Tombstone Tuesday :: Eva Leah and Ervin Shock

My aunt, Eva Leah Wiseman and her husband Ervin Shock are interred at North Webster Cemetery in Tippecanoe Township, Kosciusko County, Indiana next to her parents Charles and Elsie (Shuder) Wiseman.

SHOCK
EVA LEAH / 1908 - 1967
ERVIN E. / 1908 - 1991
Photo taken July 12, .. - Copyright © .. by Rebeckah R. Wiseman

Busch Gardens, Williamsburg VA

Today we headed over to Busch Gardens. I've been here before, but it's been years since then. None of the guys have ever been here.

I thought this was pretty fitting:

We had a lot of fun together! It was a great day!

Cool Cloud

Mt Erie ..

Steve and I decided on doing some rock climbing at Mt. Erie on Monday. Skies were to be clear, and temps around 40° up in Anacortes. This was our choice after being somewhat tired from our Saturday climb, and not thinking the skiing was going to be all that great.

We had a leisurely start to the day, and left Edmonds around 8:30am. Our intention was to climb in the Snag Buttress area of the mountain, and check out some new (to us) routes in that area. Steve's main interest was in the route Touching the Sky, a 5.9 sport route accessed from Snag Buttress. That meant climbing the first pitch of Zig Zag (5.7) to get there. Once on the ledge, we determined that the down climb, and water seep on the route meant we did not want to do it. Instead we opted to climb up the ledge slightly above the top of Snag Buttress where there were multiple routes to chose from. We opted for the Ray Auld Memorial Route (5.7) which brought us up to the top of wall.

We hiked around a bit trying to make sense of the maps and crags. We stumbled upon a short blocky sport route which I am thinking might be A View to a Climb (5.6) on the Lumpy Crag. Hard to tell. We climbed it, and just west of the top we were above the Friction Slab area. After that, we played the typical Mt. Erie find the best way down game. We looked through the book and followed some weak trails down. (Made more fun by walking on slippery grass with rock shoes.) A free-hanging rappel off a Madrone tree and some bramble bushwhacking got us back to the packs.

It was a fun day. However, I seemed not mentally up to the climbing and had difficulty at times with moves/grades that are well within my ability. Also of note, was the generally crummy rock quality and lack of good protection in some areas. Plenty of relic pitons and old bolts around too.

Coming up Zig Zag (photo by Steve Machuga)

Steve leading up Ray Auld

Show off

Da Vinci Bicycle... Or Not

Forget the Fendi Bicycle. It has been proposed that the first Italian designer bike was invented by Leonardo Da Vinci. The wooden construction above is a model "Da Vinci Bicycle", from an exhibition of the artist's inventions.

A bicycle-like sketch was discovered in 1974 during the restoration of the Codex Atlanticus and attributed to Da Vinci. Conferences were held about this discovery; academic articles written... until 1997, when the sketch was proven to be a 20th century forgery.

Okay, so Leonardo Da Vinci did not really invent the bicycle. But it's a romantic idea.

Street food in Berlin: ‘Frische Brezel’ on a bike

Frische brezels (translation: fresh pretzels) are typical street marvels in the city centres of Germany. It is very popular in the country, in German-speaking countries, as well as in the USA (brought by German speaking immigrants).

America, standing true to its capitalistic nature, found a way to mass produced the pretzels. My first encounter of a pretzel was of course back in the Philippines. We have those American-style mass produced, thin, hard and tiny pretzels coated in dark chocolate—the Jack n’Jill chocolate pretzel.

As seen in my pictures below, the real pretzel is actually a bread. I call it a designer bread with the pretzel loop design and it is soft and big. It’s so big that one piece could be my whole lunch already. It also has many varieties.

What’s nice with this street brezel vendor is that he carries a kerosene stove with him to heat up the pretzels. Yum!

Brezel vendor on a bike spotted near the Reichstag.

EUR 2,50 each and you can have them warm.

Natural and with grated cheese. I would go for natural...

More traditional Greek villages in Lesvos: Vatousa and Antissa

Greece is a favourite summer holiday destination of ours and we have become regular visitors to the mediterranean islands in the past years. In Lesvos Island last summer we did a lot of island village expeditions with our rental scooter. Dutchman and I sped on the highways, took the small country-island roads, the tiny narrow village streets and even the off the beaten tracks.



One of the many lovely villages we visited were Vatousa and Antissa in the eastern part of the island.



Vatousa









This traditional village looked so nostalgic from the main road. It reminds me of a place with secrets. Pandora’s box? Elegant, beautiful from a distance yet eerie.







Antissa



Not very far from Vatousa is Antissa. It’s a much bigger town, has more facilities, as well as a thriving local community of old men hanging out in the village square in the afternoons.



This is very typical in the Greek Islands to see men of age gathering together, playing cards, backgammon or whatever games they get their hands on, and drinking coffee. While the older women get some afternoon fresh air by sitting outside their house’s doors.











Here we lost our way (lots of one-way streets!) as we navigated the scooter through the village centre. I like it that the village square is very cozy. The trees have definitely given a different ambiance to the whole place.



Then a local man driving a white Hilux pick-up car came to our rescue. He knew we were lost as we were going around in circles. He motioned us with his hand to follow him. Just before we reached the intersection that would lead us out of the village, I managed to take a picture of him. He has this wide grin across his face as he waved his arm approvingly at us. I hurriedly shouted, ‘Efcharisto!’



Greek people in the islands are very helpful and friendly!













We cannot wait to go back again this summer to the Greek Islands!