fireworks.
Fortunately the downtown is not flooded in this year like several
years ago. For hi-res photos of our environment, updated very frequently click here (USE HIGH SPEED CONNECTION).
December 31, 2005, New Year's eve: Heavy
rains lead to flooding in low areas close to the Truckee river in
Reno and a cancellation of the midnight fireworks.
Fortunately the downtown is not flooded in this year like several
years ago.
December 26 to 30, 2005: Diether and Jutta relax in Reno and the surroundings, enjoying the local hot springs, and driving to the Rye Patch arera on one day.
December 25, 2005: On Christmas Day, Diether and Jutta attend mass at St Joseph's in Cupertino, and drive to Reno. Traffic is very dense with stop and go between San Jose and Livermore. When they reach Stockton it starts to rain. All the way past Auburn they drive in heavy rain. They are lucky, taht they reach the snow chain checkpoint on interstate 80, just when chain requirments go into effect. With their 4-wheel drive, they can go on without chains, but have to drive very slowly on the slippery highway. They arrive at their destination in Reno in the late afternoon.
December 24, 2005: Jutta, Diether, Ben, and Ruth celebrate Christmas eve together in the home in Cupertino, and exchange Christmas gifts.
December 17&18, 2005: Diether and Jutta spend the weekend in Reno, enjoying the desert outdoors on Saturday. On Monday, Jutta has to shovel snow from the driveway.
December 2 to 12, 2005: On Friday, Diether returns from the East Coast to San Jose, Jutta by car from Reno. On Saturday they go the the annual yearend holiday party of Diether's work. Jutta stays in the Bay Area for the week to attend the exhibit of a conference in San Francisco on December 11 with Diether. On December 12, she returns to Reno.
Thanksgiving weekend, November 24 to 28, 2005: We celebrate Thanksgiving at the house of Ruth's parents with many friends. On Friday morning Diether and Jutta drive to Reno. They drive to the Rye Patch area on Saturday and Sunday. On Monday morning, Diether leaves from Reno for a business trip to the East Coast.
November 19 & 20, 2005: Diether and Jutta hike in the Rye Patch and Reno areas.
November 12 to 14, 2005: On Saturday morning Jutta and Diether drive to Reno after parking Diether's car at work. On Saturday and Sunday they enjoy the outdoors close to Reno; and attend mass in Reno on Sunday night. Early on Monday morning Diether returns to San Jose to go directly to work.
November 5 to 11, 2005:
On Friday evening, everybody (Diether, Jutta, and
European friends) meet in Reno. On Saturday they check out the
Rye Patch area, have lunch in Lovelock - where Diether has a 90
min phone conference on the cell phone from the car, parked next
to the train tracks -, and return to Reno via Pyramid Lake. On
Sunday they visit Lake Tahoe (a hike on the way to Incline
Village, and a drive to Tahoe City for lunch). They return via
Squaw Valley and Truckee. On Monday they visit Virginia City and
the Capitol in Carson City before Diether returns to the San Jose
area. On Tuesday morning Jutta and the friends drive to Yosemite
via Auburn and Groveland, because the Tioga Pass is already
closed for winter, and return to San Jose on Thursday evening. On
Friday evening Diether and Jutta take the friends to the airport
for a return to Europe.
October 31, 2005: Diether drops Jutta and the European friends off at the airport on his way to work. Jutta travels to Reno, the friends to San Diego.
Weekend of October 29&30, 2005: Friends from Munich arrive shortly after noon on Saturday. On Sunday, we visit Santa Cruz together.
Weekend of October 22&23, 2005: On Saturday evening Jutta and Diether drive to Half Moon Bay for a pre-wedding event. They stay overnight in a place, that vibrates from kitchen machinery and bar noise until 11pm. On Sunday they attend a lovely coastside wedding of friends.
October 11 to 21, 2005: While Jutta is in Reno, Diether travels to Europe, and returns via the East Coast to participate in various business events.
October 4 to 8, 2005: Diether and Jutta participate in a special event in New York city. Because of a transportation snafu, they miss their flight on Friday night, and return early on Saturday morning instead.
Weekend of October 1 & 2, 2005: Jutta has to work in Reno to support a conference on alternate energy, while Diether stays in the Bay Area. On Friday evening he has a pleasant Japanese dinner and a good conversation with friends from Stanford. Jutta joins Diether on Sunday afternoon.
Weekend of September 24& 25, 2005:
Diether joins Jutta in Reno on Saturday morning. Because of the
"Street Vibrations" event, there are many bikers
in town. We watch the fireworks from the backyard,
but do not walk the town, but enjoy the outdoors instead,
including Sunday in the Rye Patch area.
Weekend of September 17& 18, 2005: We have dinner with neighbors from Nevada at our house in Cupertino on Friday evening. On Saturday they take us to a retreat in the Santa Cruz Mountains and show us the area.
September 9 to 13, 2005: Diether takes some vacation to add to the weekend close to their wedding aniversary to enjoy the outdoors around Reno with Jutta. They watch the balloon races from the backyard. They find a new area to hike in, and swim in one of the lakes, even though it is a bit cold already. Jutta and Ben see our present place in Reno for the first time, stopping by during their return drive from their honemoon on Lake Tahoe.
September 3 & 4, 2005: We stay in the San
Francisco Bay Area and meet Ruth and Ben during a short
intermission in their honeymoon at home. They 
leave for the second part of it on Sunday morning.
August 25 to 28, 2005: Diether and Jutta travelled to Reno to meet relatives, who had travelled for sight-seeing in California and Nevada after the wedding. We showed them some of our favorite spots around Reno, like Lake Tahoe, the Nevada State Museum in Carson City, and Virginia City. We also had a picnique with a barbeque on a lake. Ben and Ruth started their honeymoon.
August 23, 2005: Marie and her friend return to Europe. We drop them off at the airport in San Francisco ealy in the morning before work. Marie's connecting flight aout of Atlanta is late and flies through some turbulence after take-off, because of thunderstorms in the area.
August 21, 2005:
Today is Ben's and Ruth's wedding
in the presence of many friends and family members.
August 17, 2005: Diether goes to work, Marie
and her friend stay at the house with Jutta, while Diether's
sister and their
family drive to San Francisco and
Sausalito. They eat dinner in San Francisco, and arrive home just
before midnight.
August 16, 2005: Diether and Jutta work, while the visitors drive to Monterey to see the aquarium. For dinner, they all get together at the house in Cupertino. After dinner they have a late celebration of Marie's special birthday.
August 15, 2005: Diether and Jutta work; the relatives drive to the Santa Cruz coast in the morning, and visit Stanford University in the afternoon. After dinner Diether and Johannes pick up Marie and her friend from the San Jose Greyhound station.
August 13 & 14, 2005: In preparation of
the arrival of guests for Ben and Ruth's wedding Diether and
Jutta work in the house in Cupertino on Saturday. In 
the evening, they have dinner in downtown
San Jose, and find, that parking is difficult, because of the San
Jose jazz festival. On Sunday morning, they visit Ruth's parents
to meet her grandparents, who have arrived on Friday. Then they
continue to the airport in San Francisco to pick up Diether's
sister Gundi and her family. All six people and the luggage of
the visitors fit well into our Buick. At home, the visitors
unpack; then Diether, his sister, her husband Hans, and her son
Johannes pick up a rental car at the San Jose airport. It takes
quite a while, because the numbers on some European driver's
licenses are hard to find. After they get home, they have coffee
and cake, and good conversations followed by dinner.
August 6 to 7, 2005: On Saturday we visit
Point Lobos, and have a picnic in the parc. We continue to
Carmel, visit the old mission (photo), and drive through town.
From there we continue to Pacific Grove, where we have coffee and
pastries at the tinnery (new name now). Then we continue to
Monterey, park close to the aquarium, and walk to the wharf. We
return, taking the fast route over to higway 101. Traffic is fine
and we arricve in Cupertino in much less than 2 hours, where we
have dinner at the house. On Sunday Marie and her friend leave
early by Greyhound bus to 
explore Southern California.
Diether, Jutta, and Ben work on some cleanup around the house in
Cupertino.
July 29 to August 5, 2005: After a week-long business trip to the East Coast Diether returns to Reno in the early afternoon on Friday, and takes a few vacation days for a long weekend. In the late afternoon on Friday, they went swimming in the Stampede reservoir, stopped for some drinks in Truckee, and then watched a strong thunderstorm during the drive back to Reno. On Saturday they drove to their favorite place northeast of Reno for hiking, swimming, and some other relaxing activities. On Sunday evening, after helping some locals with harvesting apricots, they drove back to Reno. On Monday and Tuesday, they enjoy swimming in local lakes, the museum in Carson City, and the ambiance of old Virginai City. Diether returned to Cupertino on tuesday evening by air; Jutta and Marie follow by car on Wednesday. On Thursday Marie's friend arrives from Germany. On Friday morning, after an early phone conference from home, Diether takes Marie and her friend to the train station in Sunnyvale for a visit to San Francisco.
July 22to 23, 2005: On
Friday evening Diether joins Jutta and Marie in Reno, driving the
old Jeep. In the evening, they watch surprise fireworks from the
house. On Saturday they first go swimming in two lakes close to
Reno ("spinach water" in the first lake, and dried dead
fish at the beach at the second).
Then they prepare for a day of outdoors activities with a family of friends from Europe. Diether picks the friends up from the airport in Reno in the early evening. After dinner, they enjoy the cool backyard, the view, and good conversation. On Sunday everybody but Jutta (not enough seats in the cars) goes 4-wheeling to the Peavine Peak in the morning, while Jutta prepares for the afternoon picnic and swimming in a desert lake (photo). After an early dinner at the house, Diether drops the friends off at the airport to take a delayed Southwest Airlines flight to San Jose.
July 20 to 21, 2005: Jutta and Marie visit Yosemite, staying in a very rustic cabin in the valley overnight. They continue to Reno on Thursday, arriving for a thunderstorm show in the evening.
July 15 to 17, 2005: On Friday we have a dinner party with the family of a professor from Germany and other frineds at the house in Cupertino. On Saturday Jutta and Diether show Marie the redwoods of the Santa Cruz Mountains and the Pacific coastline from Davenport to Half Moon Bay. On Sunday Diether leaves for a business meeting in Toronto, and Marie and Jutta enjoy the beach in Santa Cruz.
July 11, 2005: Marie, a teenaged relative from Europe arrives for a visit.
July 9, 2005: Followed by a visit to the
Santa Cruz beach on Saturday, Jutta and Diether hosted a dinner
to celebrate Ruth's birthday with Ben, Ruth, and the parents.
June 30 to July 6, 2005: Following a Monday & Tuesday business trip by Diether to the East Coast, on Wednesday we drove to Reno via highway 88, had lunch at Kirkwood Inn, and arrived in the mid afternoon. On Thursday we continued to a remote place in Pershing County, where we stayed until Monday for swimming in the county's waters and hiking and off-roading in the Humboldt mountain range. After our return to Reno, we watched the 4th of July fireworks in the Rancho Raffael Park and in Sparks. On Tuesday and Wednesday we went swimming and sunbathing on the beaches of two of the local lakes. On Thursday Diether had to go on another business trip, returning on Friday night to San Jose, where Jutta picked himup from the airport after her return by car from Reno. (temporary link to vacation photos)
June 11, 2005: Jutta organized our annual family party at the house in Cupertino, and we were joined by many of our friends. (Details at "Special family events", Ask Diether for the key.)
March 12&13, 2005: The Santa Cruz coastline saw very little sunshine this weekend, but we walked the Santa Cruz beach anyhow, followed by an outside lunch.
February 23 to March 9, 2005: Jutta and
Diether travelled out of the San Francisco airport at about the
same time. Jutta flew directly to Germany for a business trip and
to see relatives and friends. Diether had some business on the
East Coast and joined Jutta at her parents house on Saturday.
During the next week they had separate business meetings and
Diether participated in an immunology conference in Bavaria,
followed by a weekend with Diether's parents and two vacation
days to visit good friends in Holland. They started their return
drive to the Frankfurt airport shortly before noon, 
interrupted by a late lunch close to the Moyland
Castle. They spend the night in Frankfurt, where they had dinner
in a wine cellar close to the old opera house. After breakfast on
Wednesday morning, they walked to the Main river, and then took a
train to the airport to return to San Francisco.
February 18&19, 2005: Some of the desert mountains north of Reno are free of snow again to make 4-wheeling, hiking, and watching of wildlife easier.
February 12: The weather in the SF Bay Area is good to drive to Santa Cruz and have lunch outside close to the beach.
February 5&6, 2005: Jutta and Diether experience winter in the Humboldt mountain area close to the Rye Patch reservoir and in the Reno area.
January 15&16, 2005: We stay at home this
weekend to recover from a cold, which affects many people.
January 1, 2005, New Year's Day: Diether and Jutta started the New Year in Reno. Like last year, they planned to watchthe midnight fireworks from the house. However, a localized tiny snow storm moved in just before midnight to obscure all sight. And just after the fireworks were over, the air cleared up again. So they heard the fireworks, but could not see them. They had a very good start of the year anyhow, and exchanged wishes for a happy new year over some champaign. During the day, they walked the local neighborhood, because snow made it hard to get out to the desert.
HAPPY NEW YEAR 2005
(For the other parts of the family news click: (2004, 2003, July-Dec 2002, Jan-Jun2002, Jul-Dec2001,Jan-Jun2001,Oct-Dec2000, Jul-Sep 2000, Jan-Jun 2000, 1999, 1998)