The return trip by high-speed, shuttle and train back to New York on the end of the busy 4th of July week-end. While the schedule includes a 2.5h layover at the Kingston, R.I. train-stationg (in the middle of nowhere), Amtrak managed to get another 50min delay on the 1h trip from Boston on a completely empty track, without snowstorm or other bad weather. How they managed to do that remains a mystery.

Vineyard Haven, MV

Since the previous days had been nice and windy, we were planing on a day-trip on a sailboat. However, we picked the lousiest day of the week with practically no wind, low visibility and increasing rain as the day goes on. We still took the bus to Vineyard Haven, not to be the ones to chicken out or hoping the weather would improve. Well, it didn't so the trip got cancelled. As we were sitting on the wharf, the schooner Shenandoah was towed slowly into port, since it has no engine and here was no wind. She had been out all week with a group of school-children, which certainly must have been a great experience.

Edgartown, MV

The 4th of July parade and firework on the Island is in Edgartown - in typical small town fashion.

For our anniversary dinner and some sight-seeing, we take the bus a couple of miles over to Edgartown, which is one of the posh parts of the island. Like the Nantucket, described in Moby Dick, Edgartown was a major whaling port and many of the stately mansions where build by whaling captains.

Martha's Vineyard

For our 1st anniversary and quite likely last vacation in a while, we are going to Martha's Vineyard, staying at a romantic victorian area B&B in Oak bluffs. Neither of us had ever been to Martha's Vineyard which is famous as a vacation spot or summer home for the rich and famous as well as members of the New England upper class.

Oak Bluffs, which is supposedly the party town on the island, grew out of a Methodist campground and retreat (similarly to Ocean Grove, NJ), with the tents over time replaced by small (and not so small any more) wooden structures during the course of the 18th century.





The rest of the town around the campground was built by a private developer as victorian seaside resort. It also seems that Martha's Vineyard had been for long a destination for the African American middle-class around the Boston - New York area - writers, musicians, painters, doctors, lawyers, bankers, business owners, etc. In particular Oak Bluffs still seems to be a major destination for ivy-league educated, wealthy African-American families, going about their lives with the discreet charm of the bourgeoisie and the greatest degree of normalcy. The kind of place where the Obamas would fit right in. In their own snobbish way, the New England bourgeoisie seems to be more color-blind than the rest of the country, since in their value systems legacy trumps everything else: if your parents had been members, you are automatically part of the in-crowd... In a way it is sad that this should still be curious or noteworthy, on the other hand this might be a glimpse of how a post racial society would look, where even African Americans have the right to live the same kind of comfortable and stuffy middle-class life, which aspiring to, every other ethnic group in this country is taking for granted - without the feeling of betraying some greater socio-political cause.

Berkeley, CA

An eclectic wedding party at a restaurant in downtown Berkeley. The wedding ceremony is performed by a friend of the couple - taking advantage of the broad terms of religious freedom in the US, where executing a religious office is merely a matter of self-declaration.

1600 Amphitheater Parkway, Mountain View, CA

After all the hype in the press seeing the mythical headquarter of Google in Silicon Valley is a bit underwhelming. I guess so far, Google has so successfully resisted the common edifice complex, to build a palatial headquarter matching the status of its current market valuation.

The sprawling campus in a remote corner of Mountain View seems cobbled together from a number of buildings with inconsistent office-park architecture. Each is surrounded with its own parking lot and landscaping which means that traveling between them requires passing over public streets and traveling quite a distance. For that purpose Google has a large number of public bicycles outside each building, which can be used for getting around. Thanks to the flat landscape, the favorable climate and available showers and changing rooms, many employees seem to commute by bike and have their own bikes to get around. Despite that, video conferencing within the campus is quite popular.

My first trip to headquarters since joining Google a few months ago and the first trip to the SF Bay Area in a while, which is always a good way to catch up with old friends.

We are flying back from ABQ to LAS with Southwest Airlines and from there with Jet Blue to JFK. Because of the change of airlines, we include a generous layover in Las Vegas, which is enough time to get out of the airport and have lunch at the Luxor, which we had not seen yet in our previous tour of the casinos on the strip.

From Albuquerque, we take a day trip to Santa Fe which has a cute downtown with mostly art galleries and shops selling south-western inspired things.

We take the arial tramway/cablecar up to the top of the Sandia mountains above Albuquerque. At 3000m over sea level, the air is pretty thin for somebody living basically at sea level and Albuquerque itself with 2000m is higher than Denver.

We get up very early in the morning to go to the airport to catch a flight to Albuquerque, where we are visiting family for the rest of the trip.

On the second day, we take a tour out to Hoover Dam, where we also drive through some of the surroundings of Las Vegas as well as through Boulder City. The dam was built during the great depression as a project for water management for the states surrounding the colorado river all the way down to Mexico. Like other depression area projects, it was completed ahead of schedule and under budget - but not without significant loss of life.

For three nights in Las Vegas, we are staying at the Palazzo Casino & Resort, the latest and greatest luxury hotel on the strip with rooms (sorry - guest suites...) larger than our apartment in New York. Since I had been here in 1997, Vegas has changed quite a bit. At most resorts, there is now more space dedicated to the shopping mall than to the casino and the clinking of coins from the slot-machines has been replaced by the discreet swish of a optically readable paper ticket being printed out with all the winnings. Since we are both not too much into gambling, we check out the casino architecture on the first day.

For the first night in Las Vegas, we go to the Bellagio see "O" - or eau for the French-Canadians. This very impressive spectacle by Cirque du Soleil, which plays on a very elaborate custom stage with a 25ft deep reconfigurable pool, adding synchronous swimming and platform diving to the usual repertoire of acrobatics - also performed for added difficulty while being soaking wet from getting in and out of the water.

We are leaving JFK on an evening flight with Jet Blue to Las Vegas for our last long distance trip before the baby is born.

Ocean Grove

We spend a week end during off-season at bed & breakfast in Ocean Grove. The area resembles a ghost town this time of the year, not just because of the rolling fog at the time we arrive on Saturday afternoon. After days of rain, Sunday is finally clearing up a bit and we get to see the sun while driving back along the coast - or shore, as they say in Jersey...

We take a day to visit Zurich and meet up with some friends and colleagues there which I had not seen in a long time. We have dinner at LaSalle a trendy new restaurant in the now very hip industrial quarter of Zurich-West (no relations to the Rock-band by the same name).

Rest Schmiedstube Attelwil, AG

A party with my extended family, for my father's 70th birthday and our wedding 4 month earlier to the day.

A short extended week-end trip to Switzerland at the occasion of my father's 70th birthday and our 2nd post-wedding party. First day to relax and get over the jet-lag and such.

GND-MBJ-JFK

We leave the ship around 11 to head to the airport. The return trip involves again multiple airlines, this time Air Jamaica (Grenada to Montego Bay) and Delta Airlines. We check in and are assure that our luggage is checked in to JFK directly, that MBJ will be international transit as one might expect - no problem man!

Well, as expected, it didn't turn out that way. Our luggage was unloaded in Montego Bay and not put on the Delta plane instead. However after some back and forth Air Jamaica agreed to deliver it to JFK on their next flight, but delta never figured out where it was, bohered to invesitage or even just go pick it up, once we told them where it was: right there in Terminal 4 at JFK. Finally, 4 days later, I spend an evening going out to JFK myself to visit the Air Jamaica baggage services department to get it out of the storage warehouse, where it had been sitting since Sunday night.

SV Yankee Clipper, Day VI

After a stop a lonely beach at Chatham Bay on Union Island, with great conditions for snorkeling and some really authentic underground beach bars, we set sail for the last time to head back to Grenada. Time for group pictures and a captains dinner in the most colorful attire.

SV Yankee Clipper, Day V

We anchor on the outside of a gorgeous sandy beach in front of the beach hotel and yacht club, where we are welcome to use the beach. Like everywhere it is off-season and very quiet. The water off the beach is shallow and warm like in a bath-tub. In the afternoon we set sail for some sailing in the light breeze with an almost complete set of sails for the 3-mast staysail-schooner rig (main fisherman and outer jib appear to be missing).

SV Yankee Clipper, Day IV

At 5 in the morning we wake up for the first time from the the noise of the winch on deck above our heads used to hoist the launches back on board to prepare for the short hop to the Island of Mayreau. The nice beach on Salt Whistle Bay is on the other side of the island from our anchorage and a bit of a walk over the hill. On the way back, we take a scenic ride in a "water taxi" (nice wooden speed-boat hand-made in Bequia...) around the island back to the ship, since we are schedule for introductory scuba diving in the afternoon. The diving trip into the Tobago cays is spectacular, just the ride on the speed-boat between the island is worth the trip. Here we fully understand, why the Grenadines have such a reputation among yachtsmen.

SV Yankee Clipper, Day III

We anchor all day in Admiralty Bay off Bequia. An island tour on the back of a pickup truck (on bad roads beats a ride in the precarious mini-vans, which are common all over the Caribbean) including a visit to a a breeding station for endangered hawksbill sea turtles. In the afternoon the local dive boat takes us around to 2 different sites for some snorkeling. In the evening, we go on shore again for dinner at a local restaurant with a commanding view of the bay, run by the family of an old retired ship-cook, who like many inhabitants of Bequia and similar islands make a living traveling the seas.




Special during this quiet off season and on the very small islands of the Grenadines, the advantages of traveling on a small ship become obvious. Even 50 people arriving one day from the sea are making a significant impact on a island with a population of maybe a few 1000 people. Clearly arriving with 2000-3000 people at once would turn any place into an overcrowded madhouse.

SV Yankee Clipper, Day II

Around noon, we finally cast off the pier and set sail for the Grenadines. The sea is a bit choppy and the wind more or less right on the nose, which makes the use of sails rather a bit symbolic, except maybe to help stabilize the vessel. This is the longest and roughest trip of the week, including dinner at sea, which is a bit less well attended than usual as some of the passengers are not feeling too well. Around 10pm, we anchor along the way and continue the trip the next morning at 5pm to Bequia, the first destination.

SV Yankee Clipper, Day I

At 5pm, we take a take leave from the lovely beach and a taxi to the container port of St. Georges where Windjammer Cruises' SV Yankee Clipper lies at the pier, to take on the passengers for the next week's cruise through the Grenadines. We settle into our cabine (luxurious maindeck cabine, it's still our honeymoon after all...) and meet some of the fellow passengers who are already on board since they are staying over for the 2nd week. As the night goes on, vans are coming from the airport with other people just arriving.





Being used to sailing on 30-40ft boats, the cabin is actually quite spacious and luxurious: air-conditioning, 110V electricity, running water and a full blown regular toilet (called a "head" on a ship...). For people used the comforts of a luxury cruise-liner, this may still be a bit of a culture shock. On the flip-side of all this comfort is the noise of the generator running all the time, even at night when anchoring in a lonely bay.

Grenada, Day VII

This is our last day/night at the hotel La Luna. It really is a beautiful spot, serene and secluded, a sense of minimalist, casual luxury, while every aspect of the stylish design and architecture blends with the natural surroundings to create a mood of relaxed sensuality.

Given this is a perfect romantic spot, not surprisingly, almost all of the few guests are like us newlywed couples on their honeymoon. All the couples are behaving very aloof and self-absorbed, which after a while is starting to become a bit annoying. Or maybe I just don't like to be reminded, how petty, conventional and predictable we are in our petit-bourgeois ways...

Anyway, after a week in the honeymooners isolation ward, we are ready again to mingle with the general population.

Grenada, Day VI

Today is Friday... every Friday the Fishing village of Gouyave, about 1h north of St. Georges is having a street festival, unceremoniously called "Gouyave Fish Friday". The point is simply to eat fish... (and every successfully promote the local economy). Today is also a very sunny day and we see a lot of color full fish on the little coral reef in front of our hotel.

Grenada, Day V

By now serious relaxation has become routine: beach, ocean, pool, lounge chairs...





We follow the instructions from some of the locals who periodically patrol the beach to sell stuff to tourists to discover the backroute over beaches and through resorts to the southern end of the island (pt salines) by the airport where there is a nice bar/restaurant built into the cliff by the beach.

Grenada, Day IV

Besides the open-air bathroom & shower with ocean view, each cabin also has a private mini-pool on the veranda - ideal for a romantic sunset and pre-dinner apero with a Negroni on the rocks...

Grenada, Day III

We take a tour around the island, visiting some forts, waterfalls and the mountainous rain-forest of the Grand Etang forest preserve. Much of the devastation which hurricane Ivan had caused in 2005 is still visible in the forrest as well as in building of various state of decay.

Grenada, Day II

Some serious relaxing on the beach... There is a small corral reef right in the bay, maybe 200m from the beach which in good sunlight looks like a tropical aquarium.

Grenada, Day I

For the first week of the honeymoon, we are staying at La Luna , a small but very stylish boutique hotel tucked away in a hidden cove south of St. Georges on Grenada.

The spacious bungalows in earth-tone covered concrete, teak-wood and billowing cloth and perfect to set a sophisticated island mood and add to the intoxicatingly sensual atmosphere of the whole place.

Honeymoon, day I

After we notice too late that the departure flight would have been on Saturday, we have to book last minute a new flight to somehow get to Grenada with most flights being booked out. The resulting trip involves 3 airlines and a zig-zag trip through the Caribbean: JFK-AUA-SJU-GND. The Queen Beatrix Airport in Aruba may be large and modern, but not made for transit. We have immigrate into Aruba, walk around the terminal to the departure hall and get back in. Things seem to go quite smooth until we suddenly stand before a US homeland security checkpoint and learn about 20min before departure of our connecting flight that we should have taken our luggage in the arrival hall, through customs and checked back in at the American Airways counter, to go through the wall onto a new carousel in order to pass US customs and immigration. It is time to panic... Thanks to a local AA representative, we somehow manage to run through the airport back to the arrival hall, get the luggage, pass through customs and immigration in a rather unbuerocratic manner, directly in front of the US checkpoint where we burn some time standing in line, to make it onto the plane in the last minute. Even our passports make it, which the gate agent had to enter into the new US homeland security system before departing to our second transit at San Juan International in Puerto Rico from where we finally arrive in Grenada via a noisy turbo-prop plane by American Eagle.

Day VII

The day starts a 07:00 with an SMS from Swiss Airlines that our flight is cancelled. After a few minutes on the phone, we are re-scheduled on another flight via FRA by Lufthansa. At least we don't need to rush as much any more and have some time for Breakfast. As a nice surprise, the log FRA-JFK is in Business Class with bed-like seats and old-school service. Our luggage doesn't make the transfer and is delivered at home by the next morning.

Day VI

The morning after starts slowly with an extensive breakfast and a hike up along the waterfall - again interrupted by more rain. All the guests are departing during the day so we find ourselves alone for a romantic dinner at the restaurant, a bottle of champagne at the tower suite while opening the presents and 2nd wedding night under much more relaxing and less tired circumstances.

Day V

The official part of the day starts with the departure of the DS Loetschberg from Interlaken at 14:25 which brings us to Giessbach, where the civil ceremony takes place in the old Grandhotel by the waterfall. While the rain is kind of holding out until we get there, the flood-gates are opening up short afterwards and for the rest of the day so that the Apero has to take place indoors and on a partially covered balcony. As part of the apero, the guests are releasing helium balloons into the rainy sky which carry cards with (hopefully) good wishes to be returned by any finder.

The 8 course dinner takes place in one of the main ballrooms and with less than 30 people is a comfortably informal affair. Since all the guests are staying at the hotel, the evening simply fades out slowly at the hotel bar.

Day IV

This is the day reserved for some last minute administrative, i.e. visiting the civil registrars office, the florist and the photographer for the last details. The weather is now consistently rainy and cold, which is why we criss-cross Interlaken for suitable accessories to adapt a wedding dress for the current conditions. Interlaken being a sleepy mountain resort, this proves to be quite challenging, specially since the few fashion stores are prepared for summer and not the re-run of April weather which never happened yet this year. We end up buying a white folding umbrella and a white scarf.

Day III

Obviously the Jungfraujoch is the most famous destination of the Jungfrau region, but as far as scenic mountain peaks comfortably reachable by public transportation, the Schilthorn is lesser known, half the price and possibly even more spectacular. After a stop at the Truemmelbach-falls, we get there around noon after switching between 3 different stages of airial cable-cars to get to the summit with the turning restaurant famous from the James Bond movie. Initially the weather is ok-ish, but soon clouds are pulling culminating in zero visibility and light rain.

Day II

After a quick trip to Harder Kulm above Interlaken to check out the view of the surrounding panoramic, we take the train to Bern for some more sight-seeing. The main reason for this is a visit with my parents so that the families get to meet each other at least once before the wedding.