Day Three: Salzburg

We spent our day today in Salzburg, Austria. We began with a stroll through Mirabell Gardens, home of many of the scenes from the Sound of Music movie. We visited the dwarf garden, the little covered alley, and the stairs the kids and Maria hop up and down. We refrained from singing.

After Mirabell, we swung by two of Mozart's houses, and then took a walk down the Getreidegasse, which is a shopping corridor in the old part of the city. We wandered our way past the Residenz, and into the Dom, where we were met with a surprise after a few minutes: the arrival of the Flint Hills something-or-other Choir, with director Reg, from my grandparent's church in Manhattan, Kansas. It was a bit strange to see so many people from home so far away from home. They marched up to the front of the church, climbed on some risers, and began to sing. We didn't get a chance to say hello to Reg, but I'm sure he'll hear that we saw him there when he gets home.

We continued our touring through a couple of other churches, then stopped for a quick lunch before heading up to Hohensalzburg, the fortress above the city. We met and conversed with a cute old British fellow on our way back down the funicular afterwards. He thought Kansas was part of “the South”. We didn't feel the need to correct him. :)

We finished out the afternoon with a visit to Hellbrunn Palace and Water Garden. This place was pretty fun. We didn't tour the palace, we just took the tour of the Water Garden, which is full of trick fountains and water powered mechanical figurines. Our guide delighted in soaking everyone on the tour, usually by surprise.

On our way out of the garden, we walked past the gazebo that was featured in the Sound of Music. They didn't use this actual gazebo for filming, they recreated it in a little larger scale for the movie.

Tomorrow is car-pick-up day! It seems a bit surreal that we're getting a new car tomorrow, so I'm sure it will be an interesting day.

The first two (three?) days

Well, we managed to survive the first couple of days on our vacation. Three days, if you count the flying, only two if you count the touristing. The flights were on time and relatively pilot error free, which was great. Unfortunately, we were seated in the screaming infant section on our overseas flight, so sleep was really not an option. We managed to get a few minutes here and there and made it through our first day without crashing too early.

We arrived in Zurich, Switzerland, picked up some cash, some train passes for later in the trip, and some Starbucks for breakfast, then hopped in the rental car, a Ford S-Max which is a 7 passenger minivan type thing (why do they always give us such huge cars when we reserve little VW Golf type cars?) and hit the road for Innsbruck, Austria. We side tripped to Vaduz, Liechtenstein, just to say we've been there, and paused for a break in Feldkirch, Austria.

Michelle in Feldkirch

Around this time we noticed that our rental car was behaving oddly, so upon arrival in Innsbruck we went straight to the Europcar rental facility. We will never rent from them again. It took over an hour of nonsense for us to convince them that they needed to give us a car that worked. Long story short, they finally did (a more reasonably sized Golf this time), and we contined down the road a little way to Hall in Tirol and our hotel for the night. We had showers, then dinner, and then we took a little tour of the area around the hotel before calling it a night.

I photographed Jeff

He photographed this

We started our day today with a walking tour of the old town portion of Hall in Tirol. It was pretty cute. Old churches, colorful buildings, narrow alleyways, and a fortress.

Hall in Tirol

After Hall, we proceeded back to Innsbruck to see the Goldenes Dachl (meh), the Helbinghaus (meh), and the Dom, where Maximilian is entombed. We wandered around and found another church, then stopped for a quick lunch and got back on the road.

Goldenes Dachl, Innsbruck

Maximillian's Funeral Procession

Roar!

We drove to Wattens, where we toured the Swarovski Kristallwelt, which was quite possibly the strangest museum ever. I think they let a bunch of semi-known and unknown modern art types run wild in there. Some of the displays were cool, and others were just plain strange and silly.

The Swarovski Giant

Oooh, shiny!

We continued on down the road to our hotel for the next six nights near the Konigssee in Germany. It was a beautiful drive through the Alps and the national park area. We arrived at the hotel just in time for a nice dinner and a relaxing evening. We haven't quite figured out what we're doing tomorrow, but I'm sure it will be fun!

The drive from Innsbruck to Schoenau am Konigssee

We're off!

We're off on our journey starting today! We're both quite excited, though we haven't had much time to think about it this week. Jeff had to go to Connecticut from Tuesday through Thursday for a business trip, and Friday was a bit crazy for Jeff at work, too. He had four or five meetings, he had to pack up his desk for moving to another location during our furlough, and he had to take his recently laid off employees out for their farewell lunch. Needless to say, he got home a bit late last night. :)

Michelle hung around home all week taking care of our long list of things to do before we leave. The list seemed to get longer, not shorter for a while there, but eventually everything got done and we're ready to go. We're hoping to do some blogging about the trip while we're over there, so watch this space for photos and trip notes!

Joella's Hooding Ceremony

We traveled to Lawrence this weekend for Joella's med school graduation hooding ceremony. Dan drove to Wichita from Tulsa in the morning, met up with us and Joella, and we all carpooled to Lawrence together. We arrived at about 2:30 and met our Phillips grandparents, our Uncle Don who flew in from Pittsburg, and Nathan and Ashley at an old family friend's house.

Joella and Don

Grandmother Phillips

Grandfather Phillips

Ashley and Nathan

Dan

We hung out there for a couple of hours, then adjourned to an early dinner at Marisco's, where we met up with Uncle Mike and Aunt Robyn, and Grandma Frye.

The hooding ceremony at the Lied Center started at 7:00. We arrived a little early, giving us more time for family photos. An ice cream truck was trolling the parking lot for customers, and someone dared Nathan to chase it down. He gladly obliged. The truck driver didn't seem very amused when he found out that Nathan was just running after him for a photo op, and not for a tasty treat. LOL

Everyone minus the photographer

The Phillips side of the family

Aren't we cool?

Just for you, Stacie

Sisters (I'm glad I'm not the only pale person on the planet)

Nathan in an unusual moment of exuberance (and the Frye side of the fam)

Joella gets ready to go in

Nathan goes for ice cream

The ceremony itself was a little long, but it was cool to see Joella get her hood and her two awards. She was awarded the Janet M. Glasgow-Rubin Achievement Citation for being a woman in the top 10% of her class, as well as the Willard J. Smith, M.D. Award for Academic Achievement for her superior academic performance. She was also recognized for her participation in two honor societies: the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Medical Society and the Gold Humanism Honor Society. She'll be going on to a couple of residency training programs: a Transitional year to be spent at Methodist Hospital in Houston, and then four years of Radiation Oncology Residency at University of Texas Medical Branch in Galveston, Texas. She's very excited about both (they were her top choices for residency programs).

Joella is hooded

Dr. Joella E. Wilson, M.D.!

We drove back home to Wichita with Dan after the ceremony. Jeff and Dan napped while Michelle avoided several suicidal deer on the turnpike. It was NOT fun. Luckily, we and the deer survived our harrowing journey home.

Go us!

I believe that today is our one year anniversary of joining the Y. I'm pleased to say we are still members, and that we've gotten into a routine of going at least four times a week and sometimes five. We're both definitely healthier now. I've lost over 25 pounds since joining, plus another 10 or so that I worked off at home in the few months prior to joining, so about 35 in all. Jeff's lost a few pounds too, and is definitely more toned than he's ever been. He still complains about going, but not too much. :) Fang and Errol have maintained their diets this year, too. We're just quite the healthy household of late. I'm proud of both of us for keeping it up and I hope we'll be able to continue the healthy exercise habits the rest of our lives!

Visit from Sara and John

We had the pleasure of a visit from two of Jeff's college friends, Sara and John, the other night. They brought their new daughter, Julia, along with them. She's a little over six months old, and she's a cutie, but no, we still don't want one. :P

Errol was a bit of a monster during the visit. I don't know what's wrong with him, but he just can't deal with children. He barks and them, and jumps at them, and tries to get in their carriers with them. Of course, this freaks the kids out, too, so things just escalate. Errol got to spend some alone time in his crate for a while during the visit, but when John let him out a little later, he seemed better. Julia didn't care at all what Errol was doing, because she has two dogs at home. Errol settled down when Julia was put down on the floor and they became friends.

Julia and Errol

Julia liked playing with the rug - she used it to pull herself when rolling over

Errol gives Julia a sniff - yep, smells like baby

Sara and Julia

Jeff accepts temporary custody of Julia


Jeff absentmindedly scritchy scratches Julia's head

Fang investigates the newcomer

Errol gets some much needed attention from John

Nathan's Senior Recital

We took a quick trip up to Hays with Joella last Friday night to hear Nathan play at his senior recital. Yes, he's really graduating! He has, after many, many years of schooling, earned his Bachelor of Music degree in Performance. The good part of taking many years to work up to your senior recital is that he has turned himself into an outstanding musician. Jaws were dropping and eyes were welling up throughout the entire performance. We're so glad we decided to go hear him.

He played:

"Abblasen" by Gottfried Reiche
"Vaga Cintia" by Alessandro Scarlatti
"Concerto in Eb" (Allegro con Spirito, Andante, Rondo) by Johann Nepomuk Hummel
"Okna" (Modre Okno, Zelene Okno, Cervene Okno, Zlate Okno) by Petr Eben
"Slavische Fantasie" by Carl Hohne

Here are some pictures from the evening...





Here's a link to the rest of the pictures: Nathan's Senior Recital