NP Veluwezoom

Since we will be hiking a little bit in the US I thought it would be wise to have a little training before we leave for the National Parks in the US. So last Saturday we started small with a hike of 12 km through one of our Dutch National Parks: Veluwezoom.
Veluwezoom seems to be the oldest Dutch NP. It was founded in 1932. In comparison with US NP's it's tiny and very crowded. I have never been there and Erik only knows the vista point Posbank.
We went by train to Rheden en did the rest walking.
It seemed that we had chosen the right season. The heather in moors had just begun to bloom. Everything there was covered in purple. Of course the trail lead us to the Posbank. The picture shows me with my backpack (a gift of the Postbank) sitting on the Posbank, how funny is that?
We were lucky since we had no rain during our hike and we managed the 12 km quite well. We might take an other hike in two weeks.
At night we had a nice Italian dinner at Ristorante Elba in Hattem.

Vacation in the USA

We're going on vacation in the United States from 19th August - 7th of September.

After we found out that Martin, Elena and Enea will be in Amsterdam again by the time we wanted to visit them in Italy and start our vacation in that country from their place, we started thinking:

• We might go on vacation to Italy for the next few years. Erik of course wants to see his nephew Enea to grow up.
  
• We still can go to Italy this year, but then we have to change our itinerary and see Martin, Elena and Enea on our way back. That way we could visit our friends in Italy and go to Puglia and Calabria as we had planned.
• We could do something completely different.

The last thought won. We booked a flight to Denver, Colorado. We'll rent a car at the airport and drive up north to see some National Parks. Our destinations are Rocky Mountains NP, Yellowstone NP, some smaller parks in Montana, Idaho, Washington and Oregon. If we'll have the time I want to see Seattle and Olympic NP.

Erik thought we needed a motto for your trip. It will be "rangers and log cabins".

What can happen in a month's time

It's time for a new entry to my blog. You could say that I have such a boring live that there would be nothing to write about, but that's not true. Many things happened in the last five weeks. I give you a few highlights.

Family stuff
Erik's brother Martin was in The Netherlands together with his wife Elena and their 1 year old son Enea. They moved to Italy a year ago (Elena is Italian), and we hadn't seen them since August last year. They stayed at "grandma's" house in Amsterdam and we met them twice. Once at Erik's mothers and once in Zwolle. It was nice to have them here.

High school reunion
I had a reunion at my old high school in Herborn (Johanneum Gymnasium) last month. I really did not know what to expect. I finished school 25 years ago and I do not have many contacts from that time. I went to the Netherlands and others met their challenges somewhere in the world (one of my former friends is working as a curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York I've heard). I had asked my friend Sandra if she would be there and that's the only one I really was expecting.
When I came to the school I saw that there were many other. Some of them hadn't changed at all, while others were completely unrecognizable. At times I was thinking that I really didn't know them back then. So sometimes it really felt like meeting new people.
It was nice to meet old friends again: Inge, Christine, Ute, Raimund and Sandra. Even some old teachers were there. Too bad that all ended to early. My friend Sandra had to pick up her kids at her parent's house and drive back home before we had the chance to exchange all the news...

CSD
A week later I was in Germany again. Erik and I packed our camping stuff on Friday and went off to the Christopher Street Day (CSD) in Cologne. Since I was very busy at work the weeks before that, I was enjoying being outside even though the weather wasn't that great.
We had a lot of fun at the performances at the different stages in the city. The parade was okay, though I must say that it's always the same. Maybe I could miss that next year...
It's so funny who you meet during such an event in Cologne. The whole of the Netherlands' gay scene seemed to be in Cologne. I even saw people from Zwolle at the CSD. Except friends and people we know the CSD is also an opportunity to make new friends. In that respect I'm happy I met Aldo. A very friendly and Italian gentleman who lives in Paris.
We stayed till Monday and had all the time to do some shopping (Niggemann, Saturn, Mediamarkt). All in all it was a nice relaxing weekend.

Pino in Amsterdam
While we were in Cologne our friend Pino was staying in Erik's house. Pino has accepted a job in Amsterdam and is relocating from Berlin to the Netherlands. He was busy renting a house in Amsterdam and get all the paperwork done.
Last week he made the final step: since Wednesday evening he's living officially in Amsterdam. "Pino, it's nice to have you around!"
Erik and I will throw a welcome dinner for him tomorrow.