Travelog for: Aslan

Hi Mummy,
we are still having ugly weather, it is  cold and stormy. Clyde told me that they even had snow here this week, but it melted away soon.

Today we took a short walk, mostly to accompany Jellybean and Baby_Pom_Fimble to the mailbox. Jellybean is  travelling home and Baby-Pom-Fimble is travelling to a host.

We took a short walk in the municipal park.



We started at the pond.



An observatory is situated here in the park.





Franz-Ferdinand is wearing a hat and a scarf - really useful at the moment.



What a pity, the next photo does not show that the moon was already shining bright.



(I will talk to Katja about a scarf).

Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
today we visited the neighbour city Wuppertal.

Wuppertal is the biggest city of the hilly region Bergisches Land. One of the city’s greatest attractions is the suspended monorail (Schwebebahn), which was established in 1901. The tracks are 8 m above the streets and 12 m above the Wupper River.





The whole route of the Schwebebahn is about 13 km long, following the river and crossing streets at some points, it even crosses the A46 motorway.

We went to the shopping streets than, we also had planned to visit the Christmas market.



The Christmas market is situated in the main shopping streets. We saw lots of lovely things, for example those candle holders.

Katja bought vanilla honey and honey soap here.







We enjoyed eggnog here.



We also went into one of the shopping malls, also lovely decorated.



Katja told us that maybe tomorrow we go to Wuppetal again, to see a place which Clyde would love. Let's see ....

Bye
Aslan

Hi Mum,
today we went to Wuppertal again. First we took a walk along the "Sambatrasse", a former now closed railway track, rebuilt to a lane for pedestrians and cyclists. It is following the original track through the forest, meeting some interesting points.

First stop was an open air pool which is heated by waste heat from the nearby incinerator. You can go swimming here the whole year. Katja told us that it would be covered when there would be extremely deep temperatures outside.



This is the incinerator.



We walked along allotment gardens, many gardens are decorated with memorabilia from the former railway track.



The lane is running next to the A 46 motorway for a while.



Than the most interesting part followed: The Sambatrasse is crossing the zoo. Can you see the lawn in the background? It's the tiger enclosure!





We saw the tigers.





I found this funny sign, it is saying "Infos for the tigers: Meals on wheels"




We reached the end of the Sambatrasse than, in the zoo quarter, a villa quarter with lots of interesting houses.





Soon we reached the Schwebebahn station.





Here you can see me inside the station, about 8 m above street level.



Our train was coming in!



Oh dear, the train was swaying. It felt like ... having too much eggnog.



Katja had told us before that there would be a surprise for Clyde. We visited a brewhouse to have a beer and something to eat.



We had a look at the menu and ordered Christmas beer and something to eat. Salad and potatoe wedges for Katja, burgers with french fries for her daughter and her boyfriend. Our beer was served in large glasses





Cheers!



I was so tired after my beer that I did not realized how we got home.

Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
today I made Christmas cookies with Clyde. We made macaroons with walnut, chocolate and marchpane.

We needed egg white, sugar, chopped walnuts, chopped chocolate and rasped marchpane mass.







The egg white was beaten stiff, than we added sugar, nuts, chocolate and marchpane.



We formed small piles and put them onto the baking tray.



Aren't they looking good ?



Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
the weather was still ugly today, although we tried to walk around in Katja's lunch break. First she showed us the water tower which is visible even from a larger distance, because the city centre of Remscheid is situated on a hill.





The public library is situated in the brown building on the left side, an art gallery in the house on the right side.



Here you can see the central bus station - and the first raindrops.



It was raining more and we hurried back to "our" work place along the shopping street.



Bye for now
Aslan

Good morning Mummy,
it's the fourth Advent Sunday.



Tatanka and Snakey made a wonderful sweetness yesterday with lots of chocolate, nuts and marshmallows. They did a great job



It snowed a bit during the night.



Have a pleasant Sunday
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
we went to buy the Christmas tree today. We went with Katja's brother-in-law, like every year, she told me.

We drove to a farm in one of the rural outskirts of Remscheid. Here you can drive into the forest and look vor your tree in a tree farm. You can even fell it on your own.





Those trees were too large, about 2 m .





You can go with your own car here or you can go with the farmer, on the trailer of his tractor.



We took a short walk around.



To pay for the tree we had to drive back to the farm. In the meantime the sun came out, but only for a short moment.



I also went to say Hello to the horses on the farm.



It was time than to disappear into Katja's bag. I was a bit wet and afraid to get a cold.

Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
today we helped to prepare the Christmas tree.



Love
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
after dinner we helped to unwrap the Christmas presents.



Love
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
after work we went to Katja's friend Kerstin today, to take a walk with her dog in Scharpenacken, a former army training area. This area was used for military purposes until 2004 A.D as a shooting range. Today there is a local recreation area with vast open areas.
In the background you can see a housing area in Wuppertal, famous for its exquisite villas built by factory owners.







Not long since we started our walk it began to rain again.



In the middle of the forest you can find a lovely landscape park, built by the former owner of the Vorwerk Company. Katja told us that this would be a lovely place in spring time, summer and autumn, but now it is a only muddy place.



When we went back to the car on a more rarely frequented path we found one of the old warning signs



No need to be afraid nowadays, you only might drown here today.

Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
we went to Katja's sister-in-law's family today to celebrate the last day of the year. When we arrived, there already was everything prepared for Raclette.

There were lots of vegetables like sweet pepper, carrots, mushrooms, tomatoes, than there was beef and chicken meat, salmon, bread, potatoes and much more. Of course there was a lot of cheese



Later we called a card game called "Dominion".



At midnight we all had a glass of sparkling wine.



Happy New Year!



Love
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
every update starts with the words "the weather is still a mess", so also today. Nothing changed so far. Although we took a short walk today. First we went to the municipal park to the district Hasten.





In Hasten you can often find dwellings and historical company buildings close together.





In the background you can see the outskirts of Wuppertal.



Along the main street in the valley between Wuppertal and Remscheid you can find a lot of industrial sites. Along the creeks in the valley industrialization started in middle ages here, even nowadays there are still a lot of companies which exist for centuries.



In the background you can see Hasten now, from here we had to walk straight uphill to get home.



Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
this is my first day here with fantastic weather, a great reason to take a hiking trip, so we took a long walk along the river Wupper today, in Solingen, the neighbour city. We started our trip in Balkhausen, a small hamlet in this rural area. Here we saw a lot of those typical half-timbered houses.







Finally we reached river Wupper, it is flowing towards river Rhine.





We reached a hamlet with a funny name: It is called "Rüden" because of the tale of one of the formerly reigns of this region (eventually in middle ages) who met with a riding accident and was saved by his dog.
("Rüde" is the German word for a male dog).







What a lovely place, I could sit here for hours and enjoy the sunshine.



We decided to walk back. We found an old machine.



Unfortunately we had no more sunshine on the other side of the valley.
We crossed the river here.



Bye

Aslan

Hi Mummy,
when Katja came home from work we decided to take a walk - who knows how long we would have such great weather.

We went to the municipal park first, only a few minutes to walk.



There is a pond in the park, ducks and turtles are living here.





The observatory is situated in the municipal park.



We enjoyed the sunshine



We walked to the district Hasten than.









Bye
Aslan

Hi Mummy,
the weather is still ugly here with lots of rain. Nontheless my host Katja decided that we would take a walk. We went to a woodland area. There is a creek in the valley, usually a really narrow one.  It is carrying much more water than usual.



These rain detention basins are usually empty, now they are filled. (It is raining for about six weeks now.)



We were happy when we reached our home.



Later we watched Katja's daughter prepare a torte. Her boyfriend is celebrating his birthday today, she is going to take it to the birthday party. She made a torte with cream, chocolate cream and strawberries.



She prepared the chocolate cream with egg yolk, butter and melted chocolate.





First the layers of the torte were filled with strawberry jam, than there is a layer of whipped cream and finally the chocolate cream.



Than the torte was decorated with more cream, strawberries and chocolate hearts.



It's looking good, isn't it?



Maybe I will manage to hide in her bag, so I could also go to the birthday party and taste the torte.

Bye
Aslan