Travelog for: Theodore

Today is also a very important day in Taiwan, because there are presidential elections. We left the Shrine and drove to Andrea's parents-in-law to wait for the final results.

Nutmeg and I wanted to drive, but we weren't allowed to....weird  .


So we took the best seats on the dashboard behind the front window


This picture was made while we were waiting for the final results. There were 2 candidates, 1 candidate was from the blue camp and the other one was from the green camp. Guess who won........ .

It is time to pack my bags again. I have stayed in Taiwan for a month now and I'm ready to explore new cities and countries.

First of all I wrote a postcard to my mommy to tell her that I had a great time here



After that I said good-bye to my hosts and buddy Nutmeg who will continue his adventures in Russia



And I am going to AUSTRALIA.....!!!!!

Theodore arrived in Australia today and had an immediate disappointment - being a hungry little chipmunk, he leapt out of his box, eager to find an acorn or ten...but we don't have acorns in Australia!
He was in no mood for photos today...we will get some when he is in a better frame of mind 

PS: Theodore filled up on almonds instead 

It has been raining for two weeks and I have not been allowed outside...

But I have someone to play with. Muki has arrived!

We tried to help Nik with her Editing course....

But we couldn't make head or tail of it so we decided to draw instead.

We learned about kookaburras, a native Australian bird that laughs very loudly!

We studied some of Nik's stamps

I am back home now.  I had lots of fun on the Asia and Oceanic trail, but it's also good to be back home so I can tell my family all about my travels.  I hope I will get to travel some more though.

Wow, I've gotten an invitation to visit Germany!  I am so excited!  It's hard to leave all my friends behind, but I'm sure I will make some new friends overseas!

Before I leave, I have to say goodbye to Prince Charming, Fairchild, and Westgate!



Germany, here I come!

Hi Mummy,
I arrived in Remscheid today. Because my new host Katja was not at home when the postman came, my package was brought to the neighbour house. I think they forgot me for the rest of the day. Now, in the evening, I was brought to my new host.

I was welcomed by Katja, bunny Margarida and bigfoot Hurley.



I was travelling with my diary and a postcard from Miami. It's the first postcard from Miami for Katja. She told me that here in Germany they don't have palm  trees but chestnuts, oaks, beech trees, linden  trees, birch trees, alder and also many conifers. Tomorrow we will take a long walk in the forrest. I'm soooo glad!!!

But now I'm hungry. We found pecans - delicious.



You'll hear more tomorrow.

Bye
Theodore

Hi Mummy,
we took a fantastic long walk today, about 14 kilometres. Katja has bought a book with 20 hiking routes in the environment of Remscheid. She met a friend and we went to Solingen-Unterburg by bus to follow one of the described routes.

Solingen is one of the neighbour towns of Remscheid. Burg is one of the oldest districts of this  town, situated at the river Wupper and famous for Schloss Burg, a medieval castle. I will show you this castle later.

Here you can see some of the old houses in Solingen-Burg. These houses are typical for this region. They are usually half-timbered houses, often partly or completely covered with schist, with green shutters.



This is a statue of the "Kiepenkerl", who is carrying sweet pretzels, a local delicacy, on his back in a pannier.



We had to walk straight uphill then for a while. After a few minutes walking we already were high above the river Wupper.





Here you can see a bothy for walkers.



We reached Sengbachtalsperre, a water reservoir dam. On the next photo I'm looking over the balustrade of the dam.



We are all sitting on the dam here, enjoying the midday sun.



We walked along the dam for a while. Can see you me on the next photo? (You cannot see me, but my shade).



Here I had a rest with a fir cone.



Now you can see more of the dam.



It was a wonderful trip for a chipmunk: I climbed up trees ...









... collected acorns ...



... I had a shower in the falling leafes ...



We left the forrest here and walked through a district with farms.







I met goats here, one of them was very curious and came to the fence to snuffle at me.





We also came by a sawmill. Here you can see many piled trunks.



Our next destination was Schloss Burg. We could see it while we walked towards it.





Doesn't it look georgeous? The castle was built in early 12th century on a mountain over the river Wupper. It was enlarged later, sometimes destroyed in wars and also fires. It was reconstructed in 1925 A.D.

This is the gate, facing the street.



We walked through the inner courtyards and reached the main part of the castle ground. You can find some shops here where different arts and crafts are sold.



This equorial monument is showing Count Engelbert II vom Berg, one of the early souvereign of this region.









We walked downhill then. Here you can see a chair lift crossing the lane. We also saw many beautiful old houses.





When we reached the starting point we had coffee and wafers with cream in a cafe.



We also bought some Burger Pretzels here. We will eat them tomorrow. After 14 kilometres walking I only want to sleep.

If you would like to see some more photos of the beautiful forrests you can have a look here.

Bye
Theodore

Hi Mummy,
we tasted the pretzels that we have bought yesterday. They are really good. Katja has a lot of funny pets which look similar to me but my tail is more wispy than theirs. They can climb almost as good as me but they are not allowed to climb up trees because they have to stay at home. So they climb up Katja's trouser legs. These funny little animals also like the pretzels.



Bye
Theodore

Hello Mummy,

we  have a new guest here since yesterday. It's Weasley. He says that his home is West Virginia but he looks like coming from outer space. He also behaves so ....

Katja asked us to help her. It was our job to weigh the ingredients but I'm sure we did understand something wrong 



At least we were ready to  help her. For our delicious apple cake you need the following ingredients:

For the dough:
125 g butter
125 g sugar
1 vanilla sugar
3 eggs
200 g flour
3 tsp baking powder
3 soup spoons cream
50 ml light rum
4 apples, peeled and cut into quarters

For the topping:
200 g sour cream
75 g sugar
2 eggs
1 p vanilla sauce powder
salt



Margarida asked me if I wanted to be her accomplice. She was planning to tease Weasley a little bit to discover if he had a lidden lightsaber for something like that.



Weasley did not have a lightsaber or anything but he was afraid.



We had to apologize. (Margarida is a really sassy bunny - she is full of mischief).

Weasley was playing with the flour sifter - he used it as a helmet and felt like an astronaut.



Now Katja needed the flour sifter.



When the dough is ready you have to fill it into your cake tin and put the apple quarters onto it.



The cake has to stay in the oven for 12 minutes.

The cake topping had to be made and Katja was searching for the beaters. Weasley was playing with them - they looked like antennas.



Then you take it out of the oven and pour the cake topping, containing sour cream, sugar, eggs and sauce powder, over the surface. Then it goes back into the oven for another 50 minutes.



If the cake is looking like this and is tasting really good everything is fine.



Bye
Theodore