After an uneventful flight we arrived at London Heathrow Airport, greeted by sunshine and blue skies, and not by the 'soup kitchen' weather we had rather expected.
We took the Express train to Paddington Station, which happened to be only a few blocks away from our hotel.
The buzz of the city very much reminds of New York: the traffic noise, the air filled with exhaust fumes and cigarette smoke, and rude taxi drivers in their (mostly) black cabs, trying to kill you off while you cross the street. Everybody seems to be in a rush to get some place else.
Plus the wonderful melange of ethnical diversity, that we have become so accustomed to. Language wise we seemed to have arrived in Babel, just when the confusion of the tongues happened.
Vespas in front of a Rolls-Royce dealership.
Architecture thick with history, real brick buildings, lovely parks. An overload of impressions. Not to forget the typical british stereotypes, such as this red phone booth. Not many of those seemed to have survived the new age of mobile phones.
Red double-decker buses in front of the Canadian Embassy with the Lord Nelson column in the background.
Sonja: Two thirds of the staff in the company I worked for is either dieting, lactose intolerant or gluten sensitive, hence my ex-colleagues put a lot of thought in providing me with a delicious edible gift which served me as dinner. I am going to miss those guys and gals. They were the best team I ever had the pleasure to work with.
The last morning has arrived.
Everything packed up and ready to go.
At the airport. Good bye, Canada!
I'm closin' the book On the pages and the text And I don't really care What happens next. I'm just going, I'm going, I'm gone. (Source)
Sunday morning... and the weather looked better than its forecast had promised. So for the last time we went on the Lillooet loop, along Sea-to-Sky Highway a.k.a. Highway 99. In Squamish we gathered some necessary supplies at Starbucks for a coffee break at Brandywine Falls.
While we enjoyed the view, the sun came out and presented us a lovely rainbow. It was fairly nippy but the warm beverages did the trick, and kept us warm.
Blue Jay!
We drove past Whistler towards Pemberton, and those clouds meant business... of the snowy kind.
And yes, we have been snowed on, it's only April.
Posing at Duffey Lake. It's cold and windy!
We left the snow behind, and it got warmer again as we headed towards Lillooet, where we had a quick lunch at the D'Oro Coffee Lounge.
Seton Lake
The road to Lillooet.
Along Fraser River.
Oh deer!
Rugged roads.
Oh, mountain sheep!
Beautiful vistas!
Spring has arrived!
The sky is weeping. (... and so are we...)
Our trip and our sojourn in Canada have come to their inevitable end.
For re-integration purposes we are going to watch the recently released (April 25, 2013 what a coincidence!) movie: Werden Sie Deutscher! (Become a German!). The documentary is following immigrants for six months while they are taking their mandatory 600 (!!!) hours of language course plus 45 hours of orientation course. The protagonists come from different cultural backgrounds, and have one common goal: to live, work, and/or study in Germany.
Here is a rough translation of the trailer:
Excercise 3: German for Integration Courses
"I work a lot and always come home very late. On the weekend I rest. And if there’s a good thriller on TV I am happy."
*Become A German*
Teacher: Let’s play a little bit “party”. Party? Do you understand party? (Students looking clueless, and so would we...)
German National Anthem playing.
Immigrant lady reading from study book: If you look for work, you shall... (daughter correcting: should...)
Innkeeper to immigrant: Do you have an idea about German cuisine in general? Can you prepare an Eisbein (pork knuckles, yikes!), can you bread a Schnitzel? Can you make Klöpse (meatballs) or Kohlrouladen (stuffed cabbage)? It is not simple! (Immigrant shaking head)
Immigrant’s Wife: Who is supposed to be able to read this when you take your test? (ripping paper apart) Again!
Teacher writing on blackboard: Cultural orientation, rules and behaviour patterns. Time is Money!
Comic strip: Here is a young man who doesn’t do everything right.
Immigrant lady reading from blackboard: You have to follow the laws. Don’t throw away your documents. You must read all offical letters. Pick up after your dog.
Role play 1: Policeman: Do you have an idea why we stopped you, Herr Doktor Schnöbel? Immigrant lady: Oh, boy!
Role play 2: Do you know what my problem is? YOU! You and your music!
Teacher: We are new here, we don’t know each other.
Sonja: While I was busy supervising the motorcycle transport, Roland was in the last leg of wrapping up things. We had already packed 25 boxes ourselves, and only left the fragile stuff to be packed by the movers.
A team of four turned up upstairs at the agreed time, boxed the 'leftovers' with utmost care, and wrapped up our furniture in several layers of bubble-wrap.
They had their own system of handwritten paperwork (in our computerized world we honestly somewhat expected scanners and handhelds), but Roland recorded everything electronically. Aren't we German after all?
The whole pack & wrap took longer than anticipated, so we were quite happy that we had already done our share of boxing the day before. Everything is packed up now, and tomorrow our stuff will be picked up and shipped.
We even received an approximate arrival date (although this does not mean too much yet as we will have to store our goods for a while anyway, until we have a final destination in Germany).
Sonja: Today the bikes got picked up for crating. The Sportster will get shipped in a metal box the moving company procured from a local Harley Davidson dealer, while the Vespa will be protected by a wooden custom crate.
With combined muscle power two men and myself pushed the motorcycle on to the road, since it got no insurance left. I noticed that the gentlemen in charge were no motorcycle experts. The concept of using the levers for breaking or pulling the clutch to get it into first gear to prevent the bike from moving seemed fairly new to them...
The Sportster merely fit on the lifting ramp, and again I had to make sure that the guy in front used the hand brake to prevent the bike from rolling further.
While maneuvering the Harley into a better position the battery cover came apart, and one of the rubber thingies that hold it in place got lost in the process...
Quite skeptical I watched their efforts to strap the Sportster to the wall of the truck. I was tempted to jump into the back of the vehicle and do it myself.
Next in line was the Vespa. I almost lost it when they tried lifting the scooter by its accessories, and got quite verbal about it.
I explained that the accessories are not made for heavy duty and that they should please apply appropriate care when handling those babies. I can only hope that the bikes will arrive unscathed at the warehouse and that the craters will do a good job of wrapping up the two-wheelers for the upcoming ocean transport.
Something Sherlock Holmes...
A tube station with the Palace of Westminster in the background.
Traffic lights for horsemen.
