... tired old Sound of Music jokes when talking about Salzburg? Actually, much credit goes to Greg for "going native" and appreciating Salzburg in the proper European manner: as the first home of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. At the end of our trip, he even commented that were it not for Mozart, tourists might not visit Salzburg at all! Meanwhile I'm humming "Edelweiss" (hint: not a traditional Austrian tune) and trying to remember where-all the von Trapp children danced during the "Do Re Mi" montage. OK, I only did that a little bit. :) ÖBB offers a high-speed direct route, under three hours from Wien (Vienna) to Budapest, Hungary on their RailJet line. We seriously considered making a day trip there, but ultimately decided that such a large city... read more

It snowed back in Seattle today. Online in the afternoon, I witnessed a flood of Tweets/Facebook stati from home proclaiming it "Mother Nature's April Fool's Joke" (all by people who don't know each other). Here, our 1. April was utterly free of Aprilscherze (April Fool's Jokes), even from my pun-loving sweetheart, for which I blame residual jet lag. :) We set out this morning to visit Greg's #1 destination, the Haus der Musik interactive museum. It's very much like Seattle's Pacific Science Center but devoted to sound and music. I was surprised when Greg rated it so highly, because it seemed more like a hands-on learning center and more for kids, which is great and all but is not something to which grown-ups necessarily want to devote precious Vienna time. The first few floors of the ... read more

It all started when I created a low-fare email alert for Seattle-Frankfurt am Main. I set it at what I figured was a ridiculously low threshold and didn't think about it again. Until last week, when it triggered. $450. LOLwut?! Just wrapping up a brutal month of 60-ish hour workweeks trying to deliver a software product, looking for a way to relax and reward myself, and airfares to Europe in this shoulder season are crazy low thanks to the economic downturn. On the other hand, I still haven't fully paid off the credit card from the last trip and that is not OK. On the other other hand, ZOMG $450. (Last summer was $1,500.) At the end of last year's trip, I started thinking that off-season or shoulder season might be good enough for me rather ... read more

I'm surprised and impressed that LG is having any fun in Prague at all. It's been cold, windy, and raining hard since we arrived... utterly miserable for sightseeing. And still overrun with tourists. We can't even have the fail to ourselves. Yesterday, we got stuck in a rainstorm while standing in the queue to get into the Katedrála svatého Víta, Václava a Vojtěcha (great big cathedral of some holy dudes) in Praský hrad (Prague Castle). No rain gear of any kind. I don't even remember there being a queue when Drea & I were here in 2005 and no way was I going to step out of it over a little rain. Ugh. We were wet, cold, miserable, and generally extremely Catholic by the time we got inside the doors. The Katedrála is worth it, though. ... read more

We're hosted in Dresden by friends-of-a-friend's-parents, wonderful people whom I also visited for a few days in 2005. I had heard that they were excited to have me back, but I didn't expect Herr S. to be jumping up and down, totally literally, on the train platform when he spotted us. We were greeted with a huge smile and hugs and kisses. Back at the apartment, zwei köstliche hausgemacht Kuchen... two delicious homemade cakes, one Erdbeere (strawberry) and one Pflaume (plum). LG got drei Stücke Erdbeerkuchen (three pieces of strawberry cake) and is very happy to be back in the company of Großeltern (grandparents) again!! We took a ride around the kid-operated Mini-Parkeisenbahn (cute little miniature railway) on a 5km (2.5ish miles) tour of Dresden's Großer Garten (great big garden), just a short walk from our ... read more