Home at last

After two lovely weeks in Prague, Salzburg, and Vienna, we made it home. While it was a good trip, I'm thoroughly glad to be home. Elliot does much better in his own bed and in his own time zone. While we were gone, there were storms and windy days. Unfortunately, one of the windy days took out our apricot tree. We knew it was damaged, first by rabbits and then by insects, but it had actually set fruit this year (i had counted about 36 apricots) and we were going to let it stay as long as it continued to bear fruit. Oh well. Now I have an excuse to get a nectarine tree (in addition to the peach we already planted this spring).

The yard wasn't as much of a jungle as I had feared. I credit the thick layer of hardwood bark mulch we laid down earlier this year. Without that, the weeds would have been much, much worse. Here's the front yard. There are two columnar apple trees (I think they're Sentinel Yellow and Sentinel Scarlet) in this picture; the one behind the false indigo in the upper right corner has set fruit for the first time. The one in the foreground didn't. The grass is prairie dropseed (I think it looks best right now, before it sets seed) and the red flowers are hardy shrub roses. I highly recommend these - they bloom pretty much all summer and have been hard for me for a number of years. They often die back to almost the crown, but always send up need shoots rapidly.

This is Adam's 'sci-fi' garden. I love this elderberry 'Black Lace' that's in full bloom. 

This is my cottage garden. It's still a work in progress, but most things are growing nicely. The pink flower on the right that's almost done blooming is a foxglove and on the trellis is clematis integrefolia. I think it looks great for only having been planted last year.

This is a lupine that's been there (stuck under a sedum) since we bought the house eight years ago. I always knew it was there, but it has never bloomed before. Lupines are supposedly short-lived, so the fact that this one bloomed after so many years is kind of funny.

My mock oranges are in full bloom. 

And finally, this is a wood lily. This is the second year it has bloomed. We bought it as a tiny seedling year ago so the fact that it survived to bloom makes me feel like a somewhat competent gardener. 

And for fun, here's a picture of Elliot at the park on a gorgeous June day. I have to put a burp cloth over the swing since he always tries to eat it.

Eating, palaces, eating, gardens, and eating in Vienna

For some reason the text we entered with this post didn't save. I'll add quick captions now.

There was awesome pastry, cake, and ice cream everywhere. Hard to resist!

While we were in Salzburg, there was a stone carving competition.

This is some more delicious cake and a linzer torte. Since we changed trains in Linz, we had to have some. And of course, cappuccino.

This was the Mirabell Palace garden.

The same garden. Scenes from Sound of Music (the Do Re Mi song) were filmed here.

More Sound of Music scenes.

Elliot eating his first pretzel (the inside fluffy part only). Needless to say, he loved it!

He also made friends with the waitress. She was his girlfriend by the end of dinner.

The Spanish Riding School horses in Vienna.

Schloss (palace) Schonbrunn.

It had enormous gardens.

We ate a lots of seemingly authentic Austrian food restaurants. This one was decorated like a hunting chalet.

I can't remember which church or palace this is at the moment. :)

A statue of Johann Strauss in the city park.

Emily eating the world-famous sacher torte at the Hotel Sacher. This was a definite must-do and part of the reason we chose to go to Vienna in the first place.

The blue Danube.

Dinner at the well-known Cafe Central. There was a live pianist playing show tunes on a Bosendorfer (that's for you, mom!).

The hills are alive! With the sound of Mozart

After leaving Prague, we got on a train to Salzburg. Salzburg is a cute little town in the foothills of the Austrian Alps. It's known for being the birth place of Mozart and the setting for The Sound of Music. The name comes from the city's history as a salt mining town. The city is old and quaint, and the scenery is great. 

We spent our first day exploring the town. We visited the fortress, riding the fastest funicular we've ever ridden.

From there, we hiked down the mountain and stopped at a delightful cliffside restaurant, where Elliot took a grandma nap.

After dinner, we left Elliot in the apartment with grandma and went to a Mozart concert in the marble hall of Mirabell Palace. The string quintet was very talented and the had a piano soloist who was great as well. It was really fun to see a concert in a room that was from the same period that the music was written.

On our second day, we did a walk around the old town, seeing the various buildings and their history. In the afternoon, Emily and Jeanne went on a Sound of Music bike tour.

Meanwhile, Adam found a friend and went to the Augustiner brewery biergarten for some delicious beer, pretzel, sausage and radish.

We still have a couple more days in Salzburg before heading off to Vienna.

Prague is unpronounceable fun!

Ahoj! Greetings from the Czech republic! We are having a wonderful time. This trip is a little different from past trips, because we brought Elliot and Adam's mom along. It's been really fun to have Elliot with us, and Jeanne has been really helpful. It's her first trip to Europe and she loves her baby grandson, so it's a treat for her to be with us.

The flight was pretty easy. Elliot was a trooper, with very little crying. He got some sleep on the long leg in his deluxe baby business class bassinet. Mom and Dad weren't able to get much. Elliot has lots of fun riding around in his private palanquin on daddy's back. He likes to look around at all the sights and smile at the ladies. Sometimes it's all too much and he falls asleep while riding.

We arrived on Saturday, and had to wait a bit for our apartment. After checking in, we took a moment to read before getting dinner at a great old brewery just down the street. The highlight was the accordion player who Elliot was very interested in. 

On Sunday, we had brunch with a friend, Anna, and her husband and 6 year old twin boys. She is the daughter of a woman who was Emily's grandfather's translator when he was doing business in the Czech republic many years ago. Her mother was very important to Norval, so we made sure to get in touch before the trip. It was nice to see them and catch up. 

Sunday afternoon, we took a walk around the popular sites, to get a good feel for the town. We visited the old town square, with the astronomical clock and several old churches and buildings, then went up to Prague castle, home of the cathedral of st.Vitus. We went into the garden behind the castle where there was a food festival. Many of the best restaurants around town had tents where you could taste some dishes from their menu. Elliot, as usual, made lots of friends. We talked to a chef originally from Philadelphia, who became fast friends with Elliot. He even gave us each a free desert because he liked him so much.

After dinner we walked down to the Charles bridge before heading back to the apartment for the night.

Monday, we got out early and went right to the Jewish quarter. The Jews in Prague had good and bad times, all of them visible in the synagogues and other sites around the area. The tour started with a memorial for those killed in the Holocaust, followed by an old cemetery. The cemetery had limited space, so the graves were stacked tightly, so the whole cemetery was full of headstones packed together. We also visited the oldest synagogue, which was a very cool medieval building pictured below. There was also an ornate private synagogue from one of the financiers of the Habsburg dynasty and a large Moorish style synagogue as well. After seeing those sites, we visited the modern Wenceslas square and headed back for the night.

Tuesday was our last day. We had lunch at a nice Czech restaurant in the little quarter. Emily had some goulash soup, which was delicious. We made a quick stop to see the Infant of Prague. Adam's grandma is a lifelong Catholic, and the Infant is an important symbol for Catholics. We thought she would be very happy that we stopped to see it. We then ride a funicular up the hill and sat in the top station to wait for a storm to pass. We walked back over to Prague castle one more time, but unfortunately, the sites inside were closing earlier than expected. So we decided to make our way back down to pay a quick visit to an interesting art deco building and turned in for the night.

We've really enjoyed Prague. Despite our inability to pronounce any of the words correctly, we've survived! We wish we had more time, but we're learning that we can't get as much done in a day as past trips. So now it's on to Salzburg for the next leg of the trip