World Traveling

Well, yet another whirlwind week has come to a close, and yet another nap is needed to recover from another fantastic time. Dave flew all the way here from Colorado, a 20 hour flight! He arrived on Tuesday afternoon, after leaving on Monday Afternoon the day before! He had not really slept that much for 3 days, but was happy to spend the time going around Luxembourg and seeing the sights. We dropped his things off at my place and then dropped Laurence’s car off at work for her, and off we went to see some of the sights. The first stop was the Coffee Lounge. This is my favorite coffee place in Luxembourg. We sat there and had some coffee and the walked around. We walked by the palace and into the Grund, around the Abbey. It was a really nice time. We then stopped at Urban, one of my favorite hangouts and had a drink outside. I am sure that Dave was crashing by this point but he did not show it. We moved from there to meet Laurence for a drink and some dinner. It was definitely a great time, it was a beautiful night and we made the most of it. I had to work the next day, and Dave was hitting a wall so we decided to return home. The next day, I went to work and I left Dave the keys and some money, just in case he had problems exchanging currency. He went around Luxembourg a little more on his own. After that we met Kathy at a nice little Italian restaurant in the center of town. Mind you at this point we still have not decided what we are doing for the days off that I have. We narrowed it down to renting a car and seeing what we wanted to plan. Originally, the plan was to go to Prague, but since it was going to take so long to get there we opted for some day trips instead. Thursday was the first day trip. We went to Cologne, Germany. Of course, Dave had to make fun of me a little because the thing I was searching for most was Dunkin’ Donuts. I had heard that there was one at the train station and I really wanted to find it. Unfortunately, I did not find it, but I did find a Starbucks, so I was able to have a decent size coffee. This pretty much made my whole day! We spent most of the time wandering around, just enjoying the atmosphere of the place. We did make it to a few tourist places such as the Cologne Cathedral and we passed a really cool church that was being renovated and pretty much hollowed out, but looked really interesting for pictures. We had dinner on the square with the cathedral. I think we were both a little out of sorts this day. We were both trying to be really easygoing and mostly succeeding but also we were both really a little tired and cranky. Dave has not driven a standard car that much and between sensing his stress at driving and the GPS giving us convoluted directions, I strongly suggested that he let me drive home and things were much better J This is probably another thing I will never live down, but I am used to that! On Friday, we had decided that we were going to go to Brugges in Belgium. We programmed the GPS, selecting country first then city. When we got onto the highway in Luxembourg, Dave pointed out that he thought we should be going toward Brussels. I, however, decided to follow the GPS. When we got about two hours outside of Luxembourg, I was looking at the GPS and saying to Dave, does that say 712 miles to Brugges? Apparently, I selected the one in the Pyrennes. For those of you who don’t know the Pyrennes are between France and Spain, the whole wrong side of the country. After we were thoroughly done laughing at me, we decided to go to Paris instead. We did go to a section of Paris that I had never been to before. We went Montmatre and Sacre Coeur. It was a fabulous time, we walked around and looked at all the artisans in the area and then we had dinner at one of the little cafes. We did not get home until midnight that night, but we had an incredible time. The next day we spent most of the day relaxing at home. We were going to go a tour of the palace in the afternoon but it was all booked up by the time that we got there. Instead we got something to eat in the centre and then went to the Jazz Festival. The Jazz Festival in Luxembourg was amazing! There were so many cool musicians and interesting music. It was such a great event, and it was all free! Laurence and the girl she has living with her right now also came and we had a blast. Sunday, we mad yet another trip. Laurence, Dave, and I went to Metz. It was another trip to mostly see the ambiance of the place and experience it. We sat at one of the little cafes along the river and listened to music and enjoyed the day, just chatting and eating and really just relaxing. Monday I had to work, but later in the day we went for drinks at Laurence’s house and enjoyed wine and just more relaxing, which after this whirlwind week we certainly needed. I took Tuesday off as well since it was Dave’s last day here. We ended up going to Trier in Germany and I took him around to see some of the cool places I had been before and to find gifts for his friends. We were going to eat at one really nice looking place, but as the menu was all in German and not even remotely comprehensible to either one of us, we opted for another place. The food was good there too and it was to perfect evening to end the trip on. I never knew that it was possible to laugh so much or have such a great time with any one person. It was by far the best week I have had so far!