Culturally otherwise

May 12, 2019 Tigerotor77WAirbus A320, Blue Fin Building, Hamilton, London, Lufthansa, The Crystal, Victoria Palace Theatre1 Comment

After having lived in the Allgäu for almost four years, one aspect of big city life I miss is access to the performing arts. I really enjoying playing trumpet for several years and there is something to be said about the emotional high of putting on a production. Even with regular trumpet practice over, I can still derive joy from a seat in an auditorium. Although there are local musical groups, witnessing the thundering ballads of Broadway is a dream in time gone by. Unless… we consider all of Europe a massive stage of its own.

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A Summer without the Alps

December 30, 2017 Tigerotor77WAir Canada Maple Leaf Lounge, Andre Fougeron, Atlantic Civilisation, Big Ben, Blavatnik Building viewing level, Bridget Riley, British Library, British Museum, Buckingham Palace, Burj el Murr, Cabinet War Rooms, Changing of the Guard, Churchill War Rooms, From Surface to Surface, Greenwich, Hampstead Heath, Heathrow Terminal 2, Joseph Bueys, K6, Lightning with Stag in its Glare, London, London cityscape, London Heathrow, London views, Lufthansa, Map room, Mark Rothko, Marwan Rechmaoui, Millennium Bridge, New London Architecture, Pinarello London, Red telephone box, Rosetta Stone, Royal Observatory, Singapore Airlines lounge, St. James' Park, St. Paul's Cathedral, Sunset, Susumu Koshimizu, Tate Modern, The Mall, The Shard, Westminster Abbey2 Comments

If a holiday falls on a Tuesday or Thursday in Germany, or at least in Bavaria, there is a tendency to use the day between the holiday and the previous or following weekend as a “bridge” day in order to create a four-day weekend with just one vacation day. Normally, such a weekend is spent in the Allgäu, storming summits and chasing contrails. This year seemed wetter and most weekends were busier than normal, so a good number of trips fell over those deceptively-short weekends. On one such weekend, maybe the warmest one this year, I ended up in England instead of the Allgäu.

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Relentless Modernization

September 14, 2017September 24, 2017 Tigerotor77WAirbus A350, Beijing International Airport, Great Wall, Great Wall of China, greenery, Gubei, Hong Kong, Hong Kong Harbor, income gap, Kowloon, Longyan, Longyan resort community, Lufthansa, MUC, MUC 25 years, MUC Visitors Park, MUC XXL Tour, Munich International Airport, Nanjing University of Science and Technology, NJUST, Peak Tram, Simatai, Simatai Great Wall, The Peak, Victoria Peak, WTown, Xiamen2 Comments

I thought that I would be writing this post in June, drafting my first paragraph before I processed photos that chronologically were taken before ones posted two moths ago. But it’s been a hectic summer, and so China — or more precisely the photos I took while there — has had to wait. My first stop on a warm but windy Sunday to start the trip, however, was the airport, a place I’ve become all too familiar with. Ironically, I was there to learn even more about it: MUC offers various tours of its grounds operations, and despite having lived here for two years this was the first chance I could experience one.

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Flashbacks

May 31, 2016 Tigerotor77W747-8I, Boeing, D-ABYQ, Jacksonville Beach, Jekyll Island, Jekyll Island Club Hotel, Lufthansa, Sunrise7 Comments

Initially I thought that being this close to the mountains would mean that I’d never make it up to Munich, but since December I’ve been there nine times, mostly to its airport. The weekend after bauma was one of these times, though for this trip I was heading back across the ocean to attend a friend’s wedding. The venue was Jekyll Island, which until receiving the RSVP for the wedding I hadn’t heard of before. But with clear blue skies, perfect lawns, and a gentle breeze, what’s not to love?

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Capitulating to Choice

April 2, 2016 Tigerotor77WA320neo, Barcelona, Bunker Turo de la Rovira, Bunkers of Carmel, Catalonia, Cobla, Cobla Lluïsos de Taradell, D-AIUQ, La Seu, Lufthansa, Mies van der Rohe, Mount Tibidabo, MUHBA, Museu d'Historia de Barcelona, Museu Marítim, Plaça del Rei, Sagrada Familia, Sagrat Cor, Santa Eulàlia, Tibidabo, van der Rohe Pavilion4 Comments

I was fortunate to travel most of the weekends that I was in Stuttgart in 2011. In particular, much of my travel then (as even now, in hindsight) was focused on hiking locations, and there ended up being fewer actual visits to cities than what completed lists of suggested locations from friends would have shown. One such location was Barcelona: several friends described it as being their favorite city in their time abroad, but with mountains calling I never made it there. I finally was able to visit some friends who chose it as a temporary reprieve from the Illinois winter. Initially uneasy that I would give up on an already dry and warm winter, in hindsight I’m glad the trip worked out, because the city is a bright, lively destination. No wonder the locals stay out as long as they do!

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Regrounding to reality

April 21, 2012 Tigerotor77W747-400, Chicago, Frankfurt International Airport, Lufthansa, Sears Tower, Willis TowerLeave a comment

After twenty-some weekends away from Stuttgart (out of 26), far more trips to Switzerland (six if I include the route I took to Chamonix) than I initially intended, and a last night in Germany spent not sleeping but rather packing and repacking my suitcases, I was sadly, exhaustedly, and at last headed back to the US for my final rotation.

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