Afternoon in Grainau

Yesterday, Friday, but Ryan and my Monday we showed up at work at 8:30 as we do every day. This morning however they were still assigning sections instead of having them ready to hand out. I watched as they sent a couple German's home. As always though they were speaking only German and we had no idea what was going on. Ryan, Zack and I were standing there saying to each other "they better not send us home." For one they have already been sending us home at 13,00 nearly every day drastically cutting our hours with no explanation. And for another thing it is aggravating to come to work on your Monday just to get sent home because if we had known that we could have had a three day weekend. Eventually our Supervisor did turn to us and ask if we wanted to go home. She explained that the day before we had 150 check outs (half the hotel), but nearly no check ins. This left us with so many vacancies that they did not have enough rooms for the number of housekeepers scheduled. Later one of our leaders told us that in the five years she has worked here she has only seen this happen one other time. They did not even seem to know what to do. But the three of us expressed we would prefer to stay and work. So they asked the next German who showed up if he wanted the day off and he gladly accepted. So they gave Ryan and I his section to split and told us to go home at noon. They gave Zack four rooms scattered throughout the hotel and told him to leave when he was done.

It was another beautiful day out and after we got off we had so much daylight left that Ryan and I decided to explore. We headed to Grainau an outskirt of Garmisch. This is where the true base of the Zugspitz is and we found where the Bahn heads up the mountain to the other ski area. It is also out where the Eibsee is. The Eibsee is a fair size lake that we cannot wait to take advantage of this summer. They have lots of non motorized lake activities, but Ryan and I still want to find somewhere nearish that we can try to wake board this summer. This is a side note, but we recently heard that in Austria they have some lakes with a rope tow type apparatus that pulls you on a wake board and is actually fun. We'll have to see about that this summer. Right now the Eibsee is totally frozen over. It should solid enough to walk all over and I went out on it just a little, but it is also covered with snow and I was just too nervous of what you see on the movies of falling through a thin spot.

It was also cool to explore this area because we saw the mountains from a new perspective. It gave the Zugspitz (the tallest mountain in Germany) so much depth. It was really really beautiful.

We also ate lunch at the cutest little cafe restaurant in Grainau that was attached to a hotel. Although it seemed that every other building was a hotel which was more a converted large home, not the type of hotel you'd imagine in the states. We must have chosen a good place because a ton of people showed up while we were there. I love the mixed salads they sometimes serve in Germany and did today. You get a little section of greens, a section of German potato salad (I love it SO much), some marinated cucumber slices, and some marinated cabbage. This makes such an interesting a delicious salad. Our meals were pretty good too and I had a rose wine that was very good. They serve wine here in a mini pitcher (it is 250mL) and then pour it into your wine glass leaving you more to pour yourself when you are ready. One more cultural thing we are getting used to. The cafe walls were all wood and it was decorated with lots of wooden ducks, garden pitchers, pillows with pictures of herbs. I would call it gardenesque. It was very nice.

On our way back through Grainau we stopped at a beautiful and small chapel. Inside it was decorated with the brightest colored murals on the walls and ceilings that I have seen yet inside a church. It was exquisite. And in tiered stairs down the hill behind the church were very ornate wooden and stone crosses marking graves. It was very picturesque. Before heading back to Garmisch we stopped at a Bakerei for dessert. Ryan had something cut from a round that was a huge triangle with a sweet cookie bottom, apples and pudding with nuts I think on top. I havd a flaky round pastry with what tasted like marionberries in teh center. It reminded me of a mini pie in texture and flavor, but in German form and oh so good. Then we also shared what I call a Palmier, which is French, but I don't know what to call in in German. It is a flaky spiraled pastry thing with a light sugar glaze on top. Oh how we love our Bakereis. :)

So that was yesterday afternoon's exploration. It was wonderful and made it worth getting off work early. But I was still very glad to have a full section today at work so I am able to get enough hours to get a decent pay check. I love to play, but real life does still exist and I do need to work to make money so I have money to spend on all my elaborate adventures such as the one coming up with weekend.

Hopefully you are enjoying all this blogging right now. I think the only thing I have left to catch up on is our trip to Innsbruck the day after we went snowboarding for the first time. But that will have to wait because I have been working on these last two posts for nearly two hours now and it is time for dinner.