New Castle in Newcastle

Scott and I went to the UK last weekend, for the wedding of my (former) boss, Andrew. Pictures (bad ones - I really need a new camera, because naturally it is the camera's fault) of the wedding are here. We also spent a very pleasant couple of days poking around Newcastle upon Tyne, in the very north of England. What a lovely town! We were pleasantly surprised, as it has somewhat of a reputation of being a former industrial city that has gone to wrack and ruin. Instead, it's a very pretty city with a river and cool bridges, a very nice arts center, and a lot of great stone buildings and interesting architecture. The city of Newcastle is named after the New Castle, see pictures here, as well as other sights around the town. "New," is of course relative - as the castle is from the 11th century or something like that. I'm not too clear on the details, but it's a fun destination. We flew into London and then took the train to Newcastle, so it was a good journey as well. And Carmen joined us again - yay! You can just see her head in one of my photos (not on purpose, but a nice accident). You also have to take a look at the fabulous scarf she is making me out of this silky reddish-orange yarn - it is so cool!! She, and I, also made Scott a very cool black wool hat as well. So we're basking in the custom-made knit wear of Carmen La Fabulous.

Muerren, part II...and Fasnacht too

We love Muerren. We went back again, over the Fasnacht holiday, as promised. The photos are here, album titled Muerren Redux. We made it up to the Schilthorn again this time, and managed to catch a few minutes without clouds - so there are some photos from up there this time. Scott took some skiing photos with his phone as well.

We escaped 90% of the Fasnacht festivities, and caught just the last day, under our balcony mostly - but I also wandered around the town a bit for some more close-up photos. They are here, called 06 Fasnacht album.

Hope you enjoy them.

Oh, and what I should have also mentioned (thanks, JA, for reminding me) is that friends went with us again. My friend Molly, who used to work with me (but just moved to Paris last week for a new job - weekend breaks to Paris soon to ensue!), Rosemary and Craig, who both work with me (and Craig is a former Hausmann as well, and Scott walks their dogs for them), our friend Martin who's an expat who works for another company in Swizzy, and Carmen, my old friend and roommate from NYC who now lives in London. This is Carmen's second visit, we're glad she pops over from London! And she's such a talented knitter - the woman knit me a whole hat on the way from Basel to Muerren, in the back seat of the car with two dogs hanging over her the whole time. Only about a two-hour trip, and now I have this groovy wool hat that is in stripes of grey, charcoal and black - how cool is that?! Love it.

More meme, but not me

Go to the other meme post and look in the comments to find an actual post from Scott, who, per his tag by me and by Heather E. Richardson, decided to get his meme on...yay!