Our Visit to Europa Park 2013

As part of our Summer vacation 2013 the family and I visited Europa Park in July. We've been to Europa Park several times but it had been a few years now and with the girls being older (especially taller) they're now able to do more of the rides than the last time that we went.

Since the last time we were at Europa Park, we'd seen that park had a new restaurant called the "FoodLoop" and we were excited about checking it out.  In the resturaunt there a few tables centered around different platforms where food and drinks are brought to your table in special containers over a mini roller coaster. You use a touchscreen to order your meals and your food and drinks are sent from the kitchen over the mini roller coaster to the platform where your table is. I can't guarante it but I can imagine that some kids who might need to be "encouraged" to eat their meals will be entertained by the food delivery and therefore more like to eat what is ordered. I can also imagine that the whole order and delivery process encourages people to order more food and drink.  

Because Anna likes roller coasters, she went with me through the park, while Sarah and Christine did the tamer rides. Anna and I started off with the Blue Fire. The Blue Fire is a looping coaster with passengers going through 4 different inversions. It only reaches 124 ft (38 meters) with top speed of 62 mph (100 km/h), but the looping is what makes it exciting (Wikipedia).  Anna had a good start and we were off. There is something special about wooden roller coasters, sure they don't tend to go as high or fast as many of the steel ones, but they're a lot of fun and some coster enthusiasts swear by them. Next up was the Woodan, a wooden coaster that reaches a height of 131 ft (40 meters) with a top speed of 62.1 mph (99.9 km/h) and a G-force of 3.5 (Wikipedia).While the Siver Star might not lead any coaster catagories any longer the first hill reaches heights of 239 ft (73 meters) with a drop of 219 ft (67 meters) at speeds up to 78.9 mph (127 km/h) and gravitational forces of 4g, so it is a pretty exciting ride and Annd didn't see the slightest bit scared! It is nice that someone else in the family likes to ride the roller coasters besides myself, so that I don't have to ride them alone.

It was a very hot day when we went, so we all tried a few water rides.  The thing about water rides is that most of the time you don't sit in the right seat, either you want to get really wet and most of the water misses you or you don't really want to get wet and the water is attracked to you like a magnet.  Christine decided to stand outside of one of the water rides, thinking that she might get wet.  She got a little wet when the first water ride went by and decided to stay for the next one, well she got absolutely soaked, so the trick seems to be that you find a splashy area around the water rides if you really want to get soaked.



We always have fun at Europa Park and we really enjoyed our visit this year.  I can imagine that we'll try to plan a trip there next year.  Since Europa Park gets decorated for Halloween and Christimas, we could even plan a trip to catch either of these.

Photo credit. The Silver Star picture is courtesy of Wikipedia.  The other pictures we took at the park.

September 11th - 12 Years Later

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Project 2996

Chances are that you probably know what day it is (or you'll soon be reminded if your day is just starting) but today is the twelth anniversary of Attacks of September 11th. A dozen years have passed and we're more than a decade after this terrible event.  On this day every year, I think of the victims, their families, their friends and I like to honor the memories that we all have of them. 

I discovered Project 2996 when I was doing research of an article that I was writing about September 11th, and it has become a part of my life ever since.  Doing research on some of the victims brings them into your life and though you have you probably never met them the memories of their lives become part of you and as long as you live, these memories will live on.  It might not make any sense to someone who hasn't participated yet, but surely you have read something in your life or seen something (via television or possibly online) that has touched you.  If you haven't experienced this, you need to because it is at moments like this that our humanity shines through.

Last year I talked Dale (the man responsible for Project 2996) into trying something a little bit different.  We were going to pin pictures of the victims of September 11th into a Project 2996 group pinboard on Pinterest.  The goal is to get a pin done for every single victim, with a tribute written up for them as well.  We haven't accomplished this yet but I'm really proud of the people who have joined us in the project.  I've done a couple of speeches about September 11th at Toastmasters and I convinced a friend of mine to join in on this little project, she did several pins last year and a few days ago she asked me if we were doing anything for the 12th Anniversary.  She said that she didn't have much time but she still managed to do a good dozen or so pins, so my she has a heart felt thank you from me. I'm confident that we will get a pin out for every victim!

This morning I did a dozen plus pins myself and have now learned a little bit more about Barbara Olson, Peter J. Ganci, Jr,, Army Specialist Craig Amundson, Ryan Daniel Fitzgerald, Anthony Joseph Coladonato, Andrew Cross Abate, David E. Rivers, Irina Buslo, Bojan Kostica, Gregory James Malone, Kathryn Anne Shatzoff, Peter J. O'Neill Jr., Faustino Apostol Jr, John G. Farrell, Margaret S. Lewis, Virginia M. Jablonski, and Stephanie McKenna. One of the new vicitms that I learned about had a tribute that had been written as part of Project 2996 and in reading the tribute I noticed that a family member had asked the writer if she knew the victim, but also came the comment that she was so glad to see the tribute. I received a comment from the wife of a victim that I wrote about and it touched me deeply to see this. 

On this September day, I think about the people that I have written tributes in the past (Keith Roma, Christopher Santora,Joseph P. Henry, Karl Henri Joseph, and Dana Hannon. I especially think of David W Laychak, who was the first person that I've written about in Project 2996.

I hope that you take some time out of your day to remember the victims of September 11th, their families, their friends, and the world as this day left all of us a little sadder and world a little less richer because of all these wonderful people we lost and the impact of society that they would have had and the lives that they did and would have touched.  You can follow the board on Pinterest and even join us if you'd like to do some pinning.  You can also write tributes of your own.  If you don't have a website or blog to post them on, I'd be happy to post them for you.  Feel free to leave a comment. If you knew any of the victims, I'd love to hear your memories and stories about them. 

Darryl

Here are my posts for the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th, 10th and 11th Annivesaries.  You can read more about the pinning campaign here.  The Project 2996 website is here and the Facebook group is here.

Are Your Ready for the German Champions League Final?

Millions of people will watch Bayern Munich (Munich) play Borussia Dortmund in the Champions League final tonight, will you be one of them? After 124 games with 365 goals scored, we're down to this game (figures from Wikipedia). This is a unique match up and the first time that it has been an all German Champions League final. Bayern and Dortmund are two of the top teams in the German Bundesliga, hard core and casual fans alike will be ready for these two rivals to play in this huge game.

Bayern has one of the biggest and best known soccer clubs in the world. They're the biggest and best known sports club in Germany, and 4th biggest soccer club in the world generating 368.4 million Euros in 2012 (Wikipedia). To me they're like the New York Yankees of soccer, having won 23 national tittles, winning the Champions League in 1974, 1975, 1976, and 2001; while being the runner up in 1982, 1987, 1999, 2010, 2012. They might not always win but you can't afford to overlook them.

Dortmund has developed into quite a rival for Bayern.  They won the Champions League in 1997.  Dortmund has had their ups and down and even almost went bankrupt.  Jürgen Klopp has lifted Dortmund out one of their low periods winning the Bundesliga in the 2010-11 and 2011-2012 seasons. 


Living in the Rhein-Main Area, I started following Jürgen Kloppwhen he was the coach at Mainz 05 and was impressed that he was able to led that club from the second Bundesliga to the first. I also liked watching him when he was part of the soccer coverage on German television.  It was lot of fun seeing him lead Dortmund to their two recent Bundesliga tittles.

I've seen that Jürgen Klopp has given some interesting interviews lately and I decided that I wanted to find out what was said. Since the game tonight is being held in Wembley Stadium in London, there are interviews that are done in English and non-native English speakers this provides the opportunity for lots of lost in translation  moments or translations problems.  In fact there was a Jame Bond quote that really piqued my interest.  Jurgen Klopp said in an interview at the Guardian in response to the possiblity of Robert Lewandowski will likely be leaving Dortmund (with a good possiblity of ending up at Bayern), "What can I say? If that's what Bayern wants … It's like James Bond – except they are the other guy [the villain]." 

Jürgen Klopp told the Guardian about the deep pockets of Bayern and their ability to spend large amounts of money on players that   "Bayern want a decade of success like Barça. That's OK if you have the money because it increases the possibility of success. But it's not guaranteed. We are not a supermarket but they want our players because they know we cannot pay them the same money. It could not be our way to do things like Real and Bayern and not think about taxes – and let the next generation pick up our problems. We need to work seriously and sensibly. We have this amount of money so we can pay that amount. But we lose players. Last year it was Shinji Kagawa." While he probably didn't mean that teams that don't have an endless supply of money to spend on players might not be woried about taxes but that most teams don't have the financail resources to complete with Bayern, Mancherster United, Real Madrid, and so on.  This is certainly a challenges for many teams in many diferent sports.

I can't really say that I was surprised, but I learned that Jürgen Klopp was recruited by both Bayern and Hamburg while he was at Mainz 05, before he ended up going to Dortmund. He said of the experience of being consided for the job at Bayern that "It wasn't too disappointing --for a second division manager to be called by Bayern is not the worst thing in the world"  I'm sure that Dortmund fans are glad that he ended up where he did.

Over the years I've liked it when cross town rivals met in various championship games, this makes the event special and stand out more.  In baseball I remember when the New York Mets played the New York Yankees and when the Oakland A's played the San Francisco Giants in the World Series, so it is exciting to see two German teams playing in the Champions League final.  

 Jürgen Klopp said "We are a club, not a company..but it depends on which kind of story the neutral fan wants to hear. If he respects the story of Bayern, and how much they have won since the 1970s, he can support them. But if he wants the new story, the special story, it must be Dortmund. I think, in this moment in the football world, you have to be on our side." I'll be pulling for Dortmund, how about you?

Here is a infographic that you might find interesting....

Photo credits: I combined the logos from the clubs based on logos at Wikipedia (Bayern and Dortmund).  The infographic comes from here.