Busy weekend -

Friday was my conference near Köln, so I drove up early. The conference was nice, then we did a boat cruise on the Rhein for dinner. I had wanted to take the family on a Rhein cruise, but now I am glad that I did not. It was pretty boring and not as spectacular as I had hoped. You see some castles, but you can't go in them since they are up on the hills. At least the beer was free!

Saturday I drove home then went to Summer Fest at Drew's school. The kids sang songs and we had a quick lunch. Later that day, our friends the Wrights got us onto the Patch Military Barracks for the July 4th festival! It was terrific, with tons of Americans, rides for the kids, room for the kids to run, and American food. Plus a mini-keg of Heiniken for the daddies. The only distraction turned out to be one of the more amusing things: some big bugs came out at dusk, about the size of bumblebees (but without stingers). They were annoying, so we hunted them for about an hour until their population was significantly reduced. The kids made it to fireworks without issue, amazingly. Fireworks started at 11:00 and the kids handled the noise fine as well. I was surprised that the base did not do any sort of organized patriotic program. Maybe they get enough of that every day?

Sunday was our last daytrip tour. We drove up to see Trier, which is a bit of a hike from Stuttgart. Trier is the oldest city in Germany (they claim). They have a lot of Roman ruins to see, like the Porta Nigra (black gate), a couple of old baths, and a amphitheater. Emperor Constantine had his throne room here, that was really impressive. One of the Baths and the Amphitheater both had interesting catacombs you could walk around in. Plus they had a Sunday Market, so that was nice to see. The kids crashed in the afternoon, so we just drove by the house of Karl Marx and skipped the toy museum. Not a bad way to end our trips in Germany, but I may not put Trier on the top of our list to go see. The museum was not great and the ruins were not too extensive. But still nice.

Reissdorf Kölsch - Fine, especially for a long walk along the Rhein to catch your boat.

Heiniken Mini Keg - Terrific!

Reissdorf Kölsch