Kottenforst

About 15 minutes from our house is a huge nature park with a ton of paved and dirt paths. I have been exploring the park on my mountain bike. Unfortunately none of the paths are marked, and I have yet to come across any sort of a map within the park. I am somewhat afraid of getting completely lost so my forays into the forest have been short. The next time I go out, I plan to take water, food, phone and a map so that I can really explore.

A mobile phone in Germany is called a handy. I have a prepaid phone which was only 20 euros. I simply go to the T-mobile store every month and put money on it. Thankfully, my handy has a language option so that I was able to figure out how to retrieve voicemail. I can't say the same for my home phone. The phone actually calls us to tell us we have a new voicemail. It then proceeds to tell me to press different numbers to do different things all in German. I'm not quite sure if I am getting a lot of messages or it is only one message that I never can find a way to hear. Most likely the former since there aren't too many people who even have my home phone number.

I officially have made my first friend here in Germany! While searching for ex-pat groups in Bonn, I stumbled across a blog by an American woman here in Bonn. She moved with her husband who was transferred to Bonn for work. After reading her blog, I thought we had a lot in common so I asked her if she would want to meet for coffee. We met today at a coffee shop in Bonn. I had a great time talking with her. There is something so comfortable about spending time with other Americans that you don't get even with other English speakers. When I looked at my watch, I couldn't believe we had been sitting there talking for about 2 1/2 hours. It felt like it was 40 minutes.

Yesterday we finalized our plans for our trip to Greece. We are flying into Athens on Sept 7th. We will be spending 6 days on the boat to the left. Zarko (Jim's friend in London) let us know he was renting a sailboat with some friends and asked us to join. The boat sleeps 12 so it will be pretty close quarters. We haven't met any of the other people on the boat so hopefully we will all get along.

The plan is to sleep on the boat Sunday night after we arrive and then set sail for Cyclades Islands. I think we will just hop around from island to island until we get to Santorini on the following Saturday. I can't wait for good Greek food, sun and lots of water! Oh, and of course the historical landmarks.