Vacation in the Alps

We recently had a week of vacation, during which we rented a car, packed the tent, and traveled through the western Alps. We started out driving through Switzerland before crossing into Italy over the Splügen Pass. We then reached our first goal, the Lago di Como, nestled between mountains. We stopped at some small picturesque towns on the western shore of the lake, but the highlight was probably the Villa di Balbianello, probably known best for being the filming location of several scenes from Star Wars: Episode II and Casino Royale. After visiting the city of Como, we made our way towards the next lake over, Lago Maggiore. Here we stopped in Stresa, which has some very nice turn-of-the-century architecture. Our campsite here were, as on Lake Como, dominated by trailers and campers. Our little tent was quite lonely, but that was to change soon. The next day, after a quick stop in the small town of Orta San Giulio, we made our way to the Aosta valley, which has several impressive castles guarding the way. In the town of Aosta, we saw the Roman sights (yes, they had already settled there), and visited the well-preserved upper parts of frescoes underneath the ceiling in the church of Sant'Orso (the lower parts were destroyed in the 15th century during renovations). After seeing a branch of Grom, we couldn't resist and got some gelato. Our goal for the day was the mountain town of Valnontey, where we found a very nice campground with a fantastic view of the Gran Paradiso massif. The next day, we did a day hike to the Lake of Loie and the Alpe Bardoney, a summer dairy farm. Although we were hoping to see ibex and chamois, they were not to be found. We did see a bunch of marmots, though, and heard them whistling to each other. On the way back, we did a detour to the waterfalls of Lillaz before returning to the car and the campsite. The next day, we drove the rest of the way through the Aosta valley and through the Mont Blanc tunnel (incredibly expensive) to reach the French city of Chamonix. Although we were initially planning on taking the cable car up to the Brévent and then hiking down, that side of the valley was in the clouds. The other side though was in the sun, and so we took the cable car up to the Aiguille du Midi instead, from which there was a fantastic view over the entire Mont Blanc massif. For dinner, we went to Le Dahu in Argentière that my parents had already been to many times several decades earlier, and had a traditional cheese fondue. From there, we made our way through the foothills to Annecy, and drove by two castles nearby. Since we were determined to avoid staying in Switzerland as much as possible (because it's incredibly expensive), we found a campsite just outside Geneva but still in France. Out of the mountains, we were now unfortunately back in trailer-park country. Following Lake Geneva, we passed through several nice towns, each with its own picturesque castle, until reaching Lausanne. After a quick sightseeing tour of the city, we changed (becoming the best-dressed people at the campground) and attended the public Ph.D. defense of a friend of mine. The next morning we encountered some of the first clouds and rain of our entire trip while continuing along Lake Geneva and seeing some more castles (a highlight being the Château de Chillon near Montreux) as well as stone-age menhirs. Then it was back in the direction of home, with stops in Gruyères (where we bought some cheese, of course) and Fribourg, before spending the final night in Bern. Sunday, the weather had become completely rainy, so the sightseeing tour of Bern was rather quick and hasty. A pity really, because the city seemed very nice (if also very sleepy on this Sunday morning). Then, after two more quick stops for a castle at Burgdorf and the waterfalls of the Rhine in Schaffhausen, it was back home to Ulm.

Egypt

For the Easter holidays this year, we wanted to go someplace warm, relatively cheap, and preferably not all too Catholic (so that the holidays wouldn't interfere with the vacation). So when we found a good fare to Cairo, we took advantage. It would also be my birthday, so we'd be celebrating in Egypt.
In the end, we spent a week traveling through the country (that's the absolute minimum of time, in my opinion), stopping in Luxor, Aswan as well as Cairo. Luxor surely had the most monuments: as the site of ancient Thebes, there were many temples, including the famous Luxor, Karnak, and Hatshepsut temples, as well as pharaonic tombs in the Valley of the Kings, among others. In Aswan, we visited Philae temple as well as the old quarries, took a felucca ride on the Nile and took a quick trip to Abu Simbel on the morning of my birthday. Finally, we took in the crazy and crowded city of Cairo in two days, seeing the Egyptian museum and the Islamic monuments of the old town, as well as seeing a multitude of pyramids -- the famous ones at Giza of course, but also the older ones at Saqqara and Dahshur. In Dahshur, we even got to climb down into the Red Pyramid, which was an Indiana Jones style adventure, and ensured that our legs were sore for a few days afterwards.
All in all we had a great time, even if traveling in Egypt can be frustrating at times: as a tourist, you're of course prey for all the touts trying to sell you camel rides, felucca rides, taxis, and any kind of souvenir. Then there's the haggling, which is necessary for almost anything -- certainly for taxis and at the souq. In Cairo, we were tired enough of this that we specifically sought out metered taxis, and a fixed-price fair trade shop, and I'm convinced that we saved money in this way. Finally, there are constant demands for baksheesh from most anyone, and I'm sure there are a few corners of the monuments that we avoided seeing because there was a guard there who we were sure would try to point out some obvious things ("face... cow...") and then ask for some baksheesh. Nevertheless, the beauty of the country and its sights more than balance out these inconveniences, and we're happy to have had the opportunity of going there.

What I did over break

The holidays have come and gone, so it's time for a brief recap of our activities. This year, Kristen and I went home to our respective families, so I flew to Germany. Or tried to, since my flight was canceled due to the winter storms across Europe the weekend before Christmas. Luckily, I made it on a flight the next morning, so I wasn't delayed too much. Kristen fared a bit worse, but I'll let her elaborate on that.
In Germany, I followed a strict regiment of meeting with friends, eating and drinking, and catching up on movies. For example, I finally managed to see the new Star Trek movie (which was actually quite good). In the theater, I watched "The White Ribbon" by Michael Haneke, which has got to be one of the favorites for the Oscar for best foreign picture, and "Avatar" by James Cameron, which could be the "Star Wars" of the 2000's. I also went to see a production of Verdi's "Macbeth" at the consistently good Nationaltheater Mannheim.

Barcelona

Last Tuesday was a holiday in Italy, so like all good Italians, we made a long weekend out of it and went to Barcelona for a few days. We really liked the city, with its Gothic old town and modernisme architecture by Antoni Gaudi, among others. Kristen got tickets to a concert in the Palau de la Musica Catalana for her birthday, and we enjoyed listening to Mozart's Requiem in this over-the-top concert hall. Add to that the excellent food (tapas and paella), and you can tell we had a good time.

It was also enjoyable to be in a city (even a southern European one) in which there is ample and functioning public transportation, mostly friendly and helpful people, and you don't feel like you're being ripped off at any given time. Hey Italy... *nudge, nudge* Interestingly, there were very few jaywalkers... what's up with that?

Scotland

To escape the constant, unrelenting heat in Florence in August, we went to Scotland for nearly two weeks around Assumption Day, which is when half Italy packs up and leaves for the beach or for colder climates. In all our travels, we had never met that many Italians, so I thought that they just didn't travel much. However, it seems that they do travel, just all during August: in Scotland, we saw almost as many Italians as Germans, and that's saying something!
In any case, we started out in Glasgow, where we visited Alecia and her husband, and then rented a car to drive around the countryside, camping in our tent as we went. Via Stirling Castle and Doune Castle, which was thankfully free of taunting Frenchmen, we headed for Loch Lomond, Inveraray Castle and Oban, before reaching Glencoe. Nearby, we went to the Glenfinnan Highland Games, before heading up to the Isle of Skye, where we spent a very stormy night. At this point of the trip, the weather was quite rainy and stormy, so some of the attractions, such as the Old Man of Storr, were shrouded in fog. Coming back from Skye, we crossed Scotland's highest road to get to Applecross, and drove along the coast some from there before crossing over to the east. Here, we were in castle country, so we took in Dunrobin, Urquhart, Cawdor, Fyvie, Craigievar, Fraser, Dunnottar, and Glamis. In this area, Kristen had found the locations of several Pictish stones online, so we also hunted those out. Going back south, we stopped by St. Andrews, where we had a classy lunch in the clubhouse with Andreas, a friend of mine from college, and then drove to Dunfermline, where we stayed the night with Maureen and Martin. Finally, we spent a day in Edinburgh, where we naturally visited the castle and the excellent Museum of Scotland.
While we cooked most of the time when camping, we did try the local food, such as haggis, fish and chips, or chicken tikka masala, most of which we liked, but some of which (the deep-fried pizza) was a bit too much. We also made it to two whisky distilleries, of which we have conflicting opinions (Ben: mmmmhhhh, Kristen: ugh). Some pictures of our trip can be seen below, or by clicking on the slideshow for the larger versions.

Vacation & Argentina pictures

It's August, and in Italy that means vacation. In contrast to other countries, where employers try to organize a bit so that there's always someone in the store or in the office, in Italy everyone just goes at the same time. So for the last few weeks, the number of stalls open at the market has decreased, many restaurants are closed, and one of the free newspapers printed a list of food stores that remain open in August. And so I, too, have traded the 35 degrees in Florence for the 19 degrees in Germany for a week.

Speaking of vacation, I've finally put up some pictures from our trip to Argentina in February and March here.