The Rodents have landed in the UK

The ferry was really fun. The hard part was the disembarkation! For some reason the British immigration was checking everybody's passports, so it was a really long disembarkation.

Then, we waited around for the rental car girl to pick us up. She showed up in a brand new Transit van they just got, because they didn't have our car yet. We made it to the rental car place, and got the Ford Mondeo, and headed to York.

After a few mis-turns and fits and starts with the stick shift in the wrong hand, we made it to Mrs. Kay's house. Len joined us soon afterwords. After several cups of tea, we had cheese toast for lunch.

Mrs. Kay looks great and she says she feels great too. And, Len is his usual friendly self. He helped us change to a smaller automatic vehicle for tomorrow. Mrs. Kay drove us around to get medicine for Mom's cough, then took us by the hotel very close to her house, where she got us an excellent room rate.

After we came back from the chemists, we watched a cheesy reality show called "Coach Trip", and then Kay fixed us a dinner of gammon, sweet corn, brocoli and potatoes, and we had strawberry with evaporated cream for dessert.

After dessert, time to go to the hotel. After struggling with WiFi, here we are on line!

Aboard PRIDE OF ROTTERDAM

Today was an intensive travel day!  We left the hotel in Hannover, searched for a market to purchase some goodies for Pop, then drove. A simple four hour drive turned into a nightmarish six hour drive! We left Hannover at 10 and arrived in Rotterdam at 5:15. We stopped for gas about five minutes before we dropped the Insight off. We took a taxi to the Europort.

We are now onboard "Pride of Rotterdam" waiting to see when the buffet opens for dinner.


At 2100, we sail to Hull, England, arriving at 0800.   A very pleasant an efficient way to make the trip.

We will then pick up our rental car and drive to our most excellent friend Mrs. Kay's house!

We ate at the Four Seasons Buffett aboard the "Pride of Rotterdam" tonight. It was like an onboard ship version of Hometown Buffet, but a bit different. We had salad, cheese, crackers and bread to start dinner.

Then Mom and I had roasted meat, potatoes, apple and mint sauce, and water to drink with the meal. Then we had dessert! First we had a sticky toffee pudding which was extremely delicious! Next we had honeycomb swirl ice cream, which was like a caramel-vanilla ice cream!

So far the ferry has been quite an experience, an unforgettable one (In a good way), at that!

Addendum to trip report: We ate and drank our mineral water, and butter cookies like kings, thanks to Heidi and her full bag of goodies!

A couple extra pictures from Autostadt!

Here are a couple of pictures we could not fit in the previous posting.  The first is Dru near the Easter Egg and the second is the towers of finished cars!

The Autostadt in Wolfsburg and other cool places

Today was an extremely early wake up day! We woke up at 0630 local time, and got ready to go downstairs to breakfast. It was jam packed this morning! We ate our usual bacon, tomato, mushroom, and roll quickly, so we could start on the road to Autostadt.

We needed to be on the road before 8, as it was approximately an hour drive. Autostadt stated that the factory tours were one time a day at 9:15, and the seats were limited! And we wanted to be the lucky ones!

We were making really great time until we were about 10 minutes from Autostadt. Then, we sat in traffic, for about 20 minutes. As we saw the hope of getting on the factory tour vanish, we decided our favorite McCafe, and have a coffee instead of fretting in line.

After we left the McCafe, we decided to go the opposite direction of the Autostadt, and we found a back way! We arrived at the Autostadt at 10 o'clock, instead of 8:50 as we had planned.

The Autostadt is in Wolfsburg, and it is where Volkswagen produces the Golf VI, Tiguan, and Polo, and has exhibits, museums, restaurants, beautiful architecture and landscaping! Mostly centered around cars of course.

As we entered the main lobby, we went to the exhibit upstairs, where they had a prototype of a Golf VI. It was tricky, because it looked exactly the car on one side, but it was the life-size clay model wrapped in a foil, it was amazing!

The employee kept telling people not to touch the clay because it would wear away, but she directed us to a 1/4 size model which we could touch, the clay felt waxy and very hard. There was a working model of a milling machine, carving a car like lump of clay into a Golf VI. So neat!

We went through all of those exhibits, and we decided to walk across to see the Volkswagen Pavilion. On our left, there was a little tram in a station, and the signs said "WerksTour" here. That meant Factory Tour! And they left every half an hour! Yay! We could go on the tour after all!

This little tram had about four cars attached to it, and drove across the compound to the Golf VI assembly line! You actually drove right through the factory and saw the cars being made! We saw one with a right hand drive, but most of the Golfs were left hand drive.

We then toured the Volkswagen Pavilion, the Audi Pavilion, the Skoda Pavilion, and the Lamborghini Pavilion.

For lunch we ate at the pizza restaurant, and met a nice father and his son, Marco and Isaiah. Marco works for Honeywell, and he tests superchargers on Volkswagens.

After lunch Jack toured the ZeitHaus, while Mom sat on a bench and looked around in the shops. The ZeitHaus is a Volkswagen museum, with hundreds of cars and motorbikes, but Jack noticed a glaring omission. The VW Thing was missing from the collection! There is an empty space though, maybe for the Thing?

After all our touring, we decided to have an ice cream and a cappuccino, and then we were on our way home. No traffic this time, we were home in an hour! Back to our hotel room, and instead of going down to eat, we ate butter cookies with Nutella, courtesy of Heidi!

We will pack our things tonight, and tomorrow we will be off to return our car in Rotterdam, and be on the overnight Ferry to Hull, England, for the next portion of our journey!

The Lipizzaners of Buckeburg

Today we started with breakfast downstairs, we had rolls, Jack had Nutella, bacon, mushrooms, and baked tomatoes, and Mom had cherry jam on her roll. About 0930, we jumped in the car, set the GPS for Buckeburg, and off we went.

There is a big huge castle complex there that we toured around, complete with canal and ducks! Mom took lots of duck pictures for some reason. While we were waiting for the horse show, we toured the stables, probably about 7 horses live there. Lusitanos, Lippazauns, Barb, and one mini horse with huge mane hair, his name is Jack Sparrow.

As we walked along the ground, we came upon the Park-Cafe, and we decided to eat lunch there. Jack had two Bratwurts and Pomme Fritz, and Mom had potato soup. It was very delicious!

The show started at 1500, and we were able to enter at about 1445. It was cold outside, about 50 degrees, but much warmer inside. They had some blower unit that blew heated air under the wooden theatre seats.

The show started, and they talked a lot, but we didn't understand most of it, because they spoke in German. We understood only one word out of two hundred perhaps, if we were lucky. But when the horses started to perform, we didn't need to understand what the trainers were saying, we just kind of understood what they were doing.

It was amazing how the horses could move their bodies into the air. Mom was concerned that the male trainer was using his spurs too much. I didn't think so though, because I could see he was doing it gently and not roughly, and only in conjunction with a slight tap from the whip when the horse didn't listen.

We got back to the hotel at 1730 local time, and went up to to the room and chilled for a bit, before going down to dinner at 1840. Both of us ordered the cheeseburgers, and we decided to splurge on dessert, but it was not worth the splurge. The dessert was called "Crepes Normandie", but actually should have been "Crepe Normandie" with 8 apple slices. Oh well, at least we didn't stuff ourselves!  Off to Wolfsburg tomorrow to see the Autostadt!  Then, we have to figure out how to get to York!

Hannover and the Pony Flu!

We got up at about 0900, Mom's pony flu returned, and her right eye was red, swollen and weeping. She only wanted to crawl back in bed, but the hotel was full, and they needed our room. We sat at the computer, and developed a new plan; Operation Hannover.

Our plan was to find a hotel on the outskirts, and use it as our base for the next three days. We're planning on seeing the the Autostadt at Wolfsburg. We found the Radisson Blu, in an industrial area, very, very close to the biggest convention center we have ever seen. We got a great deal, because they were basically empty on the weekends, free breakfast, free internet, and free parking included.

We left Hamburg at 1130, fired up the GPS, and pointed the Insight towards Hannover. The countryside changed a bit, with large freshly plowed fields, surrounded by leafless tress.

We were searching for a McCafe, because we had been told that they had free internet. This proved not to be the case, and we decided just to wait until we checked into the hotel before we used the internet. Besides, everybody at home was asleep.

As we headed in to the parking lot, we saw a very good omen, an olive green VW Thing pulled up and parked. The McDonald's here are always packed with people, just like this one. Lucky for us, a couple left the comfy McCafe chairs and we sat down. Mom took a picture of the food that we had, as she always does.

Next, on to Hannover. We drove by our hotel first, then decided to keep driving around. The convention area here is really interesting, with very modern architecture. It even has it's own heliport. There is small housing area next to it, where somebody has a sense of humor, regarding their satellite dish.

We drove back to the hotel, and checked in. We went up to our room, and we couldn't turn on any lights or turn on the air conditioning.. Mom then found out that the card reader inside the door was for us to put our room key in, so that we turn on the air conditioning and all of the lights.

Jack played around on the internet for a while, while we downloaded our pictures, then we headed down to the restaurant downstairs in the hotel for dinner. Jack had, you'll never guess, a hamburger and fries, while Mom had a Caesar salad with chicken and bacon slices. Which turned out to be anchovy slices when she held our table candle next to it. We shared a bottle of mineral water, and had cappuccinos and cookies for dessert.

We found that there may be a place in Bueckeburg, about an hour away from Hannover, which has Royal Lipizzaner like horse shows, we are going to try to check it out tomorrow.

Farewell for now to Mad and Mrs. Uek and on to Hamburg, sort of anyway!

I was the first one downstairs at ten minutes to 8, Mad Uek was down shortly afterwards and started making the coffee. He fixed a breakfast of sliced fresh mozzarella, sliced tomato, basil, and balsamic vinegar. We had fresh rolls again, an assortment, warmed in the oven, accompanied by salami, sliced turkey breast, pesto cheese, swiss cheese, gooseberry jam, quark cheese, and Nutella! We talked about our day yesterday, Mad Uek burned his F-4 videos to DVD for me.

Heidi fixed us a big bag of bottled water, cookies, and Nutella! We told them we would see them in May when they visit San Diego, and off we zoomed! Many hours later, we made it to Hamburg, thinking we would zip into the hotel, drop off our bags, and go to the Miniatur Wunderland.

Alas, it was not to be! For road construction, one way streets, closed streets, and confusing GPS instructions hindered us from reaching our hotel until 1730. So, we decided to the Miniatur Wunderland first. It was huge and amazing, and utterly fantastic!

Then, after the rush hour traffic had died a bit, we set off for our hotel once again, with some traffic still on the road. However, we did this time, finally navigate the obstacles to arrive at our hotel at 1730. We had dinner in the hotel pub. 

I had a Holiday Inn Burger, and Mom had the Gratiniertes Wurzfleisch, and it was cream soup with chicken, onions, mushrooms and cheese broiled on top served with lemon. 

Since we came back up to the room, we have been hearing thunder and lightning!

Fantastic Day in and around Wittmund

I got up this morning at 0752 local time! Mom and I are staying for a day or two at the Uekermanns' residence. This morning, I got up and took a shower, changing into my day clothes, and I was very excited! For today we would visit JG-71 at Wittmund AB, the last German squadron to fly the F-4 Squadron in northern Europe!

At 815, Mad Uek, Mom and I went to the Market to purchase cheese, bread and other things for our German breakfast! Then we headed back, had breakfast with the Uekermanns', which for me consisted of scrambled eggs, cheese, and bread, with Nutella, a chocolate-nut based spread!

Then after talking over our plans for the day, we did a short stop at Witmmund, to see the Tradition Room, where they had WWI, WWII and post WWII JG-71 memorabilia, which was very interesting.

Then we headed to the coastline to see the North Sea and saw the fishing town, and looked at the pumping station that pumps water from the river into the North Sea, and the floodgates that close when the harbor floods.

After that, we went back down to Wittmund, and visited JG-71, getting to go into the squadron building and see the operations center, and meet the Wing Commander and the schedulers. We had coffee and ice cream in the pilot's lounge! Then we met some of the pilots, and went on down to watch the F-4s take off.

We watched them do their thing Then we went back to the base, where Mad Uek called the simulator people, and they said that I might get to fly in the F-4F ICE simulator, which would be really nice! I wasn't counting on it though. He came back to us and said that I would get a chance to get into the simulator later!, then we headed to a German snack bar and ordered curryhurst, which is cut up sausages with curry and fries alongside.

When we got back, we got our base passes and made a beeline to the simulator, where we waited for the B-Course (Basic Course) pilot to finish his checkride in the simulator! Then, Mad Uek and I hopped in, I at the front, and Mad Uek in the rear. I did the whole flight from take off the landing, did several approaches and acrobatics, without crashing once!

For a 14Mb movie of Jack in the SIM, click here (m4v)
For a 38Mb movie of Jack in the SIM, click here (m4v)

This is the sim that the German pilots use to qualify on the F-4F Phantom! It was a rare opportunity!

We then went out to watch the F-4s at night, which with their afterburner was really impressive! After watching the 6 take off, we went out to a cafe to eat "Spagetti Ice Cream" Which is ice cream in noodle form, like the dinner dish! After dessert, we went back home, and have been watching F-4 movies ever since!.

Fliegerhorst Wittmundhafen

Fliegerhorst Wittmundhafen - Wittmundhafen Air Base - Home of Jagdgeschwader 71 "Richthofen" (JG 71) 71st Fighter Wing of the German Air Force.

JG71 is the last German Air Force unit flying the ICE II F-4F, the apex of Phantom development.  This is the unit that Hap converted to the F-4 some 35 years ago.  Time flys and so does the Phantom!  Note the green arrow at the right side of the picture, that is us on the way out!

From Jack - I just came back from Wittmundhafen, where we witnessed F-4 day take offs and landings! Mad Uek was able to get me into the simulator for an hour, and we mostly worked on approaches and acrobatics, and flying based on radar vectors! Mad Uek says that I have the feeling, the speed control, and that my landings and touch and goes were almost perfect!

He says that it's basically like the real thing, except in the slow speed handling! But other than that, I've basically flown an F-4! I think I get an honorary F-4 Phantom Driver patch.  I feel the need for speed!

We're going out now, catch you on iChat!

On the Continent and headed towards Mad and Mrs. Uek!

We landed at Schiphol after our flight, made it through Customs and Immigration.  We got a bit of sleep, so we don't feel all that bad.  Our Prius turned out to be a Honda Insight, more on that later.  We remembered to turn on Spot when we stopped for food, so we are now live.  So far we have seen a VW Thing in a accident (arrgh!) and a horse farm (yeah!).  We crossed into Germany at 1724L.

We made it to the Ueks right on schedule (revised, of course) at 1606L.  We are 8 hours ahead of California.  The Ueks have a beautiful home, more on that later.  And, as we came into the living room a German F-4 flew over.  Good omen.  Off to dinner!  More later.

Airborne!

1926 CDT - The intrepid pair are airborne enroute to Amsterdam.  ETA Schiphol 1042L on Wednesday.  An hour or so to make it through Customs and Immigration, then another hour or so to get the car and off to see Mad Uek and Heidi.  Should be with them by 1730L.

On board, but not yet under power!

After a mechanical delay, we are onboard at 1800 in seats 6A (Dru) and 7A (Jack).  Woot!  But, not under power, turns out there is a problem with the oxygen system not holding pressure.  But, we are onboard.  

Right now we are delayed until 1900.  Continental has great maintenance and we are at the Big Hub on the Ground of the Big System of the Sky, so it can be fixed here.

More to follow!

Houston Intercontinental and Checked in

Our intrepid pair was able to check in at Houston Intercontinental.  First Class, no less.  That means The President's Club.  Woot!  Of course, if someone else comes, they get bumped to the back, but it looks like plenty of room on the Jet.  The Jet is a Boeing 767-400.  Always nice to fly Boeing!  Even nicer to be up front on one.

But, the midsized big Boeing is broken.  There is a maintenance delay from the scheduled 1540 to 1630; that means a scheduled arrival in Amsterdam of 0806 Wednesday morning.  Not so bad and at least the pair is in The President's Club.  More to come, keep the fingers crossed!

Entering and Departing Houston

We got into Houston Hobby at about 8:05 local time. We were picked up by a shuttle, which was a Lincoln Town Car which was very posh.

We arrived at the La Quinta at about 9:45 local time. We had dinner at the Kettle. I had a Burger and Mom had steak and green beans.

After having vanilla ice cream for dessert, we went back to the hotel and went to bed.

This morning after much preperation, we left the hotel and are now sitting inside Houston international waiting for the gate to open!

Houston, we have landed!

Even though we got out of San Diego a half hour late to accommodate passengers connecting from Sacramento, due to a low lying jetstream we got to Houston Hobby right on schedule.  It took a bit to join up with the limo driver, he was waiting at Baggage Claim and we weren't!

Anyway, into the Lincoln Town Car and off to La Quinta near Houston Intercontinental.  What a great ride!

Safely through the Gauntlet

1345L - KSAN - Safely through security.  Luckily we are leaving at Gate 1, the old Continental gate, which has its own security!

The Saga Begins at 1305L KSAN Time

Jack and Dru got out of the Black Ford at 1305L right in front of Southwest at KSAN (that would be Lindbergh Field in San Diego), giant wheelie, two carry ons and a computer case.  All under control, a comfortable two hours before takeoff.

They started off from home several hours before and spent the intervening time getting all the stuff they forgot (all they remembered, anyway).  Now, a nice two hour wait and off to Houston Hobby (KHOU) then a shuttle ride in a nice Lincoln Towncar to a La Quinta near Houston Intercontinental (KIAH) where they will spend the night.  With any luck, there will be a restaurant close by!  Then, tomorrow about 1500L, off to Amsterdam.  That is Amster…, not Hamster…

More as the situation develops.  And, if you see them in the wild, feel free to take a picture.  Unlike the "First Family", the Secret Service won't confiscate your camera.  Dru and Jack are just real people.

Why?

This is a long story, not so long, but pretty long!

Many years ago, Hap met Bob Denton while opening Donna Nook Range for the Royal Air Force.  Hap was the Third Air Force Range Officer, which made him the Royal Air Force Range officer.  The RAF had no range officers of their own, using Air Traffic Controllers for range controllers.  Bob Denton was the head Air Traffic Controller at the soon to be opened Donna Nook Range.  But, RAF procedures required a real or pilot range officer to open a range or change a target.  Thus did Bob and Hap meet in 1975 and kept in touch after they both left their respective air forces.

In 1992, Bob and his lovely wife Kay began the tradition of spending their yearly holiday in the states for the month of October.  Thus, they were there to greet young Jack when he came home from the hospital shortly after his birth day!  The holidays continued until Bob passed away.  Then, just Mrs. Kay came until she was no longer able to travel due to the need for dialysis.  During this time we became very good friends with Paul and Emma Langstaff, Mrs. Kay's son and daughter in law; then with their wonderful kids Jack (known as Jackal) and Eve.

The Langstaffs, who now live in Perth, Western Australia, came to visit in late spring / early summer 2009.  They asked if Jack could visit with them in Perth this summer.  Thus did Jack spend January 2010  in Perth.

Back off to Reno in September 2004, for the last of the German Air Force F-4s visit to the Reno Air Races.  Hap was convinced by Jon Proehl, a young kid (now the Wing Commander at Reno) to join him for the Air Races.  The trip was contingent on Jack getting a chance to sit in the front seat of an F-4.  An even longer story which resulted in us meeting Thorsten Uekermann, LTC GAF, the last commander of the German F-4 Fighter Weapons Unit.  Luckily for us LTC Uekermann has an easier name to remember Mad Uek.  The picture of Jack in the front of 174 was our Christmas card for 2004 and somehow we stayed in touch with Mad Uek from then on.

Jack has taken up riding, Dressage, English style, of all things.  An opportunity presented to go to the Spanish Riding School in Vienna.

The Langstaffs decided to visit Mrs. Kay at the start of April 2010.

Now, it all comes together.

Dru and Jack are leaving Monday 22 March 2010 on Southwest for Houston Hobby, there they will travel via ground transportation to Houston Intercontinental to hopefully travel on a Continental pass to Amsterdam and rent a car to travel to Northern Germany to visit with Mad Uek and his lovely wife Heidi.  Oh yes, and see the last German F-4s of JG-71, the unit Hap converted from the F-104 to the F-4 some 35 or so years ago.  Then, some time in Germany, maybe the Hotel Ibis where Dru spent Desert One.  Then, due to the horses of the Spanish Riding School having the Pony Flu and performances having been canceled, off to the UK to visit Mrs. Kay and the Langstaffs in York.  Then finally back home from England on Continental, and somehow home.

Three weeks of travel and adventure!