StringGrrl sees the World

The Grosse Pointe Fishflies had there inaugural meet last week at the Grosse Pointe Woods Lakefront Park. The meet was attended by over 50 Elementary aged runners from throughout the Pointes. View Larger Map The Lakefront Park is one of the high points of a visit to Grosse Pointe Woods. Like all the other "Pointes" they have a community park for residents located on the shore of Lake St. Clair. The park has 50+ acres of green space reserved for the use of residents and their guests. This policy has drawn the ire of many neighbors, but is what just about anybody would do if they could.  With several large pools (actually ONE really big U-shaped), Diving well, and kiddie pools; the park is a refuge for many residents all summer long. Don't forget a 3 story tall water slide and rock climbing wall for the more adventurous. Also, a boat launch, tennis courts, Beach Volleyball, Basketball (indoor and outdoor) and an activities building with exercise equipment and game roo...

StringGirl opts to sample a Zurich classic Hiltl. This restaurant a long time Zurich institution offers a wide selection if vegetarian food. Diners can select to order either a'la carte or from the buffet. The buffet is paid for by weight so piling the plate up american buffet style can get expensive, but they do offer an discretion concept where you can continue to top up for 60CHF (roughly $72 lately) as it was two trips to the buffet weighed up to a 50CHF food bill. The dishes on the buffet were pretty extensive; indian food is well represented, though chinese noodles, italian pasta, quiche, frittes and othe offerings we abundant as well. The spread cover two large chaffing tables, a chilled salad bar and three smaller heat tables arranged at the windows. Spicy abergines, okra and paneer sit comfortably next to tortellini, quiche lourraine, and fettuccini. Spring rolls and fried rice and noodles, try to draw you from the salad bar. StringGirls friends Roald and Eva we...

A fellow cacher arrives only a few minutes after we replaced the cache Another cache nearly gets it. I wonder if he would appreciate help? After observing a few minutes; the cacher definitely was struggling with figuring out the location of the cache. So I thought I would give him a word of encouragement and see if he needed (or better still wanted) any assistance.  When approached he admitted that he was stumped. I told him that he was exceptionally close, I bet him he may have even already touched it (as evidenced by the picture above). Another few reaching motions into the fountain and he admitted that he was stumped. After giving as many detailed hints as I could, we handed it to him as his eyes bugged out in disbelief over the size; or lack thereof. Pointed him to the next few caches, and said "Auf Wiedersehen".

with the cache at Paradaplatz At the Zurisee with another cache, bigger but still small Micro cache certainly (nano even) Taking a new hitchhiker around town before the little guy has to say goodbye to Switzerland a while. So far this afternoon we found these three. One down by the Hauptbahnhof, another overlooking the Zurisee, and this latest at Paradaplatz. The pictures above are in reverse order. Check the logs at geocaching.com

StringGirl heads into Zurich after a dreary morning of rainy and cool temperatures.  The main gallery of the train station is decked out for a party. With white tablecloths and chandeliers. Cultural events in the Main Station are relatively common, and make the already bustling train hub festive and even more crowded. Felix's girlfriend Barbara plays Cello with the String Orchestra Weidikon, who held a concert in the Buhlkirche in Weidikon this evening. A relatively smallish church by Zurich standards, it still is impressive with fantastic wooden detail throughout. The vaulted ceiling in the soars above the congregation, in style that is somehow modest yet grand. StringGirl and Eric in front of the Rose-window that adorns the rear Apse balcony of the church. 

Roald prepares to leave Zurich in favor of Hamburg. After 3 years with AutoForm, he eschews writing code for CAE tools to instead run the code for an engineering concern. To say goodbye, we have a Barbecue on the banks of the Limmat, as dark clouds threaten in the distance. Nearly 20 colleagues from the office come down, despite the threatening clouds to have simple grilled sausages and beer, wine, and proseco. A kind farewell lead by development team leader Lothar. Retelling Roald stories under the cover of the Community Center as rain comes in and the beer flows freely. Goodbye Roald and we hope that you find Hamburg welcoming. Hope that you find a new band soon, and make some good friends there as well. We'll miss you, but keep the guest room ready for StringGirl to visit. Search for Travel Deals Outside Magazine Gear of the Year Summer 2010: eBags Mother Lode TLS Junior

On the walk from Schweikhof to Albishorn are many nice walks along the ridge. To the north we see the Zurichsee and south is the Zugersee. Near the city of Zurich it is terrifically simple to travel only a short distance to be able to enjoy great nature walks. Today i take the walk with some friends from work who invited StringGirl out for a walk on Pfingstmontag (Pentacost) which is a national holiday. View Larger Map This walk took us along the ridge that separates Zurich from Zug. A little further north is the walk along Uetliburg which is a very common tourist walk. the cache at Schweikhof StringGirl could not resist looking for a few Geocaches . Found the first cache near the beginning of the trail. There was a small restaurant cafe located here where we got a coffee and had a chance to visit a little. Prior to heading deeper into the woods. The hikers pause for a pic, StringGirl snaps the shot (low point of view) We stopped for a cafe at the Albishorn and found a sm...

The first stop at ATL is the Delta Sky Club . After only a short flight from DTW is the REAL flight from ATL to Zurich (almost 10 hours). While ATL is not one of my favorite hubs to have layovers in, they do have pretty nice lounges (membership has it's privileges). One feature of the ATL Sky Club in terminal E is a full service bar, still complimentary. Food in the Sky Clubs in Atlanta have gone down a notch over the years. In the past soup and sandwiches were among the offerings, but lately only some nuts, crackers, and carrots/celery and hummus.  Down escalator to the Underground trams The airport in Atlanta is purportedly on of the busiest in the world (either number of connections or people?). They have a daily flight to Zurich, which stringgirl has beeb slow to use as she dislikes making excahnges in the US. My general impression of the airport is of general dislike. The layout of the airport is superiorly frustrating. It is best described as a stick bug w...

Styling it up in the First Class Cabin (of an MD88) StringGirl settles into the bountiful roominess of a Delta MD88. Of the few perks she gets from acquiring 343,000 qualifying miles over the past three years is guaranteed first class upgrades on domestic flights, but we rarely if ever fly domestic. It's another trip to Europe for a week or two. Just as the school year wraps up, we head out of town for a while. The pursuit of the paycheck again makes us miss those little moments (like 5th grade promotion), lansing field trips, and the such. On the good side we'll be back in time for the Fishflies meet. So coming next Zurich in the summertime......

StringGirl wakes up early to join the Ferry Fishflies  as they have a morning run. The goal today is a mile (two laps around the school). Everybody is excited to be up early and have a chance to exercise this morning. Field day will be later today as well, so we won't have any excuse not to get a bit of a work out today. The fishflies are a K-5 running club for elementary age boys and girls in the Grosse Pointes. They meet before and after school. The fishflies rely on the kindness of a few Moms and Dads to make sure that the kids have supervision and motivation on their run.  They look forward to their first "friendly" this June, when all the local chapters of the fishflies gather.

 The Iconic Erasmusbrug (Bridge) marks the skyline of Rotterdam on a recent visit. StringGirl visits this city in the Netherlands perhaps once a year while tagging along for work. This latest stream of pictures taken while traipsing about the city in search of Geocaches . The sculpture along one of the city's many wharfs was one of the sites that the geocaching excursion brought us to. The sculpture marks the location of the Dutch Resistance Museum. It represents a Heinkel H111, German fighter plane.  In the dark we had to feel around for quite some time before happening upon the hiding spot.  The Cache once found was ingeniously hidden (I would have labeled this a "nano" cache personally). You can see in the above photo that StringGirl dwarfs the log roll which requires tweezers or some other cache extractor to manage.  Another nano cache was located nearer the Erasmusbrug. This tiny magnetic cache was adhered to the bottom of a common...