Mi-Go, Bruchsal, Germany

Leslee


Posted Apr 18, 2011, 10:33 pm
I have been at my base camp with Leslee for a month or so.  SHe found me at the charity shop and realised straight away that I didn't want a child owner and took me home.
It's ok here, there are lots of other toys for company but I have itchy feet.  I plan to go traveling as soon as I can.

I've had a great day today out in the garden and have been sharing my handywork skills helping Leslee make furniture for little Yewlee out in the sun today. 
The next job is to make me some travel bags.  One for me to carry my things to in and a larger one for me to travel comfortably in.
I can't do the sewing bit but I think I might write myself a list of things to pack.

I wonder where I'll go?  I don't mind really.  Not that I don't care, I just know how to have fun anywhere!
Leslee


Posted Apr 20, 2011, 9:15 am
The weather here is so lovely that we haven't been making travel bags yet!
Today the big ones had an appointment near a park so I had a good play.
Leslee


Posted Apr 29, 2011, 11:59 am
Mi Go thought he might have to go wild because he is so large but is excited at the moment because he might have a host.


Mi Go is enjoying having me at home today as a bank holiday has been declared today for the Royal Wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton.

He has been helping me today by operating the timer for me to do little bursts of work then play (FlyLady style).
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Jun 7, 2011, 4:30 am
Hello mummy!
This is my first day in Russia and the first place we visited was main Russian templ - The Cathedral of Christ the Saviour on the bank of the Moskva River, a few blocks west of the Kremlin. With an overall height of 105 metres (344 ft), it is the tallest Orthodox church in the world!
There is a bridge near it, you can see it at the last photo. People who just married come here to lock their padlock with their names on special trees. So romantic!
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Jun 16, 2011, 8:47 pm
Hello mummy!
Today I`ll show Maria`s country-house. It is tiny and not very comfortable but they like to come there. At first photo you can see awful guy!!!! Booo! I suppose he is instead of dog to safe house :)
The thing I liked the most is old chair where I can have a rest.

And mummy look at the last photo! I met the girl from my dreams... is not she beautiful? But she seems not to be interested in boyfriends :(
But I hope she`ll change her mind!
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Jul 4, 2011, 4:27 am
Hello mummy!
Maria is busy with her wedding preparation, that`s why we don`t have many updates. Not to waste time she took me to one of her meetings with photographer. The meeting was in the center of Moscow so we took some pictures. The one good news in all this that Maria will take me to her honey moon in two weeks :)
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Jul 12, 2011, 8:20 pm
Hello mummy!
I`m again in the countryside. But now I have a friend! She is a cat and a little bit lazy! But I like her anyway. Now it is very nice time in the countryside, everything is in blossom and I can spend much time at the open air....

But now my friend cat is calling me home. See you soon!
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Aug 23, 2011, 8:05 pm
Hello Lesley!
I`m spending with Maria her honey-moon :)
These two photos are from Palermo. Not the best photos but all TVs had their special day during traveling and my day was very boring :(
But you can enjoy the view of Zisa:
Quote:
The Zisa is a castle in the western part of Palermo, Sicily.

The construction was begun in the 12th century by Arabian craftsmen for king William I of Sicily, and completed by his son William II. The edifice had been conceived as summer residence for the Norman kings, as a part of the large hunting resort known as Genoard ("Paradise on Earth") that included also the Cuba Sottana, the Cuba Soprana and the Uscibene palace.
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Aug 23, 2011, 8:13 pm
Ciao!
I`m in Rome! Maria is mad about Rome :)
Most of my photos are made in from of or from  Monument to Vittorio Emanuele II.
People who live in Rome don`t like it and call " pie", but I like it. It is marvelous. What do you think mummy?

And of course Colosseum!!!!!
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Oct 17, 2011, 3:48 am
Hello dear mummy!
I visited exhibition of Sponge Bob! It was fun. There were many children there and my friend Bussi and I were playing with them.
TaisAfinskaia
maria.forletters@gmail.com

Posted Oct 30, 2011, 6:26 pm
Hello Lesley!
We are enjoying Russian autumn. It i not still very cold, but sunny. I ride my bicycle and walked in the forest with my friend Bussi.
Look how bright Russian autumn is!
fam-united


Posted Dec 18, 2011, 3:40 pm
Today another package arrived at our place. We all were really curious. It was a new toyvoyager called Drescher, who just had arrived at our place.

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We decided to listen to the White Christmas Album while we baked a Hannchen Jensen cake, which you can see on the left page. We baked it with peaches, because we don't like cherries in it.

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While we took care for the Hannchen Jensen cake, Petra baked some cookies. You see, it isn't that easy to hold me back from eating everything. I just threw them around when I jumped up to catch some of the finished warm cookies.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 18, 2011, 3:49 pm
Today we baked a braided yeast bun, because Petra's one son had a belated birthday party. It tasted really fine - and once more they had to take care for me to not eat it all before any other person had a chance to get a slice of it.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 18, 2011, 4:19 pm
Today we wanted to create some tea-light holder. We needed four pieces of hard transparency foil and napkins with small ornaments on them and some glue for napkins and white colour.

At first I had to rip out some ornaments of my napkin.


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Then I had to glue it on the foil.

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After it was dry again, I stamped some white colour around the ornament.

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Some even used golden colour.

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Petra helped us to staple them together.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 19, 2011, 7:51 pm
Today we helped Petra to bake two large apple cakes, because tomorrow is the last day of her son's alternative service.
We prepared the dough and cut apples into pieces, added cinnamon, raisins and sliced almonds to the apples and cooked them. Then we made a part of the dough in the plate and filled it with the warm apples and covered it with dough again. I would so love to make this internet able to give you a hint of the smell in the kitchen, yummy.

While we all worked really hard, one of us sat around and only listened to music of the cd-played. Of course one whose name is Priscilla can only listen to music of Elvis, especially when it is Christmas time and it is a Christmas album.


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The first of us, who discovered the new cd was Henry the Adventure Hound.

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We needed a lot of flour for the cake.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 19, 2011, 8:42 pm
This weekend there is a special event in Bruchsal. There is a second Christmas market for three days around the palace. The weather wasn't that great - no snow:(, but it was cold enough and the place was full of people.

At first we listend to the trombone choir playing Christmas songs. We also took a look into all the tents, but it was too crowded to take photos there.



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We left the Christmas market and took a photo of the front of the palace by night before we drove home again.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 20, 2011, 3:34 pm
While our host was teaching at school, it started to snow. We asked her to go out with us, but she said, that the snow is rather wet and that it isn't nice outside. Nevertheless she took some photos with me to show the roofs covered with some snow.

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Here you see the two towers of the church St. Peter.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 28, 2011, 9:05 pm
Petra has time to do some more baking. At first we all sat down at our place, where Petra wanted us to sit.

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We took the book and searched for some nice recipes. You can see, which recipes we picked out for baking today.

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We also baked some other sorts of cookies.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 28, 2011, 9:37 pm
Today is a very special day. We all were allowed to help packing the presents for Christmas.

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Later we helped to cook chicken fricassee in the clay pot and some corn salad and of course we helped to eat everything:)

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Later we ate some of our selfmade cookies.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 28, 2011, 10:39 pm
Merry Christmas to you!

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In the morning we watched a movie, which Petra got as present yesterday evening: Elvis: That's the way it is.
I must say, that he was a really cute guy and I also like some of his songs.


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Our sheep waited in the stable with the sheep.

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Then we all went to the crib with the newborn Jesus.


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fam-united


Posted Dec 29, 2011, 1:48 pm
Today we helped to cook again. We had lamb, dumplings, vegetables (carrots, onions, oranges and dates) with red pepper pearls. It tasted very very fine, although it was a diet recipe - without the dumplings.

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Then everyone went away and we were alone at home. We prepared everything for dinner: raclette. Look at this amount of black olives.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 31, 2011, 2:56 pm
Today we went to Petra's parents in law to celebrate Christmas with them and her husbands' sisters families. We saw some nice angels and another beautiful Christmas tree.

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fam-united


Posted Dec 31, 2011, 3:58 pm
The weather was a bit better, so we decided to go on a short walk over the graveyard, which is close to where I live right now. There is a beautiful baroque church next to the graveyard. It's called St. Peter.

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We also visited to Jewish graveyard.

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Next to the newapostolic church on the left we had a good view over a part of Bruchsal. The big house on the right is the backside of Sancta Maria.

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Next to Sancta Maria we had another good view over the city. I hope, that I will come closer to those towers to see exactly, what these buildings look like. Petra told me, that from left to right you can see the tower of the city church Our holy lady, church St. Damian and Hugo, which belongs to the palace and the old tower of the ancient castle.

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Here is the front of Sancta Maria. It is a school for soon to be kindergardeners and also home for some Franciscan nuns.

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fam-united


Posted Jan 2, 2012, 3:17 pm
It's the last day of 2011 and we start to bake a new year pretzel. At first we had to take flour, some warm milk and fresh barm. We prepared a yeast sponge. Later we added honey and melted butter and salt.

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fam-united


Posted Jan 2, 2012, 3:43 pm
Happy New Year

We celebrated with friends and had a lot of fun. At midnight we watched the fireworks.


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I'm sorry, it was really difficult to take a nice photo. This one isn't really a nice one.
fam-united


Posted Jan 2, 2012, 8:37 pm
Mandy Sheep read a lot about Baden-Württemberg, because she joins in the Big German Round Robin. After hours of searching for information about the state we're living with our host right now, she got bored of reading so much, so she decided to listen to a nice song on youtube. Maybe you will watch it to. It is "Crawfish" from Elvis Presley's movie "King Creole".

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She called us to join her.

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fam-united


Posted Jan 27, 2012, 6:47 pm
The weather isn't the best one, but today we've seen some blue sky:)
I decided to join my host and her daughter, when her daughter delivered a journal of the catholic church to some people.
On our way we saw some nice old houses.


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fam-united


Posted Jan 27, 2012, 9:29 pm
In the evening we went to take the stars from a storeroom of the church, where our hosts belong to. Petra takes care for the stars, which will be carried around by the starsingers on 6th January. Some of the stars are old, some don't look nice anymore, so Petra creates new covers and we decided to help her today.
Here you see a star, that still looks nice. Nevertheless it isn't, if you take a closer look. Last year it rained a lot and the star got wet. Now you can see white glue running down, where it should be only clear yellow. Some said, that it doesn't matter, but our host didn't like it and she asked us to cut out new yellow transparent paper and a new black star silhouette.


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We didn't like the yellow side of this star, so we decided to spray it bronze and cut out a new yellow transparent paper and black star silhouette too.

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We had to work really hard.

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We also didn't like these two stars and we had to throw one into the bin, because it was broken on the back totally.


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Then we had to outline the first star on the transparent paper.

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Priscilla helped to cut it out.

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But it was rather difficult for her, so Lintilla offered to help her.

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While we worked, we found some marzipan potatoes.

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Although the others tried to speak really low, because I had been fallen asleep in their back. You know, that I always run to get it, if I see something to eat.

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They should have known it better, too. Of course I also feel, if something to eat is around. I jumped up and caught the marzipan potatoes in the same second. Only Lintilla seemed to take no notice of it.

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Proud me! The others tried to keep calm down and go on with their work. They had to outline the black star now.

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They seems disappointed, that I didn't help them.

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But to their surprise, I was the one, who asked them, if they would allow me to cut out the black star silhouette.

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It was really difficult, but I had been the one, who knew, how to do it.

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And yeah, it just looks great. Now I can be really proud.

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But, oh dear, we had done a mistake, when we outlined the yellow star. It was the wrong side of the paper and so the star didn't fit perfectly to the wooden star. We were very disappointed.

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We had to cut out another yellow star and black star silhouette, which fit perfectly then.

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Then we had a break and read the newspapers. We read, that Wulff is the Federal President and that there are some problems, but they aren't really interesting for toyvoyagers. But it was really interesting for us, that they wrote about a storm, which should hit Germany soon - no toyvoyager weather:(

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For me it was interesting to see a photo of the wife of Baden-Württembergs Minister-President Kretschmann. I read, that she doesn't want to be called a First Lady. I did want to read this whole news article, but the others didn't and so we went on to the next page.

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We saw a photo with a little bit of snow. Wow, there's snow somewhere in Germany.

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But then we turned to read the Bruchsal news and the first thing we saw, what a nice bird singing and a pussy willow blooming. It seems like springtime here.

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Did you know, that petrol in Germany is that expensive? I'm not sure, because we didn't know about this. Diesel costs between 1,37 Euro and 1,48 Euro, which means between 1,8092 US-Dollar and 1,9544 US-Dollar. It would be interesting to know, how expensive it is in other countries.

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On Karlsruhe page on the right we read about a big construction area, where they build a new way for the city tram.

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Here is an interesting page. It shows items, which you can buy in the newspaper shop. They sell items of Baden. Maybe we should go there and take a look, but surely they will cost some money.

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fam-united


Posted Jan 28, 2012, 10:18 am
I like this Christmas decoration on the window. It's on the same place each year. If you like it too and want the originals to cut them out for yourself, please send a note to Petra.
It's a nice place for us toyvoyagers, too. It is warm and you can see everything that's going on on the street
:)

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The first photo is without flash, just to show you, how dark it is outside although it is early midday. If Petra hasn't done a mistake, then there are 26 toyvoyagers sitting together. Some are her toyvoyagers, some her daughters and some are rescued toyvoyagers, which still are at her place and of course some are guests, who will move on again.
fam-united


Posted Jan 28, 2012, 10:53 am
After the big group photo session we finished the stars.

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The other toyvoyagers were really curious and came to take a look at the beautiful stars.

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Later a group of starsingers visited our house, but we just had been too slow, so we aren't on this photo. Nevertheless we thougth, that it is a good idea to show you, how starsingers can look like. They don't carry one of our stars, though. They belong to the church region, were our hosts live, but our hosts go to another church, where they lived before. It's a bit complicated:)

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In the afternoon we all helped our Petra to bake two cakes. She told us, that tomorrow isn't only Epiphany, but also her husbands 50th birthday and that we will go to the parish hall and carry cakes with us. At first we baked a Hermann cake. It is a cake like a round robin, that's how it seems for me. Petra told us, that she received a part of the cake a few days ago and that she had to stir it and to feed it and that now it is ready to get baken. Of course we added some more stuff like flour, sugar, almonds, cinnamon, chocolate pieces.

We read the recipe.

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Then we had to get some more dishes for the "kids" of this cake.

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We had been really busy.


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We also added some apple pieces.

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We wondered, if this dish would be big enough and decided, that it wasn't. So we took a star for the dough of Hermann.

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fam-united


Posted Jan 28, 2012, 1:24 pm
Today some of us joined Petra, when she went to the parish hall to sort the sweets for the children, who walked through the streets as starsingers. They had bags and sorted the sweets so that everyone nearly received the same amount of sweets at the end. You can see the bags on the table. There were about 50 bags. Some of the bags were brought to a day care center, some to a children's home and some to a nun, who knows several poor families, who surely will be happy about some sweets.

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fam-united


Posted Feb 6, 2012, 2:30 pm
Today we drove to the Michaelsberg in Untergrombach. Untergrombach is one of Bruchsal's suburbs with about 6000 inhabitants.
3500 to 2600 BC there were frist human signs on the Michaelsberg, which gave this culture the name "Michaelsberger Kulturkreis"
1502 AD Joss Fritz from Untergrombach planned the "Bundschuhaufstand" during the time of Peasant's Wars.


In the far (right side) you see some houses, which belong to Bruchsal.


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Bruchsal and also Untergrombach are located at the edge to the Kraichgau. Here you see the Rhine Valley. If the weather is sunny, you can see the Palatinate Forest in the far.

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The chapel is on top of the Michaelsberg.

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fam-united


Posted Feb 19, 2012, 11:26 am
Karlsruhe is the third largest city of Baden-Württemberg. It is the main city of the Baden part. It is located close to the German - French border, only about 25 km from Bruchsal. We arrived at Karlsruhe after a drive of about 25 minutes.

We first tried to find a parking place and then crawled out of the car. Wow, was it cold outside. We all didn't have the right clothes for a walk, so we had to hurry.

Karlsruhe was founded in 1715 as Karlsruhe Palace, when Germany was a series of principalities and city states. The town surrounding the Palace became the seat of two of the highest courts in Germany, the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany (Bundesverfassungsgericht) whose decisions have the force of a law in many cases, and the Federal Court of Justice of Germany (Bundesgerichtshof), the highest court of appeals in matters of civil law and criminal law. It therefore considers itself the home of justice in Germany, a role taken over from Leipzig after 1945.

Due to similarities to the United States capital city, it has been speculated that Karlsruhe was a model city for the cityscape of Washington, D.C.[4] Both cities have a center — in Karlsruhe the palace and in D.C. the Capitol Building — from which the streets radiate outward. L'Enfant, Washington's city planner, had been given the plans of Karlsruhe (among numerous other European cities) as an inspiration.
(you can read this and more on wikipedia)


In 1715, Charles III William, Margrave of Baden-Durlach established Karlsruhe (Charles' repose), where he built his residence.


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The city was planned with the palace tower (Schloss) at the center and 32 streets radiating out from it like the spokes of a wheel, or the ribs of a folding fan, so that one nickname for Karlsruhe in German is the "fan city" (Fächerstadt). Here's a photo of the palace.

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We really wanted to see more, but it was so cold, that we hurried back to our car. When we looked out of the car window, we could see the State Art Gallery.

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fam-united


Posted Feb 21, 2012, 4:43 pm
We decided to drive to Durlach to climb the Turmberg. Our hosts told us, that the view from Turmberg would be just perfect. So we are really excited. You can see the top of the Turmberg just straight ahead.

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fam-united


Posted Feb 21, 2012, 7:24 pm
Durlach is a borough of the German city of Karlsruhe with a population of roughly 30,000.
It was chosen by the margrave Charles II in 1565 as residence of the rulers of Baden-Durlach, and retained this distinction though it was almost totally destroyed by the French in 1689.

Margrave Charles III William decided that he needed more space which led to the foundation of Karlsruhe, which in 1715 became the new capital until the state was merged into the grand-duchy of Baden.

We only drove through some narrow streets, because it wasn't far from sunset.


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fam-united


Posted Feb 21, 2012, 9:19 pm
The Turmberg ('tower hill') is a vineyard-covered hill of the northern most part of the Black Forest. A castle ruin with watch-tower are located on top of the Turmberg. The watch-tower in particular offers fine views of Karlsruhe towards the west and the Rhine River valley. On very clear days even farther west the Vosges in France can be seen. The Rhine River is the border between Germany and Alsace area of France. The South and East offer nice views of the Black Forest, and since the Turmberg is the northern most tip of the Black Forest you have hills more than actual mountains.

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fam-united


Posted Mar 18, 2012, 1:53 pm
Today we drove to Cologne. Petra's husband had to be there for a Trade Fair and Petra met olgamaus.

Here is some information about Cologne (wikipedia):


"Cologne (English pronunciation: /kəˈloʊn/, German: Köln [kœln], Kölsch: Kölle [ˈkœɫə]) is Germany's fourth-largest city (after Berlin, Hamburg and Munich), and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.

Cologne is located on both sides of the Rhine River. The city's famous Cologne Cathedral (Kölner Dom) is the seat of the Catholic Archbishop of Cologne. The University of Cologne (Universität zu Köln) is one of Europe's oldest and largest universities.

Cologne is a major cultural centre of the Rhineland and has a vibrant arts scene. Cologne is home to more than 30 museums and hundreds of galleries. Exhibitions range from local ancient Roman archeological sites to contemporary graphics and sculpture. The Cologne Trade Fair hosts a number of trade shows such as Art Cologne, imm Cologne, Gamescom and the Photokina."



Cologne Cathedral (German: Kölner Dom) is the city's most famous monument and the Cologne residents' most respected landmark. It is a Gothic church, started in 1248, and completed in 1880. In 1996, it was designated a World Heritage site; it houses the Shrine of the Three Kings that supposedly contains the relics of the Three Magi. Residents of Cologne sometimes refer to the cathedral as "the eternal construction site" (Dauerbaustelle).

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Cologne Central Station: On an average day, about 280,000 travellers frequent the station, making it fifth busiest station in Germany.

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Then we walked down to the Rhine.

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We turned around and took a look back to the cathedral.

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Here's the Hohenzollern Bridge.

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Great St. Martin Churchis a Romanesque Catholic church. Its foundations (circa 960 AD) rest on remnants of a Roman chapel, built on what was then an island in the Rhine. The church was badly damaged in World War II, with restoration work completed in 1985.

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We then walked around the Imhoff-Chocolate Museum. 

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We took a look back to the Hohenzollern Bridge, cathedral and Great St. Martin.

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The museum is run by the Schokoladenmuseum Köln GmbH. Since March 2006, the Swiss chocolate manufacturer Lindt & Sprüngli has been its partner in producing exhibits. Prior to that the partner was the Cologne chocolate producer Stollwerck, and the museum was formerly known as the Imhoff-Stollwerck-Museum.

On this photo you can see, how high the water was in 1995 and you can see, where we took the photo with the chocolate girl, where we stand for the view back to the churches and bridge. The yellow line shows the way we walked around the museum and the green line the way, where we came from.

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Inside the museum we saw all the machines which are necessary to make delicious chocolate.

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There is a real chocolate fountain! We all got wafers dipped into melted chocolate. Yummy!

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This equestrian statue shows Frederick William III of Prussia. You can see here, who else is on the base of the statue.

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The Heumarkt is beside the Alter Markt the biggest place in Cologne historic city.

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There are several small breweries in Cologne. This one is located at the Heumarkt.

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It started to rain and we walked back to the cathedral. We entered it and it was so so dark inside, that we had problems to take nice photos. So please excuse the quality.

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So this was the last photo of Cologne and we drove back to Bruchsal again.
fam-united


Posted Apr 6, 2012, 3:13 pm
Today we were invited to celebrate our host uncle's 80th birthday. We celebrated at a Greek Restaurant close to the Rhine. In the early afternoon we went on a walk to have a view on the Rhine. Both, the Rhine and the Neckar flow through Mannheim. Mannheim is a nice city, Petra told me, but she had no time to show more than the Rhine.

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fam-united


Posted Apr 29, 2012, 8:39 am
Happy Easter to you!

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fam-united


Posted Apr 29, 2012, 5:57 pm
Finally I found time to read these two pages of two different newspapers of the week. The one is about Bruchsal asparagus. Bruchsal is famous for its asparagus fields and auctions.

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The other newspaper page is about the baroque palace of Bruchsal. I think, you have a good view to many different parts of the main building with the church tower, but still many houses are missing.

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fam-united


Posted Apr 30, 2012, 5:46 pm
We have typical April weather in Bruchsal. There is sunshine and the next moment there is hail and thunder and rain.

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fam-united


Posted May 13, 2012, 3:28 pm
This is my last update from Bruchsal. I hope to crawl out of my envelope again soon.

Bye, Mi-Go


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