Maulbronn Monastery (Kloster)

We were in Maulbronn, a little town in the middle of no where Germany. The public transportation to Maulbronn was not every convenient. We had to take a train and a bus to get there. The bus didn't come very often either... it took us more then 2 hours to get home although it's not far from Stuttgart.

Maulbroon Monastery was a significant historical architecture site. It was designated a UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization) World Herrtage Site in 1993. It is just like the Pyramids of Gizeh, the Great Wall of China, or the Spanish Escorial.



Look at the color of trees in the picture. Don't you love fall. It's so beautiful.

Oktoberfest (Volkfest) in Stuttgart

It was like a big fair with "six flags" size of rides, many games for stuff animals, and traditional German junk food. Beer tents were as big as a football field with a live band on the stage in each tent. We got there early Saturday afternoon...not many people...empty tables were everywhere. We met up with Josh's work friends in the mid-afternoon. By evening, there were more friends showed up and the beer tent was entirely packed. Live music never stopped and cheers songs was sang in every other song. Whenever the song ("cheers" - Prost in German) was sang, people lifted up their beers and drank. The atmosphere was high and super happy. We cheered with friends and strangers whoever happened to be at the next table. Everyone was standing on the bench... SUPER FUN!! We took a lot of pictures of us and friends...most of them were blurry and goofy... who wouldn't be after our brains and bodies' been soaked and marinated with beer for so many hours. It was super funny the next day when we looked at the pictures. Very good experience and somehow blurred memory.

Photo time

Back from Taiwan! It was a great time, but super hot.

On the left are some pictures from a very interesting day.

We spent the day touring Taiwan...from mountains to ocean....one hair-style to the next....dress after dress. Yes we participated in the Chinese wedding photo circus.

A whole street in Taipei dedicated to shops selling the whole package... dresses, make-up, tux, photographer...
...the end result. Two photo books, a 24" blow up picture, but best of all we get one super sized portrait....
The goal of the photographer was to get us to do as many ridiculous, funny, romantic...you name it...photos as possible so we would spend extra money...well we bought 33/ not bad for the whole circus day at about $600!

Along the way you get to see a parade of couples doing the 'circuit'. It was very funny! I think our photographer was pretty frustrated that I didnt speak Chinese. He had to hand signal my position :-)

Well, it was a LONG day, but pretty fun....and Ally looked pretty hot in all those outfits.

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3 Fs

What do Josh and Ally do in Taipei? The answer is "3 Fs - Family, Friend, and Food" We meet with family or friends for lunch, afternoon tea,snack, dinner, or after dinner snack. In the picture, Tony is my main contact with the college friends. He always contacted everyone and made reservation for the restaurant. This time, he was also a tour guide and photographer for Josh and I. We biked around Tam-Sui river and visited Guan-Tu Temple. As you can see the bike on the bottom left of the picture...Can you believe that I even got (rented) a pink bike... cool!

The tranditional antique Guan-Tu Temple... Don't you want to take a closer look yourself... It's really magnificent.

Ally's dad and mom at Taiwan Beer Brewery in Yi Lan. We took a day trip to the east coast of Taiwan and drove by the brewery. We couldn't actually see the beer making process but visited the souvenir store...and brewery memorial hall. It was interesting to know about Taiwan Beer's history.

Little sister

Well you would never guess from the way Celia eats that she only weights about 42KG! Here is her initiation to German cuisine at Lake Titisee in the Black Forest. We are not sure where the anger in this shot comes from, but that sausage is in BIG trouble!

Maybe she should buy a smaller one?

Actually, the bear is approximately the size of her luggage!

Here we all are! Just back from hiking. The scenery was great!

The Black Forest is lightly populated and has miles of trails that are very well marked.

By Josh

Hot, Cold, Hot, Cold...changed in seconds

Crisp air, brisk wind (felt warm to hot in an instant...then cold to freeze in the next few seconds), pricey (about 3X the continent)... that's Oslo Norway... but not all...there are ocean views, tons of art statues, and friendly English speaking Norwegian. Oslo is a surprising artistic city but doesn't have much of old town flavor like other cities we visited. A couple places that we loved the most this trip were the home museum of Edvard Munch (famous paintings such as Scream and Sick Child) and the Vigelandsparken (Vigeland Park).
The park displays sculpture works by Gustav Vigeland whose form extra-
ordinary tableaux of fighting, play, and love. It's quite the opposite of Munch's paintings which were about sickness, jealousy, and death. We took a lot of pictures in the Vigeland Park...you can click on 'our photo to share' link to view them. They were incredible.

We also visited Nobel Peace Prize Center, Akershus Slott (castel), Vegeland Museum, and Oslo city hall where the Nobel Peace Prize is presented.

Great Seafood too!!!!!!!!!

Our Favorite City - Vienna continues...

They charged $$$ for visiting "Library"... we were like WHAT! LIBRARY? Then the ticket person offered us to take a peak from the library entry. As soon as we saw it, we were like...yeah we HAD to see this. Flash photography was not allowed so the picture is not very clear but you can get a feel of how beautiful it is. The showpiece of the Austrian National Library (1722-35) or Hall of Honor. The library turned out to be one of our favorite things in Vienna.

Stephansdom (Stephansplatz) - beautiful and interesting church where contained an impressive collection of works of art and buried many important bishops. We took a tour down to catacombs to see where they kept the jars of organs, coffins of bodies, and some public grave yards with exposed bodies. We could actually see piles of bones (not kidding.) Pretty creepy~


Schönburnn Palace and Gardens
We love the garden and zoo (just me) more than inside of the palace. Panda and koala bear are so cute...












We had some more chocolate desserts at the end of our second day...AND the next morning to finish the wonderful, beautiful and "sweet" Vienna trip.

Have I said enough beautiful yet? We love Vienna.