Our little B&B. Can't recommend it highly enough. So nice.
The breakfast room. The 1878 house has been meticulously restored, but only its woodwork, some hardware, and this amazing chandelier are original. The place is stunning.
This little architectural gem was just around the corner from the B&B, and is the Ladies' Library, built in 1879 for the first women's club in Michigan (which was also the third in the U.S...!).
And now, the fun stuff!
After we met up with Greg so that Mike could try on his tux (...which actually fit!), it was off to the Kalamazoo Air Zoo for us. I figured it might be worth a visit, since Mike is nuts about airplanes, and the place turned out to be pretty incredible. (Apologies...these are all phone photos.)
The Curtiss P-40N Warhawk in the Air Zoo foyer. This plane belonged to Suzanne Parish, a WWII-era test pilot, who was one of the Zoo's founders.
This little guy was my favorite plane, I think because it reminded me of a cartoon. It's a replica of a Travel Air Mystery Ship, a racer from the 1920s and 30s.
B-25J Mitchell WWII bomber. Soooo many guns on this thing.
This thing was pretty fascinating, too: it's a Goodyear FG-1D Corsair, a WWII carrier fighter. The bent wings totally blow my mind, and it never occurred to me that early aircraft-carrier fighter planes would have had folding wings...
...like these, on the Douglas AD-4NA Skyraider (also WWII).*
This little guy is also a carrier fighter, the Douglas SBD-3 Dauntless. What's interesting about this one is that they fished it out of Lake Michigan in 1993, where it had crashed during training in 1943, and they fully restored it on-site at the museum's East Campus.
Here's kinda what it looked like. This is an FM-2 Wildcat that crashed into Lake Michigan in 1944, also during training, and was only just pulled out in 2012. They intend to restore this one, too.
Now this was something spectacular: the Lockheed SR-71B Blackbird, the only one of its type left in the world. This thing was crazy massive and awe-inspiring.**
Not quite sure how this is supposed to inspire fear...I'd rather hug him instead. This is the nose art on an MiG-21PF Fishbed.
They even had a Sopwith Camel! Ok, so this one's a replica, but still. It's Snoopy's plane, for crying out loud.
My sorry attempt at a panorama of the Air Zoo's main exhibition room. Despite my weak photo, the space is rather grand, if you ask me.
On Saturday, the day of the wedding, we too a lightning-fast trip out to the Gilmore Car Museum, which isn't so much a Kalamazoo attraction as it is a 45-minutes-from-Kalamazoo attraction, which we didn't really know until we were on our way. So, sadly, we missed the Cadillac, motorcycle, and hood ornament exhibits (sigh). But we did get to see some pretty fantastical machinery. (Fair warning: lots of old-timey cars ahead. What can I say...I looooove their style.)
Like the style of this one-off 1937 Railton limousine, for example.
Or this 1928 Hudson convertible sedan.
I liked this one because it has such a frowny, I'm-carrying-bootleggers look to it...1936 Terraplane sedan.
This was the most gorgeous automobile I have ever, ever, ever seen, and I have no idea why I didn't take at least a million more photos of it. This is a 1938 Mercedes 540k Sport Tourer. Holy moly.
1935 Auburn boat-tail speedster. Love the Art Deco styling on this one.
The Corvette room. (Fun fact: the pale green one on the left was advertised as "designed by women, for women." Heh.
1959 Metropolitan 2-door hardtop. This little guy was tiny and adorable. (Its advertising slogan was "Luxury in Miniature.")
1958 Edsel! One of the automotive world's greatest failures.
The styling on this 1957 Mercury Turnpike Cruiser is nothing short of spectacular.
A bear in his natural habitat: a 1955 Studebaker.
In the hot rod room: this "1933 Ford" actually debuted in 1955 and is made from parts from no fewer than 25 cars.
Attention, Beach Boys fans: this is the Little Deuce Coupe. (That's the album cover on the stand next to the sign.)
Love, love, love this 1936 Checker Cab.
Talk about fancy: the Franklin display room.
Airplane hood ornament on a Franklin.
This 1909 Franklin Model D touring car is amazing...check out the actual lamps hanging from the dash!
One of my other favorites: a 1906 Cadillac. Neat.
And last, but assuredly not least, our rental car for the trip. They had a sale on upgrades, and seeing as how close we were to the Motor City, what were we to do? Ignore the signs? I think not. Hence, a little bit of American horsepower: the Challenger, in a very fitting bright orange.
Sadly, my phone was too weak to do them justice, but the fall colors in Michigan were tremendous.
Back in Switzerland, our next little adventure was yet another thing we'd managed not to do in our almost-three-years here: attend the Räbechilbi in Richterswil, which is about 45 minutes from Zürich by train. I'd heard about it several times, but managed somehow to always be busy (...or just lazy) when it rolled around. This year, however, we went, and what a weird, but fun, little festival.
Here's the deal: Räbechilbi is a parade wherein they use gigantic carved radishes to light up these float-like thingies, and everyone who lives along the parade route has to decorate their houses/gardens/walks with their own carved radishes. It's all fairly magical, except for the giant pushy crowds, but that's what we get for attending a popular fall festival, I suppose.
We drank some glühwein! We ate some garlic bread! The latter of which is here advertised as "Garlic bread...against vampires and light hunger." Well played, garlic bread purveyors. Well played.
We heard some brass bands! There were several of these stationed around the old town before the parade started, and they were all pretty good.
We ate some raclette! These guys were set up to crank out serious volume. Mmmm, melty cheese...
Saw lots of kids walking around with these lanterns-on-sticks. This little guy was watching one of the bands perform before the parade began.
There was this tiny pedestrian passageway, which would have been adorable even without all of the mini jack-o-lanterns, but with them, it was positively enchanting. They were hanging them over the street, for crying out loud!
A little detail. Some of the radishes were super fancy.
The "Hexen-hüsli," or witch house. (Nope, don't know why they called it that, but it was definitely drawing a crowd.)
And now, the parade! So the "floats," for the most part, were just flat sheets of wood with an image painted in black and white, and the radishes were hung on the white parts, creating a very stark negative image. Apparently, the themes for these are selected, and radishes for these are carved, by various clubs and schools in the area, and they're pulled by armies of people (no vehicles!). Here, some sort of mountain goat, followed by Bob Marley. (But of course.)
Tupac, followed by a Banksy. AMAZING.
Heh, heh...MINION!!
A nearly-life-sized model of the rescue helicopters used by Rega, the emergency airlift service here, followed by Louis de Funes, who, according to Wikipedia, was "one of the giants of French comedy."
One of the most surreal--and entertaining--elements of the parade were these two Swiss gentlemen standing behind us, discussing the floats. As the likeness of Nelson Mandela came by, they were debating whether it was President Obama, but when the Bud Spencer / Terence Hill float came past, they knew exactly and immediately who they were, whereas we had to go home and look them up. It was fairly hilarious.***
Interspersed with the floats were marching bands and various troops of children carrying various forms of radish lanterns (on hobo sticks! on boards! on wagons!), but it was too dark (and I had no tripod) to get any good shots...as you can see from most of the photos here, too. It was super cold, and crowded, but it was a good time.
Last, but certainly not least, in our most recent adventures was a last-minute trip to London. We had all sorts of things in mind that we wanted to do, but it all sorta got derailed in one way or another, so we settled for having a good time just roaming the streets, catching up with an old friend, and eating. And seeing a few things along the way.
As I recall, the first thing out of my mouth, upon hearing that we could go to London, was, "I want to see the egg building!" They built this craziness three years after I lived there, and I've been fascinated by it ever since the first time I saw a photo of it. (Fun fact: the only piece of curved glass on the whole thing is the lens at the top.)****
One of the things I really enjoy about London: the crazy juxtaposition of old and new. I like that they save what they can save.
Also got to see this building, called the Shard, which is the tallest building in the EU. (Was just doing a little research on this and found that it's a Renzo Piano. Had no idea. Kinda wish we'd known about their viewing platform, too...!)
The view from London Bridge.
Harrod's! Where we had cream tea and shockingly fantastic scones at the Disney Cafe, and then explored the glorious food halls, with Mike's buddy Paul, whom we hadn't seen since we left Pennsylvania, and his lovely wife and adorable children, whom we'd never met. (They're all positively delightful). Harrod's is decked out for Christmas...they don't play around.
On our way back to the hotel, we stumbled across this monument, which displays the shields of the Swiss cantons. The sign says it was placed here on 15 April, 1991--the 700th anniversary of the Swiss Confederation--and signifies the "lasting friendship between Switzerland and the United Kingdom." Switzerland is everywhere, people.
I heart Queen, which is why I took this photo of the gigantic statue of Freddie Mercury at the Dominion Theater, just around the corner from our hotel. (I just now realized that from this angle, it says "Minion." Heh.)
Also stumbled across this interesting church-with-ruins on our way to the Museum of London, just behind St. Paul's cathedral. The Interwebs tell me that it is Christchurch Greyfriars Church and the remaining wall of Poulters' Hall (1630-1666).
When I studied in London for a semester, back in 2000, I had an internship at the Museum of London, where I sorted and catalogued Victorian valentines. We made an all-too-brief visit to the MOL on this trip, and while my valentines were, sadly, not on display, this awesome thing was: an honest-to-goodness GLADIATOR TRIDENT. Holy smokes.
London dresses up for Christmas.
Don't kid yourselves: we did manage to fit in a good meal or two during our time there. Naturally, I could not pass through London without fish 'n' chips, so we had a nice dinner in the old-school-pub, upstairs dining room at The Cambridge, just near our hotel. To be honest, it was the sign out in front that sold me on having dinner there.
First, the "Oliver" reference, and then...mmmm, English food. Don't ever let anyone tell you the Brits have bad food: this is comfort food, people, and it is tasty. My fish was delicious, and Mike's gigantic burger--topped with bacon, cheese, BBQ sauce, onion rings, and jalapenos--was fantastic.
Good bar and pub food is a particular weakness of mine, and so I truly appreciated finding such a good spot for it, but the next night was even more special: Michelin-starred Indian food at Tamarind. I actually completely missed the fact that they had a Michelin star when I was making the booking, because look at those prices! But then we got there, and the service was terrific, and we had the world's largest tasting menu, and it was surprisingly affordable and fantastically good. Zero complaints, would go back in a heartbeat.
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We ate all of this. There were no either/or choices, it was simply just everything, and the stuff that was supposed to be spicy was actually spicy. Everything was delicious. It was glorious.
And that, with the exception of a chile degustation last month at good ol' Heuberger (he had lots more fresh, home-grown chiles this year!), was just about everything from October and November.
What I'm reading: finished Captive, and now on to Shades of Grey: A Novel, by Jasper Fforde. This guy is so creative, and it's been a while since I read any of his books, but this one is even further out-there than any of this others (at least, as I recall). Essentially, it's about a future in which society is organized into a hierarchy according to one's ability to perceive color. It was a bit hard to get into, in the first couple of pages, but now I'm genuinely enjoying reading it every night. It's got a compelling story line, and Mr. Fforde is very accomplished and entertaining with words.
What we're watching: Parks and Recreation, which continues to be mind-blowingly hilarious (I LOVE YOU, RON SWANSON! AND APRIL AND ANDY!), and Despicable Me 2, which is most assuredly why I have minions on the brain. Granted, it's not nearly as well plotted or good as the first one, but it still cracked me up. Repeatedly. This is good, good entertainment. I will be viewing it again very soon.
What we're cooking: not much lately, since we just got back from Istanbul for my surprise birthday trip. Yeah, we went to Istanbul. You'll hear about that next. And if you perhaps don't hear about it before the holidays, it'll be all my fault. In either case, though, I wish you all best for the holidays, and a delicious and adventurous new year! Thanks for sticking with me this far. I appreciate you.
*I blame this gap in my knowledge base on the fact that Top Gun was my first exposure to the world of aircraft carriers. Shame on you, Tom Cruise and Val Kilmer, for not giving us any history. (You're off the hook, though, Goose. No one can blame you for anything.)
**Obviously, there are more SR-71s still in existence, but the "B" designation here indicates that it was a training plane...you can see the second tiny cabin on top for the senior pilot.
***Hooray for spaghetti westerns, I guess! (What's funny is that we'd just watched My Name is Trinity the week before. Talk about campy!)
****Another interesting fact: the building previously on the site of "the Gherkin"--the Baltic Exchange--was severely damaged by a Provisional IRA bomb in 1992. After much legal wrangling, the city determined that the building could not be satisfactorily restored or repaired, so they mothballed what they could salvage, and it was all eventually sold and shipped to Tallinn, Estonia! Where it still awaits reassembly.
