Holiday in Taiwan and South Korea

Astrid and me had a wonderful trip to Taiwan and South Korea. It was short but impressive. Plus I met some friends from university in Seoul which I had not seen in a decade.

Traditional pagoda in the central mountains of Taiwan

Delicious food at the Sun Moon lake

Impressive newly build temple in the central Taiwan mountains, a nice mixture between traditional gold...

...and colorful architecture...

...with a massive buddha overlooking the valley.

The central mountain range with its steep and narrow roads.

Sometimes you could not even see the roads in the middle of the jungle.

A bit of trekking along the way.

Back to South Korea. We had a 2 day stop-over only, but it was enough time to visit again some places like the Shinchon area, the Sogang university and some temples in the city center.

Traditional Korean architecture

Asians do not build houses, they build cities. Coming soon...

Dawn of the day

I haven't seen such a wonderful sunrise very often, beginning a new day passing the Himalaja on a flight towards Thailand.

Winter holiday

As the winter had a tight grip on Germany til last week we decided to stay in Hesse at Astrids family for our winter holiday.

It was the week of karneval whis more a tractor show here. ;-)

We went skiing in Willingen and had fun with our horses, the dogs and the new 4-wheel drive Volvo.









On our way home to Mannheim Astrid started this year's dressage tournament season with a good placement.



Next week I will be in Bangkok for 3 days.

Ko Samui

The last Weekend in Singapore we Tool a flight to Ko Samui, a nice island on the west coast of Thailand.

Perfect summer weather, beaches, Jet Ski, elephant ride, waterfalls, there was more than enough to See for a weekend.




The big Buddha of Samui



Elephant Ride





The Long pool in our resort



Our Beach Villa

Asia

Leaving bitterly cold Germany I left to Singapore on the 8th January to work for a Dutch client for almost 3 weeks rolling out and training a planning software.

The City itself is magnificent and as every Asian capital an impressing contrast to any German city.











The first weekend I enjoyed the 30° temperature and sun on Sentosa island beach in Singapore.



This weekend my collegue and me went to Bukit Lawang near Medan on Sumatra island (Indonesia) for some Jungle trekking. It was amazing to experience this scenery and see wild monkeys, gibbons and orang-utans in their natural environment.

Riding in the snow

It has been a white christmas and it is still snowing from time to time. I was riding out with Andor today. It was a bit exciting for him in the snow plus he also learned crossing highway bridges and passing kids with firecrackers. He was a bit excited but learned his lesson.


The picture is from a day before when I went out with Andor, Astrid and the dogs

Some opera

Today at 8:00 pm there will be a live transmission of Arte liveweb of "Moscow Cheryomuski" (Dmitri Shostakovich) from the Opera Lyon. My sister´s boyfriend Mikael Babajanyan sings the role of Fedja Drebedniov. It is sung in Russian with spoken French dialogues. It is a very funny opera, lots to laugh, so if you get a chance to see it please do so.

See the video here live or the recording:

New York City

New York City, always a place to spend time. But this time I prefered hiking in the mountains over the city and just spend one afternoon/evening in NYC.







View from New Jersey on Manhattan.



Times Square

College Football - The Scarlet Knights from Rutgers

One evening we went to a football match of the college league. The Scarlet Knights from Rutgers university were playing versus University of Florida.

A Walk in the Woods - my steps on the Appalachian Trail (New York State)

In November I have been to the US for another training. 2 weeks in Parsippany, half an hour east of New York City.

The first weekend I used to go hiking the Appalachian trail. I choose the section in the Bear Mountain and Harriman State Park, the oldest part of the trail.





The Bear Mountain bridge crossing the Hudson River

















The Lemon Squeezer