Day 1: To Edmund-Graf Hütte

So, after arriving by train...



... eating the usual Austrian breakfast with Semmeln...



... and a Kochei...



... we finally started hiking...



... ending the day with the usual Kuchen and beer.

In numbers: 3:42h, 7.6 km, 1247 m ascent, 117 m descent.

Attack of the Killer Cows

Do you think this cow looks cute?



Do you get all mushy and tingly when you look at these calves?

Well, you could not be more wrong.



These are Killer Cows, looking for their next victim, who turned out to be me. On our way to the Hochstubaihütte we saw these cute calves frolicking in the grass. As soon as they saw us, they start heading for us --- which seemed really cute at that moment. Then the whole herd turned towards us and started running! This was slightly less cute, and rather intimidating. After stupidly encouraging them by running away, and paying the price for it by falling down (and being sore for almost three weeks), we finally gained the upper hand again by shouting at these monsters.



The rest of today's trip was luckily less eventful. After going down 1000 meters, we had to climb 1200 meters, which is not too hard after 2 1/2 weeks of hiking.





And everything is forgotten and rosy again.

Towards Austria

München Is Weißwürste mit Brezeln

Yum-o!

Montevideo

I am conferring in Uruguay. Montevideo is a very pleasant city, but I have yet to see anything picture worthy. Add to that the fact that my food photography is appalling and you've got yourself wishing that I had left the pretty apple π as the latest post.

Oh well, at least you now know this little surprising tidbit of information: in Montevideo, everyone drinks Zillertaller beer. Who would have thought!!

Also, here is the plate of gnocchi I ate on the 29th, which is what you're supposed to do on the 29th (obviously). I was encouraged by the waiter to tuck a 20 pesos bill under my plate, so according to the interwebz, I have now earned wealth and prosperity for the coming month.

Day 2 in Chicago

I did not fulfill my promise yesterday, and no results, groundbreaking or not, were attained. At some point, I decided to stop working all the same, and made my way back downtown.

I had a wonderful dinner at Fox and Obel. The waiter convinced me that it was a good idea to buy a huge bottle of beer, since "they are sold at retail price, so buying more is saving more"! The result of course was that I got so drunk that all the money I "saved" had to be spent on dessert. It was worth every penny though!

Germany Redux

Believe it or not, we are in Germany again! For a conference this time.

Here we are celebrating the final day (EVAH!!!!!11!!!1!1!eleven!11!) in Germany!

Great Food

After these photo ops on the Mairspitze, we arrived at the Nürnberger Hütte. We enjoyed the sun, and their spectacularly good food!



There was home smoked bacon, Hauswurst, great cakes etc. Also beer.



Gröstl.



Goulash mit Knödel.



And a "Tris" of Schlutzkrapfen, Käseknödel and some other deliciousness. Many good reasons to stay overnight in huts!

After exercising, one needs to eat

Hence, more beer snacks and beer followed our 5-minute exercise session.









We spent two days in Birstonas eating mediocre food, and going to a spa, which was even worse than the community swimming pool in Hilvarenbeek. But somehow, we still had a good time.

Beer snacks

Lithuania appears to be famous for its beer snacks. Our first introduction to this "assortment to beer" was at Avilys in Kaunas. It turned out that normally, beer snacks are quite a bit less fancy (and also quite a bit less expensive), consisting mainly of fried bread and some cheese.



As the name says, the "assortment to beer" was accompanied by plenty of beer. We then went to a tapas restaurant a few doors down the street. I guess (although I don't quite remember) we must have already had enough of Lithuanian food.



After some tapas and plenty more beer and wine, we walked for 45-60 minutes through the freezing cold back to our B&B in the geographical center of Kaunas.



Next day, breakfast was delivered to our room, which we quite appreciated, considering our pretty serious hangovers...

Similaunhütte

After a pathetic excuse for a breakfast at the Martin-Busch-Hütte, we went up to the Similaunhütte under an amazing blue sky. We met a guy with his dog on our way there, who had decided it was a perfect day to take the old Big Foots out for a spin.





We had a second breakfast at the Similaunhütte, with sausage and beer...

... and then descended all the way to Vent. No pictures of dinner, because F was sick and rather surprisingly did not have any.