Blog – Page 9

Nadine: Sweden

Sweden was really fun, every body was really nice and most of the people knew how to speak English. At the farm, there were a lot of cool things like, the dogs and the chickens. All of the animals were really funny and cute, but the dogs stood out, there names were Tilda and Alice. Tilda was away for part of our stay in Sweden, she was breeding at another persons home. Alice was there the whole time and Alice is very playful, one of the things that stands out about Alice is that every time you start to run, she runs after you and try so bite your hand or pant leg. The chickens are funny for very different reasons than the dogs, for the chickens are funny because the babies always walk through the holes in the chicken coop to try to get to the older chickens, it is very funny. There is one other funny animal on the farm, and that animal is the humans, and they are very funny, there are 4 kids and the youngest is 1, the next youngest is 3, the next youngest is 5, and the oldest is 7. There is one other funny thing that is not that funny and is not an animal, it is the traditional food at this carnival, it was steamed bread, goat cheese, and butter. My dad says a nice thing to say about the traditional swedish food is that it is not too spicy. These are some of the best things I witnessed in Sweden.

Hank: Sweden

Blog

Sweden: Sweden is green and wet and fresh and as most people reading this are aware, Austin Texas is not. All the people are really nice. It is really hard to sleep the first few nights you get here because it never really gets dark in the summer. When it is midnight here it is about as bright as 8:30 pm in Texas. We saw a baby moose which was really cool. It was standing in a ditch and at first we thought it was a donkey. I also caught my first pike. It looked like an alligator gar. In the area of northern Sweden that we were staying in there was the highest brown bear population in all of Sweden. Unfortunately we were not lucky enough to catch a glimpse of one. I also caught a brown trout that we ate one night. I learned how to make concrete with cement, sand, and water. It is really tiring and gets you super dirty. You dump a mixture of sand, water, and concrete into big metal barrels that spin and thicken the mixture. After that you pour and flatten it and when it dries you have concrete.

Cruising Hammarstrand Sweden

Blog

Last night Hank and I went to a “cruising” in the nearby town of Hammarstrand, Sweden, population around 1,050. A big turnout on the main street saw lots of restored cars, mostly American cars from the 50s-70s. I’m told that these cruisings happen in several different towns. It felt funny seeing all these beautifully restored American cars in a small town in northern Sweden. The most unusual transport was a jet powered bicycle (a great Mathews science project). This place would be perfect for a Wagoneers concert. Hank and I had a great time.

P.S.: Uncle Ray, there was a very nice Shelby Cobra that would look so good on Nadine for her 16th birthday.

Kurt: Sweden

Blog

We were very fortunate to stay with the Missneback family for two weeks on their farm in northern Sweden. This is a picture of the farm from across the river. The Missnebacks have four very sweet children and welcomed us as part of their family. We met the Missnebacks through the WWOOF organic farming organization. We worked on their farm and they allowed us to stay in a cabin there, taught us about the farm, showed us around this very beautiful area and took us fishing and swimming. We had dinner with the Missnebacks most nights. Peter and Camilla are very friendly and interesting, explaining many things about Sweden to us and inquiring about things in the U.S. Hank, Nadine and I enjoyed playing with the four Missneback children. We hope they will come visit us in Austin.

This area of northern Sweden looks a lot like parts of Vermont: very green with thick forests, big hills and some mountains. The small towns and farms here are more spread out than in Vermont. Population density is very low. During our stay in late June, it never really got dark at night. Although the sun went down, I guess it was close enough to the horizon that it did not get dark. It was fully light from around 3 in the morning until 11 or so at night. Although I don’t think I am man enough to tolerate the winters here, I would love to have a cabin by a lake up in these mountains.

We arrived just a few days before Midsummer Eve festival, which is one of the big festivals in Sweden. The Missnebacks took us to their festival and then to another fiddle festival in the woods that night. The fiddle festival reminded me of Kerrville Folk Festival many years ago, with people camping and generally walking around the festival and joining in music.

We also had our first hospital visit of the trip after Nadine hurt her knee. Given that there is no doctor close to the farm, we drove about 45 minutes to a hospital emergency room to get an x-ray of Nadine’s knee. We waited about an hour to get the x-ray and visit with the doctor, which is a little bit quicker than we have experienced in Austin for visits to the emergency room.

Kurt: Copenhagen

Blog

Copenhagen (June 11-17, 2013)

My favorite activity was swimming at the Islands Brygge area in Copenhagen harbor. When we jumped into the cold water there, we realized that it was salt water. Very nice. We will see if the new walking path on Lady Bird Lake in Austin has a swimming area like this.

The first things I noticed in downtown Copenhagen were the widespread use of bicycles; the impressive number of tall, attractive blond people; and the incredibly high number of young people who smoke cigarettes.

At some point in history, the people of Copenhagen included two bike lanes on each side of many of their bigger roads. Imagine big bike lanes running for 5 miles or more each way from downtown Austin along Lamar and Burnet Lane with thousands of bike commuters each day. The bike lanes have their own set of traffic lights that some smart engineer has timed so that on bikes you ride quite far before having to stop at red lights for cars. Hank, Nadine and I rode our bikes about 5 miles from our hotel to the new aquarium, Den Blu Planet. I read that over 30% of people in Copenhagen commute to work and school by bike.

One day while it rained we saw Ironman 3, and noted that Nadine bears many similarities to Pepper Potts. In Copenhagen we also arrived at our first trip motto for Nadine: “Usually right, always certain.”

Hank: Copenhagen

Blog

Copenhagen: this place is great. There is an amusement park called Tivoli Gardens, a beach, great food, and every one bikes everywhere. It reminds me a lot of Austin. Copenhagen has lots of tall buildings. Another great thing is that they have separated bike lanes with right and left turn lanes and even mini traffic lights for the bikes. At Tivoli we rode rides like the Demon roller coaster and bumper cars. It was really great because none of the lines were more than 5 minutes. We walked to this really cool planetarium and we rode our bikes about 5 miles to the new Copenhagen aquarium, Den Bla Planet. At the planetarium we saw a lot of space exhibits and a movie on the Arctic. At the aquarium we saw sharks and reef fish and sting rays. We also rode our bikes to a park and swimming area in the river that runs through downtown Copenhagen. I went swimming and realized it was salt water and it was bitter cold and made my little toes numb. Our hotel sort of stunk. It was two beds pushed together so you could fall in between the beds while you are asleep. Although I had a lot of fun pushing Nadine through the space in between. It was really funny when she went through head first because it took her a while to get out.