Bockfest 2010

Well, it's almost the end of July, so I decided I should get another post up, this one on our adventures in March. Now I'll only be 4 months behind (yikes!), but August should be a little less busy, so hopefully I'll be able to catch up a lot more then.

At the beginning of March we volunteered at and participated in Bockfest. Bockfest celebrates the coming of Spring with Bock-style beer. Bock apparently means 'goat' in German, so goats are celebrated too. Bockfest is, by far, the coolest celebration in Cincinnati (in mine and Nik's opinions). Scott (Nik's best friend) and his wife Annie will hopefully be visiting us next year for Bockfest! Here are some pictures from the opening parade on Friday and Bockfest hall.

{scary eyes}




{yes, i am short}


{Moerlein is a Cincinnati beer company, probably my favorite Cincinnati brew}

More posts shortly on the rest of our fun month of March!

February 2010

Although the shortest month in the year, February was packed with fun and friends. The month was kicked off by a visit with our good friend, Emily. Emily and I worked together at Duke, where we quickly became friends. Emily quit her job to venture in to goat farming, but luckily for us, she took a road trip before beginning her internship. The weather was cold and snowy, but we still made the most of her time with us by catching up over drinks, a diner serving up a German breakfast, Eden Park, and Mainstrasse (Covington, KY). Here are some pictures from her visit:

Emily and her cute new haircut!






Ohio river, looking in to Kentucky.

It was really awesome having Emily visit. Hopefully we'll be able to see her next time she makes it back to Ohio!

Our next fun weekend was Valentine's Day weekend. We went out to a lovely dinner at Hugo, a southern restaurant down the street from us on Saturday night. We stopped by Aglamesis, our neighborhood ice cream shop, on our way home. (For those of you who don't know, Cincinnati turns out to be a big ice cream town: Aglamesis, Graeters, and UDF to name a few.)

On Sunday (Valentine's Day), we went ice skating at Fountain Square in downtown. It was quite a wonderful weekend and it was great to spend quality time together.

The following weekend was full of adventure too: a Cincinnati Cyclones game with Tricia and Kevin and exploring old, underground lagering cellars in Over-the-Rhine (OTR) Cincinnati.

Nik and I volunteered at Bockfest (a really awesome celebration of spring and beer) in February mainly so we could get a free tour of the old underground lagering cellars in OTR Cincinnati. And we're super glad we did, because they were AWESOME. We encourage all our friends to come visit next year for Bockfest (although we only have 1 spare bedroom...).

The tunnel above went under the street and was built during prohibition in order to transport the beer to the bottling plant.










Such cool, old buildings packed full of history.

To wrap up the month, the last weekend we ventured down to the Cincinnati Contemporary Arts Center to check out the Shepard Fairey exhibit. We then explored town to find all his art work.

Look really, really closely.