The "Secret" Staff outing!

Friday, after school, a large charter bus pulled up front and most of the 45 staff members from ISA piled in. We're a bit of a motley crew at this point, having survived the first week of school. Most of the male teachers sat in the back of the bus (never a good sign), Geoff and Dagmar brought their adorable dog, we finally found the preschool teacher who was running down the street from the bank afraid we'd leave her behind and we threw Cathie, the principal, in the bus as the doors were closing.

Our secret location was 20 km from Augsburg. We knew we were headed for the national forest, we just weren't quite sure where. I sat near Alke, Melissa, Vania and Anjuli and we swapped weirdest kid stories until the bus pulled up at the Mickhauser Alm. It's a restaurant/grill/hiking trail. Everyone was so tired we decided to get drinks first so I ordered a lovely cappucino which I needed desperately since the warm ride in the bus had literally lulled a few of us to sleep.

After coffee, we headed out for the walk. There was the short walk (800 meters) or the "Grosser" walk (4 km). I took the longer walk. It was fun to be able to chat with different people and move around, unlike eating out where you're stuck with the people you sit next to. I walked most of the way with Eoin (pronounced "Owen"), one of the new teachers from Ireland. He was absolutely fascinating. His father is a professional Irish storyteller and goes around Ireland collecting stories and performing. Eoin himself studied archeaology and so as we were walking along the path, he found bits of pottery, unusual rocks and other strange things that most people miss when walking in the woods. We only got lost three times, Richard only brought up bizarre 9/11 conspiracies once and the iphone compass app made a guest appearance about 4 times.

By the time we got back to the Alm, we were starving. Unfortunately, the rustic menu was on street sign like pillars around the patio and Cathie kept sitting in front of it so we only saw half the menu at any given time. I got the Kaesespaetzle which is Bavaria macaroni and cheese. Heaven! It had those crunchy fried onion straws on top which made it even better. I sat by Geoff, Dagmar, Sarah, Herr Wagner (our new finance manager) and Eoin. It was fun chatting with Geoff about music and photography.

After dinner, we shuffled around a bit, chatting with different people. I ordered a plum cake that came just as the bus was pulling in. I woofed it down (yummy!), took my last sip of white wine and got on the bus.

Ah, the bus ride home...several of our male teachers certainly enjoyed the local beer and the fact that the school was paying for it. The singing started within the first mile of the ride home and didn't stop until I got off at the train station where several teachers needed to catch their train home.

The song selection was an eclectic mix of American oldies that I didn't know the lyrics to and Irish/Australian/British songs about working on farms and dancing with your "lassie".

I walked home from the train station which is always nice at night and collasped on my couch, thankful I had not only survived, but enjoyed my first week of teaching!

Update: Saw Christine today (one of the people who got off at the train station with me). Turns out that she and several other teachers went out after being dropped off and didn't quite get home until 3AM (the poor boys who live in Ulm about 45 minutes away had to catch an early morning train to get home)!