330).

 Back inside, in the dress-up section, i.e. Sophie heaven.

Spotted a creepy guy in the children's corner

 Pom-poms!

 Crafting a mask for the carnival costume. (There is that creepy guy again!)

 Topping off the afternoon with a train ride through the shopping arcades.

Düsseldorf Boat Show

Another Sunday trying to find something fun to do. Since having worked for Messe Düsseldorf more than ten years ago now, I have been wanting to visit their boat show just once. People have told me how impressive it is to see the superyachts being hauled in to the exhibit halls. This year,  I had a chance to see it for myself. I knew Andrew would not object to scouting out our future yacht. We strung Sophie along on stories of the fabled kids area which in the end turned out to be rather mediocre. In fact, Sophie was far more interested in giving us her opinions on which boat we should purchase; preferably one with three bedrooms, one of which would be hers, one of which would be ours, and one for guests. She also liked big kitchens, bathrooms with showers, and flatscreen TVs. 

At this point I was ordered to remove a particularly unflattering picture of Andrew.

 Not wasting any time - straight to the superyachts.

 For some boats, one needed an appointment or invitation. We had neither. Their loss.

 One of Sophie's choices (her shot). It was actually quite reasonably priced.

 No expense spared on this exhibit - even carted in some real sand.

 Nice little boat, inspected by Sophie.

 The police boat.

 So much for the kids area.

 Canoe test track.

 A definite favorite, along with the waterslide paddle boat next to it.

The magic of 3D glasses - making everyone look like an idiot.

Sunny Sunday at the Park

The rain is taking a break and we fueled up on Vitamin D at the large park behind our gym. I had just bought a guide to 'Düsseldorf with Children' the day before and it pointed out that there was a small petting zoo in one corner. 

 Sophie even dug out her sunglasses for the occasion. 

 These geese survived the holidays.

 As did these rather skinny looking ducks.

 I think they were called Indian Running ducks or something along those lines. We just found they looked hilarious.

Muffins, rhubarb cheese cake and café au lait al fresco in January. We are growing a thick skin.

Just too bad that these blue skies are not meant to stick around. 

Remembering And Discovering

I realize that we have not made a new entry in a while. This was for two reasons: 1) Andrew has been home and we have simply had better things to do ;-), 2) Andrew decided during the middle of the past week that neither one of us was allowed on the computer for two days except to briefly check our email twice a day. It seemed that Andrew had had a harder time with it (I caught him on facebook twice on day two). We agreed to make this a regular thing - no computer for two days per week. It felt very liberating I have to say. 

So if I am going to pick only one event to blog about tonight, I will choose to write about what we did today and then work my way back through the past week. Andrew is back to work tomorrow, so we made today very much a family day with a bit of an excursion, some fresh air and a nice Sunday meal. We are still getting used to German Sundays - nothing (only gas stations and restaurants are open). That results in everyone panicking and stressing out to get everything done on Saturday, only to sit there with nothing to do on Sunday.

It being almost Remembrance Day, we decided to take a short drive northwest to the Reichswald military cemetery where more than 7,000 allied soldiers lie buried, most of them British. 

 It was very moving to say the least. 

 It was divided into two halves: RAF soldiers to the left and army to the right.

 Soldiers that had gone down in one airplane were buried together.

 The personal inscriptions by family members in the gravestones (made from Portland stone!) were heartbreaking. We hardly found anybody older than 31. 

 The one soldier's grave who had received the Victoria Cross. 

 After our visit to the cemetery, during which Sophie was very patient and well-behaved, we had promised her a stop at a small zoo nearby. Not quite the San Francisco Zoo, but these birds could have fit right in there, we thought.

 Or how about this pigeon with those fancy feet.

 These castle ruins were right next to the zoo in Weeze.

 Very impressive deer. It's mating season - not that we saw anything we needed to explain to Sophie. Phew!

 Climbing trees with Daddy's help.

 A bit lopsided.

 By chance we discovered that the German war cemetery for the area was right next to this zoo. We thought we might as well take a look. It was deserted. And somber. What stood out was that most soldiers buried here were a lot older than the Allied soldiers, many of them 45 - 50 years old. The younger ones had already been dead this close to the end of the war. What a waste of lives.

This note was posted on a tree at the cemetery. One of many missing soldiers. Many bodies remained unidentified as the local population did not return to this area until August '45 to "clean up." 

While we were out it grew increasingly cooler and grayer. November has finally caught up with us. Brr!

Time for a delicious Sunday dinner: Duck a l'orange. Andrew outdid himself. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of the dish. I was quite hungry. But here is one of Sophie eating her dessert. And no, that is not an alcoholic beverage in front of her. Also, please disregard the messy kitchen counter in the background.