Elephant Parade

 

This week is the start of the Elephant parade in Luxembourg.  It is organized in effort to raise awareness of Asian elephant as an endangered species.  Many of these elephants are already sold.  So kids and I are always checking if an elephant is available, so we can buy one as well ;))

 

This was Carolyn's favorite.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cool artwork

 

Carolyn's second favorite.

 

 

I did try to look up the prices, just for the curiosity sake, but there was just a listing of agencies around the world responsible for the sales and promotions of these elephants.

 

And that is not all.  We are determined to see all that are here in Luxembourg.  Check in later for more pictures.

Just to share

1. They love our piñatas here.  We were blessed to make several friends here, so for one of the birthday party I made piñata.  It has a picture of Lillie Fee, the birthday girl's favorite character.

 

 

2. Luxembourg is not a true bicycle country like Holland / Netherlands, however they do try.  The city provides bicycles for rent. The first 30 min are free of charge and there are many stations where you can pick up and drop off your bike.  Here are some pictures.

 

This is a local "station".  Any location has about 15 bicycles.

 

 

The lock system.

 

Payment center on one side of the "checkout booth".

 

A map of the area on the other side.

 

 

 

 

 

 

3.  Ahhh, toilets.  If you travel from city to city and used public toilets, you know all the frustrations and discomforts.  Most of the time you have to pay to use the bathroom, around $1, unless you are in a mall.  Even some McDonalds, Burger Kings and other chains charge unless you buy their food, and even then not all are that generous.

 

However in this post I wanted to highlight the cool things I have discovered about European bathrooms.  They are not all the same but majority seem to offer.

 

So, first of all toilets have dual flash system, aka for # 1 and #2,  SAVE WATER ;))

 

 

Sanitizing gel dispenser, so you can clean your seat.

 

 

This is touch free trashcan.  One less thing you are touching :)

 

 

And this is not all about European toilets. More to come.



 



 

Six Countries in One Weekend

Actually, we drove through six countries in one day.  Before we get to those count of those countries, I would like to share our other purpose for travelling.  We wanted to visit the Neuschwanstein Castle, Germany.  I did not follow my gut and did not make any reservations for the tour, but if any of you reading this please do so.  It will save you a lot of time.  The castle is visited by some 1.4 million tourists each year, so as you can imagine the little town that sits around the castle is very busy.  There is a sufficient parking.  If you do not make reservations, you can walk up to the grounds of the castle and walk all around it and see the fabulous views.

This was the first view of the castle from the parking lot.

 

 

Several views of the little town nearby.

 

Hohenschwangau castle

 

More of the little town

 

A lake.

 

 

Since we did not make any reservations, we walked up the trail to the castle.  Kids did really good job walking with us.  Maybe the fact that our dog was walking with us kept them motivated.

 

Just wanted to make sure it is documented that I have been there, done that, and got the post card.

 

 

The grounds...

 

After our visit we headed to Imst, Austria, to ride the world longest coaster. However we have arrived too late, so we headed for our hotel.  It was so peaceful there!

 

 

 

 

Kids did some rock climbing in Austria!

 

My husband grew some hair!  There is something about the mountain air.

 

View from around the coaster.

 

Waiting for the coaster to open.

 

Testing out the seats.

 

These next two are for real.  We are about to ride 3.58 km, downhill, no brakes.

 

 

... just kidding, we had to use brakes.  Somebody in front of us were not up to brake free riding ;(((((

 

The ride was absolutely great.  Check out their website, just Google - Imst, Austria, Alpine coater.

 

So from there we headed out to  Liechtenstein.

 

Here is the candid pic from their local pizza place.  The country is so small, we just wanted to stop and catch some views before we passed it by.

 

Just one more proof, since I could not find a place that sold post cards.  But that is Europe on Sunday to you ;(((

 

Before we knew, we were crossing the bridge from Liechtenstein to Switzerland.

 

 

Some local views.

 

Zurich.

 

If you are counting with me, we have been in three countries just on Sunday before 2 o'clock.  The mountain region was breathtaking.  We will recommend to everybody to make a similar trip.

From then on, it was not much fun.  We crossed into Germany and a little while later into France, trying to return the rental car by 10pm (22:00).  We arrived in Lux by 21:30, just enough time for my husband to return the car.