Final Comments

Hi Everyone!

This will most likely be the final blog. Today is humid and overcast. It is supposed to rain a lot this afternoon. Tomorrow hopefully everyone will pack and get organized for the flight home on Wednesday. Tuesday at 7:30 is our going away party at a place called the Central Station. It should last just 90 minutes to 2 hours.

We will arrive at the airport around 11 AM Frankfurt time (3 AM in Denver). After checking in, we will head to the security spot and go through the first area, where we can shop for awhile depending on how much time we have. Our flight (446) departs at 1:50 PM Frankfurt Time (5:50 AM in Denver). We hope that the food is better on the way home than it was on the way here.

I think that all of the kids have had a great experience and learned a lot of different things about Germany, the German culture, how to use public transportation, etc. I'm sure they will have a lot of things to tell everyone when they return.

Thanks for following our trip and reading the blog.

Vienna Final Day Pictures

Rachel on her way to the concert. She won the award for being the best dressed on that evening.
These are samples of the plaques around Vienna that show the names of victims of the Holocaust. It is meant to personalize the Holocaust instead of looking at large numbers. We saw these on our walking tour.

At the concert before it starte. Jon was shopping.

Riesenrad Pictures

The Kids inside Car #2 on the Vienna Ferris Wheel. Rachel added PHS GAPP to the list of Graffiti names of people who were there.
The view of the Amusement Park from above.

This car was about at the top when I took the picture.

Extra Pictures from Vienna

Here is a picture of the Gloriette at Schönbrunn Palace in Vienna.

One of Rembrandt's self Portraits that we saw at the Kunst Historisches Museum in Vienna.

The Return to Darmstadt

Hi Everyone!

We left the youth hostel at 7:30 this morning and got back to the train station in Darmstadt at 4:30. The trip went fine. It was long, but we made it home successfully. Ty leaves tomorrow and Monday and Tuesday the kids don't have school due to testing.

I'm going to relax and recover this evening. Maybe I will post the last pictures tomorrow. Our going away party is scheduled for Tuesday at 7:30.

Have a great weekend.

Friday-Vienna

Guten Abend!

Hi Everyone. We got home early tonight (11:00 PM)! Here's the recap of the day.

After breakfast this morning, we all went into town. Then the kids had free time do what they wanted to do. I needed to take care of buying tickets, getting money, etc. Rachel and Jessie went sightseeing and went to the opera house, the Naschmarkt (a flea market) and possibly some other places. The guys went to the palace Belvedere and saw an exhibit of Gustav Klimt (an artist) who Jon really likes.

I found out that the trip is really over, because after paying for the concert tickets tonight, I went to the bank to get out money off of the credit card. I have not been able to check the balance, so wasn't sure what was left. I had to adjust my amount of withdrawal several times until it was low enough to give us money. After giving everyone their food money for today and tomorrow, paying for the concert and the tour of the Jewish area, we have about 65 Euros left over.

We met at Stephensplatz at 12:45 and then walked to where our tour was starting. The tour was through the Jewish part of Vienna. The guide gave the tour in German and English. Most of the Jewish areas have been destroyed. Around the time Hitler came to power, there were about 200,000 Jews in Vienna (10% of the population). Today there are 17,000. While on the remembrance tour (called that because you see where certain places were), we saw a lot of Jewish people (they come from a lot of different countries). I learned today, that one of the musical Strauss had Jewish ancestry, but because he was a favorite of Hitler's, he didn't have any problems. Hitler had ALL of the paperwork destroyed that showed his Jewish heritage.

We came home for a brief hour. Then we left, had dinner at the Kurssalon, where we heard the concert. We choose a different place after consulting with the tourist info office this morning. it was fun and the program had a lot of Strauss and Mozart. The concert ended at about 10:15. We made our way home and I just checked to see if everyone is more or less packed for tomorrow morning's early departure.

I don't know when I will get pictures uploaded from today. Tomorrow we will travel all day and get to Darmstadt around 4:30 Pm and to our host families shortly thereafter.

Gute Nacht!

Thursday Write-up

Good Morning to all! It is 12:40 AM in Vienna. We just returned from the Amusement Park (Prater). This will be a short post because I am really tired tonight.

We started out by going to Schönbrunn palace. See the photos in the previous posts. We toured the palace (audio tour) and then went to the garden. We went to the Maze. Rachel got through it the fastest of anyone. The kids hung out in that area for awhile. We ate our lunch and as we were leaving the weather started getting colder and very windy.

Around 1:30 we went to the Kunst Historisches Museum (Art History Museum). We saw a lot of different artists, including Rembrandts. We headed back to the youth hostel for a break and to unload our purchases. The kids went swimming.

We went into town around 6:30 for dinner. We had a good authentic Austrian Meal. Ty had an amazing meal. We got to the amusement park around 9 PM. It is called Prater. The kids went on rides and we met at the Riesenrad (the big ferris wheel). We rode that (one rotation), spent money in the shop and headed home. We had to take two subways to get to our bus. Little did we know that the last bus to the youth hostel was leaving in 15 minutes.

Tomorrow the kids will go into town and have free time until around 12:30. We then will go on a tour of the Jewish sections of Vienna. Unfortunately, the Vienna Boy's Choir was sold out. Instead we will head back to Schönbrunn for a concert at 8:30 PM.

Vienna Day 3 Pictures

The Group at Schönbrunn Palace this morning.

Schönbrunn Palace.

The Gardens at Schönbrunn Palace.

Vienna Day 2 Pictures-round 2

Mr. Staubitz unsuccessfully directing the Vienna Symphony Orchestra.

Jessie with the waiter at the Italian Restaurant.

Watching another street performer in Vienna.

Vienna Day 2 Pictures

The crown from 1024/1025 at the Treasury Museum.

A street performer in downtown Vienna.

Arthur rolling the dice to compose his Waltz at the House of Music.

Vienna Day 1 Pictures

Damstadt Train station prior to departure.
Unfortunately, this is the castle next door to our hostel!
A view of our hostel from the back.

Wednesday

Wow in a week we will be almost in Denver! Hard to believe.

Today it was rainy when we started out. Jessie was elected to be our leader this morning and get us around via public transportation. She learned a lot and survived the experience. Arthur had the afternoon/evening slot for this activity.

We started out at the practice session for the Lippazaner horses. I have to admit it wasn't very exciting. We lasted about 30 minutes. I also found out that 2 kids have horse allergies. Oops!~

Afterwards we went to see the treasures of various empires. We saw a sabel from Charlemagne, a large cross that was made in 1024/1025. It was interesting. The kids picked out two items they liked and we went back through and looked at them. It was intersting to see what they chose.

After that we headed into the main square for some free time and lunch. Our lunch packets have 2 sandwiches, an apple, a drink and candy. They are pretty good.

I had to take care of some touristy things and met the kids at 1:30. We went into the cathedral, then the kids went up the stairs to have a view of Vienna. We watched some street performers and then headed to the House of Music. It has a lot of hands on things. For example, we could conduct the Vienna Symphony. Most of us failed miserably. If the symphony did not like your ability to virtually condut, they basically insulted you.

At 5:00, we ate at an Italian restaurant. We had the place to ourselves. One of the waiters really liked Jessie. She had her picture taken with him. He wanted us to come back tomorrow.

We headed back to the youth hostel and came across more street performers. We got back around 8 PM.

Tomorrow is a holiday. We will travel to the Schönbrunn Palace and the Art history Musuem.

Schlaf Gut!

Travel Day

Good Evening to All!

We met at the Darmstadt trainstation this morning at 9. Our first train left at 9:30. It was running a little late, but we had plenty of time before connecting in Frankfurt. Our trip from Frankfurt to Vienna was 7 hours. It was long and Mr. Staubitz informed us that with only two more hours of travel time, we could have been in Denver!

The man sitting at the table with Jessie, Rachel and Ty was very kind and put up with their rowdiness. He played cards with them and ate cookies he was offered. He will never view Leberwurst (liver sausage) the same after Ty's description of it looking like cat food.

We arrived in Vienna around 5:30, took the subway, then a bus to our youth hostel. The area is beautiful. I am not able to upload pictures on this computer, but hope to be able to somewhere tomorrow. We are overlooking Vienna and are in a forested area. It is a small youth hostel with pretty nice rooms.

We ate dinner at a restaurant near by. Arthur and Ty ordered Wiener Schitzel and it was HUGE. However, after eating soup and the massive Wienerschnitzel, Arthur was still hungry.

Tomorrow will be a full day of sightseeing. We will start out watching the Lippazaner horses. Then it is off to some museums, etc.

That's all for tonight.

Monday Update

Hi Everyone!

I am not uploading any pictures, because they will look like all of the school ones from last week. The kids all had a good weekend and did various things with their partners and host families. I went to a museum to see an exhibit on Masks that was quite interesting.

Yesterday, was the European Parliament Election that occurs every 5 years. I went with my host family to the polling place. They vote for a party, not a particular person. The ballot was interesting because there were about 20 some political parties listed. Here is a sampling: The CDU/CSU (republicans in nature), SPD (democrats), Die Linke (the leftist party), Die Grünen (The greens or environmental party) and then the not so common ones: The over 50 party, Newropa(new europe), the Violettes, The Grays, and my all time favorite the Pirates!!! The republicans won in Germany, with the democrats second, then the leftists, the FDP and the Greens rounded out the top parties. Only 5% voted for the "other" parties. All in all it was really interesting.


In Vienna I will try to update in the evenings after we get back from the day's activities. This will probably be between 10 PM and Midnight.

Vienna Travel Information

Tuesday, June 9th
9:00-9:10 Meet in the main hallway
9:30 Depart from Track 7 (Gleis 7) for Frankfurt (stay together as a group)
9:48 Arrive Frankfurt

10:21 Depart Track 12 with ICE train #25,
car 23 (seats 55, 56, 58, 93, 94, 96, 98)

17:22 Arrive at Vienna West Train Station

**************************************************

Saturday, June 13th
8:40 Depart Vienna West Train Station-Track 3
ICE Train #28 (Seats 55 and 93-98)
15:36 Arrive Frankfurt
16:06 Depart Frankfurt (RB)
16:25 Arrive Darmstadt (Track 10)

Seligenstadt 1

Today we took a train to the town of Seligenstadt. We met in Darmstadt at the main station at 8:15. It took about 45 minutes to get to the town. Here we are below arriving at the monastery. Mr. Lieb is leading the group!

This is a picture of the church and the monastery from the garden taken during our tour.

This is a style of architecture called Half-timbered houses or Fachwerkhouse. This was a building in the center of town.

Today we met at the train station in Darmstadt at 8:15 for our fieldtrip to the Monastery in Seligenstadt. We took a train to Babenhausen und transferred to another train. The trip took about 45 minutes. We had a 90 minute tour of the Monastery. Afterwards, everyone had a chance to walk around the town.

Seligenstadt 2

The students observing the mill. It is a working mill. We went inside and saw the rest of the area.

Jon Showing us how to use this gigantic hammer. The tour guide is in the background.

Here's Jan (Ty's partner) showing his ability to use the hammer.

After seeing the inside rooms of the monastery, students had about 3 hours to walk around the town of Seligenstadt and also get lunch. There is also a very good ice cream shop near the monastery that most seemed to find without much of a problem.

We returned on the train around 4 PM in Darmstadt. The students now have the weekend to spend with their host families and partners. I will see them Monday morning when we meet during 2nd period prior to our presentations.

Have a great weekend.

3rd School Day-Part 2

Jessie in a small group with 5th graders. Common questions are: Do you like Germany? Have you got a brother? What is your favorite color? However, the most popular question for each of the Americans is: Do you have a boyfriend/girlfriend? When they say no, they are asked if they want one. It has been quite entertaining with the younger students.

Rachel in a small group. The kids rotate from group to group after about 5 minutes. This allows the German kids to ask questions in a small group setting and have more personal contact with the PHS students.

During 3rd-4th today, we went to the train station to validate our Eurail passes. Tomorrow, we will use the passes to go to Seligenstadt. We leave on Tuesday for Vienna. The train Info is the same as what was posted earlier. However, our return times have changed and I will get everyone that info in the near future.

We are heading to the 10th grade classes and a 9th grade class in the next 3 class periods. Have a wonderful Thursday!

3rd School Day-Rock Stars in the Making!!

It all started in 1st period today. The girl's wanted Arthur to sign their bag that holds their pens and pencils. She then went around to the rest of the Americans (including Ms. Parsons) and asked for their signatures (aka-autographs).

Ty is with a small group of 6th graders. Yesterday he was asked about Music and then they wanted him to sing. Luckily, the class period ended before Ty had a chance to sing!!

This continued during the 2nd period class. However, it was on paper that they wanted the signatures. Arthur was the first to escape the classroom! All are impressed with Jon because A) he is a wrestler and B) he has seen Brad Pitt upclose and in person!

Group Picture

Here are the happy exchange students introducing themselves to a 5ht grade class.

2nd School Day

Hi Everyone!

Here are some pictures from school. Picture #1 is the courtyard and the backside of the school. The building is from around 1920's. It is 4 stories and slated to be renovated soon.

Picture #2 is a picture from the language activity run bz the 12th graders. The 12th graders run the activity and the little kids have to speak English with them. Picture 3 is Ty in a small group setting talking with kids. I will add one more picture on a second upload of the entire group. They did a good job today. We have 5 more presentations tomorrow and then during periods 3 and 4 we are heading to the train station to validate our Rail Passes for our first train ride on Friday. The weather is cool (upper 60's) but very nice.

Have a great day!

June 2

Guten Morgen!

I just finished meeting with the kids. All seemed rested and ready to go. The weekend was fine. Ty was away at a family get together. He said that he is in the "generations" picture for the family. Jessie was in Heidelberg and the other 3 were at the music festival in Darmstadt (Schlossgrabenfest). Today they are following their partners to their classes. Tomorrow they are giving presentations. I will try to upload photos tomorrow. Have a great day.#