shell vase

 my project for the weekend filling my 26" vase with shells I collected from Africa and Mexico

graduation June 2013

  can you imagine carter and Madison start kindergarden in September?

art walk on Grandville street

Sharon and I take in the art walk on Grandville street. They have talks , food (mostly cookies and cakes some crackers and grapes ),and wine, coffee and sparkling water. 16 galleries participatated.  a fun day weather cooperated and parking was only $4 for the whole day.

my mothers day gift

things are looking better I think we are over our jet lag.We spent last night on the boat for a break. Sherri did a good job finishing varnishing the boat while we were away.
sherri and Gerry took us out for dinner with the twins 

An over all of the trip

An over all of our cruise. The first few days on MS Amadeus were heavenly. Great food and friendly staff and wonderful sights. Amsterdam was exceptional with its canals and 16^th century homes. Cologne-Germany with it's beautiful Cathedral and ancient Roman archeological sites. This is where we got a free sample of perfume. The original Eau de Cologne. Koblenz. We waited here for 6 days taking bus trips to Rudesheim where the musical museum was. Miltenberg and Wertheim next. Here I helped blow my glass fish .At Cochem we visit the castle Reichburg and go wine tasting. Heidelberg we go to it's castle. The next day we are bused to Eltz castle the best of them all. The company tried their best with bus trips to castles and towns but the river would not go down. Enough is enough of busing and back to the ship. We get a comfortable bus and start moving to Linz Austria on Sunday so no semies allowed on road. , here the highlight was St Stephan's Cathedral. Vienna the next day. My second favourite city. Hofburg Palace and the Opera house stand out. We also got to see the Lipizzan horses in their stalls. Bratislava Slovakia, Maximilian's town has wonderful buildings also repaired after the plight of the wars. Budapest Hungary last with Buda castle where we have lunch. Again wonderful repaired buildings. One thing we learned we would never take a bus trip with all the packing and unpacking. The bonus is we met many wonderful people.

Budapest Hungery

June 14 Friday 2013

Sorry I have not posted but Thursday we were up at 4am to get to the airport. A very good flight even though it was long 8-9 hours. We arrived in Vancouver to sunshine picked up our car at the airport and drove home had a can of beans for  supper while we watched the news and went to bed .2am but 7pm Vancouver time . We slept until 2 then got up unpacked and went back to bed until 7.  Now back to Budapest Hungry Wednesday .A 2-1/2 hour drive by bus . Again lush green country sides with All their rain. We arrive just in time for lunch at the Citadella restaurant. A castle made over, wonderful setting. Great views from top of the hill. A city tour next to see the city hall, opera house and palaces. We pass the zoo and amusement park with a wooden roller coaster. We see part of the Berlin wall and the iron Curtain. Back to the hotel Aquincum. We are all invited to the bar at 6:30 for a free drink .Dinner is at 7. The wine flowed there too .

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June 11 Tuesday-We are back on the bus at 9am heading to Bratislava Slovakia's capital,. It was only a one hour drive. We have our first day of poring rain. We get a tour of the city and lunch at Zichy before we go to the hotel-Sheraton Bratislavia.  the best hotel on the whole trip. We get off the bus and stop at the castle Bratislava for a great view of the city. We can see 3 countries-Austria,Hungary and Czechia. The Danube river is here . They had to evacuate many people because of the flood. Windows too wet and roads too bumpy to take pictures so I just got a few while the bus slowed down or stopped. The main industry is car production and car parts. Chocolates and food production is 2^{nd .    Our hotel is right next to a huge shopping mall}                             

Vienna concert

Vienna