Sad Pandas Should Eat Tofu

Where have I been?  Well, mostly Minneapolis with a side trip to Boston and a visit home to Bismarck.  Oh, but you meant where have I been since September when I last posted.  That’s a bit longer of an answer but here I go…

‘Round about August I started to feel my depression kicking in.  I spent a lot of time wondering if we should even bother with this trip.  It was a long way to go to feel blue.  And I felt like I was starting to scrape the bottom of my particular barrel.  Then one day I was home and I watched a random documentary about juice fasting (Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead).  I reacted pretty strongly.  When I watch It’s a Wonderful Life I need to hug my loved ones, when I watched Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead I apparently needed to launch out of the house, buy two books on juicing, buy a cart full of veg and fruit and then head to Target to buy a juicer.

This has very little to do with travel but it has a whole lot to do with my mood which has made me feel like I want to travel again.  I juiced for ten days and felt reallly great afterwards.  Then about four or five weeks later the Mister and I both did another fast (on his encouragement).  The big thing was that between those fasts and since, I’ve stuck to a mostly vegan diet and it’s kind spectactular how much better I’ve been feeling.

So I want to start writing in this blog again because we are going on the trip and I do want to share all of the research and planning I’ve been doing.  I have to remind myself that this blog is more about a scrapbook for me than about anyone else reading it because I worry that I’m boring the pants of y’all.  I really want to look back and have a record of the time leading up to our European adventure because finally making it overseas is something that I’ve been meaning to do for years and I’m proud that I’ve stuck with this.

[Hi, Mom!]

Anyway, I’ll start writing my one post a day starting after the new year.  Until then I hope you are all safe and sound.  Here’s best wishes to you this holiday season whatever it is you’re eating!

Skivvies Not Required

I’ve taken some really long baths in my time.  I’ll finish a book there or just slowly turn into a prune.  I love it.  So the prospect of taking a 3.5 hour bath has me anxious for our trip to get here already.

In Baden-Baden, so named as it is the city of Baden in the district of Baden, we will be getting squeaky clean.  We will also, apparently, be getting naked.  At the Roman-Irish Baths in Freiderichsbad mud doesn’t stand a chance and neither does that good old American-bred modesty.  All clothes are left behind for 3.5 hours of different baths, showers, steam rooms and pools.  My thought is that if everyone else is going to be starkers then who cares?  I know the rest of the world doesn’t think this way but a wise man by the name of Ollie gave me a really good piece of advice once.  He said that no one thinks about you even a fraction as much as you think they do.  So if you believe that, and I do, then is naked guy #2 really going to spend the next half hour thinking about how white my behind is?  Doubtful.  So on with the fun!

There are a number of steps involved in the bathing, as I mentioned before.  They are as follows:

1. Shower
2. Warm air bath 129.2° F
3. Hot air bath 154.4° F
4. Shower
5. Soap & brush massage (additional cost)
6. Shower
7. Thermal steam bath 113° F
8. Themal steam bath 118.4° F
9. Thermal full bath 96.8° F
10. Themal whirlpool bath
11. Thermal kinotherapeutic bath (did research on what kinotherapeutic is but it’s all in German)
12. Shower
13. Cold water bath (immersion bath) 64.4° F
14. Drying off (warm towels)
15. Application of moisturizing cream
16. Resting area

The baths alternate from completely mixed to mostly separated from day to day.  On the day the sexes are seperated they can still meet up in the baths under the domed roof.  I think it would be fun to share this with the Mister.  Mark Twain is quoted as saying “In Freiderichsbad you lose track of time within 10 minutes and track of the world in 20 minutes”.

Towels, slippers and moisturizing cream all come with the price of admission (€29 with the soap massage and €21 without).  All the different rooms have assigned time limits as some German scientist spent a very long time figuring out the exact amount of time you would need to be wrapped up in a blanket.  Times are somewhat flexible from what I read and the staff is roughly multilingual.  I plan on just following the delighted sighs.

Medieval Travellers: The Rich and the Restless – Margaret Wade Labarge

I really want to tell you about this book but there are two things getting in my way: the writer’s name and the keywords people are using to find my blog. 

First, Labarge.  Every single time I picked up this book I kept thinking of the 80s pop song “Rhythm of the Night” which you can see lyp synced here.  The urge to dance until the morning light kept coming over me.  Sometimes that’s exactly what you need to do and other times you have to lay in bed and read about rich people in the 1400s, know what I mean?  Two chapters in and I just stuck a Post-It™ over the cover to make. it. stop.

Secondly, you keyword searchers.  I know that you’re trying to get out of writing a book report by reading my take.  You know how I know?  Because you type in things like “summary” and “synopsis” after the book title.  Listen, if desperation has brought you to the point of counting on me for helpful advice then keep on being desperate, kids.  Oh, and thanks for stopping by.  I seriously do appreciate it.

Okay, now that that’s out of the way, let’s talk about the book.  Basically during the medieval period leaders had to get out and show everybody that they were still the boss.  They didn’t do this by diamonds on their grills or firing people on national TV.  What they did was gather a bunch of their staff, friends and the dark ages version of Kato Kaelin and stomped all over their kingdom.  Doing this took a bunch of money and a bunch of time.  First off, the size and splendor of your particular wagon train had to be equal to how much of a rock star you were.  Kings are traveling with 40-60 people as a general rule.  Lords, priests, bishops, queens and other celebs didn’t have as large of a posse but they also didn’t gather their frequent flier miles alone.

So large groups of people traveling together, what does this sound like?  Oh, a tour.  And on a tour, you are with a bunch of your countrymen so this kind of prevents you from having to talk to outsiders which is exactly what happened.  They had one or two guys who were responsible for translating and guiding.  No guidebooks and no phrasebooks for these guys.  They didn’t even have to worry about changing money which was a huge concern back then as going from Paris to Rome could cause you to change through over a dozen different currencies.

Though you didn’t need a passport during these times (or a horridly unfortunate passport photo) you would need a letter of introduction or a go sign from the leader of the country that you would be passing through.  This was back in the day when a lot of the land was city states.  Meaning, if I left Minneapolis today and headed to Eau Claire, I’d have to get someone to sign off on me in St Paul, too. 

And I’d have to bring the guy sweet presents.  In the book Lab… let’s just call her Maggie, describes all these crazy presents that people were giving each other.  Poor servants are tasked with moving leopards, falcons, giraffes and all other wackadoo gifts across the Alps and the sea and plenty of other places.  The leaders of the known world at that time became super hard to shop for because everyone was trying to outdo each other.  You laugh but I better not see you in a stretch Hummer.

Anyway, this book was a fun read and I learned a lot, more than I’m sharing here.  The main point is that people always travelled.  I’m not the first white person to head over to Europe.  In fact, us crackers like to get over there quite a bit, according to Stuff White People Like.  I’m happy to continue the tradition.  While I’m at, remind me I need a falcon.

Rick Steves Labor Day Travel Sale

I think that the Mister are just about done gear shopping but I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to share the We Can Do It Rick Steves image.   So head on over and get your savings now. 

Trip Ahoy! is in no way affiliated with Rick Steves (but gosh darn it, we wish we were).

Slightly Apologetic in Salzburg

I’m from North Dakota, a land populated by Lutherans.  If you don’t know any Lutherans (they aren’t very vocal about it, typically) let me describe them.  They are kind people but they frequently beat themselves up for not being kinder.  If someone gives a Lutheran a compliment on their shirt such as “I like your shirt, that’s a great color on you” they are likely to get an earful.  “This?  Oh, this is old.  And I think it makes me look kind of washed out.  I shouldn’t even be wearing it because it’s too warm out today but it was clean.  It’s not as nice as the shirt you’re wearing.”  After saying something of this sort they will find a way to compliment you a couple of times or leave the room in abject horror.

Typical Salzburger fare - not sure what it is, not sure I care. Let's eat!

Lutherans are also embarassed of their food.  They don’t want it to be too flashy so they typically cover it in some kind of Cream of Something soup.  The Holy Trinity to a Lutheran is Campbell’s Cream of Something, Cool Whip and Miracle Whip.  Let not a potluck be had without them.  I am glad of this.  When Lutherans have a potluck they delight in dishing out whatever is there and knowing that it will taste like what they had at the last gathering.  You know, except for that new fangled ramen salad that just showed up.  What was she thinking?

I joke but I love these people, which is good, because I am one.  I like to tell people that a North Dakotan Girl Scout’s cookie sales pitch is something like “You wouldn’t want to buy cookies, would you?”  Kind of assuming failure and wishing that this moment in the spotlight was over already.  Heck, I bought more than half of the band candy I “sold” and gave it to friends to spare myself this shame.  (Random aside, I just realized my band teacher’s name was Mr. Salzburg.  My life is not unlike a poorly written episode of the new Twilight Zone that no one watched.)

Durrrrr…  maybe I should get to the point about the Austrians here?  Well, I was reading a site today about Salzburg written by real live Austrians.  The Off the Beaten Path section appealed to me and I started to feel at home when I read phrases such as: “If you are in Salzburg as a tourist, you probably won’t be interested in any of the city’s sports facilities” or “Alas, since it is still in Salzburg, it effectively became a nice, but rather tame mix of a theater and bar”. 

I’ll be darned if their lukewarm enthusiasm hasn’t won me over.  I even read that Austrians are really uncomfortable with compliments.  They either are somewhat suspicious or embarassed.  These are my people.  I can’t wait to try their hotdish!

Oh and please read the wonderfully titled post they wrote called “Crappy 10: Things Not to Do in Salzburg“.  My favorite quote “Don’t wear Canada flags on all parts of your body if you are American.  It is ridiculous and doesn’t work.  Don’t worry: we know that not everyone of you guys voted for George W., and since Austria doesn’t have any oil, we can still love you without fear, no matter if you are Texan or Ontarian.”

Knock Out

I’ve been a little behind on research this past week.  It may have been a bit hard for you to carry on without me telling you what I think about various travel soap and the best destination to get a haircut in Switzerland.  For that, I apologize. 

Today I’m back and I’m committing to being back by sharing a little story about desktop wallpaper.  You see, I spend a good part of my work life in front of a computer (when I’m not at someone else’s computer).  So it’s helpful to me to have pictures up that inspire me.  Even if they only inspire me to not fall asleep.  Times are hard, people.  Sleeping on the job is no longer okay.  I had no idea that there would be days like this.  Sooner or later they are going to tell me that I can’t wear pajamas to work and then it’s going to get ten different shades of serious in my world.

Thankfully, that day has yet to come.  And I can still pick my desktop so I did.  I popped a picture of the Mister and Henry (otherwise known as LB for Little Buddy) onto one screen.  You can see it on the right side bar with all my other Flickr photos.  For the second photo I thought I should pick one of somewhere that we’ll be going.  When I thought of the beautiful places we’ll be in less than a year (hold me!), this is the clear beauty pageant winner.  Or scholarship contest, if that’s how we’re rolling.  The Cinque Terre.

What’s even better is I found today’s image at a site called Chaffeurs Italy.  Now I don’t want the Mister to read this and get excited that we’ll be met at the train station by a driver with a sign that reads “Karli and the Mister”.  Though that would be cute.  Anyone got buddies in Milan?  Never mind.  What I’m getting at here is that the Cinque Terre (or Five Lands) is a group of five cities near Genoa.  They all have their own personalities and specialities.  I’m gonna blog about them again soon but I thought that this picture would give you a taste of the good things to come.

It’s Hip to Be a Venetian Square

Napoleon called it “the most beautiful drawing room in all of Europe”.  Or at least plenty of people think he did.  I guess the jury’s out on that quote but I think we still get the point.  Piazza San Marco or, as us Yanks call it, St Mark’s Square is a looker.  It’s the buildings, the pavement and even the pigeon poo.  For centuries this square has been the religious, political and social center of Venice.  Beauty and brains and all that there.  It’s one of my favorite places in the world.

St Mark’s Square got it’s start with a dead saint.  In 828/9 San Marco was adopted as the patron saint of Venice.  Before him, St Theodore had that honor.  He sounds pretty cool as he is portrayed in a statue on the Piazza with a spear and a crocodile representing his feat of slaying a dragon.  And if you had a dragon, a patron saint that could mark him expired might be nice.  But St Mark got the job when his relics were taken from Constantinople and handed over to the Venetians.  Having relics in those days was a big deal, kind of like hosting the Olympics but even better because you typically get to build a church.  And that’s what the Venetians did.  Eventually.

Check it. These Clarks shoe models are so happy to be in Piazza San Marco. Apparently too happy to notice there isn't any shoe modeling going on. Dang!

When St Mark’s relics came to town they were originally stored in the Doge’s palace.  The Doge is the rule of Venice and so that seemed like a good place.  This Doge leaves a gift in his will of a church to be built in Venice to house the relics.  And that’s how we get St Mark’s Basillica.  Of course, the original one was mostly burned down in a rebellion in 976 and had to be rebuilt in 1063.  It’s still old and it still has relics, aka religious bling.

To reiterate just how important relics are view the mosaic above the door of San Marco.  It depicts some Venetians in Alexandria smuggling the relics out.  To hide them they thought it would be best to put them in pork.  You see, back then TSA was Muslim and they don’t dig on swine.  So they allowed the Venetians to leave Alexandria with the relics because they assumed that no one would be desperate enough to hide highly esteemed religious objects in dead pig.  Obviously they didn’t know who they were dealing with.  In fact, all of beautiful San Marco is covered in fabulous artwork liberated from other places.  And you know, pigeon poo.  But that’s all local, my friends.

By George, I Think She’s Got It

Back when I wrote this post I knew that I’d have changes made to my itinerary… I guess I just thought that something else would make them.  Like Mother Nature, Delta airlines or a winning lottery ticket.  No, I’m the one who finds reasons here and there to tinker with what looks like a well-laid plan from the outside.  And now, with only a bit of certainty, I can say that I think I’m done.  Or rather, I freaking hope that I’m bloody well done.

At this point everything fits in place like a jigsaw puzzle that someone had all too much time designing.  If everything goes as planned we’ll be able to take in a whole bunch of sights and still have a vacation.  Meaning both the Mister and I will enjoy the trip which is important because I kind of like him. 

Here are some of my lessons learned.

• Don’t rely on your memory for train schedules. 
• Avoid scheduling visits to places just because someone said you should or because it fits the route best. 
• Choose your splurges wisely and where they will give you the most bang for your buck. 
• Remember that planning is supposed to be somewhat enjoyable and stop wigging out already.
• Ask your travel partner questions and don’t be surprised when they have opinions too.
• Soap containers really aren’t all that different.  Stop buying them.
• It might be good to practice leaving the house as preparation for leaving the country.
• It’s only a trip. 

 

I’m So Excited and I Couldn’t Possibly Hide It

Sometimes I just can’t help getting excited about little things.  It’s probably a good trait to have but it does warrant a lot of knowing smiles from my friends.  You know, the kind where you can hear them thinking “there she goes again!”  I’d hate to let them down so here’s a post about mailing envelopes.

DuPont makes a kind of quasi paper called Tyvek.  This stuff is awesome.  It weighs what paper does but it is water-resistant, tear-resistant and it’s recyclable.  I bought a pack at Office Max today.  They aren’t cheap at $12.99 for five but they are perfect for the job.  And what is the job?  I’m glad you asked.  Or I’m glad that I’m pretending you asked because that will help me transition into the next paragraph.

I think this pictures says "if you don't love Tyvek envelopes then you're a stinky dog hater", what do you think?

When I travel I like to keep ticket stubs and other paper bits with me.  The folders will come in handy since they are both tough and super light.  They can hold all the stuff we collect and even serve as a mailing pouch should I go nuts with my scrap-keeping.  I hope I won’t but there is something to be said in favor of free souvenirs that are flat that sometimes has me going a bit overboard. 

The only problem is that since we might be mailing these suckers home I don’t feel like I can color on them.  But they are big and white and begging for doodles.  Quick, someone get me a drink.  It’s going to be long night.

Everybody In the Whole Cell Block

We have plans to visit Lucerne to see the former Swiss fortress that was hidden inside a mountain.  I wrote about that here but I’m sure that you’ve already committed it to memory so forget I said anything.  When I was looking for a hotel I came across a pretty unique one.  It’s called Jailhotel Löwengraben and it was a former jail.

Built in 1862 the jail was still in use until 1998 when a new prison was built and the prisoners moved along.  As the building was considered somewhat historic the city didn’t want to tear it down.  They floated a bunch of different ideas of what could be housed in the building without changing much of the structure.  My favorite has to be the plan to have a school there.  As if school didn’t feel enough like incarceration, let’s make it more realistic, shall we?  In the end, the hotel idea won out.  And since, as I mentioned, not much of the structure has changed, if you stay there you are staying in a jail.

They have three types of rooms – former cells, former offices and four suites.  The suites were a former library, a former rec room for prisoners, the director’s office and what used to be the visitor’s room.  The suites look like nice big rooms, the former offices or “Most Wanted” rooms look like smallish hotel rooms.  And the former cells or “Unplugged” rooms?  They look like cells… because they freaking were.  It seems that some of the good people on Trip Advisor didn’t quite the whole theme of the place.

The experience was really really close to jail experience! Gives you a first hand experience of what it would be to spend time behind the bars. The room was the most narrow/small room I have ever slept in! Dark, narrow and with a stell rail bed! The door of the room is made of old style steel & wood. There was not even a single window in the room except for a peep hole all the way up near the roof! (italics are mine)  And inside all this, was a make shift bath+toilet!
The experience was so bad and depressing that we kept roaming around in the streets even though we were dead tired. The very thought of getting back to this room was so repulsive that we chose to spend out time out doors until it was late in the night.

And…

The Rooms in this Jail Hotel were very small with hardly any ventilation. We felt choked and claustrophobic. Families should avoid this Jail!  (italics are mine)