Pisa Again

Again doing the infamous picture at Pisa.

Catacombs in Paris

This is me and Kim at the Catacombs in Paris.

Here are skulls and femurs surrounding one of the support stuctures in the catacombs.

me with skulls designed in a heart shape.  Yep.

This is to show how short the catacombs are.  I said wowser, I feel like a giant in here.

the ground was wet here.  And there was water droplets falling on me.  Weird.

Misadventures in Dogsitting

This is a gift the dogs brought into the house.  At first I thought "they brought in a weird ball".  Then I looked closer and noticed the ball had prickles on it and thought "why would someone put prickles on a dog toy?".  At this moment I realized that it was a hedgehog.  As I walked closer to it, I noticed it heaving, yes it was breathing.  The dogs brought me the gift of a live hedgehog.  This picture was taken after I put the dogs in a bathroom and the hedgehog thought to itself that it was safe to walk around and make its home inside the house.

This is when I finally got it swept into a dust pan.  I was trying to portray how big this thing was.  It was not one of those small hedgehogs you see in the pet store.  I struggled to get the hedgehog onto the dustpan because it gripped the rug with its feet.

So I put the hedgehog outside.  It just sat there.  I went out about a half hour to see if it has died but it was dark and I could not see so I used the flash of my camera.  This is the picture I got.  The hedgehog giving the mad stink eye.

German American club - Stammisch

The ladies of Stammisch and me in our dirndls.

Our president at the pig roast.

Our president singing at the pig roast.

Ghost Tour in Edinburgh

On our last night in Edinburgh my parents and I decided to take a Ghost Tour.  There are many different types of Ghost Tours and we went on the torture and ghost tour.  Since our tour include torture, they had items in at their office of torture.  (it seemed to be a common theme in my excursions in Europe).

The tour was one of the highlights of our trip not because they talked about ghosts, which they barely spoke of, but becasue it was an interesting history lesson.  It told the dark, gross part of history which we tend to ignore.

This weapon was used to cut people's heads off.

This is probably the most disgusting item of torture I have ever heard about. 

This is a little Blair Witch. 

This is the circle where the BBC version of Ghost Hunters was filmed.  The camera man started to feel uncomfortable while filming so he left. He had 30 scratches on his back and need 8 stitches.

The seedy road where the office for the Ghost Tour is located.

This is where the Ghost Tour met.  And the blurred visions on this photo are the closest I got to seeing ghosts.

Fountains Abbey

This is a World Heritage site. The Abbey was founded in 1132. The life of Abbey was brought to an abrupt end in 1539 by Henry VIII's Dissolution of the Monasteries.

There was not enough time for us to see the fountains.  So we only saw the Abbey. 

In Bruges - Kinda like the movie with less violence

One of the canals in the city of Bruges.

This is a wall with only Belgium beers and the beer's corresponding glass

Me in front of the one of the city's canals

Fall colors.

Bruges is a very beautiful city.  Unfornuately, we did not have enough time to take a canal ride.  One of the churches in Bruges claims to have the blood of Christ in it.  But the blood is on display only at specific times to the public so we were not able to do.  Also, it appeared that the watchtower was closed due to construction so we were unable to do that as well. 

We did get a wonderful tour of the city.  Bruges is called the "egg city" because of its shape and the way it developed.  Bruges has two parts the yolk and the white stuff.

We watched the movie In Bruges before we came to this town. 

One of the canals was filled with swans and ducks.  It was pretty beautiful.

Me in front of one of the canals of the outer city

Statue of Michangelo - the only one outside of Italy.

One of the four horsemen

Stirling Castle - Highlands

Reenactment of a war.

The premerie of Braveheart was done at this castle.

The king from Braveheart.  Robert the Bruce or something like that.

Near the bridge in this picture is where the statue of William Wallace is located.  I could not see though.  Maybe you can.

Graveyard near the castle.

The castle's garden

The tapestries which apparently are a big deal.

The Firth of Fourth

My dad and me in front of the bridge.

The bridge by itself.

It is the famous bridge in Scotland.  It is a railroad.  If you look closely at the second picture you can see a train chugging along the tracks.