Our trip to Salzburg went well with no problems on our Denver to Chicago to Munich flights.  We spent a couple of hours in Munich before driving to Salzburg where our fall 2013 European trip would officially begin with a return stay at the Hotel Sacher Salzburg which sits on the banks of the usually lovely Salzach River directly across from old town.  I say the usually lovely Salzach as it was not so lovely this time with the river running very high and with debris from the very heavy rains in the area.  Yes, we left flooding at home only to be with flooding on vacation.

We returned to Salzburg after having been here only 10 months ago because in November 2012, we had lousy weather, several key attractions were closed at that time and the summer gardens were long gone.  In addition to staying at the Sacher again which is a no-brainer very high quality repeat, we dined at L’Osteria, a very popular pasta and pizza place (also in 2012), Pizzeria il Centro on Linzergasse (tough to find casual places on a Sunday but the pizza was very good) and St. Peter.  St. Peter was a repeat from 2012 and claims to be the longest serving restaurant in Europe (since 803 CE) which I think means they could say longest serving in Europe and the US and Canada, and…

In addition to just touring around and enjoying the city, we visited Hellbrunn Palace with all of its crazy water features and its gardens, we traveled to Berchtesgarden (Germany), a small town about 30 minutes away through beautiful countryside, Hohenwerfen Fortress which dates to the 11th century and offers great views and a good tour, Liechtensteinklamm, a scenic area near St. Johann which includes a great hike through a canyon cut by glaciers that left high walls, narrow passages and a beautiful stream and falls.  We also re-visited Mirabell Gardens, this time with its beautiful floral displays, Kollegien Church (closed for restoration last year) and the gorgeous little town of Golling.  This downtown was so beautiful you could easily tell they did not have a Wal-Mart to ruin it.

We were fortunate to get a lot of touring in without losing much time to the intermittent heavy rains.  Next we will head for Bavaria.

In 1904 Robert Butchart built a cement plant among limestone deposits by the Tod Inlet on Victoria Island.  As the limestone deposits were consumed for the production of cement, Jennie Butchart planned to convert the area to create something of beauty from the exhausted limestone pit.  And that she did.  It is now apparently on the 1,000 Places to See Before You Die list.

That’s a good idea because amateur photographs never do a place like this justice.

Konnie and I left Seattle on August 27 after some recreation and work, including an evening with former Steamboat neighbors Mark and Bonnie Porter, for Victoria British Columbia.  We traveled via the Victoria Clipper (clippervacations.com), a pleasant two hour and 45 minutes sea voyage, with old travel friends Dave and Lisa Wangsness from the north Georgia mountains.

Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, is a lovely city and our mistake on this trip was not allowing enough time.  But then, we really didn’t have any more time with my having to prepare for work, our getting the house in Steamboat Springs ready for a bogus renter, my going to Indiana over Labor Day weekend and our upcoming departure for an 18 day trip to Europe.  So the Secret is that two full days is not nearly enough time for Victoria.  She needs more.

We toured the downtown, stayed at the Hotel Grand Pacific (hotelgrandpacific.com), visited the Royal BC Museum (royalbcmuseum.bc.ca), and dined at (in the order of how much I like them) 10 Acres, Catalano and The Black Olive.

We liked beautiful Victoria very much and will try to get back there soon.  Especially to see  The Butchart Gardens in a different season.  Butchart will receive its own post coming next.

We lingered awhile in Saint Louis before heading to Kansas City (thus a couple of Saint Louis pictures here).  Busch Stadium is beautiful and is, of course, downtown.  Add to its own beauty the view of the Arch from inside the stadium and you’ve got a superb ballpark experience.

Kauffman Stadium in Kansas City, on the other hand, has been our only stadium not in the downtown area or otherwise densely populated spot such as the Bronx.  We significantly prefer the former.  At 40 years old this year, they have done an outstanding job of maintaining and remodeling the facility so it doesn’t feel much different than the newest ones.  I’m just not a fan of the zillion acres of parking lots and no hotels or restaurants within walking distance.  The dispersion of traffic alone among the many parking facilities in the city locations is a major attribute of those parks.

The Royals were held to three hits and took a 9 to 1 shellacking at the hands of the Chicago White Sox but it was the fastest game of our six being played in under two and a half hours, i.e., the way it is supposed to be done.

That’s it for 2013.  Six games in six cities in seven days.  4,000 miles, two great grandmothers and 9 major league baseballs.  22 major league games together at 17 different stadiums, 25 baseballs and five theme parks in four years.  Oh yes, and about 35 days alone with my grandsons.  They’ve signed up for next year so more to come…

Ryan caught a batted ball on the fly in the right field bleachers during batting practice in Detroit.  As I am told, it was just under the top of the wall with no competition.  I did not see it but I paid close attention after that.  While I still played the fool by not toting around my 400 mm lense for a possible repeat, I did capture this sequence with my 270 lense from 300 feet away in Kansas City as I sat behind third base and he sat behind the 387 mark in the outfield.  I think you can see by a few of the faces and the outfielder who keeps Ryan in his vision that I was not the only one impressed

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Are you bored yet?  If not, you will be soon.  I stepped out last night to try to capture some shots of the Saint Louis Arch.  Here are a “few.”

Off to Saint Louis on June 20 to see the Cubs take on the Cards.  So far our moving the trip to June from the heat of July has worked perfectly.  It touched 90 on Thursday in Saint Louis but being a night game, the evening was perfect.

The Cards prevailed 6 to 1 in a game with no particular high points.  Busch Stadium is lovely with the added benefit of the Arch behind the outfield wall.  Ryan did nail his fourth ball of the trip on a toss from the Saint Louis third base coach.  Given that we sit behind the visitors dugout in visitor’s garb, the decision to toss the ball Ryan’s way elicited quite the negative reaction of the crowd as Ryan snared the toss in his Cubbies Cap.

Just a few shots from the evening.  Off to Kansas City for game 6 on Friday where the forecast includes a warning for “hot and humid conditions.”

Tuesday night after the Cincinnati game we headed to Oxford, Ohio, the home of the beautiful Miami University, where we spent the night in the lovely Elms Hotel.  Had I known that I would end up majoring in Business instead of Engineering, this would have been a logical place to go to school.

We went to Oxford to visit Betty Hofmann, Ryan’s and Logan’s  other great grandmother along with my Mother, Virginia Howell.  Betty lives in a very nice retirement community which I thought to be a perfect place for my Mother also but my pitch has not yet met with success.

Then on to my hometown of Liberty Indiana where the boys had lunch with my old friend Dale Cummins (aka Debbie Cummins of Facebook) at Liberty’s finest eating establishment, El Reparo, and then a tour of the high school gym to see where I spent my “glory” days of the 20th century.  My thanks to Christine Rude and Connie Rosenberger for helping us visit my past.  We spent the night at my Mother’s in New Castle Indiana where she has resided since leaving Liberty in 1968.

We left Toledo Tuesday morning after Monday evening’s game in Detroit and headed for Cincinnati with a multi-hour detour through New Castle Indiana where my Mother lives.  The detour saved Ryan and Logan from a trip down memory lane from both my Mother who grew up in Cincy and me who lived and went to school there for five years.

We arrived in time for batting practice but due to threatening weather, there was none.  So we had 90 minutes to watch the storm that surrounded us.  But the first thing we learned is that Great American Ball Park has itself confused with Yankee Stadium as it does have the second highest concession prices of any venue we have visited.  A bottle of water in Detroit was $3.75, $5.50 at GABP and $6 at Yankee on our last visit.

The mystery of the evening was how does a team throw 17 strikeouts, allow but 4 hits and manage to lose 4 to zip?  The Reds accomplished just that.  Ryan and Logan managed to leave with a ball each giving them each three for the trip.  A far cry from their 11 in 2011 but more than satisfying.  And we do have two games remaining.

After spending the night in lovely Oxford Ohio we visited their other maternal grandmother who will turn 85 soon.  With my Mother turning 88 soon, they are very fortunate to have had the opportunity to know that generation of their family.

Off to St. Louis on Thursday for the Cardinal Cub rivalry.  Can we have our fifth day of perfect baseball weather?

We were able to get into Detroit by lunch time and do a little exploring.  It is such a shame for the city to be in the condition it is.  It has much beauty in its buildings, plazas, small city park areas and the riverfront.  But also in the area are the boarded up buildings and abandoned lots overgrown with weeds.  And the big give away about the state of affairs in Detroit is the fact that many, many downtown traffic lights are set on yellow flashing lights during the weekday.

Comerica Park is lovely and ranks up there with my favorites.  It is tasteful with no advertising on the foul poles, much quieter music and less of the promotional hype that was absolutely constant in Cleveland.  Better food selection also including Mexican.  Unfortunately, the neighborhood in which it is located is absolutely dead.  None of the energy that accompanies all of the other downtown ballparks we have visited even though the energy level in Cleveland was a bit on the low side though nothing like Detroit.

We saw a good game with the Tigers prevailing 5 to 1 over the Orioles.  Ryan and Logan left with three balls including one caught on the fly in the right field bleachers during batting practice.  The temperature at game’s end was 68 degrees which was nearly 40 degrees cooler than the temperatures that pummeled us on the east coast in 2010 and 2011.

Three games down with three to go.  Off to Cincinnati for the Reds and Pirates with a detour to visit two great grandmothers.