Regensburg Trip - more really pretty old places!

Saturday we made the 45 minute drive to Regensburg where the Medtronic HR guy lives. He offered to be a tour guide and show us around his city. We started at a brewery where we hoped to be able to get a tour. He called ahead and they said they don't have normal tour times, but if the owner was there he would do one. Unfortunately he wasn't there, but the food was still good! This brewery specializes in Palmator, which is a very strong beer that I think you can only get during Lent (except that's not true because they already have it). The story is that the monks can't (or couldn't a long time ago?) eat during Lent, so instead they brew a high-calorie, high-alcohol content beer. Doesn't sound like the best plan to me, but I guess it worked for them! We bought some to go since we didn't want it before sightseeing! It was 7 Euro (about $10) for 6 half liter bottles of really good beer.

The first sight to see on our tour was the old courthouse, where kings of the middle ages made the decisions about who they were going to fight next. In this picture, the metal bars hanging by the door were standardized units of measurement. I think the smallest was used to define a cubit. It is a sign of how important Regensburg was that they had measurement standards.











I like this picture of a street in Regensburg that we would consider an alley. They had streets downtown that you could drive on, but many more of these narrow pedestrian passageways lined with shops.

Of course, we had to see another beautiful old cathedral in Regensburg. They see to be everywhere! It's fascinating that there are buildings here that were built long before the United States was even thought of. We've been told that these smaller cities in Germany are much better that the large cities for seeing historical sights because they weren't bombed during WW2 like the main cities were. This cathedral dates back to the 1300s. They still have services here, but I don't know how people can handle the cold! It was frigid in there in the time we looked around. I can't imagine a whole church service, but you can't really heat a 700 year old building. Check out this stained glass!

Here's a pretty shot of the Danube with the city on both sides. We're standing on a bridge that dates back to the 12th century. It was open for cars until about 5 years ago, but now it's only open to pedestrians. It's amazing to me that they could build a bridge to last that long!

 A picture of the bridge: 

A pretty picture of the countryside just outside of Regensburg: 

It was a beautiful city, and other than being really cold, a great way to spend a Saturday after a long, hard week of work!

Bavarian Food

I started to title this post "German food" then realized I may still not know anything about "German food" because everything here is "Bavarian." I get the impression that Bavaria is very distinct from the rest of Germany. Even the dialect is very different, I'm told. But I've had quite a lot of traditional Bavarian food and overall I really like it! I was afraid of coming to Germany and not liking the food or it all being way to heavy to enjoy day after day, but it hasn't been a problem at all. The biggest problem is knowing what to order. Supposedly in big cities restaurants have English menus... this is not a big city. Some restaurants have had English menus and generally we've had German co-workers with us to translate or the waitress spoke enough English that there weren't any problems. Until last night. I accidentally ordered liver. We all just picked something at random off the daily special menu, and we joked about trying to remember the German word for liver to make sure we didn't get it. I turned out to the be lucky one that got the liver. I'd never had it before, so I wasn't even sure what it was. Craig, my co-worker, suspects that it's veal liver since it wasn't as bad as other liver he has had. It actually wasn't that bad, but I certainly wouldn't order it again on purpose!

Here's a picture of the meal, plus the menu in case you want to try to figure out which word means liver! My meal was the 17 Euro one.

Aside from the liver, I've had some really great food here. Cheese plates are available at every restaurant, as well as the breakfast buffet in the hotel. Yum!

There is a grocery store just a short walk from the office, and it's been a nice alternative to eating out every day. I've had a good time looking at all the food and differences between German food and food in the US. I'm still amazed that so many places beer is the cheapest thing to drink. See the picture below for an example, if you can blow it up big enough! The beer is the cheapest item in the case, other than a 0.25 L coke that is listed on the prices but they don't actually sell. We learned there is a law that at least one non-alcoholic option always has to be cheaper than beer.

Here's the menu from a Mexican restaurant where we ate. Not very different from US Mexican restaurants, except for the baked potato and hot wings sections!

Gummi Bears are EVERYWHERE in Germany. There are tons of Haribo brand options at the grocery, but there is also a whole store of gummi bears - Bear's and Friends. I'll be bringing sour gummies home as souvenirs!

Passau trip

Today we visited Passua, a very pretty city about 45 minutes from Deggendorf. It seemed to be a fairly large city, but seemed quaint with buildings painted lots of pastel colors and the Danube river running through the middle.

The highlight of Passau was the gorgeous cathedrals. Since we didn't know what we should be trying to see in Passau and didn't have a map or any visitor's information, we wondered around looking for pretty things. The first cathedral we found was gorgeous. It's amazing how intricate the architecture is and I'd love to know how they built it.

The most famous cathedral in Passau is Saint Stephan's, which I now know has the world's largest pipe organ. It made the first cathedral look plain. These pictures don't even begin to show how pretty it is!

I thought the plain wooden fews were interesting compared to how ornate everything else was.

The ceiling!

As a complete contrast, we also saw a Lutheran church. I'm not going to pretend like I remember anything about the Protestant reformation, but I'm sure the plainness of this church is indicative of something from the early Protestant days!

Among other Passau

excitement, I used my first pay toilet today! Luckily the cafe where we had lunch gave us coins the same shape as a 50 cent coin to get in so we didn't actually have to pay! We ate at a cafe with no English menus and a staff that didn't go to much trouble to try to speak to us in English. I ordered a wrap, but that was all I could tell from the menu. I was expecting a wrap like at home, but it was hot food inside and really good! The cafe also had a bakery full of AMAZING looking desserts, so we each got a piece of cake for later. It was probably the highlight of my day!

Munich!

My co-workers and I spent our Saturday in Munich seeing the sights. I volunteered to drive. When I made the car reservation and someone pointed out to me that it would be a manual transmission unless I requested automatic, I decided to play it cool and claim that I could drive a stick. It turned out ok (although I did stall a couple embarrassing times because I couldn't seem to find second gear) but I was really nervous! No better place to practice driving skills than on the Audabon, right? I never tested to see how fast I could go. I cruised around 140 km/hr, which is about 85 mph. Not too fast!

By the time we got there around noon we didn't really have time to see much before it got dark. We started at the BMW museum, which was pretty interesting. We wanted to do a plant tour but they only have them during the week, when we'll be working. It kinda made me want a BMW!

The most impressive car showroom I've ever seen...

A crazy looking little car. This was the first BMW. It had a motorcycle engine and the door opens on the front!

There was an exhibit of the BMW "Art Cars" on display temporarily. Various famous artists painted cars and it's a traveling exhibit.

After the BMW museum we went to the Neue Pinakothek Art Museum. It had all art from the 1800s and early 1900s. I've never had a huge appreciation for art, but I really enjoyed it. Here are a couple pictures that I liked. The first I took to prove I really went, since I didn't have any pictures of me! It's in front of a Monet that was my favorite. The second picture is three van Gogh paintings that I also liked.

To top off the day, we went to dinner at the Hofbrauhaus (means "beer house" maybe?) It's supposed to be one of the "must do" things in Munich. It was a huge room packed with tables where you had to seat yourself, which for us meant finally going up to a table with two people and asking to sit with them. It seems like that isn't too uncommon. Since the place is based on beer I had to get one, of course, but they only came in liter mugs. It was huge! I'm also surprised here about the limited selection of beer at most restaurants, since beer is so German. Most places seem to have a wheat beer, a dunkel (darker) and an "ordinary" beer (according to the English menus). I think the "ordinary" is a lagar. But there's typically only one brand, which is different from the US. And I'm CRAVING a huge glass of ice water, but that's not nearly as easy to obtain as a beer. And is probably at least as expensive!

I've held off on ordering weiner schnitzel because I figured that would be a good fallback option when I find myself in a restaurant with no Germans co-workers and no English menu, but I decided to go ahead and get it tonight. It was great! Here are some pictures...

My co-worker Craig and I.

My dinner!

The Hafbrauhaus -

Running Challenges

I made it to Germany safely on Wednesday morning, and now, Friday morning, I'm exhausted. They say jet lag hits the third day. I think staying up too late and getting up early doesn't help! I'm here with two co-workers, working in our Deggendorf manufacturing plant each day. We work 8 to 5:00, then I've been coming back to the hotel and trying to catch up on emails and do work with all the people back home that are working until midnight Germany time. So it's pretty tiring! This weekend I'm hoping to get out and do some fun stuff, and I'll post pictures!

The title of this blog is "running challenges." Two have hit me this week. First, see above. I'm in Germany, without any of my running buddies, with TONS of yummy food and beer that I want to try and without my normal routine or gym/pool access. I'm afraid I'm going to come home fat, slow and lazy. Second, after several years of running I've finally come within 2 1/2 minutes of my Boston Qualifying time. For years I didn't have qualifying as a goal, even, because it seemed impossible. Now it seems possible. Until yesterday. The BAA announced that in 2013 qualifying times will drop by 5 minutes. I could probably still get that fast (3:35). But they've also implemented a new registration process starting in 2012 that allows the faster runners to register first. So I'm at a point where yes, I can probably qualify, but I may never be able to register before it is full. Very frustrating! So, naturally, I want to run faster to increase my chances, but that's going to be tough. Especially when I'm in Germany eating, drinking, working too hard and hopefully playing some instead of training.

Run Toto Run 50k Race Report

Justin and I drove to Kansas City, Kansas for the Run Toto Run 10 miler, 20 miler and 50k this weekend. I was dead-set on making it the full 50k, but Justin has had some recent back pain and decided the 10 miler was enough! It was definitely a character-builder for me. The start was in about 6 inches of powdery snow, and I've never run in snow further than my mailbox. Unless it's packed down, it's a lot like running in dry sand. Every step required engaging stability muscles, and my ankles started hurting a couple miles in. During the first two miles, as my feet froze with snow in my shoes and I couldn't find a solid foothold on any step, I seriously considered dropping to the 10 mile or 20 mile options. The course was a 10 mile loop, so runners could easily change their minds on what distance to run. After the first couple miles, though, the snow was more packed and it got easier, and I remembered that we drove all the way to Kansas to run a 50k, so that's what I was going to do! Justin and I ran together the first loop, which was fun. The second loop still had a decent number of people, so I made small talk along the way. For most of the second loop the snow was packed and running wasn't too difficult, at least on the flat parts! The third loop was lonelier, with many people running the 10 or 20 milers. The temperature had risen to around 45 degrees, so the snow was melting and the trails were deteriorating quickly. They were super-slick in places, muddy in others and sometimes just cold, deep slush. Running uphill was hard because with every step up I slid backward. Running downhill was hard because it would be really easy to lose control slip-sliding everywhere! I realized somewhere near the end that I could finish under 7 hours, compared to my previous 50k when I finished around 7:35, so I started trying my hardest to actually run rather than walk and came in around 6:55 (8th out of only 12 female finishers). It was a great experience. Although it was really hard and I couldn't wait to be done, it forced me to dig deep and motivate myself and find an inner strength to keep going. I'm really sore and will be for a few days, but I'm so glad we made the trip and I finished all 50k!

Here's a picture of the start line, with the worst of the deep powdery snow.

Here are some more pictures from the race. It was so much fun!

After the finish...

Between the second and third loops I stopped to chat with Justin. That's the best part about trail races... I'm generally in no hurry to get going!

Big Sky Ski Trip 2011!

This past weekend Justin and I went to Big Sky, Montana with a bunch of friends (some that we knew before the trip and some that we didn't!) to go snowboarding and skiing. It was an AWESOME trip! I forget every year how much I LOVE to snowboard! This was our fourth annual ski trip over Superbowl weekend, and I hope there are many more to come!

We rented a great house that sleeps up to 14, then crammed up to 17 people into it. Our group represented 10 different states! It was advertised as "ski in/ski out" but the resort website should have included a picture of the slope that you had to "ski in"...

Luckily Justin found an alternative to skiing in, with the effective belly slide!

I learned to snowboard 4 years ago at Breckenridge and have enjoyed getting better each year. Unfortunately, everyone we go with was probably better than me to begin with and also get better each year, so it's a constant challenge to try to keep up! But I saw some definite improvements this year:

• Learned to not be SO scared of going fast. A couple falls that didn't really hurt helped my confidence, and I never caught the front edge of the board as I fear.
• Only fell off the lift once! I'm not really proud of that one. It was pretty stupid, but at least it was only once.
• Learned to jump a little in place, like to turn the board around or move forward without unstrapping. Very useful.
• Navigated crowded catwalks without being terrified of falling!
• I can stop, when I want, where I want, every time!

Big Sky was gorgeous, and we got tons of great pictures. Here's a favorite.

Of course, we also had a great time back at the house. Other than Thursday night when we arrived, we ate all our meals at the house, cooking spaghetti (thanks Will), chili and baked potatoes (thanks Claire!) and an assortment of junk food during the Superbowl. We think that as a group we consumed at least 228 beers, so we didn't go hungry or thirsty. It was pretty great!

First Blog Post!

I've thought about starting a blog for a while now, because I love reading my friends' blogs and even blogs by strangers that now feel like friends, but I've been hesitant because I don't have an adorable child or any amazing skills to blog about. However, my husband Justin and I seem to always be doing something, so this blog will be a compilation of whatever we're up to!

The title, "Sprint to the Finish" is primarily because of my love for running and racing, but also because I love starting new things but often lose interest midway through and rush to get done. One example is the bonus room that I mostly painted, then got tired of and hurried to finish, pulling the paint off with the painters tape. It still has spots of exposed paneling that I haven't touched up. So, whether I'm in a running a race or just going about daily activities, I'm always on a "sprint to the finish!"