Berlin

John-The Meeting:

We were looking forward to our Berlin Sit because our hosts have two cats, Oskar and Lucy, and our host, Ellie, seemed very nice during the Skype interview and in all communications. We did spend a night in Berlin while traveling from Gdansk to Munich. While we only saw the train station and our hotel, it was all impressive and Ellie said their home was in the “cool” section.

Lucy

We flew into the Berlin Schonefeld Airport in the afternoon and walked out into a beautiful sunny day. The signage indicated the train we needed was close, just down a pathway. We passed the “Mama Burrito” food truck and stopped for a beer at a beer garden. The train took us to the tram that dropped us off just in front of our hotel Ellie had suggested. Barb told Ellie we arrived and the hotel was nice. Ellie said she and Ben would meet us in front of the hotel at 7 for a short walking tour of their neighborhood and back to their home for a review of our responsibilities and to meet Oskar and Lucy.

At about 10 minutes to seven we went down to the lobby. It was busy with guests checking in and out and waiting for the remaining members of their group to go out to see Berlin. After a few minutes I went outside to look for our hosts. I was entertaining myself by balancing on the curb looking for a car with two young people thinking they should recognize me because I was certain to look just like the person Barb would be married to. Across the street from the trams and further down our street toward Alexanderplatz I saw people, sitting, standing and walking through and around the chairs and tables in the lights from the businesses and street lamps. If I didn’t have plans I would have ventured to either street to see what the people were doing. Within minutes I noticed two people approaching slowly and felt they were looking at me. My first thought was, “Don’t make eye contact for fear of provoking an altercation!” so I avoided eye contact, it is a city of over 3.5 million. Luckily, they had more sense than me because the woman asked if I was John and then I realized it was Ellie and Ben. Not a good first impression on my part. I partially regrouped, greeted them both with only a handshake and said, “I will get Barb.”

Barb came out with her huge warm smile and outstretched arms providing each of our hosts with a comforting hug. Ben and Ellie must have been relieved Barb was accompanying me. They walked us across the street explaining their home was on the other side of the busy street divided by the Tram tracks. The street we were walking on was wide with trees and people enjoying the gorgeous night. Ben and Ellie explained they didn’t frequent this side because there are so many places to enjoy in the area around their home. The roads were not busy with cars as I’d expected in an area at the heart of a city of that size but we saw later that the trams, trains and buses were very popular. Berlin is also been ranked tenth most friendly bike city in the world, another reason for the noticeable absence of vehicles. Ellie had just explained the distinction of bike lane paths from the pedestrian walkways as we started walking toward the street. I looked at the sidewalk and saw the bike lanes were red pavers, a clear demarcation from the sidewalk. At that moment I felt a polite tug on my arm prompting me to move quickly in that direction. It was Ellie directing me out of the path of an oncoming cyclist. Slick second impression, oblivious.

Great neighborhood food!

After crossing the street, we walked up and down several blocks with Ellie and Ben pointing out places of interest. The streets were wide with tall trees toward the street and tall clean buildings with attractive architecture and some color differentiating one from the other. There were restaurants, bars, late night convenient stores, grocery stores, pharmacies, a cake decorating shop, “Cake Ville -- Bake, Rattle and Roll”, with ample people and good energy. At one point, Ben said he hoped we will enjoy our stay in Berlin. At that moment Ben motioned toward a wine shop. He talked to the clerk and they selected a bottle of wine.



We then thought it was a good time to meet Oskar and Lucy. They live in a two story home. Both cats were friendly and playful. We knew they were going to be good hosts while Ben and Ellie were on holiday. I say hosts because we knew if we abided by Oskar and Lucy’s rules everything would go smoothly. Ben and Ellie showed us their place pointing out the automatic cat food feeder and watering bowl, along with other items to make our stay more pleasant. Since none of us had eaten Ellie had a Nepalese restaurant deliver some food. We said they could order anything because we will eat any food. We talked over a glass of wine about Berlin, politics, cats and we coaxed Ben to show us the video he made of their year of house sitting in and around Australia. He said when they returned home many people asked them what they did for a year so they thought it would be easiest to describe it through a video. They paused the video when the food was delivered. There was antipasto, a calzone type food, and two small pizza like foods with a light airy crust with cheese, sauce and, one had whole olives. I enjoyed it all but loved the antipasto probably because I had seen that on menus all my life and never knew what it was. After watching the video, Barb and I were ready to look for Sit opportunities in Australia.

The conversation tripped and flowed from subject to subject while drinking a couple additional glasses of wine. Barb and I wanted to open the next bottle of wine but, begrudgingly, suggested we go because we expected they had to prepare for their trip. I have been told it is a good practice to leave the dinner table slightly hungry. I suppose that allows you to feel you’ve earned the right to your next meal. Well, we left that night wanting to spend more time with our hosts and maybe we will see them before we leave Berlin or during another adventure we may be on.
My response to Ben’s hope we enjoyed our stay should have been, “I don’t see how we couldn’t!”, because we loved it!

Barb – The Stay:

Ben and Ellie’s neighborhood was great! We found great restaurants, a nice pub, a grocery store nearby as well as the tram being very convenient.

We took a tour of the city one day by taking 2 different public buses that pretty much circled the city.

We went to the Berlin Wall. There are many areas of the Wall left and we choose the East Side Gallery area. Many artists have left their mark on the wall and this section spans about a mile.

You can see more of my photos of the Berlin Wall. Just CLICK HERE.

Ben and Ellie had an amazing Espresso machine and John took full advantage of it (with a little help from Lucy)

Ellie had told us about the Festival of Lights that would be happening during our stay. It sounded nice but we had no idea how amazing it would be! Every year, Berlin turns into a world full of light art. International artists present glowing light projections, 3D video mappings and light installations, transporting their messages, themes and contents. These artistic projections on landmarks, monuments, buildings, streets and neighborhoods. We had never seen anything like it! Live music accompanied some of the light shows and I captured part of one.

You can view the video of the light show. CLICK HERE.

You can see more photos from the light show. Just CLICK HERE.

Oskar

And of course there was Lucy and Oskar, our “hosts”. They were entertaining, adorable and loads of fun! It was a great Sit and we were so happy to be able to have lunch with Ben and Ellie when they returned home.








If you would like to see more of my photos of Berlin, just CLICK HERE.

Cheers!
Barb and John

What We’ve Done, What We’ve Learned

While the overarching idea, rent our home in the states and stay rent free traveling Europe and elsewhere by Pet Sitting for a year was very appealing and financially sound, we still had to overcome some obstacles - physically moving all of our belongings from place to place, coordinating schedules for Sits while identifying and organizing the different modes of transportation, balancing our budget and finally, enjoying the experiences of our lives.

Etta in France

A critical component for us to be able to travel six months in Europe is Pet Sitting. Pet or House Sitting is when homeowners, going on holiday (vacation) or a business trip for days or weeks, open their home, rent free, in exchange for feeding and attending to their pet’s needs. So, for feeding and playing with animals, we live, temporarily, in homes located in towns and cities throughout Europe meeting some wonderful people and experience things we never thought we would. Since the animals are not on life support requiring 24/7 care and we are not trained veterinarians, we are able to venture out in the area for hours at a time while our furry friends sleep, oblivious to our brief absence. Fantastic! Although the Sits with our new furry friends has been rewarding and memorable, the purpose of our trip was to experience people, places and things.

Since we are in our 50’s, with me closer to 60, moving our 40 pounds of luggage between the six Sits (so far) and four additional stops, almost always via multiple transportation modes in three months has been challenging. Luckily, Barb is a determined person and devoted partner and does her fair share of the physical moving and I have been able to provide any extra muscle when needed. We learned to shift as much weight to our backpacks for the ground transportation since there is no size restrictions and distribute it into our handbags when flying. This has helped tremendously. We realized the difficulty of moving our luggage as we made our way to our first hotel in London but the impetus for change happened boarding our plane on Flybe airlines. I still recall the feeling of angst as I entered our plane’s fuselage, each with our 20 pound backpacks and seeing the overhead not much bigger than a bread box realizing they would never fit. During our next Sit we worked on a solution. Just recently we received our collapsible handcart that should help even more.

The coordination of the dozen or so Sits we will probably need for the six months in Europe have been handled perfectly by Barb. She applies for Sits, always mindful of available time slots in our schedule, arranges interviews and makes sure I look somewhat presentable when we have a Skype call. As far as the travel arrangements, Barb must have travel planning in her DNA or blood because she has always done that in our relationship and has been fantastic on this Adventure. I’ve watched her sit in front of our laptop with her eyes glazing, toggling between many different screens for schedules for trains, buses, airlines, hotels and their cancellation policies, Google maps for walking distances from terminal to terminal to hotel, and other websites. It’s too much for me to comprehend and since she enjoys it and skilled my input would just muddle things.

We did learn a valuable lesson on over committing to our hosts. Between our second and third Sit we had to leave at 3:30AM in Ward End, England to meet our third host in Edinburgh, Scotland by noon. We took a taxi to the airport, flew to Edinburgh, caught a tram into the city to get the keys for our AirBnB, then a taxi to meet our host and finally an Uber to our AirBnB. That was a grind but we did it and since then we make realistic commitments with adequate time between Sits.




After three months of traveling we are reasonably satisfied with our expenses relative to our budget. We still need to be aware of our budgetary constraints but also want to enjoy these experiences. Since we travel to locations based on the Sits we have been to places we never heard of so we never considered them as a place we would want to go. Our third Sit, Edinburgh Scotland, was such a place. After reading a travel book and doing a little internet research the city size was adequate, it had mass transportation, we could easily walk to places and their temperatures would be a high of 75 degrees. We stayed there for one month and saw a good portion of the city and it far exceeded our expectations and we would love to return. Another time we had four days before our Munich Sit so we selected Gdansk Poland because it was exotic, for us, and the flight was reasonable. Our research indicated the temperatures and cost of living was reasonable. Since it has a population of 450K we knew there would be activities we enjoy. We loved it! We could just as easily traveled to popular locations and had fun but I can’t imagine they would be more memorable than Gdansk. We knew the budget could be doomed by rationalizing expensive travel and hotels to popular but out of the way places by the phrase, “We should spend the money. We deserve it and this is a once in a lifetime opportunity!”

Pintxos 

I think people, friends, bloggers, writers, recommend places because they enjoyed them, of course, but they probably don’t have the same expectations of places or the same interest as us. Those suggestions are a good place to start but a decision should only be made after some introspection and research. Also, books or the internet should be taken as generally accurate. For instance, Barb found a blog that described a city in northern Spain having a style of eating and drinking that appealed to us, bars giving a free tapas with the purchase of a glass of wine. We enjoy eating small plates of food, going to bars and drinking wine or beer so we planned a trip to Bilbao, Spain. Well, the city was fantastic and we loved it but we didn’t get any free tapas. My point is if we had expected free food we would have been disappointed. We did expect bars to serve small plates and they did and we thoroughly enjoyed our meals and experience.



Sometimes we like to take the “On-Off Tours” of cities. It’s a way to see some of the city and identify sections that we would like to see. We took one of those tours in Munich Germany with the plan to stay on the bus for a complete route identifying stops we would like to go back to on the second time around route. I used the map provided to make note of interesting places. While listening to the guide and seeing the areas I filled the map with notes and asterisks on stops that were places we think would be worth going to. So, we finished the route and decided to go for lunch and discuss what we saw. There were several places on my map I made notes about and two with asterisks. As we read the tour bus brochure we realized we paid for the three different tours so we agreed to try one more tour after lunch. By the time we approached our last stop on that second tour I had made notes on five stops with asterisks next to three. Then we saw the Marienplatz, looked at each other and agreed this is the place to go. Well, two weeks in Munich and we went back to the Marienplatz every time we took the train into the city. Barb and I had a great time in all of our visits to the city but we can’t say we saw anything but one small section. I think most people judge their experiences on cities they visit based on what they have done, makes sense. So, if I tell a person Munich is a great city and we had fun I am actually describing one small section. The converse could also be true if a person tells us a city isn’t worth seeing. My point is if you adhere to limited guidelines based on your desires and a city meets them, it’s probably a place to explore.

I think seeing most of the world class and popular cities would be a great experience but I question if it is worth spending the extra money when you can go to a place you may never have heard of for far less and have a comparable or more memorable experience. Also, cities are not monolithic and are made up of several or many sections each possibly providing different experiences so unless your wants and needs match the personality of the person doing the recommending, you should do you own research and decide if you want to visit.

A minor point and possibly contradictory, is when you are considering saving a euro or two by taking a sleeper train through Madrid, Spain to a destination to avoid a hotel cost. We had that very situation and quickly decided to pay the additional euros for the hotel in Madrid even though we would only be there for part of day. Since we would be going through Madrid anyways why would we not want to see Madrid! This decision to spend the additional money in a city we didn’t research as opposed to sleeping on a train through a world class city was a wise one. (Note: That trip planned through Madrid fell through when we landed a Sit in Amsterdam Netherlands!)

Cheers!
John


Note from Barb: John expressed really well the thought process of how we have been traveling these last 3 months, our expectations, challenges and logistics of meeting every Sit. I am truly lucky to have such a wonderful partner to share this journey with. It can be stressful at times and it was a LOT of work just getting to the point of boarding the plane to Europe but we have said over and over and over again, it was worth it. We have met incredible people which we hope to stay in touch with and maybe host at our home, visited places I never dreamed of and have collected so many wonderful memories.

Munich

When we visit unfamiliar cities or towns of any size we like to take a tour to see if any section or streets appeals to us. Since we’ve been in Europe the “City Tours-Hop-on-Hop-Off” have been perfect. So on our initial trip into Munich, Barb found out where that tour company starts their tours and we took the train to the city center. The tour cost about $23 each but we were entitled to three tours and an English audio tour. The bus showed us Nymphenburg Palace, Olympic Park, the English Garden, the historic Old Town, Odeonsplatz and many others, about 19 specific places and general information about Munich. Our strategy is to take one full route, identify potential places of interest and take the next bus to those locations at no additional cost. We were directed to a bus immediately across the street from the bus tour building so we hopped on and listened to the stories and information and saw a clean, beautiful and vibrant city. I made some notes on the tour map of places that might be fun to go back to.  After the first tour, nine points of interest, we decided to eat some authentic German food. We didn’t want to walk too far so we could get on the next route. Looking around we saw a Subway, a sign that indicated what was probably Lebanese cuisine, the Best Kebabs & Pizza in Munich, Ruff’s Burger and Taco Libre. Plenty of delicious looking ethnic food but no sign of any German fare. We opted for Taco Libre and split a carbonated lime drink and a scrumptious quesadilla for about $10.50. Disappointed but definitely satisfied.

The pedestrian area at Marienplatz

We saw the bus for the next tour and hopped on, plugged in our earphones and enjoyed the next sites. I had a couple of places marked on my map as we headed to the last stop before getting back to our starting point, Marienplatz. There was a very large pedestrian area busy with people walking and sitting under umbrellas in front of restaurants and cafes. We also saw a few German cuisine restaurants so I looked at Barb and we both agreed this was our stop. As we got off the bus Barb said the Viktualienmarkt, outdoor market, was in this area. We headed for what looked to be a bar with the front sliding doors wide open to a few tables in front looking onto the pedestrian area. As our luck would have it we were in a restaurant/bar that serves beer from the Paulaner brewery. I ordered a pilsner and Barb ordered a similar beer called the Furstenburg, she had to for our friend Ryan Furstenberg. As we drank the beer Barb turned on her cellular trying to locate the market and deduced it must be behind the huge building across the walkway and talked about making our way over there, after finishing our second beer.


As dinner time was upon us we went to one of the first German restaurants. It was busy with diners all sitting at long tables. With no hostess, find seats, ask if those spots are available and sit down. The harried smiling waitress rushed to our table and asked if we would like the English menu. She came back with it showing each item has a three digit number, placed a small pad and pen on the table and asked if we would write down our selection and she would be most grateful.


In short order we had our beers and no sooner toasted to our good fortune when the food was brought to the table, a plate of sauerkraut, boiled potatoes and five small “vurst” of different types and a basket of pretzels. The food was exactly what we wanted and it didn’t disappoint.

Rathaus-Glockenspiel

As we left the restaurant Barb pointed straight ahead of us across the pedestrian walkway and said the market should be somewhere in that direction. There were businesses and many people to our left and an old building to our right. We headed toward the right. We passed through some arches into a huge courtyard surrounded by large building one being the Rathaus-Glockenspiel. The building dates back to 1908 and every day at 1100 and 1300, dolls high up on the building, reenacts dances in tribute to a 16^th century Duke with a dance of hope and encouragement. There were many people and businesses and we saw the stairs for our train home. We meandered around down one street and another looking at people and the different stores. As we turned one corner we noticed tops of tents across the street from us. Barb said, correctly, “I think that is the market.” Although we had no idea exactly how we got there it turns out it was exactly on the other side of the building Barb initially indicated.
The market was quite large with many tents of merchants selling wine, cheese, flowers, produce, prepared foods from sushi to brats and beer. In the center of the market were huge chestnut trees and dozens of picnic tables with the backs of each bench seat abutted against the one behind it with rows in between sections of the benches.

The beer garden

I went to a small booth with the sign “Bier”. The building may have been 10’X15’ with a small gate and turnstile to direct the flow of customers. All the signs were in German but I was able to understand “.51 L ‎€ 3.9” over the first window and “1 L ‎€7.6” over the second. It wasn’t difficult because on the counter were glasses of beer of two different sizes. I picked up two of the half liter and moved to the third window with the man with a wooden change box on the counter quite worn from sliding change coins out for the many customers. He spoke to me in German, I handed him the ‎€ 10 he passed me my change and said “Danka”. There was always a line there every time we went to the market, sometimes with 8 people sometimes with 20, but it never took more than a few minutes before I walked away with my beer.


I found Barb at the table sitting next to some people with a scrumptious plate of food. We toasted to our good fortune and took a sip. There were hundreds of people sitting in and around the picnic tables, old, young, some dressed fancy, mostly dressed casually. Some had their meals served to them from the surrounding merchants, others brought Tupperware filled containers or pulled from plastic bags bought from a market merchant but almost everyone seemed to have beer. We loved it!

The beer festival

On one of our visits to the Viktualienmarkt beer garden, we sat next to a couple from Munich. Wolfgang and his wife lived near Viktualienmarkt and came to the market about 3 times a week. Over beers we talked history, politics, Germany and the US. They asked if we would like to go to a Wine festival. Of course! So the 4 of us left the beer garden for a short walk to the wine festival. The festival was packed. Wolfgang turned to us and asked if a beer festival would do. Of course! We took a bus and ended up under the famous Angel of Peace to a wonderful festival. More beer, German music, a good sized pretzel and we were enjoying the festivities. When it was time to go, Wolfgang and his wife accompanied us back to the train station. We said our goodbyes and headed back “home”.

To see more of our photos from Munich, click here for Barb's photo's.

Cheers!
John

Little Bear

We arrived in Munich at the main train station. Anna, our homeowner and Mom to Bear, met us. As we drove through the city, Anna pointed out several areas of interests. We were excited to explore Munich!

We arrived at Anna and Mat's home. It is a modern home in the suburbs of Munich. As we started up the stairs to drop off our backpacks in our room, we met Bear on the second floor. Bear is a petite, black kitty. She immediately came over to greet us and I immediately fell in love! Bear has a mild form of Hydrocephalus. Commonly known as water on the brain, Bear sometimes wobbles and loses balance, however, this actually makes her so endearing. She has the sweetest little meow and is just very affectionate.

That night, Anna and her husband Mat took us out for a traditional Bavarian dinner. The restaurant was right in the neighborhood and a nice stroll from the house. I had pork tenderloin and spaetzle, John had schnitzel with roasted potatoes. We ended up eating leftovers for the next 2 days! Wonderful!

The next morning Anna and Mat left on their motorbike for eastern Europe. John and I took the next 3 days to relax and spend time with Bear so she was comfortable with us and got used to us staying in her house. We all got along wonderfully!

We had 2 weeks in Munich and alternated days between staying at the house and venturing into the city. We'll have a post about the sights and sounds of Munich.

Bear was a delight to take care of. She took her beauty naps in the afternoon and in the evenings, John and I would play cards at the dining table while Bear would run up and down the stairs (yes, she may wobble but she is a streak going up and down the stairs!) and venture outside to the patio, always stopping over to the table for pets and scratches.

We had a wonderful time at Anna and Mat's. I'd like to think we made new friends who we would love to see again. That is the great thing about pet sitting, meeting wonderful people and experiencing different cultures.

Cheers!
Barb

Westerplatte

In 1939, 205 Polish defenders on the tiny peninsula of Westerplatte held off about 2600 Germans who attacked them from land, sea and air.

This was the invasion of Poland by Adolf Hitler and ignited World War II.

Guardhouse 1

 At 4:45 AM on September 1, 1939, the Germans opened fire on Westerplatte. The Germans initially thought this "skirmish" would be over in less than an hour. The Polish army was under orders to hold out for twelve hours until they were relieved, but relief never came. The Germans learned on day 1 how determined the Polish army was to maintain their ground at Westerplatte. The German marines attacked 4 times but failed to break through to the circle of reinforced guardhouses. 

Barracks

Over the next 6 days the Polish army held out at Westerplatte. Meanwhile Hitler invaded Poland in the north, south and west. On September 7, having fought for seven days against enormous odds, the Polish army surrendered.  Surprised at how few defenders there were, the German soldiers saluted them as they marched out into captivity and German General Eberhardt allowed Polish commander Major Sucharski to keep his saber, an extraordinary show of respect. 

Guardhouse 1

Westerplatte is now a memorial. Guardhouse 1, which was the key point of defence against the Germans  is intact with 2 shells from a Schleswig-Holstein ironically propping up the entrance. The inside provides representations of the interior.  The barracks is also "standing", reinforced so that visitors can tour the ruble. There are memorials to the soldiers that fought and died. It is well laid out and well worth of short trip from Gdansk (formally Danzig) to visit Westerplatte.

You can see more of my photos from Westerplatte here.

Barb