Travelog for: Tucker

Hey folks,

my name is Tucker and I am new here. I am a life-loving turtle from Germany, to be exact from a city called Dortmund.
My neighbourhood here isn't very beautiful, that's why I want to travel around the world!!




I love everything related to beaches, the ocean and stuff like that



Besides I love eating. There's nothing better than a good meal After a good meal it's nice to lay in the sun and relax a little bit. Well, you might think that I'm a lazy turtle who doesn't want to move, but actually I'm full of energy and ready to explore unkown places. I love visiting places where I've never been before, it's so exciting

My host has another TV, Lexie. She is my best friend and she knows absolutely everything about me. It will be kinda hard to say goodbye to her when one of us is going to start a new adventure... 



Well, that's it about me!!
I'm very excited about the travels and adventures that wait for me somewhere out there

Read you next time!

Tucker

Hi guys,

it's me again
My Mum took me with her to university today. The university is called "TU Dortmund" and exists since 1968. It has 2 campuses. The northern campus is much bigger than the southern campus, but the southern one is more familiar and a little more modern.
At the southern campus is the whole constructing stuff, like architecture, spatial planning and civil engineering. At the northern campus are the natural sciences, the humane discipline, sports and everything related to music.
I've been at the southern one today because my mum studies spatial planning there.

On the right you can see the building of my mum's faculty (spatial planning). In the middle is the building for the civil engineering and on the left (hard to see, I know) is the building for architecture.


At home I enjoyed a cosy evening on the couch. I turned a chain of lights on to make it even more comfortable.


Well, it's quite late now and I'm sure I'm gonna fall asleep on the couch if I don't go to bed now

Good night, guys!
Tucker

Hello world,

it is my last day at home today, I'm gonna start my first adventure, finally!! I'm soo looking forward to spend some time in different places all over the world. I hope everything will go well.
Well, I enjoyed my last day here in Bochum and went to the city center. There was a festival called "Maiabend Fest" (May evening festival).
It's an old traditional festival which is several hundreds of years old. The background of this festival is that back then - a few hundred years ago - young people cut down a tree in a district in Bochum called "Harpen" and carried it to the city center. Since this time, this procedure is beeing held every year.
There is a parade every year where the Maischützen (there's no english word for it) walk from Harpen to the city center, drinking lots of alcohol and making music.
In the city center itself is a big festival with many beer stalls, food stands, a medieval market and a stage with live music. I really like it!

Here you can see me and some scottish members of the parade. To be honest, I have absolutely no idea why there were scottish people But I love scottish music and bagpipes


I saw some police at the festival, they kept an eye on everything and they did a great job. The other TV's and me got the chance to take a photo on a police car One of the policemen turned a LED display on which shows "STOP", especially for our photo It is mirror-inverted so that the car drivers can read it when they look in their rearview mirror when the police is behind them.



Well, back at home it was time to say goodbye to Brownbeard, Bussi, Marawarpina and my best friend Lexie.


I'm gonna miss Lexie and my mum so much!! It's hard to say goodbye but I'm looking forward to my life as a ToyVoyager and to meet many other TV's and people!!
Oh, Lexie starts her first adventure today as well. I'm curious if I'll meet her somewhere out there in the world.
Well, we hugged and squeezed us for a last time before we both left our home.


That's it for today. I'll make my next update when I arrive in Remscheid.

Byebye!!
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
I arrived in Remscheid today! My new host Katja (another Katja ) released me from my envelope at her workplace in a law firm. There were even two other TVs to welcome me, Virgo and Pelly.



My new host was celebrating her birthday at the weekend, so I brought a present and a birthday card with me. She loves the bookmark.



Katja and her colleague enjoyed some sweets in their lunch break, I also tried them. Yummy!

... the longest praline in the whole wide world ...



... and peanuts in dark chocolate - even better!



Bye for today
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
today we took Shooga to the mailbox - she was leaving to Canada. Katja took me on a walk in the municipal park. First she showed me a small park, situated in front of the police headquarter.



We did not have to walk long until we reached the municipal park.



I found this sign telling about a myth from East Prussia, about the Stinthengst (which means king of fish). The Stinthengst can be found in the coat of arms of Sensburg, formaler in East Prussia, nowadays in Poland, which is twinned to Remscheid since 1954.



There is a pond with ducks, the Stinthengst and .... turtles!!! I saw one of them taking a sun bath.



Here is a zoomed photo.





And there the Stinthengst is swimming





The observatory is situated in the municipal park.



We reached a section of the park with lots of flowers.



This memorial is dedicated to the dead of several earlier wars, before WW I.





Behind those trees there are allotment gardens (Schrebergärten).



There is a fairground close to the municipal park. The first fun fair is taking place now.





They also have a ferris wheel here.



We walked towards our home than.



A playground is situated here, under those large trees.



My last photo was taken in the vicinity of my current home.



Bye for now
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
today we bought food for the pets on the farmers market. My host is keeping three ferrets, they eat lots of meat, mostly poultry.

We bought stomachs, a neck  and hearts from turkey and chicken wings and necks.



Everything had to be hackled and packed into servings, than it was packed into the freezer.





Katja told me that the ferrets liked their food raw - yuck! But they are predators, so it ok for them.

Bye
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
we took a walk today in a nearby valley.



I met cows here, Galloway cattle.



They are having the cutest baby



Katja told me that it had to be only a few days old, it still had its umbilical cord under its belly.

This is Mum with her baby.



There are some single houses hidden in the forest.



We enjoyed the sunshine



Later we also met goats, here are some curious baby goats.



We walked through the district "Kremenholl" with typical 1960's/1970's building density.



Looking back ... allotment gardens everywhere







Bye
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
today we had fantastic weather, so we took a walk in the outskirts of Remscheid. We started in the district Lennep, one of the historic parts of the city. Soon we left the city area and walked through rural areas.





We reached an upstream temporary dam, it belongs to Wupper dam.



We followed a path along a now closed railway track.



This is the old railway building.



We walked through an old worker's housing estate. They once belonged to a cloth mill.





In the forest we  found lots of blooming trees and bushes, like this hawthorn.



We enjoyed the warm sunshine







We also took a walk in the city centre of Lennep. Here you can find an historic city core, most  houses were built in late 18th century after a great fire. You can find typical "Bergische Häuser" here - mostly half-timbered houses and houses which are covered with slate, with characteristic green shutters.



This is "Klosterkirche", a former church of an abbey. Nowadays it is a cultural centre and a lovely restaurant.











This was a lovely trip,

Bye
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
we visited an exhibtion for "garden and living" today in the neighbour city Solingen. It was taking place in the palace garden of Schloss Gruenewald.



You could see the most interesting things around gardening. Flowers of course, decorating items, barbeques, all sorts of fire places, exclusive furniture for balcony and patio, also handmade jewelry, intesting food, spices, cheese, handmade clothings ....



There was also a bird of prey demonstration.



I must admit that the predators at home are dangerous enough, so I don't need more of them!

Katja told me that those birds would be more interested in mice and rats, but not in turtles





This is a garden decoration with coloured glass.





Those branches with leaves made of glass were at least 2,5 m tall.





We bought marine salt from Camargue with herbs and a piece of honey soap.

On our way back to the car we came across this rape field. The wooded box in the foreground is a bee home (that's where rapeseed honey is made ).



Bye
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
in Katja´'s lunch break we took a walk around the city centre.

Let me show you the water tower first. The city centre of Remscheid is situated on a hill,  the water tower was built at the highest point of that hill. Its tower and the nearby tower of the city hall are visible from the surrounding cities.





Here you can see the company bulding of the local newspaper, Remscheider General-Anzeiger.



This is the central bus station.



The shopping street with the pedestrian area is beginning here. A farmers market is taking place here twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday.



We walked along  the shopping street ...



... and soon we reached the shopping mall, Allee-Center.



Those giant forceps are marking the beginning of the shopping street. They are symbol for the worldwide well known tool producing industry.



This is the city hall, its tower is 48 m tall.



When we walked towards our home Katja showed us a part of the city with lots of lovely old houses.





From here  we only had to walk a few minutes to get home.



Bye
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
today we visited Katja's sister-in-law and brother-in-law. They have a tortoise living in their garden, her name is Hanni. We also took the ferretsto the garden to let them play and dig there. Here is Shiva while the other ferrets were ploughing up the compost pile.



I went to Hanni's enclosure than to meet her. She seemed to be not interested in me, only her back and bum were visible.



There was delicious salad in her enclosure, I went inside to taste the salad. Yummy!



It didn't seem to bother Hanni that I was sitting in her enclosure. We tried to tempt her with fragrant strawberries. Even more yummy!



Finally she came to eat the strawberries.



OMG, she was really big! She told me that she was a Hermann's tortoise, about 12 years old and her weight was about 2,5 kg. We decided to take a walk in the grass.





Later she walked back to her enclosure and I went home with Katja and the ferrets.



Love
Tucker

Hi Mummy,
today I left Remscheid, also Mini-Woof. We both packed our things and took off to our new destinations.

For me it's Canada!



Love
Tucker

Hi Mum,

I am in Canada ! Today I felt a lot of activity around my travelling quarters...



...and, as they were opened from the outside, I jumped out and found a crowd of TVs welcoming me in Calgary : they are Sweetsy,  Melek, Greeny delMonte, Elisa, and Tatanka all coming from Germany like me , Cherry Lola from the US,  Commodore Quack from Wales and sammino, a stay-at-home TV who introduced himself as my host here in Calgary. They were all very impressed with the gifts I brought with me and, of course, we spent the evening chatting and occasionally eating chocolate .

Hi Mum,

Today, I went for the first time up to the mountains. As apparently it often happens, the first part of the morning was spent between trees...a wonderful excuse to let smaug do the walking, take a little nap in his bag and make up for the sleep lost due to the early wake up . Eventually we reached a spot with a bit of view where we could look at both the mountains around us...



...and the prairies far away in the east .



The weather didn’t look very nice so we thought it was time to head back and maybe enjoy a nice hot chocolate , but smaug said there was no reason not to try reach our target of the day, that peak up there .



So, off we went. Listening to the wind howling outside the rucksack was a bit concerning , but somehow we reached the top and managed to take a few photos in the wind before hiding back inside. From up there we could see the Nakiska ski area...



...mountains both south and north...




...and again the prairies in the distance .

Hi Mum,

Today we all gathered together to say goodbye and wish a safe trip to Cherry Lola and Greeny delMonte who are travelling to their next hosts in Germany and the US .