Oktoberfest at Playa Lucia

If I had to pick just ONE weekend out of the year that I wanted to be home in La Crosse, Wisconsin, well, okay, it would probably be Christmas.  But thankfully I have 3 weeks off at Christmas, so I’m making that happen.  BUT if I had to pick just one OTHER weekend out of the year that I wanted to be home…
It would be this weekend.  The beginning of Oktoberfest. 

Why I want to be home is not so much that I want to join the rest of the city in a 10 day drinking binge or eat my year’s share of bratwurst.  It’s the people, and the atmosphere.

Unlike high school, after college there are no 5 and 10 year reunions to look forward to.  But if you were in marching band, there’s something better.  And it is called The Alumni Band, and marching the Oktoberfest parade. 

Oktoberfest weekend, almost every person I remember as a friend from college comes back to La Crosse.  Friday night brings Alumni Band practice, reuniting with friends, and usually going out on the town.  Saturday, of course, brings the parade…more friends…a 3 mile march with a drum and lots of free adult beverages (many offered from people in the crowd), and a sea of familiar faces—many that I only see once a year…and more fun after the parade ends. 

It’s a time I hate to miss.  But, this year, I did. 

Instead, I was here.



Danielle and Kelsey and I tried out a new beach today called Playa Lucia, and we found it to our liking. 

The beach is beautiful—though the water wasn’t as clear or blue-green as at some beaches we’ve seen.  As we pulled off the road, we entered a forest of planted palm trees with sandy drives winding among them.  We pulled up to a deserted spot on the beach and planted ourselves there. 

Later, we explored further down the beach, and discovered that though the south end of the beach is breathtaking, with enormous boulders lining the shore, it is also full of seaweed, making swimming there impossible.

We mainly spent the day just relaxing.  Lying in the sun listening to the waves, with an occasional short dip to cool off, was exactly what I needed.






Of course, as I lay there, polka music played through my head.  Roll out the barrel… (Hurray, Hurrah, La Crosse!  La Crosse!)  

You're right little button...my friends ARE all there.
But I've got friends here too.

Comments

  1. Called to GoSeptember 26, 2011 at 9:10 AM

    Nice post, friend! I too missed Oktoberfest... but I had a great weekend in Taiwan... so I can't really complain. :)

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Cambodia: Reflections and Highlights

Image
I was really excited to visit Cambodia for a few days and hit up Angkor Wat and the other temples in the area.  Cambodia felt like my kind of adventure--and I can’t even really say why.  But I was excited.  I was excited for our hotel there--a full-out boutique hotel (not a hostel), with AC, a swimming pool, breakfast included, and airport pick-up for free--which cost us a scant $20 per night.  And we’d read about a lot of great tours we could take with local guides.  Flying in and flying out, this leg of the trip would be a breeze, and hopefully everything would be as cheap as the hotel.   The Mango Rain Boutique Hotel Our flight to Cambodia was unlike any other I’ve ever been on.  There were only about 20 of us on the flight--which would not have been strange, except it was, because we were on a full-size plane that could have seated 200.  The 20 of us were mostly grouped together towards the back of the plane.  Second impressive t...
Read more

DI Globals 2016: A Tale of Two Teams

Image
For the past 3 years, I have acted as a team manager for Destination Imagination at my school in Guatemala, and each year, my team has earned a trip to Global Finals in Knoxville, Tennessee.  This school year, I was blessed to manage the exact same team I had last year—the Aguaguates, the most wonderful group of kids any DI team manager could wish for.  This group, all 7 th graders this year, has everything needed to not only excel at DI, but also make a team manager’s job almost unnecessary.  They have amazing team chemistry, and they understand the importance of teamwork.  They’re crazy creative and hilarious and amazing actors when they get on stage.  They push themselves to improve their performances.  They know what they need to get done for DI, and they create their own practice schedules.  In short, they are a DI dream team, not to mention really, really great people .  This year though, I took one look at the school calendar and deci...
Read more

Yearly Update: The Journey to 30

Image
Over a year has passed since my last “update.”  And the year I was 29, despite the fact that I lived close to home rather than abroad, was anything but boring, so there’s no real reason for the lack of blog posts.   The year I was 29, I survived what may have been my most difficult year of teaching yet.  Many overseas teachers say, “Teaching in the States is so much different than teaching abroad.  You’ll see.  That’s why I went overseas; I’d never go back to teaching in the States.  It’s just...too much.”  Well, they’re not wrong.  I admit, I thought that with five years teaching experience under my belt, my first year in the US, my first year at the high school level, would go rather smoothly.  While in a sense it did (no concerns about the quality of my work from administration or complaints from parents), it was mentally and emotionally very taxing.  Even this year, my 2nd back in the States, I’m still adjusting to and coming t...
Read more