Digging out

I'm thinking about making a list of all the things I should be doing right now... but let's have some fun and talk about my European adventure.


These photos are not in any kind of order because I'm too lazy to rearrange them. Confounded blogger interface!

The above loveliness is Vienna. ahhh Vienna. We were fortunate enough to spend a few extra days in Vienna courtesy of the Austrian Airlines. More on that later.

This is Gluwein. Mulled wine. Ymmm. I also had a variety of "punshes", orange, amaretto - delicious! I also had the best hot cocoa ever in Nuremberg. These saved me from certain hypothermia.

I was fascinated by the summer houses tucked at the edge of towns, near the train tracks. The little houses are so charming and the yards and gardens look interesting. I need to do some looking around on flickr to find about more about these little areas.

This was another love, the apfel (apple) pretzel.

Cute stuff in the Christmas markets.

Expensive stuff in the Christmas markets. These are little stuffed hearts. The small is 4.90 Euro, or around $8. That's crazy.

Love. Love. Love.

Digging the tiny cars.

No matter what country we were in, when you mention that you are from Tennessee there are two things people say: Jack Daniels and Elvis Presley.

This is coke mixed with JD in a can. You could drink one of these for breakfast and no one would bat and eye, 'cept for the uptight 'merican tourists.


The night we arrived in Prague we got lost. Seriously lost and unable to figure out where we were. I mean, where-in-the-world-are-we lost. We got off the train too soon. I smelled cow manure. Gina couldn't read the signs. We didn't have any of Czech crowns.

I think I had a panic attack.

We had a very expensive cab ride from a man listening to Al Jazeera (what if he hates Americans).

We arrived safely, the cab driver was a gentleman and was extremely patient while we changed our money.

We had a delicious dinner.

Then it started snowing.

We walked across the Saint Charles bridge.

I was in love with Prague.


Prague sucks you in. Well, literally, you can't find your way out but it is beautiful everywhere you look.

This was right in front of us... these nice men just asked us to wait a moment and out stepped the Czech prime minister! He got in the car and sped away before I could nab a photo of him or ask a few questions.



It was a long trip, 12 days. Our flight out of Vienna was canceled due to all of the snow at the D.C. airport so we had and extended stay in Vienna which we packed with museums and churches and wearing some really, really dirty clothes. Our return trip via the Polish airlines was long and interesting. The Polish people are a very active sort of people. I have NEVER seen a plane board and disembark so smoothly and quickly. I have never been on a 9 hour flight where most of the people were standing or walking around during the flight... or helping themselves to the beverages in the flight attendant kitchen. Thankfully we got home with the only major glitch being that Gina had a box of pretzels checked for being explosives. Really, on the tiny flight to Knoxville. (I think the guy just wanted to eat them)

Anna has let me know that she doesn't want me to be gone for "lots and lots of days" again. Christmas was a blur, probably because to me it was all happening way too close to my European bedtime. The girls are happy and well, that's all that matters.