Love the Lausanne Weekends. . . .

Headed out of Frankfurt for a last minute trip to visit friends in Lausanne this weekend. And what a weekend it was, full of fabulous food, incredible wines (many, many bottles ) and unbelievably wonderful company. I do love any chance I have to get together with the Girls (Andrea and Vanessa).

It's hard not to enjoy a weekend when you've got great people cooking for you. With Bally's amazing french toast, several delicious bottles of champagne stretched breakfast far into the day after a full night out at the clubs on Friday.

And as if that wasn't enough, I met Andrea's good friend Stuart, a totally eclectic food lover whose mom owned a restaurant and has cooked for the Australian embassy with a friend of his. He had promised Andrea a famous roast chicken dinner for the girls, and he definitely didn't disappoint. I think when he said he didn't have enough time to bake something I may have actually asked the poor guy to marry me! :)

No worries though, Stuart joined us on top of the mountainside for a glass of wine and more culinary discussion before working his magic in the kitchen. And what magic it was! Gorgeous roasted chicken with lemon and butter, pan roasted asparagus, many beautiful roasted vegetables. Gorgeous bottles of Spanish red wine from Stuart's private collection (which he's probably about to auction off if anyone of you is interested). And then for dessert, balsamic macerated strawberries and raspberries over a really incredible, dense chocolate cake. God I think I might be hungry again for his cooking! Anyway, it was a great night, with great company and amazing food.
I do love these weekends with Andrea and her friends. It's almost as if we've found ourselves in some French country home and everyone just drops by and stays for a while to talk and catch up and just relax. So fabulous.

So to finish the weekend of food and fun off I returned home for dinner cooked by another lovely friend of mine, Jon who made me delicious pasta and then capped the weekend off with fireworks! Oh how lucky am I to have friends like this! Truly, truly lucky.

Oh the Fire Fighters

So last weekend I was walking home from the Konstablerwache farmers market when I saw this very large crowd gathered right by the pedestrian bridge on the river. There were all of these fire trucks and a fire fighting boat and many people in fire gear and all I could think is that one of the freighter ships that moves up and down the Main River must have gotten into an accident!

And then I got closer and heard a man commentating on the happenings over a bullhorn. That was when I realized that it was a demonstration, and not just any demonstration, a youth fire brigade demonstration. It was so fun to watch. To see these little kids handling these really large fire hoses. I tell you! I just love the way they do stuff in this country. I actually saw an ad for the youth fire brigade on TV the other day. Apparently all German youth have to do some sort of community service whether it's serving in the army, working with the ambulance corp, the fire brigade or something along those lines.

Sights around the City

Ever since I arrived in Frankfurt in March, I have tried to carry my camera around with me so I could capture some of the things you see when you're just new to a city. The things that once you've been there for a while start to blend into the background and simply become the place that you live.

These are a few of the images that really caught my attention in the first few weeks and months.

Flohmarkt

So every Saturday just a few blocks from where I live, there is a 10 story flea market that springs up along the river. You can find almost anything you might possibly want in this flea market, from bicycles to lamps to socks to rifle scopes . . . . and I'm not kidding about that last one. But in all honesty, I wouldn't say that it is that much different from a flea market back in the states, but what is interesting is how the styles of selling differ.

On one of my first weekends in Frankfurt I actually found my kitchen table here. It's the base of an old iron sewing machine so it's incredibly heavy, but very cool looking. I made one of my friends, Jon, help me carry it the 10 blocks back to my apartment. He at 6'4" and me at 5'4" made quite the sight hauling this thing down the street. And the thing must have weighed 200 lbs. Insane, but I was just so glad to have a place to sit down and eat something while I waited for my furniture to arrive.

So back to the market, there are both Turkish and German sellers at this market and each has a distinctly different style of selling, the Germans tend to be much quieter, much less ostentatious in how they sell. The Turks on the other hand are out there, in your face, shouting following you down the sidewalk, always selling, selling, selling. They've really carried so much of their selling style from home into Germany. It's interesting.

The relationship between the Turks and the Germans is quite tense and has been for a while. As I understand things, back in the 50s and 60s Germany relaxed many of its immigration laws because it had a very low rate of unemployment and needed workers to come into the country to fill low-paying, labor jobs. The Turks moved very quickly into Germany because there was a lot of opportunity for them. Unfortunately, as unemployment rates went up over the years, none of the Turks left Germany, so a real sense of resentment started growing among the Germans about how many Turkish there were in Germany, and they were taking all of these jobs, and actual Germans were unemployed. . . . you get the picture. Basically there is quite a lot of racism directed against the Turkish who are living in Germany. It doesn't seem to be quite so obvious from what I've seen, but I have heard that there are quite a lot of problems. Particularly from the more disenfranchised young German men.

There are definitely some interesting similarities between racial tensions against recent immigrants in America and the current situation in Germany. Particularly in regards to how quite a few people see Mexican immigrants as taking away job opportunities domestically. The problem with that view, from what I see, is that most native born Americans don't want to do the work that recent immigrants are willing to do. As far as I can tell, the same situation also seems to exist here in Germany. It's an interesting point of similarity between our two countries.

Bike Polo Anyone?

So one day not too long ago, I was walking around the city, trying to find new places (and a cup of coffee). As I walked by the old stock exchange, in addition to the usual punk kid skate boarders, I saw this group of people on bikes riding slowly in circles with big sticks. It took me a minute to figure out what they were doing, but turns out they were playing polo on bikes!

The things you see in this city sometimes.

Wining in the Rheingau

So last Tuesday, my friend Doug (see the lovely picture to the right) and I took our Feiertag (holiday) and went to the Rheingau to sip Rieslings and see the sites.

It was beautiful and I have to say the landscape quite resembled Wisconsin. Doug and I both think that's why there were so many German settlers who moved to the area when they immigrated. It reminded them of home.

This was my first time driving in Germany on the Autobahn and I can't lie, driving the Autobahn is everything you could imagine and more. The speed and the fun of driving a fast German car is a combination that practically guarantees very fun driving. Granted I have to do this in kilometers, but I was going an easy 140km and was being passed by people who were going at least 200km and probably even fast than that. Fun and slightly terrifying all at once. I do have to say that German drivers really are impressive. Apparently they have to take a very expensive course here in order to receive their license and then they have an incredibly long probationary period where their license can be taken away for any tiny infraction. On a side note, I should be receiving my have an Illinois driver's license I am able to drive 10 ton trucks in German driver's license sometime in the next few weeks. How fun is that? And because I the United Kingdom. I don't know about you, but as much faith as I have in my driving abilities the thought of me behind a truck that size on the left hand side of the road is a touch frightening. . . .

Back on track again, Doug and I started out on Tuesday morning from the agency and hopped right onto the Autobahn to a town called Eltville. It was a really pretty town, in some ways exactly how I would have pictured a little German town along the Rhein River. We stopped to poke around a bit, but in order to do that I had to park the car. Can I just tell you that I don't know if I will ever understand how Germans know where they can and cannot park on the street? As far as I can tell they just put their car on a sidewalk wherever there happens to be some space. But beyond that I have yet to figure out what signs or street markings actually indicate that a person can park there without getting a ticket.

After finding parking we wandered around Eltville for a little while and found this really beautiful church right in the center. Actually it was a little complex of church buildings. Very cool stuff inside, all open to the public for no charge. The funny thing was that right up next to the alter I found this sign, obviously made in Sunday school class or something like that:






Such a random little class project , Shabbat Shalom in what is obviously a church.

Anyhow, we left the church and were on our way back to the car and out of Eltville when we noticed a sign for a Flohmarkt that was taking place just outside of the town with music and food and stuff like that. We decided to drive up since it looked like it was little ways away. But once we saw the crowds and the random stuff people were carrying away from the Flohmarkt, we decided to forgo the Flohmarkt in favor of a historic monastery called the Kloster Eberbach. My German teacher Petra had told me about this particular stop on the route we were planning to follow. It is one of her favorite places and by great luck, also has rather lovely Rieslings to sample and purchase as well.

The Kloster Eberbach was incredibly impressive. Beyond the history, the buildings and main chapel were really pretty breathtaking. So breathtaking in fact, that part of the movie "The Name of the Rose" was filmed on the premises within the main chapel. The acoustics within the space were unbelievable. I could stand in one corner and whisper to Doug and he could hear me as if I was standing right next to him.

Check out these pictures of the chapel:

This is the original main chapel, also where they filmed some of the "Name of the Rose". They actually still have a set piece from the film in the chapel today.


This here was originally the dormitory for the full monks. Any laymen who were dedicated to Christ but hadn't taken full vows slept elsewhere in order to keep the monks from being disturbed.






This is the view from the dormitory window down into the courtyard.

Once we had worked our way through the main religious buildings we got to the really interesting part, the wine presses and wine cellar. I've never seen wine presses like these before, they were really quite large and they had some wonderful detail on them. The presses themselves had a number assigned to it, but neither Doug nor I could quite figure it out how it was ordered.

The wine presses at Kloster Eberbach.

Detail from the wine presses.

The wine bike. OK, so I don't actually know what this is, but it looks like something one would pedal around after pressing wine all day long.

The wine casks.

And of course after seeing the casks we had to go and sample some of the wines from Kloster Eberbach, which were delicious. I had no idea how different Rieslings could taste from one vintage to another. We each went home with at least a case of wine if not a little more. And head home is what we did after checking out the Kloster Eberbach. On the way home we managed to somehow get lost when we were only about five minutes from the agency. I'll tell you something, you really start to understand how much you're picking up a language when you have to ask for directions in it. Somehow Doug and I managed to ask for directions in German and then actually follow them when they were given to us in German. Not too bad for new German learners.

So, Happy Ascension Day!

And of course, this wouldn't be complete without a last few pictures that I just couldn't quite fit in next to all the text:

The Door of St. Michaelskapelle.

A very cool old gravestone. Not sure why there's a Skull and Crossbones on it.

Dragon Adornment in the small chapel at St. Michaelskapelle.

Very cool little building nestled above the road by Kloster Eberbach.


The grounds at Kloster Eberbach.
Kloster Eberbach main chapel.
A small door in the Dormitory at Kloster Eberbach.

The wine cellar at Kloster Eberbach.

Easter in Provence

5-9 April-2007













Ah, Easter. Well, being Jewish I can't say that the actual holiday has that much religious meaning for me, but I do love the chocolate Easter eggs and the fact that living in Germany means I get a four day weekend. How cool is that??

So for this long holiday weekend, my friend and I decided to drive the Napoleon Route from Grenoble down to the French Riviera and Cannes. OK, so Napoleon went the opposite direction, but really, does it matter that much to you??

So before we went on our trip through France, Andrea and I went to see this DJ, called David Guetta. It's a music festival that is partly sponsored by Marlboro. We went with Andrea's Dutch friends Tycho, Robbert, and Stuart.

It was a fun night out with everyone. My first night out really since I moved over to Germany. I had such a great time, although the fact that we were out until almost 5 am meant that we didn't really get moving until much later in the afternoon, but that's ok, we still managed to get on the road before it got dark out on Friday afternoon.

So when we finally did make it out the door, we made our first stop Annecy. It is this beautiful, incredibly picturesque town maybe a two or three hour drive from Lausanne. It was definitely a place to linger. And we definitely spent some time lingering and taking pictures.

After a leisurely glass of wine in Annecy, we hopped back into the car and headed to Grenoble, where we had no hotel reservation and a general clue as to where we might be going. But I tell you, we still managed to find a reasonable hotel for a resounding 40 Euros. It wasn't the fanciest hotel I've ever stayed in (and flushing the toilet was a noisy and turbo charged affair), but it was clean and secure and right in the middle of the city. Speaking of which, Grenoble is a fantastic place to do some shopping, let me tell you.

We spent the morning just wandering around Grenoble, shopping and looking in windows and then early afternoon we headed south. We passed a little town called Brie (that remarkably bore the scent of the cheese itself), and then kept driving past beautiful pastures and postcard perfect mountains.

And kept on our way until we reached a town called Vizille. It was so beautiful. They had this chateau there that they had turned into a museum. It was completely free and the chateau gardens had been completely maintained and were all open to the public. The gardens were amazing. And I can't imagine what the house must have been like to live in. I imagine it was a bit drafty and cold. Anyhow, they had a really wonderful art collection.

After leaving Vizille, we hit a bit of rain, but as we were driving a beautiful regenbogen came out since the sun was already kind of going down. It was so beautiful.

The rain didn't last very long, and soon we were on our way to Castellane watching the sun set as we drove along. So the thing Gorges. They are also known as the Grand Canyon of Europe. At the time we drove through the you should know about getting toCastellane is that in order to get to this town, you have to drive through an area called the Verdon Gorges, the sun was going down, the rain was falling, and I was driving the car along hairpin turns clutching the steering wheel for dear life. And I think Andrea was unusually happy that it was getting dark out so we couldn't see the full extent of the actual gorges themselves. From the little I did manage to see, it was quite a long way down. . . .

Castellane is this tiny little town sunk in the middle of the gorges. And in the summer, it is full of tourists who are there to rock climb, white water raft, hike and participate in any other outdoor sport you can possibly dream up (we actually saw paragliders as we were leaving the town the next day). It's a pretty little town, with about five hotels in it. And guess what we didn't have again on Saturday night. . . yup, a hotel reservation. So we arrived at one hotel, asked the proprietor if he had any rooms (to which he of course replied no), but since he was full up, he directed us to a little motel down the street. And told us to hurry because everyone was looking for rooms. We got one, and since the guy at the other hotel had been so nice, we went back there for dinner. And we ate, and ate, and ate for hours. And drank some of the most amazing wine I think I have had in a long, long time. And the cheese. . . my god the chevre this man was serving was unreal, a little runny, rolled in herbs de Provence, with a sweet, creamy tanginess I could die for. I think I could have made three days worth of meals out of that wine and cheese alone. And the escargot weren't bad either I must say.

Anyway, we went back to the motel at about 1am, crawled into bed and passed out until early the next day. Easter morning. It was a beautiful sunny day and after packing up (and me pulling the door handle off the door of our room. Oops!), we had breakfast down in town. It was beautiful, the church bells were ringing, there was a little market right down in the square selling, herbs, sausages, fresh cheese, Provencal olive oil, regional cookies and things like that. It was beautiful and perfect for Easter.

After breakfast, we decided to hike up to this little chapel that sat on a cliff and overlooked the town. It wasn't a difficulty climb, in fact it probably only took about 20 minutes to hike all the way up, but it was a beautiful view of the town from up top, and the chapel itself was really pretty. I believe it was a Notre Dame chapel, but I might be mistaken. Anyway, we hiked back down, grabbed the car and kept heading South, because now, St. Tropez was calling our name.

We did find this beautiful little chapel along the way where we believe (according to our guidebook) that Napoleon may have stopped in at as he marched from Cannes to Grenoble.

It didn't take us that long after leaving Castellane to get into more Mediterranean climes. In fact, as we started descending in altitude we immediately noticed the change in the air and in the architecture. It was actually pretty incredible, the buildings and houses as we descended became increasingly colorful and the closer we got to Cannes the more we saw lilacs blooming along the fences and in people's yards.

And then there it was, Cannes and the Ocean.

It was incredibly pretty, and surprisingly humid as well. But it only made us want to get to St. Tropez faster, so we pretty much did a drive by of Cannes and kept on trucking along the coastline. The coastline itself was pretty amazing.

St. Tropez was great. We met up with Andrea's friend, Ilham and her fiance, Pascual. Spent a night out on the town and a morning hanging out down in St. Tropez. What an insight into a totally different world from where I live. Ilham and Pascual were telling us about this bar you can go to and they keep a running contest of who has spent the most money on a bottle of liquor. Ilham said they once saw someone spend more than 20,000 euros on a bottle of champagne. It's crazy! I just can't quite imagine what it must be like to lie that kind of life. But hey it wouldn't stop me from going back. It is a beautiful resort town. People all walk around wearing white, they play baci ball in the middle of the town square, they party and live life to the fullest. It's decadent, but it is fun once in a while.

We had a great breakfast and coffee right by the harbour before heading back to Lausanne. And I should add here, that I made my train by about 60 seconds. I think I walked onto the train and the doors closed right behind me a few seconds later. Now, I know what you're all thinking, especially given my tendencies towards tardiness. but you should all know that we left plenty of time for me to get to the train. What we couldn't control was the immense traffic accident that stopped everything for miles and delayed us by almost two hours. That was far, far beyond our control. The good thing is that I did actually make the train, and I rolled into Frankfurt on a crisp April morning at 4:30am.

It was a long day at the office on Tuesday. But so worth it.
And that my friends, was my first adventure in the French countryside. Now I just have to figure out what "St." town I'm going to hit up next. . . . suggestions are welcome. . . . St. Sebastian anyone??