FranceBlog in English

Last friday was my trip back home. With the currently largest Airline, Delta, I did this trip. Hans drove me to the Airport and I was ready to go back to Germany via Paris. I had to unpack 2.5kg (5pounds) books and my razor to make the 50 pound (22.6kg) limit for my suitcase. I also got a nice seat near the exit and toilets. With lots of legroom and good entertainment system.

Since I had only 55 minutes between the flights I was lucky to be near the exit. But due to some delay I had only 45 minutes time. Was tough, but I made it through passport control (was a pain) and from Terminal E to D (long way to walk). In the plane I had a DejaVu experience. Like 7 years ago on a flight from Atlanta to Paris and then to germany I was sitting at the window near the luggage compartment. So I could see the guys loading the luggage. I also saw my suitcase arriving . I thought, great, my luggage is with me, but they again were not able to load it. I talked to the flight attendant, but it was too late. No chance. So I already knew that I will arrive without my luggage in Berlin. At the lost luggage desk they already knew when it would arrive that saturday. Since we had to do something in Berlin anyway it was ok. Daggie picked me up with Grandma Hella, Fabian and sick Jonathan.

We picked up a dog for my mother (Grandma Hella) .A 7 year old Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. A nice little, smooth lovely dog. Good for older people and they love kids.

In the afternoon we drove back to the airport and picked up my suitcase. The whole weekend went by fast. We met Grandma Hella, Uncle Axel, Nadin and Laura and Grandpa Hans-Juergen and Helga.

Today we drove back to our „old little“ Home in Stetten. Nice to be back. Saturday we drive back to France.

A bientot

It is my last night in Atlanta. Very soon I will be back home with my family. So it was time to go to a very good BBQ Restaurant with the colleagues Phil, Marty, Dave, Hans and Phil’s son. We went to Williamson Bros BBQ. I guess it was good, that we went to this place now, after three weeks. Otherwise we would have been there more often, and that is not good 🙂

Work was done and we took off. Driving north on Cobb Pkwy. and right at the hug Chicken from KFC. A few hundered meters on the left was the BBQ Restaurant. It was already smelling delicious on the outside. You could smell the smoke… hmmmmm. After getting inside we also saw the tons of meat in the BBQ grill.

It took just a few minutes to decide what we want to eat. No big discussion. I ordered the full rack of Baby Back Ribs. Hans as well. The others had some smaller portions. But that was ok. We only had a small breakfast and only salad for lunch (yes, only salad, I know that is pretty unbelieveable for someone like me, but I am not 25 anymore 🙂  )

When the ribs came it was soooo delcious. I finished them in a short time. They just disappeared and only some bones were left over. After we payed our bill we drove back to the Hotel in our 3L V6 SUV Mercury Mariner. Good car, but the 200HP are not enough for this big car.

I packed my suitcase and I am not glad to go home tomorrow. I hope that Delta and Air France will be on time and my luggage will arrive together with me and not a few days later. Next stop – home

C ya

To kind of celebrate the end of our second week here (I had halftime last wednesday), Hans and I did a little BBQ at the Hotel. We went to the Kröger Supermarket and bought some deliciuos, tender Steak and Shrimps, BBQ Ribs, Vegetables, Wine and Beer. Since the weather did not look that stable we only did the BBQ at the gas grill near the pook and had the dinner itself in the apartment. It was pretty warm and mild (24C / 74F) but they expected some rain that evening. It was not just rain. In a neighbour county they had a Tornado Warning and we had a severe Thunderstorm warning. It was raining like crazy. Stormy, rain… The night was not that quiet. But anyway. It was weekend, so I wont complain.

After a nice breakfast we just decided to make a easy day. Instead of going to Stone Mountain we decided to not go in this wet weather. We went shopping into some big Malls. That was more relaxing.

The night from Saturday to Sunday was not good at all. I could not sleep. Not because of rain or a couple that celebrates their honeymoon. No some neighbour next room had some severe Healthproblems. In the night I suddenly heard around 4 am a woman shouting and a man breathing not very healthy. Some minutes later I heard the ambulance coming and then they helped them. I don’t know how the person is doing, but this experience kept me awake a while.

After a nice talk with my family (I miss them soooo much), Hans and I did again a breakfast in his room.

Theweather was fantastic today. Blue sky, just some little clouds and temps in the mit 50s. It was very windy but that was ok. After the nice drive to Stone Mountain Park we walked around. Stone Mountain is the third largest Monolith worldwide and solid granite. See Wikipedia for more info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stone_Mountain

The park is nice with a little historic town, a train, cable car… After looking around we took the train to get to the walk up trail. That is also a nice little ride around the rock with some very nice views. After we arrived we started to walk up the trail. It is a 1.3 Miles trail up to 1683 feet. We had also a funny experience. A young couple was walking in front of us. The girl just had a very short skirt. Due to the high winds this skirt was more up than down, so they changed the skirt to short. Was funny. See a short Video from the Top of Stone Mountain

The view was spectacular up there. We saw the skyline of Atlanta and the surrounding areas. It was beautiful, very windy but worth the walk. After a little rest up there we went down with the Sky Ride cable car (swiss made), since our Adventure Pass covered all that. We walked around once more and wathced a hammersmith doing his hard work.

Was very interesting. Outside the historic town you could also see a Monster Truck. It was possible to take a ride on the back also. But 10USD for a 2 minute ride around the parking lot was too much for me. I took some pictures, took a video of the truck taking off with the nice V8 Sound and that was it. We finised the day at the Outback Steakhouse (with blooming onion and Steaks). See a little Video of the Monster Truck

Picture are here in this new Slideshow: STONE MOUNTAIN SHOW

C ya soon

Finally I was at a carshow again. I drove with Hans to a small town 45 minutes north of Atlanta. At a Church parking lot a small carshow was held and 20-30 cars showed up. Not a huge amount but some nice cars were there. From a new Scion XB to a 1930s Ford, Mustang, Camaro, Corvette… Everything you need for a show. Even the sun came out and we were happy, because we haven’t seen it for a week or so. Yesterday they also cancelled a NASCAR race near Atlanta due to the bad weather.

The pictures from the carshow are here starting at Atlanta159

We also drove around today and went shopping in the Mall of Georgia. We bought some nice stuff for our families and of course some stuff for us. I was also able to buy some of my favorite KRISPY KREME Doughnuts…yeahh 🙂

Eating is not everything but a important thing here. We were of course hungry tonight and decided to have a evening in the Sal Grosso (http://www.salgrosso.com ). That is a Brazilian Steakhouse. Yeah, more steaks you think. Sure. But it is a kind of All you can eat Steakhouse. But not the cheap type of All you can eat restaurant. For about 40 USD you can eat as much as you can. Saladbar and meat in 16 different variations. So you fill your plate with Salad and you sit at the table. YOu have a little card on the table. You must turn the card to the green side when you want some of the delicous Steak, Filet Mignon, Lamb… If you do not want more meat you just turn the card to the red side until you are hungry again. That was really delicious and worth the money.  So we had a good weekend and let’s see what the next week brings

A rainy week in Atlanta is over. We had no bad April 1st fools day jokes so it was a easy week 🙂 Since there was no snack available in the Hotel on Friday we went shopping and got some Shiner Bock (my favorite beer from Texas), Wine from France and Chile and some delicious steaks. So we finished them in the room, drunk some wine and beer.

The plans for Saturday were either going to a nice car show near Stone Mountain Park or going to the largest Aquarium in the world in Atlanta. Since the weather was wet, very very wet (they had a drought for a long time) it was obviuos that no car show on our list today. We drove downtown to the Aquarium and it is really a breathtaking experience. The largest tank hold 6.3 Million Gallons of water. Different themes are there for the Rain forest, arctic… Really a very good experience. Kids can do a lot, they can touch fishes and learn a lot. I’ve been to several Aquariums in the world and they were all great. But this Aquarium kicks a..

Most Aquariums have seahorses, tuna, penguins… but this Georgia Aquarium is one of the few Aquariums in the world that has Whalesharks and Beluga whales. Whalesharks are the biggest fishes in the world. They are names whaleshark because they look like a shark and they are as huge as a whale. So when you walk through the huge glas tunnel and see the Stingrays, sharks and finally the huge whalesharks you can’t shut your mouth. But those huge fishes can’t eat big fishes or even humans…no, they can only open their mouth as wide as quarter in diameter.

I shot lots of phots and also videos. The pictures are available here, but the videos will take a while. 

The other fascinating animals are the Beluga Whales. Those white whales swim in a 900000 gallon tank and it is also breathtaking to see them . Trust me, it is really worth to go there to this Aquarium when you are in Atlanta, it is a MUST. Forget the Cola Museum, it is not worth the money.

After the visit we walked around in Atlanta a bit. We saw the Skyscrapers covers in clouds. Rain was there from time to time. To satisfy our little appetite we went to the Hard Rock Cafe. Also some shopping was done. That was our Saturday. Let’s see how Sunday and the next weekend will be.

A bientot