Crokus Break 3.0 (February 2017)

Our third trip to Austria was probably the best one so far. The traffic wasn't bad through Germany, we had good weather, nobody got hurt, and best of all we had great company across all ages.

The drive through Austria is awe-inspiring.
It almost made the last 20 km into Lech - which took an hour to drive - manageable.

Everyone was happy at this point, having just left school on Friday afternoon.
I think Eliza was watching something on the iPad in the 3rd row.

Eliza's pizza at the place we stopped for dinner in Germany.
That is not a camera trick. She did not finish it.

We finally arrived on Saturday afternoon. Not a bad view from the room!

Lilli and Eliza ready to hit it!

:)

Lunch break!

We like it here.

More ski-lift selfies~

Some of that great company I mentioned - we talked the Candelarios into joining us.

More friends - these up at the restaurant at the top of the mountain.

Sunset view from the restaurant. 

Skiing down at night with only a headlamp is very cool.
This is the only place on the runs where that was lit.

Earlier in the week, Lucy and Lilli talked us into going down this mess while Eliza was in ski school.
This was NOT good snow... Took quite a long time to get everyone through. Hopefully we will not repeat this.

More Candelarios!!

This was the best apres-ski location! We were the only ones there, which was perfect!!

Lucy FINALLY talked us into letting her snowboard on the last day.
So I rode with her. On a powder day. On greens. That were 100 yards long.
Dad of the Year.

Not surprisingly, Lucy picked up riding very quickly. She's mine.

Paris and Versailles (November 2016)

We were able to schedule conferences early and spend the rest of a long weekend in Paris. Despite several visits to - perhaps - our favorite city, none of us had been to Versailles, so that was at the top the agenda.

We spent the first afternoon/ evening walking around the city however, because why not?

Mom and I had coffee at the restaurant in the background when she visited.

Bocce here is like basketball in Louisville. They play it well and seriously.

The apartment where Holli spent her year abroad - 1992-93

It's her street.

Notre Dame de Paris et la Siene

Closer...

And from the other side...

St. Michael's Fountain

I can't remember the name of this tourist trap/ restaurant, but it was fun.
We got to sing "Alouette", which I still recall from my 1988 French class.
The girls were a little disturbed when they learned the translation.

La Place Vendome... was covered by scaffolding during our first visit.

Rodin & Dante teaming up for some seriously disturbing imagery~

Thoughtful... 

More from outside of the Rodin museum

Obligatory~

Finally at Versailles

The grounds are enormous.

And opulent. I can't imagine how cool it must have been here with the court.
I also can't imagine how much the French peasants suffered to provide the funds to acquire and build it.

We stopped by Sacre Coeur on our way out of town - mostly because every time we drive away I am drawn to the place but we don't have time... Very cool location overlooking the city.

Maybe when I get caught up the blog quality will improve. But then again maybe it already has because of my reduced commentary.........

A Long Weekend in London (October Break, 2016)

We made our first (and only) family trip to London last year for our October break. I'll skip the long-winded witticisms and get to the pictures as our current October break is quickly approaching and I don't like being a year behind.

Buckingham Palace

We happened to visit (the outside only) during a classic car show. I enjoyed it.

Streets of London

This exhibit was one of the highlights of the week. No pictures allowed. ;)

The National Gallery from Trafalgar Square

On the Millennium Bridge

From the London Eye...

The Tower of London

These ravens were huge.

Big Ben... Parliament

Westminster Abbey

London Bridge

Matilda!

This show deserves its own blog entry. It was terrific.

Wicked!

This one was not.

Natural History Museum

Harry Potter World
This was the highlight of the trip from my perspective, as you'll no doubt note from the volume of pictures to follow. The movies were filmed on location here, and it basically remains as it was.

The Great Hall

Potions... Snape's classroom.

The snakes move - this was not CGI.

This WAS CGI.

The ice sculpture at the ball held during the Tri-Wizard cup as I recall...
I am sure that any one of my daughters will correct me if I'm mistaken.

Dumbledore' office

So as it turns out, a LOT of the scenes were done with robotics as opposed to CGI.
Professor Lupin here, in his alt-form.

Diagon Alley & The Weasley's Shop

The next bits were my favorites - models. Everything they created started with drawings, which became paper models and grew from there. I was not prepared for the final model.

As we wound our way through the last of the paper models we spilled out into a huge room containing this:

You get some idea of the scale from this perspective as those people to the left of the Great Hall are in the 6' range.

The lighting is continuously, slowly cycling to show off the castle at different times of the day. I could have walked around it all day. The detail was really incredible.

Dad's Interests...

I walked around the Imperial War Museum solo for a couple of hours. Very well done.
Highly recommended, but I didn't take any pictures inside.

We didn't see the show, but it was particularly timely given the US election climate

Yep.