The Babymoon Tour

mood: rested | drinking: always

Boy and I have been away. Far, far away.

Which should explain the lack of updates here. I considered writing from Prague but really, it’s better to be out there seeing the sights than sitting indoors blogging about them.

We have always loved to travel, and we vacation well together. Which is to say that vacations have typically been a pretty blissful experience for us.

Since 2009 was a crazy year, full of upheaval, change, and a new house, we figured we’d probably stick close to said new house in 2010 and not really go anywhere exciting.

And then that plus sign showed up in January, and our world went a little topsy-turvy.

So we decided that we’d take one last big hurrah before the Bean arrives. One last solo world tour, just the two of us. When Bean’s old enough, of course, we want to take her touring with us, but we know that for the next few years at least, we’ll probably be lying low.

The itinerary wasn’t too hard to figure out. We wanted to visit some places neither of us have ever been, and Prague was at the top of my list. So we connected the dots from there.

We flew out of San Francisco on April 13, landed in Frankfurt, Germany, very early the next morning, and immediately hopped a train to Munich. From Munich, we continued south to Innsbruck, Austria, then from Innsbruck to Vienna, then on into the Czech Republic to Prague, and finally back to Frankfurt to fly home. We were gone for two weeks.

The Babymoon was amazing, not only because of all the beautiful places we visited, but because Boy and I got to just hang out with each other, exploring each day as a new adventure. Truth be told, though, this trip was quite a bit different from the other times we’ve traveled internationally. Usually we don’t check out strollers and buy baby clothes.

But our first day in Munich, Boy became enamoured with the cool-looking strollers. (Europe just does baby gear so much better than the US. Everything looks so mod.) And of course, we brought a boatload of goodies home for Bean–an adorable stuffed pony from Munich, the sweetest little dress from Vienna, and an amazing marionette from Prague.

One of my favorite memories will always be the picture above, our literal mountaintop experience. While in Innsbruck, we took a funicular and two gondolas up to an Alpine peak called Hafelekar. It was gorgeous up there in the clouds, and very hard to come down.

Boy will probably remember the giant steins of beer in Munich, and I was as giddy as a little kid to see the Lipizzaner stallions perform at the Spanish Riding School in Vienna. Prague was full of beauty, and that’s where we decided to take a few belly shots of my 5-month bump.

It was an amazing time, and we’re so glad we took the trip. But now it’s back to reality–which is itself pretty damn good.

As our friend Michael said, “If you have to come home, at least you get to come home to San Francisco.”

And speaking of coming home, we got lucky with the volcano from Iceland. It erupted while we were in Austria, and of course we were keeping close tabs on all the airport closures and whatnot. We met many fellow travelers who were stuck, and marveled at the way an ash cloud from Iceland could keep everyone in Europe on the ground.

But the airport in Frankfurt re-opened on a Thursday, and we flew on Sunday, so everything worked out.

As fun as it is to leave for adventures, I’m very happy to be back home, too. And now I’ve got my plate full with some new poems and shooting part 7 of our 8-part cinépoem, The Tyranny of the Mirror. Not to mention getting ready for Bean’s arrival. So I’m not going to be bored at all.

-Lo, with vacation afterglow.