Germany

I apologize to my legion of fans for going dark the last few days. Miles and I have been spending all our time being social and playing with Anton.

We arrived Wednesday evening in Stuttgart, having taken the train from Paris. Blumi & Fatma fed us a wonderful BBQ dinner. Poor Miles had caught a cold in Paris, so he went to bed early.

Thursday, we went walkbout in Stuttgart. We utilized the excellent public transit system to visit various areas; parks, tea houses and beer gardens. The weather was lovely, everyone was very friendly, and the scenery gloriously green.

On Friday, we met up with Greg Larsen and his wife, Marie-Jose. Greg is a friend of Miles' from elementary school. We visited Esslingen, a cute, old village, complete with a castle on the hill. We sat at a cafe and ate cake, weathered a brief, but intense, rain storm, and did a bit of shopping. Then we climbed the hill to the "Fat Tower", which now houses a restaurant. (Oy! What a climb!) After wandering around the top of the hill and admiring the view, we went back down into town. We had a private tour of 15th century wine cellers and a late lunch. Then Fatma, Anton and I went home and the rest of the gang went shopping for dinner supplies. Luckily, we are in Germany during asparagus season. So our dinner was potatoes, and asparagus, napped in the most delicious hollandaise sauce (Thanks, Marie-Jose!) along with three varieties of ham.

Every morning, the Blums set out a lovely breakfast for us. We are getting so spoiled; once home, making our own coffee and getting our own meals will seem very hard.....