Oktoberfest

Last weekend, we spent a quick weekend in Munich, at the traditional Oktoberfest!  We had a great time hanging out with old friends and quickly making some new ones.  We got up early on Saturday morning for a chance to rush the doors at 9am.

Unfortunately, we weren't there quite early enough and didn't get our own table, but friends took care of us.  We waited around and visited for three hours, until a parade came by and the keg was tapped at noon!  "O'zapft is!" ("It's tapped!" in the Bavarian language).

 The hard-working waiters and waitresses spent the next couple of hours carrying up to ten liter steins of beer to thirsty revelers.

The guys at our table drank their fair share!

We ate roasted chicken, delicious sauerkraut and huge riesnbrezn (big pretzel).

 

 

Afterwards, we strolled the fairgrounds and snacked on a weiner and corn on the cob, a Nutella crepe and ice cream.

We met lots of neat people and were very sad to leave our last Oktoberfest, at least for the foreseeable future.  Prost!

 

 

Eze & Monaco pictures

The Chateau de la Chevre d'Or in Eze

 Tyler's yummy café au lait

 

 Cars in the hotel's parking lot--two Rolls', something black and a Ferrari

 

 Monaco's marina

 

Monte Carlo Casino

 

 Maserati parked outside the casino

 

 The view from the Grand Corniche (high road along the sea) as we left

 

Côte d'Azur

The Côte d'Azur, often known in English as the French Riviera, is the Mediterranean coastline of the south eastern corner of France, extending from Menton near the Italian border in the east to either Hyères or Cassis in the west. (wikipedia)

We visited the French Riviera on September 4-7, American Labor Day weekend.  We arrived in Nice on Saturday morning and spent the day wandering the downtown, following Rick Steves' walking tour and checking out the cool rocky beaches. 

 

  

 

We arrived to a recommended restaurant around 7:15pm and were told we'd have to wait until 7:30pm to order--the staff was still eating their dinner!  The food was completely worth the wait, Tyler had veal escalope and Laura ate a salad with chèvre toasts and proscuitto.  YUM!  On the way out, the waiter insisted that we keep the pen.  We figured it had the name of the restaurant on it and we'd keep it as a souvenir.  Upon closer inspection, nope, just a regular BIC! 

Sunday, we explored the town of Villefranche-sur-Mer (where we stayed).  Along the bay, we saw hundreds of tiny jellyfish!  We overheard someone saying that the day before, the beach had been closed because there were so many jellyfish.  Fortunately, we just got a good view and walked on. 

That afternoon, we hiked Cap Ferrat and gawked at the crazy huge yachts bobbing along in the bay.  Many people just dropped anchor (and the women, their tops!) and floated for the day.  One family even took their dog into the water with them! 

After a sweaty hike, we swam at the Plage de Passable. 

 

  

 

Then, we spent the evening enjoying the view and eating at a delicious restaurant.  Tyler had chicken-duck-chicken-duck-chicken slices and I had three different kinds of fish.  SO fresh!

Monday, we got up early, or so we vacationers thought, and got in the car.  We drove to Eze-le-village, a hilltop town that Tyler's parent actually visited when they spent a few weeks in France in 1978.  It was really cool to see the uber-expensive hotel where they stayed (courtesy of Nana & Granddad), the cars in the parking lot there and have a café where they might have sat.  Then, onto Monaco and the yachts of the country with the highest per capita income in the world.  Wow!  The casino looked more like a combination between a really ritzy country club and a palace.  There was a 10€ cover charge, to keep the riff-raff out, but we played the (no-cover charge) slots and won 1.80€ on a 5€ bet!  That's over a 30% gain!  We know when to hold them and when to fold them, so we took our money and ran.  We saw cars there that I've only read about and the swarms of other tourists made it feel somewhat like a circus. 

Fo' rizzle...

This is IT. I'm making a commitment to myself and you, our family and friends, that I will make our blog cool. You may now notice that it has a pretty background--but not too "pretty," for Tyler's sake--and that I'm actually posting. I might not be quite as crazy about posting as my friend Laura Smith (love ya!) but hopefully y'all will get a taste of what's up with us.

We have some exciting things coming up in the near future: We're going to be traveling a TON in the next few months, including a cruise in November, and we're moving in December--Tyler to Korea, Laura to Nebraska! Leaving Italy will be extremely difficult as we've made some fabulous friends here, but we're ready to live in America. Tyler has to wait a little while longer for that, but eventually he will join me in the land of Open 24 Hours.

Stay tuned for pictures from the Cote d'Azur last weekend.  Here's a preview...

Ciao for now!