Ice Sculpture Festival in Brugge. Burrr...was it cold! The sign inside the tents for the festival said about -5 C (22 F).
Look kids...Big Ben!
Scott trying to impress the Belgian kids by standing up on the ice slide. He survived.
Scott in the igloo.
Me going down another ice slide.

What a nice and relaxing weekend we had. This was the first weekend in probably years we sat around the house and did absolutely nothing all weekend. Here's a recap of our entire weekend after we visited the Ice Sculptures on Saturday at noon.

We watched the entire first season of 24. Yes, 24 episodes at 45 minutes each. Only 4 more seasons until we catch up to the current Season 6. (I know, we're a tad behind.)

Well, this will probably be my last post for 2006. We leave for the U.S. on Thursday. Whoo hoo! We'll spend Christmas in Colorado, then fly back to Atlanta and drive down to Albany, then back up to Atlanta for a week. It's going to be a busy couple of weeks but we're going to enjoy every minute of it - why? - because we will be home!

Merry Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

Check back in 2007 for more Eichenberger adventures!

Hit and Run
Our weekend was pretty uneventful until we went to move our car Sunday night. Sadly, we were victims of a hit and run.

Since we are living the "city" life here in Brugge we don't have a garage or permanent parking spot. Every night when Scott comes home, he hopes there's a spot right outside our house, otherwise he's riding around looking for one. There have only been a few times when we just couldn't find anything. Saturday afternoon was one of those occasions. After driving around for about 30 minutes we found what we thought was a great parking spot about 3 blocks away from our house. When we went to move the car Sunday night to a better location the picture above shows what we found.

Panic and deductible were the first things that ran through my head. But then I quickly regrouped and thought - police report. How hard could that be, right? Scott and I can speak polite greeting dutch and restaurant dutch but we are no where near "let's file a police report" in dutch. We found the number to the police department (101 in case you are wondering) and Scott jumbled his way through "hit and run." We went back to wait by the car and time just kept passing by so I being the patient person that I am dialed the police again and luckily someone spoke English and I was able to re-file the report. The police finally came and looked at the car and what was left of the other persons headlight. The car is still drivable just not pleasant to look at.

Hopefully repairing the car is a smooth process and we won't be dinged out of pocket too much.

Click HERE to see our pics from Pisa, Italy and Malta.

Pizza & Vino in Pisa + Mojito's, Martini's & Massages in MaltaYes, everyone else was posing for a picture like this so we did it as well. We had a great time on our first official vacation since we arrived 6 months ago. We landed in Pisa Friday night and stayed there until Saturday late afternoon. We saw the Leaning Tower of Pisa approx. 100 times and Scott banned me from taking anymore pictures of it. They city itself is very small with not too much to do so we were glad we only stayed one night.Above are the main tourist attractions in Pisa - the Baptistry, the Duomo, and the famous Leaning Tower of Pisa. Aren't the Tuscan Hills in this picture gorgeous? I think that is what I like most about Italy, the landscape and rolling hills.



Above are pictures of Malta. The first one is taken off our balcony overlooking the Mediterranean Sea and the coast of Malta with a slight view of the other Maltese Island, Gozo. Then there is a picture of the Maltan Temples. Here are a few facts about Malta:

• The Maltan Temples date back to 3600 B.C (before the Pyramids and Stonehenge!) (Note to self: be sure to wear hiking shoes and not ballerina flats next time you wonder around archeological remains.)
• Malta is 220 km in diameter. (About 110 miles) (We thought it was the same size as Kauai, Hawaii - silly us!)
• Malta is just below Sicily and right above Africa. You can see Sicily from the Northern Coast but you can not see Africa. (I guess that's as close to Africa as I can get for now.)
• Maltese is the native language and English is their second. (Finally, somewhere I can communicate effectively.)
• They drive on the other side of the road. (We didn't even attempt it. We used public transportation.)
• They have a lot of American food. (Of course we ate at the local Hard Rock Cafe!)
• We'd describe Malta as being similar to Mexico. (Only a lot safer, very clean, and taxi's with flat rates!)

We had a great time relaxing in the warm weather of Malta. Now it's time to get back to the real world.

I'll upload our pictures later this week so check back soon!