Local Sightings

Between the daylight savings time switch, and the fact that the garden pictured below was covered with pine boughs just last week, it is definitely springtime in Germany! Despite that the temperature had dropped quite a bit these past couple of days.

Another site that I often pass on my way into work in Augsburg is this wood pile that I find very impressive:

Plus, it is so true that sometimes it really is the little things. I am very used to sitting in a cubicle with a desk and walls that are grey, in a room with no windows. Having spent the past week and a half or so working off site, both locations that we have been at have plenty of windows in the office which is more than a little refreshing.

From where I sat in Augsburg prior to our move to the containers earlier today, the window straight in front of me perfectly frames the church steeple pictured below.

After spending so much time looking at it, I took a walk during lunch on Monday to investigate.

The stones at the front of the church had a cross pattern in them:

I thought that the moss growing in the cracks between many of the stones was pretty cool too:

Also, there was a very intriguing statue outside the main entrance to the church:

Today R and I spent the latter half of our work day in Manching again. Prior to heading into the office there, we swung by Ingolstadt. This brief detour gave me my first ever sighting of the Danube!

We got caught in a rainstorm pretty close to getting back to the hotel.  It wasn't a total loss since there was a full rainbow over the cemetary across the street.

Best. Yogurt. Ever.

After getting back to the hotel after work today, I decided to head down to the grocery store to grab some dinner. 

There was definitely a good storm brewing as I was walking to the store - and thanks to not having grabbed my umbrella, I got to walk through some of it on the way back from the store.  I got some pretty good pics of the storm rolling in though:

I am a big fan of Oiko’s Greek Yogurt, particularly the honey flavor, back in The States. This might actually top that:

The marzipan yogurt was AMAZING! Yesterday I tried some walnut-macadamia flavored yogurt from the same brand. If I had to rank them, I would go with the marzipan, Oiko’s honey and then the walnut-macadamia.

Pussy Willows

I've always been a fan of pussy willow, and have been noticing a lot of them around here - carrying them, in gardens, in the cemetary, etc.  Or even as door decorations such as here:

According to several online sources, in areas too far north for palms to grow, pussy willow is often used instead, with Bavaria being one of the mentioned locations where this is common.

Schloß Hohenschwanstein, Schloß Neuschwanstein, and Oberammergau

Yesterday I went on a 100km (each way) roadtrip with R and S with the main objective being to see Schloss Neuschwanstein in Schwangau which is about as far south as you can go in Germany without being in Austria.

The drive itself was gorgeous, courtesty of the alps!

We also had a pretty good game of "Decipher that Road Sign" going:

Watch out for frogs?  Frog crossing? Frogs are slippery when squished?

First sighting of Schloss Neuschwanstein:

There was a very neat looking church just outside of Schwangau:

A view of Schloss Hohenschwanstein  taken during our walk up to Schloss Neuschwanstein:

Marienbrucke was reportly the site to go to in order to get the best shots of Schloss Neuschwanstein:

On the way back to Augsburg, we took a small detour to the town of Oberammergau.  I had never heard about this town before, but they are famous for the Passion Play that they do every ten years because of a vow the 1633 inhabitants made with God as part of asking Him to spare them from the bubonic plague.  2010 is one of those every ten years:

I saw sevetral actors outside the theatre taking a break.  A gentleman who I'm pretty sure was the actor playing Jesus was outside smoking.

Also, I love how my mom has the ability to put everything in perspective with simple comments.  I was talking to her about how the Oberammergau Passion Play is 7 hours long which is like an entire day.  She reminded me that it took Jesus a day to die.

The pictures I included here are only a few of all that I took yesterday.  All of the pictures can be found here.

My iPhone is smarter than me

This time anyways.  Seeing as I just went though the daylight savings time switch a couple of weeks ago back in The States, that every country does not do that switch at the same time never crossed my mind.  So I was a little confused at first this morning when my iPhone alarm starting going off an hour earlier than I had expected, and read an hour later than the clock on my noise machine.  But sure enough, the iPhone (which I have on airplane mode so that I don't accidently use it - but I did change the time zone temporarily) was right about the time change.  This officially means that I've gotten to "spring forward" twice this year and lose two hours of sleep.  I'd like it a lot better if I were gaining those two hours...

TGIF!

One more work week down!


Augsburger Rathaus during the day:

Perlachturm, which is just north of Augsburger Rathaus:

There are several statues downtown, all of them with a wood board base, and this is one of them:

I got a few odd looks as I was taking these next couple of pictures, but I thought that it was an intriguing building.  It looked like it currently houses the post office as well as a few other businesses:

It would have been interesting to see the floorplan for the building because it had courtyard like areas too:

Not entirely sure what this building was - it seemed to be associated with St. Anna Kirche.  Either way it was neat inside and out:

It's been a while since I've taken European history, so I had to refresh my memory as to the important roles that St. Anne's and Augsburg played in the Reformation - i.e., the Augsburg Confession.  Along one of the walls is this plaque that I need to work on translating at some point:

A few last shots:

Out and About

Yesterday was a very good day adventure wise.  One of my coworkers and I got to take a field trip to another site that is about 80km from where we are currently working for a meeting.

There was lots of farmland (as well as "eau de cow" courtesy of the fertilizer being used) being prepped.  One thing that that stood out were these:

The first one is a bit blurry but I thought that the telephone pole was good for scaling purposes.  We were both a bit confused for a minute but then R determine that they are for growing hops!

We got to the area a bit early and while he grabbed some lunch, I walked around Manching and took some pictures.  It is a cute little town:

I also got to enjoy a few flybys from a Eurofighter:

After getting back to Augsburg, I enjoyed another awesome German sunset:

I joined the guys when they headed downtown for dinner.  However, instead of having dinner with them, I wandered around and took pictures.  :)

The town square had some very cool cobblestone patterns:

St. Ulrich's and St. Afra's Abbey:

Augsburger Rathaus:

And some fun with time lapse: