My life - action and adventure 

I was born in the valley of the Rhine river as child of a Post office civil servant.  My father was already unusually adventurous for his time, our first journey abroad was in 1953 to Italy, in an old plywood DKW, which caught fire climbing the then unpaved mountain roads in the Alps. Father deleted the flames and continued alone on the pass, my mother and we children followed him by foot. 

This adventurous nature didn't come out for some years, because the late 60's brought not only student revolutions, but also a husband and a son. Cash was scarcely and vacation meant going to my sister’ house, she was married in the Netherlands. In the middle of the 80's I was alone again with my teenage son and we went to our first trip together to a holidays club in Tunisia. In the hotel  there was offered a trip to the desert.  A fully air-conditioned touring bus brought me and a group of 50 people to the dunes of Douz, in the morning we were put ridiculously disguised on camels and went to the dunes to admire the sunrise.

But it had happened already, I had myself infected on the virus "Africa", which never releases and brings you back and back again on this fascinating continent. There I wanted to go again to enjoy this sun, this width, this sand! But not in a rush with a travel group of well fed people in their fifties behind me, no, I want to go by myself, cross the Sahara on dirt roads, have plenty of time. That was my dream. Oh, would I meet one day a nice man and go with him on the large journey ...

Until I woke up one morning and was thinking: Why do I need a man for this trip? Why not do it alone?

Immediately I booked a flight to Agadir. From there I wanted to travel with public transportation to the Sahara. A few weeks before my departure Mary, a co-worker,  asked me if she could come with me. And so we two completely naive women started on this exciting trip to unknown adventures. And adventures there were plenty, but soon I found out, that I could not go to all the places where I wanted to go without a car. The bus didn't bring me to the far end of the country, the most interesting places. And so in the same year I bought my first four wheel drive car, a small Suzuki jeep, and since then I was altogether maybe two years in Morocco. I visited also Algeria, but didn't like it too much, and of course went back to Tunisia. During all these years and travels I wrote travel guides about Morocco and Tunisia, and my first interest was explaining how to find your way on the dirt roads, which are not indicated in any maps, and are without road signs. Tunisia is available on CD.

My son Brian had pursued my activities in these years very distrustfully, a mother travelling in the Sahara did not fit in his eyes. But then finally he came along with me on a trip, not without his girlfriend of course, who is long married to him now. Here the two are enjoying a picnic in the Dahar mountains in Tunisia.

After I did so for 10 years, I had the feeling that I need a change in my life, that simply somewhat new in my life must occur. A friend had taken me on a ride in his single engine airplane. Already from the first moment I was fascinated. A terrific feeling to regard the world in such a way from above. If I could do this myself! But it is simply too expensive to earn the private pilot licence.  I went again to Morocco, displaced this desire for one year, but it simply always came back and I had to admit to myself that it made no sense. I must do it!

So I went in January 1997 to Florida, and on to a completely new world. Florida is so different than North Africa, but beautifully also. For me it is not a country for vacation and adventure, it is a country to live. Such a pleasant climate, such beautiful homes, such a wide space to live. No parking lot concerns, no crowding in the supermarket, this wonderful beaches, nice people. And then the freedom of flying. Every few miles there are airfields, no landing fees, flying at night without problems, no complains about noise, in the opposite, there are even villages, which are built along a runway, with a hangar behind the house and a taxiway from the runway to the house. And be honest: such a single-engine plane, which is to be heard only while takeoff and landing, makes fewer noise as a Harley, and also fewer than crying of a child. So it was only logically that I acquired a little home in the spring 2002, a quite modest home, not a hangar house in a Fly-in community, but it is mine and I can go now to Florida, whenever I want. No more hotel concerns, if because of Race or Bikeweek also the last bed is occupied at quadruple price ...

But sometime one must also earn its rolls and its gasoline for the travel. So I work as a quite normal specialist in the Federal Statistical Office of Germany, and it makes fun. Statistics does not have to be always a dry job, and our team is the most state of the art in the office. We arranged a detailed Internet supply and my function is to care for the Statistics Shop editorially. There one can download tables against fee on its PC and can thereby work with the figures immediately. If you miss anything in the Shop, please send simply a E-Mail to me and I'll see what I can do.

Besides our office goes in addition, about ten times in the year on fairs and congresses. There my colleagues and I show the interested public, which information we can offer and where our information is to be found. I enjoy very much to have there direct contact with our customers.

In 2006 there was a new developement. After writing travel guides for more than 10 years for a publisher I founded my own edition. In the first year I published a travel guide Morocco, a camping guide and a hotel guide. But my favorite project was a children's book about Morocco. This year followed a travel guide Mauritania.