I realize it's been quite a while since I last posted. Quite a few things have been going on. Go ahead and feel free to blame the interruption on our internet service provider for installing our internet five days later than they were supposed to. Here's a summary of what's happened in the last week or so.

1. We returned from Europe and spent a few days in Michigan saying our goodbyes and prepping for our move.

2. We got a new (used) car.

3. We moved to the South, driving all 22 hours and 1275 miles with three cats in the back of the car.

4. We closed on our house.

5. We rented a U-haul truck, got our things out of storage, bought a washer, dryer, refrigerator, 2 chairs and 2 ottomans, and a non-motorized push mower (think green!).

6. We set up our new place: cleaned, unpacked, hooked up the washer/dryer, mowed the lawn, and turned on the water (by myself, with a crescent wrench, no thanks to the city but thanks to the city office worker who told me how I could do it so I wouldn't have to wait for a technician).

7. Made about 56 trips to Lowe's.

8. Went to our new schools for our first days.

9. Passed out.

On the way home, we stopped in Salzburg, Austria, known best as the birthplace of Mozart, the place where much of the filming was done for the Sound of Music, and the real-life hometown of Maria von Trapp (the nun whose life on which the Sound of Music was based).


Above and below: Salzburg castle.




Above and below: near the city center of Salzburg, another UNESCO World Heritage site.


And that's it. Tomorrow, Sarah and I fly back home from Frankfurt to Michigan. It will be a full 24 hours of travel, so we're not exactly looking forward to that...

We took a quick day trip from Bratislava to Vienna, Austria. It probably turned out to be my favorite part of our trip, as evidenced by the many photos I've posted. Unfortunately, the Vienna leg of the trip wasn't exactly planned, so we didn't have tons of information about the buildings we were looking at.

Above: the Imperial Court Theater, whatever that means.

Below: soaring above the trees the towers of, get this, the mayor's office (Rathaus, in German).


Above: Hofburg Imperial Palace.

Below: more of the palace.


Above: I'm not sure, more palace?

Below: Karlskirche (St. Charles Church), commissioned by Charles VI. There was a terrible plague, he prayed and vowed to build a church if God would take away the plague. And so it was built.


Above and below: the city center of Vienna, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.


Above and below: more from Vienna's city center.


Above and below: the city of Vienna.


Above and below: Votivkirche (candle church), one of the most important neo-Gothic religious architectural sites in the world (so says Wikipedia). Apparently the site was chosen because of a failed assassination attempt on Emperor Franz Joseph (Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary).


Above: more Votivkirche.

Below: we parked in Vienna, I hit "points of interest" on the GPS, and the first item that came up, 200 yards from our parking space, was the home and office of one Dr. Sigmund Freud. Of course we had to stop by.


Above: look closely at the picture, and you may actually spot a Sigmund look alike in the background.

Tomorrow, finally, the last few pictures (from Salzburg, Austria).

So I was going to try and put in all the pictures from the last leg of the trip today, but as it turns out, I have way too many. Instead, I'll do Bratislava, Slovakia today; Vienna, Austria tomorrow; and Salzburg, Austria the next day.

Bratislava is an interesting city. Sitting along the banks of the Danube, it's the capital city of Slovakia and the only national capital (e.g., Washington D.C.) that borders two separate countries (Hungary and Austria). In addition, it's only 37 miles from Vienna, Austria, making them the two closest national capitals in the world.


Above: Michael's Gate: the only remaining structure from the city's medieval fortifications. It was built around 1300 and renovated in the 1700's.

Below: one of the narrow, crowded streets.



Above: the banks of the Danube from atop a hill in the city.

Below: note the Novy Most bridge, topped with a UFO-shaped restaurant, in the background.


Above: Bratislava Castle. The site has been inhabited since about 3000 B.C. Also, the back of some lady's head.

Our next stop was Wroclaw, Poland, a city that, over the years at various times, has been a part of Germany (formerly known as Breslau), Prussia, Austria, and Bohemia.

Above: one of our first stops was to climb a cathedral tower. This particular tower was actually attached to a church that became Lutheran during the reformation in the 16th century, but it was reclaimed by the Catholic church in the 1940's.

Below: but we only reason we knew to climb the tower was because of a recommendation from our waiter at lunch (tasty authentic Georgian cuisine--the former Soviet republic, not the southern U.S. state).



Above: on the way up.

Below: from the top.


Above and below: more from the top.


Above: more row houses!

Below: rival cathedral.



Above: another cathedral.

Below: a lady I saw.


Up next: the last leg of our trip.