The Loyal Bavarians, Episode 5

My nephews have cameos in "Breaking Brawt"! So fun. :)

It's really sad to see this series come to an end. It's been such a fun look back on the town that I love, and it is my sincerest wish that those who see it become as fond of it as I am. Enjoy:

• The former Mayor of Leavenworth is in the shot where Dolph talks about Trude and The Royal Bavarians. "Lots of luck with that..." was an improvised line that cracks me up.

• The way Jessie says, "My girl Ams," makes me melt. :)

• Apparently, the crew had to be there by 4am in order to make the bratwurst! This is why I'm not an actor.

• Those sausage-eating outtakes at the end.... another reason I'm not an actor.

• "Say my name!" *snort laugh*

And that's it! I'm so proud of my brother for his creativity and work. Please share these videos with your friends and if you're ever in Washington, make sure to pay my hometown of Leavenworth a visit for me! :)

The Loyal Bavarians, Episode 4

"Wilda's Good Fortune" is the episode where the Lost Boys really grow on me! {I laugh at "par-cow!" every. time.} And Wilda's absurd, but devastating discovery is completely entertaining.

• This episode is jam-packed with nostalgia! I remember when they first put up the Maypole; I've been to the Nutcracker Museum several times; and even the shot of the hanging flower baskets being watered makes me think of summer days on main street.

• Wilda is handed a fortune cookie by our good family friend, Sister Bailey. Hi Mary Lou!!

• Truffles the Bear sits outside of the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory, which, until I was nearly 20 years old, I believed was exclusive to Leavenworth. He really is chained to the bench because people keep stealing him!

• I love that the Lost Boys are shown in the gazebo, because that's exactly where the 'bad boys' always hang out! Ha!

• If you're going to eat your feelings, Leavenworth is the place to do it. Pastries, chocolates, and sweets galore. I used to walk to the Taffy Shop after work and get a free sample of their latest flavor creation, and the Danish Bakery has the best cream horns. Yum.

The Loyal Bavarians, Episode 3

"Amsel's Day Out" is my favorite episode. I love how super sweet and innocent Amsel is, and the way she elevates Jessie as a result:

• The lookout point that Jessie takes Amsel to is the top of Icicle Hill. I used to run that hill every day! I still miss the view.

• "He looks like a stalker!" is a completely improvised line and makes me remember how common it felt to have adults of all ages invested in you and protective of you. That kind of community feeling is authentically Leavenworth.

• I'm kind of sad that the Tattoo place didn't show up until after I moved away. It certainly adds a younger vibe.

• In the outtakes, you get to see the alpenhorn being blown on top of the Enzian Inn, which has been a fixture of Leavenworth for as long as I can remember! Also, the Enzian has the most amazing breakfast buffets. Go. You'll thank me.

• I am secretly in love with Klemens. 

The Loyal Bavarians, Episode 2

The second episode, "Baruch Wane", is one of my favorites! Having lived in Leavenworth myself, I can identify with Bennie being torn between the love of his 'Bavarian heritage' and his desire to usher in a more modern age.

When I was 16, we lived in a little house just off of the main street, which meant gingerbread trim, accordion music piped over outdoor speakers 24/7 and the smells of bratwurst and sauerkraut wafting through the air. For the most part, I had a fierce pride for my strange little hometown, but other times.... I longed to have a place where I could buy a t-shirt that didn't have a beer stein printed on the front.

• I love that they're caught eating 'contraband' in the ally. Getting our first McDonalds in Leavenworth was quite the controversy-- it totally felt like you were a traitor if you were seen eating there!

• Still, McDonalds was not where you went if you were craving American food. It was always the 59er Diner for burgers and shakes. It's the perfect BatCave for Bennie.

• In actuality, The Castle Site is where all the city buses are parked-- but for years, my brother has wanted to build a real castle there. I love that he worked that into the script! {Take note, people! Leavenworth needs an IMAX theater and moat rides!}

• "Gun ridden ally." *snort laugh*

BONUS! Episode 2.5!

Meet the Lost Boys of Leavenworth-- they claim to be the collateral damage of 'oppressive' theme towns. :)

The Loyal Bavarians, Episode 1

Growing up, my family moved at least every two years. By the time I left home at the age of 19, I'd already moved twenty-nine times! But the last six moves and five teenage years were spent in the town of Leavenworth, Washington-- a breathtakingly beautiful bavarian-themed tourist town that I unequivically think of as 'home'.

To be a local in a tourist town is a distinctly unique experience; one that can be difficult to describe. That's why I love the new web series "The Loyal Bavarians". It's humorous and absurd and yet a completely dead on homage to the place that I love. I'll be posting one episode each day this week, along with some brief annotations at the end.

Enjoy!

• The outfits that Amsel and Wilda are wearing? I wore those when I worked at Cafe Rumpelstilzchen as a waitress and baker. {No longer in business, but hi Theo and Elsa!}

• Woody Goomsba is-- to my chagrin and horror-- completely real. It was a video that went viral and brought drunken college kids to Oktoberfest, but did IN NO WAY represent Leavenworth. RIP Woody. 

• All the exterior shots make me terribly homesick.

• I recognize the Reinhardt's house-- it's on Icicle Loop. Nearby is where "The Sound of Music" is performed every summer.

• My son wants to know where he can get a pretzel that big. {Answer: The Munchen Haus, Andreas Keller, and The Danish Bakery. You're willkommen.} 

Last Christmas

From the minute I tearfully declared my decision to divorce, my family has swarmed in to love, protect, nurture and sustain me.

They dropped everything. 

Half of them picked up and moved states to be near me. The other half has been helping financially and emotionally. All of them have been praying for me, talking with me, and giving the kind of empathetic, whole-hearted, essential support that brings to mind soldiers in the trenches together. I cannot imagine going through this without them. They've been indispensable. My soft place to land. My refuge.

We call it the Hansen Invasion, and I've never been so proud to be a Hansen.

Over the holiday break, we decided that it might be cathartic to make a Christmas Video after all.

Discovering who J really is has been the biggest disappointment of my life; but accepting who J really is has been biggest liberation of my life. I needed a song that encapsulated both the heartbreak and the resolve; the disgust and the freedom, the sorrow and the joy.

And that's how we decided to cover "Last Christmas" by Wham.

Enjoy it in all its 80's glory. :)



I have to mention that this was all shot in a single night after we'd put the kids {15 between us all} to bed. We filmed it using a half working Panasonic PK800 tube camera {like on Ghostbusters!} and a Nikon DSLR pointed at a TV. We wrapped up around 2am and none of us fully recall the events captured on film-- but it was a complete blast.

Every time I watch it, I gut-laugh and feel fiercely grateful for the abundance of good that the world still offers. My brothers and sisters are evidence of that.

Happy Christmas. ;)

Alaska Cruise: Part 6

The way J's eyes lit up when he saw our train was exactly the way I felt in Juneau. Trains are J's Kayaks. :)

Originally, the whole family had talked about renting a few cars to drive to Anchorage. J heard that plan and countered it with a scenic, glass topped train ride.

Good call.

Even if nature's majesty was wasted on some:

I know it's redundant to keep talking about how beautiful Alaska is, but really! It was SO beautiful. Like, fill up your soul beautiful. Like, breathe it all in beautiful. Like, spend every minute outside so you can bask in it beautiful. 

I'm sure that like Washington, it's an entirely different story in the winter, {Constant cloud cover + impassable snow + deep, dark days = sadness for this girl} which is why my new motto is-- this is why God invented snowbirds. 

So green! So rugged! Only our Seattle resident looks nonplussed.

And, of course, we have a GoPro time laps taken from this angle:

Thanks to the quickly approaching Summer Solstice, we had super-slow sunsets.

I had to look up the phenomenon when we got home.

It felt like the sun was suspended near the horizon endlessly, making for some truly compulsive photo taking. :)

Of course, J saved his biggest reactions for the train whistle. His brother caught this spontaneous show of excitement:

That's my guy. :) He didn't sit down the entire 3 hour train ride, even though he was tired and sore from our hike. It was a great way to say goodbye to Alaska!

Alaska Cruise: Part 5

Our last port was Seward, where we decided to hike Harding Trail overlooking Exit Glacier. It's supposed to be a 6-8 hour hike, but we only had 4 hours to dedicate to it.

I carried the camera bag, but was so excited by the challenge of the climb that I never remembered to take it out. Consequently, we have a lot of pictures taken by J's iPhone of my backside. ;)

I did get one photo of a marmot, though. It looks like a tiny groundhog here, but it was big.  We discovered throughout the course of this trip that J always spots {and gets excited by} the animals when we're out in nature. I, on the other hand, like the views, vegetation, and physical exertion.

The trail was beautiful. Mountains, trees, flowers, waterfalls-- with each subtle change in elevation, there was something new to see.

While I still have plenty of post-depression junk in my trunk, I felt pretty fit. I was bounding up rocky stairways and speeding up the rough trail to try and get as far as we could in our limited time frame. We were both soaked in sweat by the time we got to the glacier overlook.

At this point, we were passed by a man running up the trail. Not just jogging. He was full out running! As it turns out, Seward is famous for a race up the nearly vertical face of Mt Marathon every 4th of July. This guy was training for it, and $%&@ if I didn't feel suddenly very out of shape! I was impressed. And jealous. And adding Mt Marathon to my bucket list.

J did not feel the same way. Once we passed the tree line and started hiking the switchbacks in snow up to our shins, he began to peter out and fall behind. We wanted to make it to the trail's end {or at least as far as the emergency shelter} but had to turn back or risk missing our ride. We could have done it if we'd had another 45 minutes. 

Even so, I was so happy to get a real hike. As I kept telling J, being outdoors and really using my body had become extremely cathartic for me. I was able to stop berating myself for not looking the way I think I 'should' look, and instead could really relish all that my body is capable of doing. I felt vibrant and healthy and truly alive.

At the top, we ran out of water. Disobeying every instinct my mom instilled in me, we found a stream of pure glacier runoff and {hoping it wouldn't kill us} filled our water bottles with the icy cold water.

Soooo good. And I'm still alive, so, there you go. :)

Then we hiked down {not nearly as fun as going up}, caught our shuttle back to town, and had a fish lunch before catching our train to Anchorage.

I already miss having fresh fish every single day. :( Seward, you were awesome. See you again for the Mt Marathon race. Someday.

Alaska Cruise: Part 3

You know how sometimes returning from vacation can send you into a funk? Because reality. And dishes. And 108 degree heat.

Well, we've been back for a week, and I'm still on a high. I think it's safe to say that this upswing in my mood is more than just residual vacation bliss, and is, in fact, a chemical shift. I haven't felt this effortlessly happy since... wow. Since I very first went on anti-depressants. I'll have to do a more in-depth post on all of that, but for now, suffice it to say that I feel good.

Next up in our tour de Alaska: Skagway.

Right off the boat, we found two of our favorite things-- a VW Bus for him, and two beautiful wooden kayaks for her. :)

Skagway is an Alaskan gold-rush town. It had that cool frontier/railroad vibe, and of course J was obsessed with the train history. The building above had the date 1899 on it. I have no idea what it was used for, but the decorated facade was certainly interesting.

J loved all the train stuff. Apparently, this is how one clears snow off of train tracks in Alaska:

Part of our group had booked a fishing trip while the rest of us took a bus up to the Canadian border and the Yukon. It wasn't as adventurous as striking out on our own, but we did get to hike to a waterfall:

 Photograph some amazing scenery:

Watch a black bear fresh out of hibernation:

And sing "Silver and Gold" in front of the Yukon sign:

Honestly, it was incredibly beautiful. All the lakes and rivers had an iridescent blue-green quality due to the silt in the glacier runoff. The trees at the highest altitudes were two hundred years old, and yet only came up to my waist since they grow in such harsh conditions. And the mountains!

 I had to keep saying it: "Now that's a mountain!" Even though J gave me this look every time I did:

Worth it.

Alaska Cruise: Part Deux

Even now, when I look back on Juneau, it seems surreal-- the crisp air, the towering, misty mountains, and most of all, the blue ice.

Before our trip, I'd told J that if we could only do one thing in Alaska, I'd want to see ice caves. I found a company called Above & Beyond Alaska that guides challenging 6 hour hikes up Mendenhall Glacier, where you don crampons and marvel at the caves created by the melting ice. But it was $200 per person, and after J's car broke down {for the 2nd time!} in the weeks before we left, I knew it wasn't going to be financially feasible.

We decided to hike on our own instead. It was a grey day with a constant, spitting rain. We took the shuttle to Mendenhall and took a {paved} trail to the waterfall overlooking Glacier Lake. It was gorgeous, if not physically challenging. The lake was filled with icebergs caused by the glacial calving, and even from shore, they were a bright turquoise blue.

And then I saw the kayakers. 

Just two of them gliding along the lake and navigating the ice alone, so close to the blue, they could touch it. 

The day before, I'd discovered in Icy Straits how much I loved to kayak. The power of using my body to propel myself thru the water; the serenity of being so near the surface; the exhilaration of exploring nature in a way that seemed silent and unnoticed and one-- all of it combined to create a supremely zen experience. 

I saw those kayakers and turned to J with my eyes alight. "I want to go to there," I exclaimed.

 

As it turns out, the same company that guides glacier hikes {Above & Beyond Alaska} rents the kayaks. They outfit you in rain gear, give you a quick safety rundown, and then drop you off for 4 hours of self guided exploration on the lake. HEAVEN!

It was breathtaking. Awe-inspiring. Thrilling. Every similar adjective you can think up, it applies. It was absolutely the highlight of the entire trip, and by the time we were finished {sweating, sore arms, and with manic grins plastered to our faces} I declared, "Give me an ocean and a kayak, and I'll be a happy woman!"

And that was just Day 4. Pinch me!

Alaska Cruise: Part 1

Hello internets! Yes, I'm still alive! And thanks to some tinkering with my meds and the removal of my Mirena (big surprise: hormonal birth control and I do not get along) I'm feeling far less anxious and depressed. It's early days yet, but I'm still hopeful that this is the beginning of a mental upswing for me. Having recently returned from an amazing vacation hasn't hurt, either! :) 

J's parents are celebrating their 50th Wedding Anniversary this year, so to celebrate, their 6 children + spouses joined them on a cruise to Alaska. I'll be honest, J and I were both wary-- it seemed like a lot of money to have to spend on something we assumed would be a floating hotel and buffet, {Wall*E anyone?} and I didn't want to end up having resentments.

But my mother in law is persistent, and with everyone else fully on board, we knew it wasn't really an option to bow out. So we gathered the money, bribed an overqualified and soft-hearted SIL to watch the kids, and embarked with very low expectations. At the very least, I wouldn't have to cook or do dishes for 9 days, right?

King Crab Leg in Juneau, AK

Holy Freakin' Awesomesauce, did we have fun! 

Ketchikan was our first stop. The town was cute, but kinda touristy, so we took a bus to Totem Bight State Park, and admired the scenery. It was a gorgeous day, sunny and breezy with the smell of sea spray on the air. 

Every so often, J would see my expression, sigh, and say, "Go ahead. I know you want to." With relish, I'd exclaim, "Now THAT'S a mountain!!" I hadn't realized how often I tend to point out the fact that Arizona doesn't have 'real' mountains once I go home to the Northwest. 

Next was Icy Straits Point, a small island village that used to receive all its revenue from the local fish-packing plant. Now it boasts a zip-line, kayaking, whale watching, and a bear population that outnumbers humans 5 to 1! Also, the fish-packing-plant-turned-museum-and-gift-shop is actually pretty cool.

J, of course, adored the wildlife. Fifteen years ago, on our honeymoon, he got distracted by a bald eagle perched outside our window. I was left twiddling my thumbs in bed and I haven't let him live it down since. :) In Icy Straits, he spent hours snapping photos of the bald eagles. We have pictures of them flying, fishing, nesting, eating and more. Hopefully, bald eagles are finally out of his system. 

But the eagles weren't the only excitement! We watched as three humpback whales bubbled and fed. {and so did that lady-- I love her shocked expression!} They were HUGE and amazing and, since we saw them from the shore, totally worth the $300 we didn't spend on a whale-watching tour. :)

And this was only 3 days in! More to come in Alaska Cruise: Part Duex.