On to Germany...

Bruce drove me to the airport on the eve of Heather and Brian' birthday, June 7th to fly to Amsterdam and then on to Dusseldorf to visit Uschi and Reiner!  Left at 8:20pm and arrived in Amsterdam Friday morning at 7:00 am.  Yes, it was a long flight!  But this was

the view when i opened the airplane window!

 Sunrise from the air.. over Amsterdam!

 The Amsterdam Airport is Stunning!
First I discovered places to sleep and get "charged up".

 The library/ media center.... Lap tops, iPads, etc. even BOOKS!

 A place for even more relaxation. This was great since
I had made an error in planning my trip and had a 10 hour layover
in Amsterdam!  What a ninny!!!!  But this was a great airport
to be "stuck".  The day flew by!    

 The Kid's Forest they called the play area.

Foot/back/water/massages and even a fish tank where you
could have little tiny fish "clean" your feet!  No,
I just took pictures.

 The Dutch Restaurant but i forgot to take
pictures of the Tulip Store! 

Guess I should let you know that I finally bought a phone
(on sale at the airport) that I can see and hopefully use someday!  So I spent
most of the day trying to figure it out. 
Um..I still haven't quite done that.

 And then there were LEGOS!

After my 10 hours in the airport and seeing just about every corner but the 1st class

lounges, I was finally on my 25 min. trip to
Dusseldorf where I would meet
Uschi and Reiner.

They are our German friends of over 20 years now!
Uschi is like the sister i never had.
And Reiner is a great cook!

This area of Germany is fairly level... 

Everything is so green and growing right now.
 It looks like a rich carpeting.

 The Autobahn from the air.

Some of Uschi's Art Work!

On Sat. morning we took off on a walk.
These are some folks in the "barn yard" with their 4 dogs.

They also board 8 horses here at the barn. 

The little dog on the left is Barney, then Henry (the cutest one), 

and i forget the others.  Couldn't get good pictures. They never
stopped moving.  I miss my Barney.

Just on our walk...

                 A typical picture around Dortmund.. Girls out riding their horses.

                       A lot of them are boarded at the place I am visiting.

Favorite picture from our walk to the Hardward store.... like Lowes or Home Depot.

Can't you just smell these roses?

 The old and the new.... Autobahn on right,
our walking road on left.

 And then... I entered a shocking world compared to
what i have been accustomed to in Africa.

 It's amazing in just a few months how i could have forgotten just
how much stuff can be in one store.

 Including plants and beautiful flowers!

It actually was a bit of culture shock... I was surprised.

 This is Uschi and Reiner's part of the backyard where they live.  I took it because there is something in this picture that we rarely have in Kigali and you can't see it.  Only the result of it is showing... THE WIND!  It was so terribly windy yesterday and some of the trees were bending way over.

But the sun was shining.... in fact unlike Kigali where the sun goes down at 6pm every evening.. THE SUN DIDN'T SET UNTIL AFTER 10PM!  So my body rhythms are
a bit off.  But boy was it great to sit outside in the evening.... and on into the night!

Thank you Bruce, for sending me to see Uschi and Reiner!
Wish you could be here, too.
An even more shocking discovery for me was that the stores
don't close anymore before 8pm and some even until 10pm.

Tomorrow is Sunday... Usually a quiet day in Germany.
 The stores are still Closed on Sunday, at least!
It's so good to be here!!

love,
margie