A whirilwind visit from my sister Patty

The first 10 days of February flew by in a flash this year, thanks to a visit from my sister Patty and our attempt to show her as many sights during those 10 days as possible.

She arrived on Friday and we decided to introduce her to the Raclette tradition at dinner that night. After discovering Raclette on our trip to Luzern, Switzerland last year, it's quickly become a favorite.

On Saturday, we all headed to Rüdesheim for a walk around the city, festive Fasching lunch celebration and then a beautiful drive up the Rhine river as far as the Loreley monument and back. It was windy and quite cold but the sun was shining and the views were lovely. Sunday took us to Köln (Cologne) for a big Fasching parade that lasted for hours, with all kinds of floats, high school (gymnasium) groups, and lots of drunken revelers.

On Monday, Patty & I flew to Florence, Italy for a 3-day sister trip. Since our flight landed in Pisa, it was quite late by the time we got to Florence, so we went to dinner and walked around a bit. Tuesday was super-sight day, though, where we started early with sunrise at the Ponte Vecchio, toured the magnificent renaissance art in the Uffizi Museum, moved on to walk all 463 steps to the top of the Duomo, and saw the statue of David in all his glory. In addition, we walked all over the central part of the city, visiting the the Plazza della Repubblica, Plazza Santa Croce, Plazza Santa Maria Novella, Plazza della Signoria, passing the Bargello museum, and visiting the Ponte Vecchio again at sunset. We had a nice Italian dinner, some wine, and fell exhausted into our beds. We took in an outdoor market early Wednesday morning before the bus ride back to Pisa to fly home to Frankfurt.

Thursday found us in Frankfurt and, after an exciting trip to the grocery store, we took the UBahn downtown and caught the sights of the Romer, the Main river, and downtown Frankfurt. We found a traditional German restaurant for lunch, so Patty was sure to have schnitzel, spätzel, Frankfurter grün sauce, German beer, and kartoffel puffers (potato pancakes) during her German stay.

Friday we left the house at 4:15 in the morning, with DD#1, to catch a bus to Poland with the American Women's Club. We stopped in Seiffen to shop for traditional German Christmas decorations including nutcrackers and pyramids, and then continued on to Poland. We hit a couple of potter shops on Friday night, before checking into our castle hotel for dinner and rest. Saturday was one pottery shop after another but everyone had fun finding bargains. We had a late lunch in a traditional Polish restaurant, stopped at a crystal factory and headed home, getting back at about 2 a.m. This made is somewhat painful to get up and get Patty packed on Sunday morning, to have her to the airport by 10:30, but it was well worth it.

It was a busy week with lots of sights, but hopefully she enjoyed her visit and had so much fun she didn't worry too much about the craziness of moving, buying and selling houses, and getting her life organized at home - all that was waiting for her on her return the the U.S. The visit was a bit of a blur, but fortunately we have good pictures to remember it by.