To those who have served
in the reaches of the north,
the sands of the desert,
the heat of the jungle,
and on the swells of the sea…
To those who have walked through the valley,
heard the scream of the rockets,
smelled the smoke and seen the wreckage,
and comforted those who have…
To those who have watched the screens for warning,
waited for the order you hoped would never come,
guarded the land and seas and skies,
and to those who had to send them when you couldn’t go…
To all who have carried out the mission, flawed as it may be,
To those who returned to jeers instead of cheers,
To all who served in the cause of freedom,
For just a few or for a stretch of years…
Thank you.
Related Images:
After a long hiatus, I’ve decided to revive my travel blog. Though Facebook has become the primary way to share our adventures with my family, I find that when I’m traveling somewhere, I like to seek out opinions, thoughts, and advice from others who have been there. Plus, I need to shake the rust off my writing skills! So, for the grand reopening, on to our first – and likely most exotic – adventure of 2016…Dubai.
Related Images:
We took a day trip to the “Romantic Rhine” – specifically the area more prosaically known as the Upper Middle Rhine. This UNESCO World Heritage site features about 40 castles in a 65 kilometer stretch between Bingen and Koblenz. Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
Every autumn, numerous villages in the Alpine regions of Austria and Germany celebrate the Almatrieb, the return of the cows and their herders from the Alps, where they have spent the summer. This tradition is marked with festivals including food, music, and topped with the cattle parades and Viehscheid, where the cattle are separated and returned to the owning families. The cows are decorated with flowers and bells to celebrate the safe return. The festivals occur from mid-September to early October, and this year we decided to visit one in the Tirol region of Austria on my birthday. Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
We got into Budapest in the late afternoon. Traffic was snarled up and parking, of course, was a pain, as in most cities in Europe. However, even though there was a miscommunication in the parking, the hotel people let us park in the one of the taxi spots right in front of the hotel, and the view from hotel was gorgeous–overlooking the Danube with a great view of Pest. (Budapest became a single city in 1873–unifying Buda and Óbuda on the west bank of the Danube with Pest on the east bank.) Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
The Beautiful Blue Danube…isn’t. At least not the part we’ve seen. It’s brown, just like the muddy Mississippi. Still, it’s an impressive sight, especially seen from the mountain where Devin Castle stands. Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
Well, the first tale I have to tell rather overshadowed a fairly nice day in Vienna–on the way back to the hotel, a (presumably drunk) older man slapped me on the tail in the subway station! I mean, really! Fortunately, he was moving pretty fast and apparently never skipped a beat, since he was halfway to the escalator when I whipped around. Sorry to say, this kind of spoiled a perfectly good day spent at Schönbrunn Palace and Tiergarten. Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
I have wanted to visit Vienna for a long time; I have leave I have to burn, so was lucky enough to get some time off for one last summer trip before school started. (Side note–Rebecca is starting high school–AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH!) I got home late Wednesday night, so we got a bit of a late start in the morning, but we finally got everything packed and got on the road to our first stop, Vienna. Read the rest of this entry »
Related Images:
Mainau (the “Flower Island”) is a popular destination in Lake Constance (or the Bodensee). It has over 100 acres of gardens, a palace with a huge rose garden, an arboretum, and a butterfly house. We took a day trip there over the 4th of July weekend.
It was beautiful, but HOT! It was over 90 degrees–I know that doesn’t seem hot compared to Arizona, but then there’s no air conditioning anywhere over here (except in the car, and we needed it when we were done). Rebecca really liked the butterfly house, but it was truly tropical; we finally had to leave before I completely dehydrated.
Something a little different–see the slideshow below for the pictures of our day trip to Mainau.
Related Images:
For our base to see the beaches of Normandy, we stayed in a little hotel just outside the main city area of Bayeux, France. The room was really small, but the area was nice; we could see the town of Bayeux and there were cows right behind the hotel, which Rebecca thought was cool. Read the rest of this entry »