Authors note:  I was tempted to not even publish this post because it’s kind of boring, but thought my American friends and family might find shopping in Germany to be interesting.  Sorry (my German friends & family) if you’re bored – you can skip this one 🙂

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Not a whole lot happening here on Tuesday.  We just did a little grocery shopping to get ready for the New Year celebrations and Stilla’s birthday.  Her birthday is on the 31st of December and everyone celebrates with fireworks 🙂

We drove to nearby Freystadt with our son William and stopped first at the German equivalent of a Dollar Store®.

Do we have arrow-shaped sponges in America?

How about round sponges on a stick?

I wonder if customs will let us bring back this giant-sized doggie sausage back with us for little ‘Coach’?

This one (below) is for my cousin Phil… bet he’d like to play with this.

Dollar (er… Euro) wall art.

How about some Star Wars theme party plates, napkins, etc., ?

We checked out at this German version of a Dollar Store® and then drove over to a grocery store called LiDL®.

Now here’s a concept we need to institute in the states… shopping carts that require a 50 Euro Cent piece to be placed in the handle to release a lock.  You get your coin back when you put the cart back and connect to another cart.  Cool… no more dings in your car door from carts left in the parking lot, and probably not as many stolen carts being driven around town by bag ladies and bums 🙂

Of course, they all require a little extra drivers training (on my part) because the back wheels aren’t locked in the forward position like the ones in the states.  These seem to have a mind of their own.

Baked goodies:

Now, this is interesting…

… put your fresh loaf of bread into the machine, set the thickness, slide the window closed, push the start button, and voila!  It slices your loaf in seconds.

But you still have to bag it yourself… guess you can’t have everything 🙂

You won’t find milk in the refrigerator here.  Only on the shelves.

And the grocery stores here have well-stocked liquor aisles.

And lots of fireworks for the upcoming new year celebrations:

Anybody know what a Litschi is?

Me either… but you can buy them here (below).

Most (if not all) stores in Germany, do not provide grocery bags when checking out.  If you want a grocery bag, you’ll have to bring your own or pay a fee for a fabric / cloth-type bag.  This store puts it’s empty cardboard boxes near the register in a large wire basket for customers to use (below).  That helps the store get rid of their cardboard while at the same time – helps the customers that forgot to bring their own shopping bag(s).

Loading the cart.

Loading the car.

Next, we stopped off at the Getränkemarkt (Drink Store).

Anyone want a beer (bier)?

You can even get a Corona® here.

How about a nice mini-keg?

If you buy this six-pack (below) you get a free trash can 🙂

Beer lovers paradise:

Nice varied assortment of holiday biers, only 9 Oreos (er, Euros) 🙂

ChristkindlesMarkt Glühwein in a bottle… in case you don’t want to go to a Christmas market.

Original Budweiser® from the Czech Republic.

Even my favorite – Pyraser Bier®, next to the other local biers; Spalter®, Tucher®, and Winkler Bräu®.

This is a ready-mixed beer and limo (below), called a Radler, it’s kind of like beer and Sprite… pretty popular over here for those times you want a refreshing drink without getting tipsy on the high alcohol content of German bier.

And this is a ready-mix Hefeweizen bier with Cola.  Also popular here.

Checkout counter at the Getränkemarkt (Drink Store).

Our final grocery store stop for the day was at Edeka®.  We went to multiple grocery stores because the last one didn’t have a particular item that Stilla needed to get for Opa.

Bakery at the entrance to the Edeka® grocery store.  Tempting eh?

The frozen foods aisle(s).

Impulse buy… frozen thin-crust pizza.  Yummm.

The yogurt aisle.

The soup aisle.

William decided to stock up on some soup.

The cookie aisle.

The chip aisle.

The alcohol aisle.

And the chocolate aisle.

Darn it… we didn’t get out of here without getting another cart load of groceries 😉

Hope you weren’t too bored with the shopping trip.  Check back for my next post on my old Army barracks in Schwabach.  We did a day trip yesterday (Wednesday) to a museum at O’Brien Barracks and also drove by Katterbach Army Air Field – both were places I was stationed at with the U.S Army for many years.  O’Brien Barracks was turned back over to the Germans in ’92 I believe, but Katterbach is still going strong.

 

 

 

I mentioned at the end of my last  blog post that our neighbor and old friend, Werner got me to commit to help out on a project of his…

He had taken on the task of building a new stage for the Theater Club (Theatergruppe) in the village of Meckenhausen and today (Monday) was the day we were to meet and finish assembling the pieces along with the help of a few other volunteers he had gathered.

But first, we needed some more parts… so I walked over and met Werner at his house and we drove to a tool store in nearby Thalmässing.

Cool place… I guess I’d liken it to a Harbor-Freight™ store but with quality tools.  This place is called Dorner™ (←link here) and is just chock-full of manly ‘get-r-done’ type tools and equipment.  The only problem (for me) is that they’re all 220V.

How do you like these window displays?  Dewalt® power tools…

Stihl® chainsaws and related items…

and Bosch® power tools…

Inside the mega-tool store:

They even had mini-size toy chainsaws for the kids next to the Stihl® display 🙂

After purchasing some fastening hardware and then tearing ourselves away from the cool tool store… we drove back toward Meckenhausen.

We stopped briefly at a historical marker near the village of Mindorf:

The Rhein-Main-Donau-Kanal; also called Main-Danube Canal, RMD Canal or Europa Canal, in Bavaria, Germany, connects the Main and the Danube rivers across the European Watershed, running from Bamberg via Nuremberg to Kelheim. The canal connects the North Sea and Atlantic Ocean to the Black Sea, providing a navigable artery between the Rhine delta (at Rotterdam in the Netherlands), and the Danube Delta in south-eastern Romania and south-western Ukraine (or Constanța, through the Danube–Black Sea Canal). The present canal was completed in 1992 and is 171 kilometres (106 mi) long. (ref. Wikipedia®)

These bridge foundations (below) were laid by Polish POW’s during WWII when the Rhein-Main-Donau-Kanal was planned in 1938, for the so-called Mindorfer Linie south of Nuremberg.  As early as 1939 the first preparatory work began at Thalmässing in Landkreis Roth. However, after the war this route was dropped and the canal (where the river boats cruise) now runs just north of Meckenhausen.

We also passed by the Pyraser Bier Brewery (below).  My personal favorite German bier.

Here’s the administrative building (below) for the brewery and also the subject of the breweries’ logo (←link).

We finally made it back to Meckenhausen and met up with other volunteers at a Woodworking shop called Maget Schreinerei which is where we spent the rest of the day putting the stage platforms together.

These aluminum frames (below) were already pre-made to specifications and delivered to the shop.

The ingenious locking mechanism (below) is for the platform legs.  The intent is to have multiple (12) platforms than can be easily torn down and set back up again whenever the Theatergruppe needs them.

Stefan and Werner test fitted the platform legs.

These are the pressed board panels that we still have to mount to the frames.

But first, we had to cut the sheets to size.

The machine (above) cut off the smallest of slivers (below) with exact precision.

Then we pre-drilled the holes in each panel to fit each respective frame.

Then it was time to counter sink the holes and place bolts, nuts, and washers through the assembly to tighten.

Only 9 more to go…  Uggh.

After a while, we got a sort of assembly line going.  Here’s Alfons drilling the holes.

Michael sanded down the edges while Werner, Stefan, and I placed and tightened all the fastening hardware.

Michael, Werner, and Stefan admiring their handiwork.

We even built a platform with wheels to store and transport all the stage platforms on.  Here we are loading up the finished products to take over to the Sportheim.

We had to make two trips to get all the platforms over to the sport halle.

And then we had to take them up the stairs at the Meckenhausen Turn & Sport Verein (TSV).  This is the village sport hall.  Link HERE.  This building houses a club house with bar area, locker rooms, and showers.  It also accommodates tennis, fussball (soccer), gymnastics, aerobics, theater, etc.,

This is the theater groups room (below) where the platforms will all be set up and connected together to make a raised stage for performances.  Nice room, eh?

The downstairs bar area.

View onto the fussball (soccer) field.

The fussball (soccer) field.

We finally got all the platforms upstairs and placed them on the cart we made.

Unfortunately, the wheels didn’t stand up to the immense weight.

Guess we’ll have to go get some more heavy-duty wheels at that cool tool store 🙂

We ended up just stacking the platforms on the floor in the upstairs storage room.

Luckily, we had a couple more volunteers pitch in at the last moment to finish stacking the platforms in their final resting place.

Then it was ‘feirabend’ (closing time) finally 🙂  We got together at the local gasthaus ‘Stafros’ for liquid refreshments and food.  You may recall that this is the place we had our Christmas day dinner.

Pyraser bier goood 🙂

Currywurst mit pommes (with fries) goood 🙂

That’s all for now folks… I have to rest up now after all that work 😉

 

 

On Sunday, after spending a lazy morning at the house, we went over to the nearby Rest Area/Truck Stop for lunch with our son William.

The Hilpodrom Restaurant (←link here) is part of a rest area and truck stop next to the autobahn at the Sindersdorf exit.  Most of this area was just open fields when we lived here in the ’80’s and again in the late ’90’s to early 2000’s.  Now there’s a large number of businesses and even a Burger King.  I also noticed a new (to us) RV dealership which we’ll have to find time to check out and report on.

Our oldest daughter Jennifer even worked here for a short while back in 2003 (pics below).

(Starting from the top right and then counter-clockwise in the pic below): William had the Gulasch mit Nudeln (Goulash with noodles), Stilla the Burgunder Braten mit Kloß (Burgundy Roast with dumplings), and I had the Champignon Schnitzel mit Pommes (Mushroom Schnitzel with fries).  Pretty darn good food for a truck stop 🙂

In the afternoon, we had an invitation to stop by and visit with our good neighbors and old friends, Werner & Claudia.   We walked over to their beautiful house around 3PM with William & Jasmin.  Stilla’s sister Anneliese was already there.

Werner & Claudia were the first Germans to visit us in Colorado back in 1991.  Here’s an old pic (below) that I pulled from the archives of them on top of Pikes Peak.

Claudia went all out with a couple of tasty cakes.  Yummm once again 🙂

A Bratapfelkuchen (roasted apple cake).

And one of my favorites; a Himmlische Torte (Heavenly Cake).  Stilla used to make this often.

After the awesome cakes and coffee, Werner & Claudia brought out their collection of homemade liquers and schnapps…everyone sampled these except for myself, I have to be careful what I drink since my bout of acute pancreatitis last year.  I heard they were good.

I did sample a good local bier though:

And just when we thought the evening couldn’t get any better – Claudia brought out platters of Pizza Brötchen!  These were great.  Stilla would often made these at home when she could get the correct German bread rolls.   Double Yummm 🙂

The family Christmas tree.

What a great evening with great friends!  We talked and enjoyed each other’s company until late in the evening… Thanks for the hospitality Werner & Claudia!  We made plans for me to join Werner in the morning to help work on a project he took on.  Check back tomorrow to learn more…

 

The weather on Saturday was still good, with a high temperature in the mid-to-upper 50’s F° (13-14 C°). ü

Stefan said if the weather was good and if the sun was out; we’d go on for a motorcycle ride.  He messaged me around noon that we were a ‘GO’ for a 1PM start time!

Stilla dropped me off at Stefan & Annerose’s house where we met up with a family friend, Erich Sipl.  The three of us went on a terrific ~2hr ride through the surrounding countryside… a definite highlight of our, (errr… my), trip to Germany 🙂

Stefan loaned me his Heritage Softail.

Stefan rode his customized Sportster; modified by Stilla’s other brother Ludwig at his Harley® dealership (now Indian®) that I wrote about in an earlier post (HERE).

Erich rode his self-customized Sportster.

What a great ride 🙂  Thanks Stefan!  It’s always fun to ride around on the back roads in Germany; there’s such beautiful scenery, and every few miles it seems that you’re going through yet-another historically significant old village or winding along on an old forest road.  At one point, we even took a curvy canyon road past some rock formations that made you think of Colorado.   Sorry… no pics of the ride 🙁  That would be dangerous, right?

Erich’s small sportster tank required a stop for a refill.

Notice Stefan’s handle bar grip turn-signals in the pics (above) and (below).  I still haven’t seen these in the States.

I liked the teeny-tiny taillight/turn-signals on Erich’s Sportster…

they were really bright for how small they are.

Stefan still has a little mascot (Harley-Pig) tied to his handlebars (below).

I still have mine, (the same one), tied above my license plate.  As seen in the pic of my bike (below) from a couple months ago.

Anyway… after we finished our ride and warmed up a bit; we closed out the day by going to the Volunteer Fire Department (Freiwillige Feuerwehr) Glühwein party in Meckenhausen.   I told you the German’s don’t need much reason to have another party 🙂

There was a huge turnout of town-folk.  The area next to the volunteer fire department building was filled with fire-barrels, tables, vendor stands/bars, and even a large fire ring.

Bratwurst sandwiches… Yummm.

Lots of family, friends, and townspeople…

A large fire surrounded with beer table benches kept folks warm while they enjoyed Glühwein, bratwursts, and bier.

A few of these cool fire-barrel tables situated around the grounds also served folks well.

There was such a good turnout of people, that sometimes it was hard to get a refill at the counter.

And that’s all for now folks.  Stay tuned for more Schnitzeland adventure…

 

Fröhliche Weihnachten (Merry Christmas)!  It’s our 21st day in Germany – Thursday the 24th.  Most Germans (at least the one’s I know) celebrate Christmas on the 24th and open presents after evening mass.

I started out the day by helping Stilla’s brother Wolfgang again.  He heard about a broken pew at the town church and asked me to help him fix it.

Wolfgang had a church key to get us in, which looked (surprisingly enough) just like you’d expect a historical church key to look like 🙂  This church was built in the early 1700’s.

Wolfgang evaluated the broken church pew (bench seat) and took measurements to see what tools and/or materials we might need to make the repair(s).

We went back to Wolfgang’s woodshop to cut some wood braces to fix the pew.

Then we returned to the church to make repairs.

There… all fixed now!

Here’s a picture of the altar…

and the Christmas tree.

This little baby Jesus (below) was just put up on display for the service tonight, which is why the ladder is in front of the altar.

While we were there, some other folks were putting out decorations and new candles and remarked that one of the candle holders on the altar was loose and crooked.  So, Wolfgang tightened up some screws and put in a washer to shore up the figurine candle-holder:

And there!  All better now 🙂

Back at the workshop, Wolfgang showed off the Kesseltopf that we fixed a few days earlier.  I wrote about this in a previous post HERE.   He had just hooked up the stovepipe and tested it the day before.  A Kesseltopf is basically a huge wood-fired stove with a tilt function; the giant pot swivels so the contents can be poured out.  It’s all ready to fire up and cook some Kesselfleisch now.  Another reason to have a party 🙂

After church services, we (Stilla & I, William, and Opa) were invited over to Martin & Maria’s house in Meckenhausen for Christmas dinner.

More good food.

and awesome dessert.

We closed out the evening by playing a dice game named ‘5000’.

Thanks for the great dinner Maria & Martin!

And Merry Christmas everyone 🙂

 

We started out our Tuesday by going over to Martin & Maria’s house for Kaiserschmarrn.  Yummm!  Click HERE to learn more about this dish from my friend Wikipedia®.

Martin put up this neat Christmas decoration outside their house.

In the evening we were invited over to Erich & Eli’s house for brotzeit.

More good food, with more good people!  We’re definitely going on diets when we get back 🙂

Erich & Eli’s family.

Eli has her Nussknacker (Nutcracker) collection on display in front of the nativity scene manger.

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Wednesday morning was spent helping Wolfgang move and stack the wood-pellets for his stove that we picked up last week.

The family dog, Mauki, wasn’t very helpful unloading the trailer 🙂

Afterwards, I helped Wolfgang put some new flooring in a hallway.  I have to earn our keep somehow, right?

In the evening on Wednesday, we went over to the neighbor’s house; Gunter & Marion’s.  It was Gunter’s birthday!

Of course, more good food was on hand…

and lots of good friends & neighbors.

Happy Birthday Gunter!

That’s all for now, stay tuned…

 

Happy Monday!  Still my most favorite day of the week (since retirement) 🙂  This is our 18th day in Germany.

In the morning, I helped Wolfgang on his latest project.  An old stove (Kessel) that holds a giant pot that tilts.

This old stove (Kessel) was used in the house many, many years ago when Opa & Oma still raised pigs and cows here at the homestead in Sindersdorf.

The ceramic (or some similar material) was broken at the bottom of the stove.  It was Wolfgang’s goal to repair it by replacing the missing pieces so he can set it up to cook a pigs head (Kesselfleisch) sometime in the near future.  Click HERE to learn more about Kesselfleisch.

Here’s the repaired section (below) ready for testing after the fire-proof cement dries.

In the evening, we were invited over to Stefan & Annerose’s house again for a Glühwein abend (evening).  As if we needed another reason to have a get-together 🙂

Stefan set up his fire barrel under the carport cover.  Pretty cool setup… he put a table on a barrel that has been modified as a sort of wood-burning heater, complete with stovepipe.

We finished off the home-made Glühwein early in the evening and switched to other liquid refreshments.  The traditional Christmas hot beverage was a big hit.  Stefan clearly didn’t make enough.  Click HERE for recipe.

We enjoyed the evening with family and friends while we huddled around Stefan’s awesome fire-barrel bar.

Another awesome family gathering.  Stay tuned for more…

On Sunday, Stilla’s sister Anneliese invited us over to her house for dinner.

Yumm!  Lende, Kroketten, reis, and salat.  Thanks Ann 🙂

In the late afternoon we all convoyed in two cars to the town of Anwald just south of Nuernberg.  Our destination was another Christmas market called Romantischer Weihnachtsmarkt Gut Wolfgangshof (←link).

Follow along with us on another Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Market):

After standing in the long entrance line, we paid our 5 Euro per person entry fee.

Notice the Nuernberger Ei in the distance (below).  I mentioned this in yesterday’s post when we were in Nürnberg.

The area between buildings was filled with vendor booths and people.

At one point, we found beer-table seating inside one of the large buildings and enjoyed some Gulasch and Pizza.

There were even vendors in one of the larger building’s hay-loft.

The Christmas lights all came on as dusk fell, making this place even more beautiful.

Vendor crafts of all sorts were for sale throughout the grounds in tiny huts.

Hay wagon.

Eerie angels walked by us on stilts, and at one point there was even a real camel giving kiddie rides around the area.

Hope you enjoyed the tour… we did:)  The weather is still good here.  It’s only been damp and soggy since we arrived, with the sun even peeking out a few times.  No snow predicted for Christmas.  Looks like it’s not going to be a white Christmas here, but that’s OK with me 🙂

As mentioned in my previous post; Saturday was a long day and I had to split my post into two parts; this is (Part 2 of 2).

After we got back home from Nürnberg (map above), we went straight over to the Schützenhaus in Meckenhausen.  You may recall from my previous post on Day 3 in Deutschland that we took part in an air-rifle competition.  Tonight was the evening where the prizes are doled out at a Christmas party and more… read on:

Here’s a link to the Schützeverein Meckenhausen website: (HERE)

Hand-painted memorial plaques adorn the walls in the Schutzenverein building.  Click HERE to learn more from Wikipedia®.

And here’s the results (below) of the shooting competition:

William came in 13th place!  Here’s the target (below) that he turned in to have evaluated.

I still get to say that I taught William everything he knows.  🙂  However, I didn’t do so well  🙁    Either way, it was still good fun.

Plenty of liquid refreshments were on hand as the party kicked off with a little music.  Tables and chairs now filled the area where we were shooting last week.

Awards and certificates were handed out to some:

The prizes were all placed on and around a couple big tables:

Everyone that took part in the shooting competition had their name called out in the order that they ranked.  Then each person would go up to the table and pick out one of the prizes that were donated by local businesses.  Everyone received a quality gift.

After a little christmas story-telling and some more music, they auctioned off christmas tree branches.  This is a neat tradition… tied to each branch are usually at least a couple pair of smoked bratwurst, some pretzels, schnapps, and sometimes even candy.  What a great way to bring in some money for the club.  Especially when you have a hungry crowd that’s been drinking beers.  🙂

Here’s Martin & Maria cutting the goodies off the branch they won (below).

I paid 33 Euros for my branch and had leftovers to take home.

Another good time with good people.  Check back soon for an update on another Christmasmarkt we visited on Sunday at Gut Wolfgangshof.  Hopefully, I can get caught up soon with the blog posts…