Lost Maples

This last week we went to Lost Maples, a state natural area northwest of San Antonio. This park is one of the few places where you can enjoy true fall colors in Texas.
The timing was absolutely perfect; all trees were in their prime time for full color.



The park itself is very small so we got to hike the whole thing within a day but it had a clear water river running through which made it very enjoyable.

Halloween

My favorite thing about Halloween is handing out candy to the little kids. Our neighborhood is so full of little tinies and they all come looking for candy all night long. So fun!

After that was over we went to a friend's house to celebrate! Believe it or not, this Halloween was the very first time I actually dressed up! Some last minute brainstorming and I turned into a pretty butterfly with a tennis player by my side. Look at those sexy socks!

Texas Hidden Wonders

A couple of weekends ago we went for a drive to Inks Lake State Park and to our surprise it was so fun! We got to watch a beautiful sunset and enjoy the pretty scenery all to ourselves.

See if you can find Tica on this picture:


We even got to see a pretty cardinal, a fun treat we get to hear every morning.


After being in Texas for 3 years we finally decided it was time to branch out and enjoy more of the Texas wilderness. Stay tuned for more parks' posts to come.

No Basement in The Alamo

This weekend found us in San Antonio at our Company picnic. We packed everyone from the image below (Jess, Steve, Me, Tica, Ricardo, Sylvia, & Gerardo) into the StolpeMobile at 9:30 in the morning and headed out.

At most companies this would have been a very boring affair, but not with NI. They rented out the entire Six Flags in San Antonio for employees and their friends/family only. The cost was $5 per employee and included the rides, lunch, and all the fountain drinks you could down in an 8 hour period.

To say it was awesome would be a gross understatement – especially when you take into account the longest line I waited in for any ride was 15 minutes and that was only because I insisted on riding in the very front. (I wanted to see the “super drop” on the Superman roller coaster from the front.) Here’s a picture of Tica with the "super drop" in the background.

It was really fun knowing pretty much everyone at the park, drinking way too much PowerAde and Diet Coke while riding 12 roller coasters in less than 6 hours! Though it's sad that I’ll never be able to go to another amusement park again because now I have experienced life without lines and can never go back to the drudgery of waiting.

Finally, no trip to San Antonio would be complete without stopping by The Alamo. We headed there after the park, found there to be no basement, and finished off the evening at a Mexican restaurant on the River Walk.

Just Say No to Hurricanes

So, by now, I'll assume you've heard that hurricane Ike WAS going to hit Austin, but missed us completely. I guess that's OK considering the damage it caused to the other places it hit, but Tica and I were really looking forward to the rain. Plus, if it hit us, that would have been the second time Tica was hit by Ike since she met up with him while she was in the DR last week.

So since there was no hurricane to deal with I decided to work on the side yard a bit more. Last week I rented a bob cat and my friend Steve and I dug up about 40 200 - 300 pound boulders to level out the wash area next to the side of my house. Here's a photo of the work. I'm still planning on putting a little more top soil on the dirt area you see in the picture and planting some grass seed. Tica's still not convinced that the grass seed will work - even after seeing Mom's success with it.

After the yard work, we had some friends over to the house for some arepas - a very delicious Venezuelan dish that one of our friends from work made. They were amazing! I was going to include a photo of them, but they were eaten way too quickly for any photography.

We also took the time to visit the Oasis restaurant on Lake Travis. It's a pretty cool spot that sits up on some cliffs above the lake and provides some amazing views of the sunset. In fact, you could say that it is the #1 restaurant to view sunsets in Austin.

We still had the remenants of Ike hanging around, so we didn't get to see too much of the sunset, but it was still very pretty.

18th Annual Hot Sauce Festival in Austin

Ausin is a city that is well known for it's eccentric nature. In fact, I'd say that the city motto or slogan could be summed up in a phrase that is commonly heard and even found on T-Shirts in Austin: "Keep Austin Weird"

One of the many ways Austin keeps itself weird is through it's many festivals and happenings. From Blues on the Green, a free blues concert every Wednesday in the summer, to the Austin Bat Festival, celebrating the nearly 1 million bats under the Congress Ave bridge.

Today Tica and I volunteered at the Austin Hot Sauce Festival, which includes hot sauce entries from local kitchens, companies, and individuals alike from around Texas. We worked the hot sauce tasting tent where there were hundreds of different types of salsa and sauce. For payment we got to taste all of the salsa without waiting in the sun in the 1.5 hour line. Plus we got some really snazzy T-Shirts to boot. The salsa was awesome, and the bands playing were all pretty cool, which made for a very cool (yet really hot) day.

Yosemite

Sorry it’s been so long since our last post. It’s easy to get distracted with other things, like planning our next trip!
We just came back from a 6 day hiking trip in Yosemite National Park. We convinced some of our friends from Texas to come with us and ended up hiking a little more than 61 miles. The trip was so fun and everyone did really well even though it was their first time on a multi-day hiking trip.

Here is a brief recount of the trip:
The first day we visited the Mariposa Grove which has lots of Giant Sequoias. Arves’ favorite trees just in case you can’t tell from the picture.

This picture helps a bit with perspective on the massive size of these trees.


We also walked through Yosemite Valley and got to appreciate how crowded this area of the park is.

Now for the hike, we started and ended at Mono Meadows and had two major highlights: Red Peak Pass on day 2 and Half Dome on day 5.

Map overview


Day 1 – 14 miles through dusty and sandy trails
Still fresh at the starting point.

The first river crossing - Nice cold water on the feet

This was one of our longer days and we were all ready to be done. We camped at Upper Merced Pass Lake. Nothing like a nice ice cold bath after long day of hiking. This was our every day ritual.


Day 2 – Up to Red Peak Pass
Our climb started at 8900ft going up to Lower Ottoway Lake. Beautiful place for a rest


The climb went up to 11,180ft to Red Peak Pass with several glacier lakes along the way which made the climb all that more enjoyable.

The climb approaching the pass was very very steep.

We started to walk through some patches of snow but had no idea what was coming after the pass. Just like it was steep on the way up it was super steep on the way down and covered in snow. We had to go straight down!

The pass was beautiful and the frozen streams made it look even better. I loved it!

Camp #2 at Red Devil Lake.

Day 3 – Todo lo que sube tiene que caer
This day was mostly down with pretty green meadows and clear water lakes and streams

View from the camp that morning at Washburn Lake

Day 4 – Approaching the Valley
This was an easy day with amazing views of Yosemite Valley from the top of the mountains. We camped at the junction with the John Muir Trail and Clouds Rest Trail. It wasn’t our favorite campsite but it was still really pretty and gave us a great start for Half Dome.

Day 5 – Half Dome summit
Early rise to beat the crowds at the top of Half Dome. The views of the Dome were spectacular and we kept wondering if it was as steep as it looked. Little did we know…


Here is the easy part of the climb. The little hump to the right of the top.


Still smiling after the easy part was over


It took me some time to believe I could do it but here is the proof, We made it!!



We all made it up


This was no camera trick; it was straight up and down.




The last night’s feast.

Riding for Multiple Sclerosis

One of Austin's most popular activities is road biking because of great weather, good roads, and beutiful hill country. This year we're getting ready to ride 150 miles for Multiple Sclerosis in the BP MS 150. We get to ride with 12,000 people from Houston to Austin to help raise money and awareness for Multiple Sclerosis.

We have a goal of raising $1,000.00 this year. If you would like to donate to the cause, you can do so by going to this site.

Here are some pictures from last year's ride.

The Long Awaited Germania Trip

I recently had the opportunity to travel to Germany for work for a week, and took an extra day or two to check out what I’d been missing by not living there.

Here's a list of my observations: Lets do it by the numbers this time:

18 - Times I joked about US currency being worthless (1.5 dollars – 1 euro)

18 - Times that german people laughed at that joke.

1 –Total number of times people from the US laughed at said joke.

5 - Germans who yelled at me for some reason or another - usually for making them late for something. They seem obsessed with being on time!

13 – Germans who seemed suspicious when I told them I didn’t speak German


2.5 – Number of kilometers walked while dragging my suitcase around Garmisch looking for my hotel
1 – number of giant lego men I found to hold hands with while searching for my hotel


92 – number of minutes spent looking at the mountains from the patio of my hotel room. I really miss the mountains.


800 - average millisecond delay between housekeeping knocking on the door and housekeeping kicking the door in

2 - number of times this happened while I was in a towel

23 – Number of trains ridden

5 - Kick-butt EuroMullets(tm) spotted on the train

64 - Minutes I slept in incredibly awkward positions on said trains

200 – Number of wrinkles in my dress shirt for sales visits – No irons in German hotels ☹.

3 – Number of castles visited


27 - Number of David Hasselhoff jokes made by me and B-Mac - for some reason Germans actually like his music!

22 - Meals consumed that centered on the theme of "Pork, Dumpling and Gravy"


1 – Number of times I had pork chops garnished with bacon slices

0 – Number of times I regretted eating bacon covered pork chops

11 – Hours spent watching co-workers consume large amounts of German beer in bier gartens


6 – Average number of coworkers per day I mocked for having a “tough time” after said hours

5 – The cost in dollars for .2 liters of "Coke Lite" (that's 6.7 fluid ounces for you US types).

6 – Average number of coworkers per day that mocked me for paying 10x more for Coke than they paid for beer

2000 – Number of square miles of fields that would be perfect for playing croquet or frizbee


1 – Days spent skiing on the Austrian/German border

8 - Number of "Schlepp Lifts" (Translated "Hauling Lifts") at the Zugspitz Ski resort, which operated by slipping behind one's butt and schlepping you up the hill.

2 - Number of times I failed epically at the Schlep lift by falling off

300 – Average number of feet I was dragged up the mountain on my stomach after falling from the lift - I refused to let go!


0 – Number of trees at the ski resort


9 - Seconds that I rode on a pig statue for a picture before being asked by a stranger "Are you from Texas?" and begrudgingly admitting "yes". I think it was the triumphant "yee-haw" that gave me away!

80 – Percentage of buildings in Munich that were destroyed in the war

1 – Rebuilt and most amazing town hall – complete with clock and glockenspiel


11 – My shoe size

11 – Apparent size of the “devil’s foot print” in the Munich Frauenkirche– draw your own conclusions
9 - Times a member of our party was clipped, hit, or yelled at by a bicyclist. It’s tough when you are only used to dodging cars to avoid trains and bicycles – it’s like frogger on steroids.

6 - Average number of TV channels that turn into porn channels after midnight.

9 - Number of movies I watched on my laptop between the hours of midnight and 3:00 AM

19% - Sales Tax rate in Germany. No lie.

18 - Number of billboards spotted that wouldn't go over well in the US. Yes, that's a blue condom on a lemon.

38 - Hours spent traveling home from Munich. Thank you, Delta, for losing our pilots.

8 – Krystals (bite sized burgers) consumed in the Atlanta airport while waiting for pilots.

1 - bird hit by our airplane on the approach into Austin

9.5 - On a scale of 1 to Awesome, the rating of my trip in its entirety – Thanks Germany!