German

Editorial Comment:This is for Wednesday November 17th and is written by the real Ed Winkle himself
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It has taken me 18 years to get back to the Fatherland. 18 years! I don't know why it took me so long. I guess I never had a good reason to come back before today.

I was accepted into LEAD Class IV at Ohio State in 1991. The 60 day intensive agricultural study over two years with 29 classmates culminated in a 3 week trip to Europe in 1993. We were here in February 1992 or 3, I cannot remember which at this moment and it was the greatest thing that had happened to me at that point in my life.

I love Germany and I love Europe, the roots of my ancestors. I am Celt and German with some Dutch thrown in for good measure. I woke up early this morning anticipating taking LuAnn to my Fatherland later this morning.

I am German through and through. The words and pronunciation is coming back to me. It is a shame my high school did not offer German as it was the only language that interested me when I was told I needed two years of foreign language to attend college back in 1963. My school only offered French and Spanish so I chose French which helped me greatly in our tour of Paris and the Paris Agricultural Show a few years ago.

At this point in our River Danube Oddesey cruise I can say the Abbey at Melk, Austria has been most impressive. Everything has been wonderful, though, and I can highly recommend Vantage Travel to you for your European exploration. They are Europeans who speak English and know their continent very well.

The 160 people on the cruise are well educated and well travelled and in my age group. We have met several new friends we will see again in the future. One is Doug and Mary Bocksteigel from West Bend, Wisconsin, originally from Oak Hills of Cincinnati. We have a lot in common and they are delightful people.

If you mention my name when you sign up for one of Vantage's trips, we both receive a nice little discount. I will share more about that later but this morning I am enjoying telling you about our trip up the Danube from Budapest to almost Germany today.

We will spend the day around Passau, Germany before travelling on up the river.

It has taken me 18 years to get back to this country but I am almost there.

I can't wait to get off the ship and look around.

Ralph, you are doing a great job, just like I imagined and even better. It will take me awhile to digest your well written posts when we return home.

Ed and LuAnn