Gremlin’s Fireside Chat

We started our family Bavarian holiday by flying out on the Dublin on Wednesday morning at 07:20 and after a couple of hours flight we arrived in Munich. Hiring a VW car from Hertz took an hour and the next time we come we will not use hertz since all the other providers had no queues. We are based in beautiful Bavarian town of Murnau.

Today we visited Neuschwanstein Castle and the beautiful rococo church at wieskirche. The castle is beautiful with fabulous views but is smaller than I expected but the whole thing is a tourist trap. The church is in the middle of no-where, a UNESCO heritage site and absolutely draw dropping.

Maeve is having a great time. One new skill Maeve has learnt is to ‘chink her beaker’ in a toast when our we offer. Civilized is what our daughter has become.

Heard recently about people who try to get the best MPG out of their cars thus saving money. Apart from being a bunch of misers there is a lot of self discipline in controlling speed etc to get the best out of your car (best oil/parts/tyres etc required) being anal retentive would be high up on my list of assumed requirements for this “sport”.

Anyway, Me, the Wife and baby Maeve were going into town for a shopping trip we decided that the best way to do was through Dublins port tunnel – a 4.5 KM tunnel which goes from the M1 near the airport to the docks near the city centre; Its usually very expensive but at weekends its only 3 euro and there being a GAA match on the alternative route would have been a nightmare. We hit the tunnel south-bound entrance at the perscribed 80KM/H and put the car in neutral and left the rest to Gravity and momentum. With the slight decline we managed 4KM before the speed dipped below 50KM/H.

All rather inane and simple fun…

Just returned from a fabulous weeks holiday staying with a friend in Berlin. Thanks Margaret, and what a fab apartment you have.

I have always wanted to visit Berlin – a place of culture and a place associated with one of histories odious and fascinating men, Adolf Hitler. Below is a picture of me standing 30 feet above where he sought his own personal “final solution”.

I find it funny that where one person considered to be the centre of a “great germanic empire” is no more than a car park at the back of some 1980’s DDR flats.

Anyway the family had a great time – being a carnivore I enjoyed the German food, especially the bludwurst, and the beer.

More postings when I recover from the trip back….

It being the bank holiday weekend and a fantastic warm and sunny day (rare in Ireland) we decided to go down to the National Stud and Japanese Gardens in Kildare. They are well worth a visit. Apparently they are the best Japanese Gardens in Europe – Having never seen a formal Japanese garden I cannot verify that claim, however we really enjoyed the gardens and the Stud (Nice if you like racehorses).

Here are some photo’s we took on the day.

More photos are available here.

Just delaying packing (who likes it) after a 3 night stay in Washington DC and we have thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. The city is really well thought out – being designed to be the capital from the start REALLY shows, and there are some fantastic neo-classical buildings.

Well we have visited the Capitol Building (nice), Smithsonian Museums (Air and Space, Native Indian, Natural History), The Spy Museum – which is really cool, so much so we spent 4 hours there; The Lincoln Memorial, WWII Memorial, Korian War Memorial, Vietnam Memorial, Walked passed the White-House. Unfortunately the Library of congress was closed when we went to visit it (bummer for a couple of Bibliofiles such as X and Me).
Had some great thrills in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum where they have a V2, ME109 and a ME262 – even got to touch some genuine moon rock . Unfortunately only half the museum is in Washington DC the rest is by Dulles Airport where they have a Space Shuttle and Blackbird SR71 spy-plane; but we don’t have the time

People are all friendly and polite here – although you don’t see many caucasians in the “menial” jobs. American’s in DC all seem to have a skewed view of history regarding what is and is not Treason. But History is rarely objective, which is a pity.

For the final few hours we are going to visit Arlington Military Cemetry and GeorgeTown.