FranceBlog in English

Playing with cars is fun. Thats why we took some diecast models from the CARS Movie and a Hoodz car to shoot some pics. Enjoy

and a little movie (14MB,320×288 Pixel) or (32MB,768×576 Pixel) with pictures from August/September and music from Christophe Maé

Since Jonathan has his new bicycle and he rides it like a rocket we made a little bicycle tour in windy but mild weather. About 6 miles along the fields and wineyards. Last week we saw a white horse and we wanted to meet it again a feed some apples. So we bought some apples and a mudguard for Jonathans bike. After a nice rain on thursday he drove through all puddles he found and looked very dirty. Now with the new feature installed it doesn’t matter anymore.
Fabian and Dagmar were the first at the horse and gave the first apple. The horse liked it a lot. So Jonathan gave the second. I gave some leftovers. Even with the strong winds the kids drove very good and it was a lot of fun, see the pictures 🙂 

We had another reason to do a BBQ. Lots of friends and colleagues from germany were in Montpellier this week. To meet everyone we invited them. Since many people went shopping with an empty stomach we had lots of meat to put on the BBQ Grill. Nobody went home hungry 🙂 We also celebrated a birthday and we had lots of fun…. See the pictures 

The first week of september was full of nice and funny things. Several colleagues from all around Europe were there and also some friends from Fabian‘ s school were here to visit us.  Since the first day at school was on tuesday and wednesdays is off, the kids enjoyed it a lot to play together. Sigrun and Olaf took care also of Fabian and Jonathan. So Dagmar and I were able to meet the colleagues in Montpellier to go to a Fondue Restaurant. That was delicious. It is hot as well in the restaurant with all the pots filled with hot oil…But nice. Hans and Heidi also visited us several times . So we went together with Sigrun, Olaf, Yannik and Gregor to the „Le Galion“ Restaurant in historic Aigues-Mortes. You can have your food cooked on a hot stone there, directly at your table. Fish or meat.

The first part of the weekend was cloudy. After a really strong Thunderstorm on Thursday night with humid, warm temperatures we used the time to update the webpages of Fabian and Jonathan with Pictures from 2007. 2008 will come soon. Check out the pictures:

Fabian’s homepage: http://fabian.bigmek.de or pics directly at: http://bigmek.de/fabian/FabiAlbum2007.swf

Jonathan’s homepage: http://jonathan.bigmek.de or pics directly at: http://bigmek.de/jonathan/JonaAlbum2007.swf 

Today we used the sunny and mild weather to make a little bicycle tour. Jonathans’s first one with his new little bike. We made a 9km trip through the close, quiet neighbourhood and the wineyards. He managed it very good. Was his first trip with real traffic. See you soon

Today it was a normal day, but with just 30C with lots of clouds. So we decided to make a trip to Micropolis. That is not a little french town, but a intersting educational world. Insect world. You can see, feel the world of insects. There is a outside area where the insects have your size, or the size of a labrador retriever dog and you can imagine how it’s like to be a insect or the inside world where thousands of insects, alive or dead can be seen. The webpage is available at: http://www.micropolis.biz
To get there we had to drive through wonderful areas north of Montpellier. from 20m(60ft) above sealevel to more than 800m (2400ft). Across the Viaduct de Millau. All together that was a wonderful sunday with the family. At home we finished with a little bycicle tour near our home with Jonathan and Fabian. Jonathan now also drives Bycicle like a maniac. He got a new little kids Moutainbike and drives great. Helmet and gloves, he is doing fine. A bientot

That’s it. Three weeks of vacation are over now. That was really fast. After this weekend the normal way of life is back again. School, work… The weeks were nice. We visited our families in germany, drove more than 2000 miles in those 3 weeks. I admit that driving on the german Autobahn with more than 120 MPH is nice, but it is too crowded in germany on the Autobahn. Driving with 80PMH is relaxing and easy on the french highways. Since there is a toll to pay the Highways are not that crowded.
In germany we went to the baptism of Juliane Mia (from Dagmars sister Kerstin), we had several BBQs with friends and family and we did our yearly Family Photo on the steps of our house. Since we moved into our house in 2004 we take pictures each August/September. It is not always easy, because the Kids sometimes do not do what we expect but that makes it really funny.

Here is the latest 2008 Family Picture:

This is a collage of the past pictures:

Here in france, the weather is nice as usual. Hot, sunny and we can really enjoy. Several friends already visited us here and this will continue. The little Clio is also running great with the same good mileage of 37MPG. More pictures from the last weeks can be found on my Webpage: http://bigmek.de/digital.htm

Have fun and a bientot The Engelkahles

I just uploaded some new videos on Youtube and I splitted the SchwobaCup Video into two parts that can be watched on Youtube now. I don’t care if many people watch it, they are just for fun 🙂

Schwobacup Part 1 and 2:

Part 1: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=O7XecEICI1w

Part 2: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=gPXIfkt6ns4

Aquarium Mare Nostrum Montpellier: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=u2A0SBPRskc

OCC Orange County Choppers & V-Force Customs: http://de.youtube.com/watch?v=xyjutMwLJZU

if that was really Golf what we tried today. I am not sure. But every sunday there are free Golf lessons here at our Hotel. So Fabi and Philipp came with me to practice a little bit. It was hot and sunny. Together with lots of other people we tried to hit the golfball and also putt into the holes later. Not as easy as it looks. Some balls flew near the 100m mark, but sometimes the grass we hit flew further than the ball (5m for the ball and 10m for the grass). If this will be my Hobby in the near future I am not really sure about that, but I have more time to try it. Of course we also went to the beach and the pool. Was a lot of fun. Jonathan is doing fine in his swimming suit and he is less and less scared and tries swimming very well. Fabian is more quiet but that is ok.

I just filled up my little Renault Clio with this nice expensive liquid called gasoline. 510km about 319miles were driven. The 43Liter Tank (11.2Gallons) needed 32.2Liters (8.4Gallons). That is a average of 6.3L/100km or 37MPG. Not too bad for the traffic to work. That is more than 4L less than the Cougar consumes. The Cougar has a average of about 10.5L/100km(22MPG). The specs of the Clio say that even 4.7L/100km might be possible (50MPG). So 13km each way (8.1 miles) that is 26km per workday or 130km (81miles) per week. With driving to work, shopping and sightseeing I might drive around 10000km (6125miles) per year with the Clio I can save about 420L(109 Gallons) per year. Right now the price per Liter is between 1.379 Euro and 1.47 Euro (about 8.30 USD to  8.80USD per Gallon) here in Montpellier. So I can save around 588 Euro per year more or less. I usually fill my car up at the elf Gas station in Montpellier. That one is the cheapest, 8 cent less than Total or other big brands. Only the Shopping Center Gas Stations are similar. My little 55HP Clio is not bad at all, accelerates pretty fast since it is a light car with only 850kg (compared to 1390kg of the Cougar). Driving „green“ is cool. A bientot