My friend Brett studied abroad in Spain last Fall. While he was there he visited the Basque region where he fell in love with the town of San Sebastian, known as Donostia to the Basque people. He sent me an email saying he guaranteed I too would fall in love with this gem of a desination on the Northwest Coast of Spain. So since the moment I knew I would be living in Germany San Sebastian has been on the top of my list to vist. I have no idea why it has taken me so long to visit Spain, but the wait has been well worth it. And Brett was right, I am in love with this very special place.
We flew from Munich to the island of Mallorca. And then from Mallorca to Bilbao. We took a bus to the city of Bilbao to check out the Guggenheim Museum. We did not go for what was inside the museum though, we went for the exterior. The only other building remotely similar to this is the Experience Music Project (EMP) in Seattle. I cannot upload picture here but I promise I will when I get back. Yes, I know I never upload pictures but I really am going to get some up SOON. The building is a collaboration of so many shapes and is mostly made out of titanium. It is just fantastic to look at. We walked over a bridge and then along the river across from the museum taking oh so many pictures.
When we had seen the structure from I think every angle possible except from the air we took the bus the rest of the way to the main bus terminal to catch the hour and 15 minute bus to San Sebastian. It was perfect timing because we boarded the bus just before it pulled out.
We were not sure how to take a city bus to the old town where we are staying, so we had a lovely walk along the river board walk. It was a perfect night and I am so glad we were able to walk. Once in town we struggled to find out hostel at first, but eventually with the help of some other travellers we ran into and a nice lady in a pastry shop we found our hostel that was right under our nose just with limited signage.
After settling into our room and getting some great directions and a map from our reception we headed out to dinner. Brett also gave me great advice. The main fair here is Basque tapas known as Pintxos pronounced peen-chose. Many restaurants have these things out on the counter of the bar. It costs less to stand and eat at the bar rather than at a table. You can also order things from the kitchen but all of it is in small portions. I LOVE IT. You get to have so many different things. So perfect for me.
First we went to a place and were sort of getting the feel for what to do. We ordered a sider which is famous here. It is made out of fresh apples without added sugar or carbonation. It is poured from high above the gladd and in small amounts so you consume it in only a few drinks because the longer it is in the glass it looses the little bit of natural carbonation it has. I really like the unique flavor of it. We ate five different pintxos on baguette and then ordered a shrimp skewer that was mmmmm so good. It was a recommendation of the receptionist.
Our next stop was one of Brett's favorite places and now I know why. We each had a glass of the white wine special to the region that was very good. Then I asked for three fish pintxos whatever he decided. My tastebuds have seldom been in a grater state of pleasure than eating those three dishes. A scallop, fish with onions under it, and octopus. I don't know what they did to them but WOW!
After than we wandered a little but were pretty tired so we headed back to bed.
This morning we got up pretty late and it felt so good. :) We left the hostel around noon and headed toward Gros on the other side of the river where we were told is not touristy at all and has a nice beach that many people surf at. For a couple hours we just wandered around. We saw the craziest dog that I think the lady dreaded it's hair. We have a picture of that too because I really wanted it and so we ran after the lady for blocks until Ryan got a good shot. Good thing she didn't notice her stalkers. We also found this awesome store that I treated myself to a few new clothing purchases because they had a whole rack of items for only 5 euro each. I was loving it. Then we went to a grocery store where Ryan got a couple snacks and a bottle of sider that is currently chilling in the fridge for later. It was only 1,50 euro for the bottle. What a deal. We tried to find a pintxos bar the reception told us about in the morning but we could not find it and they were hesitant on the street and the name so who knows if we were even in the right place. But we went somewhere else and enjoyed what we had especially the big green olives that he poured some garlic and olive oil on. Mmmmmmm And after that we went to the beach for over an hour just sitting, reading, splashing in the waves, taking pictures, and enjoying God's magnificent creation that has been named Donostia.
After the beach we walked all along the water on the board walk for hours. Eventually we stopped and each had a drink at a sea side outside restaurant. I tried the red wine cola combo that they drink here. I always like to try what the locals do. Can you believe it I did not hate it? I am going to start mixing all sorts of things with wine and beer after the combos I have tried in Europe.
And now we have been back at the hostel for a couple hours having what Ryan is calling our siesta. He has been sleeping mostly and I have been reading about Spain and now look at how productive I am on my blog. A treat for all my readers and also for me because now I am one step ahead of where I normally am. Even though I have a lot of catching up to do from my last few trips.
Well that has been everything so far. Now I need to go get Ryan up so we can go pleasure ourselves wtih more pintxos for dinner. Adios amigos! (trying to learn Spanish and oddly I am telling Ryan Spanish words even though he is the only one of the two of us who studied it haha)
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Lichtenstein to Lucerne
Back to my travels while my Mom was here. After our first trip we had to come back and work a few days. And then Ryan and I went on the employee river raft trip in Austria, which was very fun, while my Mom went to the Passion Play in Oberammergau.
The following day we loaded up the car with our bags and camping gear and headed to Switzerland. On the way we wanted to see a teeny tiny little country known as Lichtenstein. When we first crossed into Lichtenstein we tried to get our passports stamped, but no matter where we went to ask they all pointed us toward somewhere else and back again to where we started, so eventually we realized that just wasn't going to happen.
To drive from one side of Lichtenstein to the other took about 15 to 20 minutes. It is so small that they even have a running race during the year where you run through the whole country the long way and I'm not sure it is even a full marathon. We stopped in one town and found there to be nothing there, so we got back in the car after walking around and headed to the capital. Right before we reached the city center there was a winery that we stopped at and waited for them to open. Once we were let inside they said they wouldn't do a tasting because we didn't have a group of 10. Sheesh! So we drove on into town and parked to get out and walk around and we found a Doner Kebab shop for lunch because everything else we would have had to sell and arm and a leg to afford. Lichtenstein is very expensive. When we left here we were into Switzerland in two minutes.
Our destination was Lucerne. I'm so glad we met the Swiss guy Jens in Dresden the previous week and he said we should go to Lucerne over Zurich. It was absolutely stunning. The town is around Lake Lucerne and the natural beauty here was breath taking.
Switzerland is also ridiculously expensive. I didn't expect it because $1=1.12 swiss franc however that doesn't mean they won't charge 2 or 3 franc for something you'd expect to cost a dollar. All the hostels and hotels I looked at were out of my price range, so I found us a great camp ground right across from the lake. I'm so glad that Ryan and I have acquired a couple tents while being here because camping was a perfect option.
Food was just as expensive as hostels so we avoided restaurants like a plague and followed the suggestion of my travel book to eat in the cafeteria/deli places that are in department stores or at grocery stores. The food was simple but not bad.
When we got up the next morning we headed into town and wanted to check out the market along the river. I love markets everywhere I go and this one was no different. We found food here and there to nibble on. I got some apple cake that made me think of my Granny who I remember made an apple cake that I used to love when I was little. The market ran along both sides of the river and on the far side was a bunch of middle eastern food we shared for lunch such as tabbouleh, falafel, pita, and hummus.
We had noticed some sort of a festival getting set up an an open area that we went to check out. It turned out this was Political Immigration Day in Lucerne. They celebrate all the people who have immigrated here from around the world one day a year. There were numerous food booths where people were making a selling food from their country of origin. There was also a stage that had rotating bands playing music from their home countries. It was really really cool and I think made our time in Lucerne so much more special. At least for me because I love this kind of thing but I know my mom liked it too and Ryan is so easy going he likes most anything.
We didn't eat right away since we'd just eaten at the market. We kept walking around the streets of the town. We wandered up the hill a ways to find the old city walls which you can mount and walk along and up into the clock tower in the center. It gave us a nice view.
Eventually thought we did make it back to the Festival and ate till our stomachs couldn't fit anymore. We had food from Afghanistan, East Africa, Sri Lanka, India, and the Philippines. It was awesome to see so, so, so many people from around the world. There was an African band I really enjoyed while we sat and ate, but when the next band came on from maybe Russia we were not so much enjoying their music or their cigarettes hanging out of their mouths as they sang. During the African band a group of guys all dressed a like showed up and a couple of them were in crazy costumes and it was funny seeing them dance in the dancing area with everyone gathered around. It was a very fun event.
Our walk to and from the campground was nice because we could walk along the lake in the nice park. It was a bit of a walk back and forth but it was enjoyable and I preferred it to our option of taking the bus.
Oh goodness I was almost going to skip an exciting part of our trip. That evening we went to an English Pub to watch the US and England face off in the first round of the World Cup. It was nice to have the commentary in English and it was fun to be in an atmosphere with so many die hard England fans and then the few of us rooting for the USA. The game ended in a draw which was maybe the best for us since I would hate to think of what they could have done to us if we had beat them. :) After the game we headed back to the campground for bed.
The next day we didn't go back into town. Instead we went not even a mile down from the campground to the Transportation Museum. This museum was awesome. We learned how tunnels are drilled through mountains today and went on a ride in a cart to learn how it was done way back in the day when Switzerland was first starting to put in tunnels way before all the modern conveniences we have today. We saw up close and personal so many trains, cars, and airplanes I don't even have a guess how many in total there were. The museum was in sections based on the type of transportation. The car area had a cool thing that had a different car from every year and it would bring a car down one at a time to tell you about the history of it and it's functions. It was really nifty. There was even a planetarium that we went to a show in. I was disappointed though because the show was all about zodiac signs and I wanted to learn more about constalations and planets rather than how the zodiacs line up one a month and that is why we have signs for when we are born. But at least it was a comfy seat and I may have dozed off a little bit.
After several hours in the museum we decided we should be getting on the road. We had already packed up our tents, so we just went to fetch the car at our site. We decided to drive to Zurich on the way back and stop for dinner since it was on the way. In a Rich Steve's book I had he recommended a buffet restaurant that was Vegetarian and reasonably priced, so after some searching around the city we found it. Well it wasn't exactly what I'd call reasonably priced. It cost 6 swiss francs for 100grams of food I think. You took your plate and got what you wanted from the buffet and then they weighed it and you paid. I have no clue how much 100 grams is and apparently neither did my Mom or Ryan because in total our meal was 100 swiss frans which is almost $100. Yikes! That was a shocker to all of us. We had been worried about all the extra swiss money we had exchanged, but hadn't spent. I can tell you that was the end of that worry. The food was really good, thank goodness. And when we had all finished we were stuffed, so that was good too. While Ryan was eating some hummus on his plate he bit into a plastic bottle topper that had obviously accidentally ended up there. He took it to the counter and they were very apologetic. The offered him a free drink, which he didn't really want so then they offered free dessert which he accepted. When we had finished our dinner and he went to ask about the dessert they said he could have anything he wanted and as much of it as he wanted. AWESOME! So we had a HUGE bowl of chocolate mouse from the buffet and a piece of some sort of cake from their case. They even had a chef from the back come out and explain what the piece was that Ryan had bit into and the chef made the comment, "at least it wasn't meat." Of course Ryan isn't a vegetarian and probably wouldn't have thought twice if meat had been in something he was eating. So if we go back to Zurich (which I don't care too it didn't strike me as all that nice just a big city) I would probably not eat here unless I found a money tree between now and then OR I ate a much much smaller amount of food.
We had a fantastic trip to Switzerland. I'd love to go back before we are done in Europe. We loved traveling with my Mom and we are so thankful that she was able to come over. I know that she had a wonderful time and I hope she knows that we had a great time having her here and traveling with her.
The following day we loaded up the car with our bags and camping gear and headed to Switzerland. On the way we wanted to see a teeny tiny little country known as Lichtenstein. When we first crossed into Lichtenstein we tried to get our passports stamped, but no matter where we went to ask they all pointed us toward somewhere else and back again to where we started, so eventually we realized that just wasn't going to happen.
To drive from one side of Lichtenstein to the other took about 15 to 20 minutes. It is so small that they even have a running race during the year where you run through the whole country the long way and I'm not sure it is even a full marathon. We stopped in one town and found there to be nothing there, so we got back in the car after walking around and headed to the capital. Right before we reached the city center there was a winery that we stopped at and waited for them to open. Once we were let inside they said they wouldn't do a tasting because we didn't have a group of 10. Sheesh! So we drove on into town and parked to get out and walk around and we found a Doner Kebab shop for lunch because everything else we would have had to sell and arm and a leg to afford. Lichtenstein is very expensive. When we left here we were into Switzerland in two minutes.
Our destination was Lucerne. I'm so glad we met the Swiss guy Jens in Dresden the previous week and he said we should go to Lucerne over Zurich. It was absolutely stunning. The town is around Lake Lucerne and the natural beauty here was breath taking.
Switzerland is also ridiculously expensive. I didn't expect it because $1=1.12 swiss franc however that doesn't mean they won't charge 2 or 3 franc for something you'd expect to cost a dollar. All the hostels and hotels I looked at were out of my price range, so I found us a great camp ground right across from the lake. I'm so glad that Ryan and I have acquired a couple tents while being here because camping was a perfect option.
Food was just as expensive as hostels so we avoided restaurants like a plague and followed the suggestion of my travel book to eat in the cafeteria/deli places that are in department stores or at grocery stores. The food was simple but not bad.
When we got up the next morning we headed into town and wanted to check out the market along the river. I love markets everywhere I go and this one was no different. We found food here and there to nibble on. I got some apple cake that made me think of my Granny who I remember made an apple cake that I used to love when I was little. The market ran along both sides of the river and on the far side was a bunch of middle eastern food we shared for lunch such as tabbouleh, falafel, pita, and hummus.
We had noticed some sort of a festival getting set up an an open area that we went to check out. It turned out this was Political Immigration Day in Lucerne. They celebrate all the people who have immigrated here from around the world one day a year. There were numerous food booths where people were making a selling food from their country of origin. There was also a stage that had rotating bands playing music from their home countries. It was really really cool and I think made our time in Lucerne so much more special. At least for me because I love this kind of thing but I know my mom liked it too and Ryan is so easy going he likes most anything.
We didn't eat right away since we'd just eaten at the market. We kept walking around the streets of the town. We wandered up the hill a ways to find the old city walls which you can mount and walk along and up into the clock tower in the center. It gave us a nice view.
Eventually thought we did make it back to the Festival and ate till our stomachs couldn't fit anymore. We had food from Afghanistan, East Africa, Sri Lanka, India, and the Philippines. It was awesome to see so, so, so many people from around the world. There was an African band I really enjoyed while we sat and ate, but when the next band came on from maybe Russia we were not so much enjoying their music or their cigarettes hanging out of their mouths as they sang. During the African band a group of guys all dressed a like showed up and a couple of them were in crazy costumes and it was funny seeing them dance in the dancing area with everyone gathered around. It was a very fun event.
Our walk to and from the campground was nice because we could walk along the lake in the nice park. It was a bit of a walk back and forth but it was enjoyable and I preferred it to our option of taking the bus.
Oh goodness I was almost going to skip an exciting part of our trip. That evening we went to an English Pub to watch the US and England face off in the first round of the World Cup. It was nice to have the commentary in English and it was fun to be in an atmosphere with so many die hard England fans and then the few of us rooting for the USA. The game ended in a draw which was maybe the best for us since I would hate to think of what they could have done to us if we had beat them. :) After the game we headed back to the campground for bed.
The next day we didn't go back into town. Instead we went not even a mile down from the campground to the Transportation Museum. This museum was awesome. We learned how tunnels are drilled through mountains today and went on a ride in a cart to learn how it was done way back in the day when Switzerland was first starting to put in tunnels way before all the modern conveniences we have today. We saw up close and personal so many trains, cars, and airplanes I don't even have a guess how many in total there were. The museum was in sections based on the type of transportation. The car area had a cool thing that had a different car from every year and it would bring a car down one at a time to tell you about the history of it and it's functions. It was really nifty. There was even a planetarium that we went to a show in. I was disappointed though because the show was all about zodiac signs and I wanted to learn more about constalations and planets rather than how the zodiacs line up one a month and that is why we have signs for when we are born. But at least it was a comfy seat and I may have dozed off a little bit.
After several hours in the museum we decided we should be getting on the road. We had already packed up our tents, so we just went to fetch the car at our site. We decided to drive to Zurich on the way back and stop for dinner since it was on the way. In a Rich Steve's book I had he recommended a buffet restaurant that was Vegetarian and reasonably priced, so after some searching around the city we found it. Well it wasn't exactly what I'd call reasonably priced. It cost 6 swiss francs for 100grams of food I think. You took your plate and got what you wanted from the buffet and then they weighed it and you paid. I have no clue how much 100 grams is and apparently neither did my Mom or Ryan because in total our meal was 100 swiss frans which is almost $100. Yikes! That was a shocker to all of us. We had been worried about all the extra swiss money we had exchanged, but hadn't spent. I can tell you that was the end of that worry. The food was really good, thank goodness. And when we had all finished we were stuffed, so that was good too. While Ryan was eating some hummus on his plate he bit into a plastic bottle topper that had obviously accidentally ended up there. He took it to the counter and they were very apologetic. The offered him a free drink, which he didn't really want so then they offered free dessert which he accepted. When we had finished our dinner and he went to ask about the dessert they said he could have anything he wanted and as much of it as he wanted. AWESOME! So we had a HUGE bowl of chocolate mouse from the buffet and a piece of some sort of cake from their case. They even had a chef from the back come out and explain what the piece was that Ryan had bit into and the chef made the comment, "at least it wasn't meat." Of course Ryan isn't a vegetarian and probably wouldn't have thought twice if meat had been in something he was eating. So if we go back to Zurich (which I don't care too it didn't strike me as all that nice just a big city) I would probably not eat here unless I found a money tree between now and then OR I ate a much much smaller amount of food.
We had a fantastic trip to Switzerland. I'd love to go back before we are done in Europe. We loved traveling with my Mom and we are so thankful that she was able to come over. I know that she had a wonderful time and I hope she knows that we had a great time having her here and traveling with her.
Thursday, September 2, 2010
Mama Mia comes to Duetschland
Well, well, well. I couldn't decide if I should name this post the way I had originally intended or title it REWIND because my Mom was actually here three months ago now. As you can see I went with the original title.
This was my Mom's first time to Europe and we were excited to show her a good time. If any of you have talked to her since she got back I'm sure she eagerly expressed that she did in fact have a very good time.
We were planning to meet her after we got off work at the Hauptbahn Hof in Munich, but unfortunately her luggage was left behind somewhere and so she waited at the airport for a later flight to bring it. It was nice of someone at the lost baggage counter to help her call my phone. Although Ryan and I were already at the train station waiting we jumped in the car and were able to greet her at the airport.
We headed back downtown to our hostel in Munich where we had arranged to stay for the night. From the moment we got out of the car she was taking pictures. And to be honest I think she was a little star struck because the buildings she was taking pictures of weren't even the pretty ones (although she'd argue that statement).
We checked into the hostel, dropped our bags in our rooms, moved the car to a different street the hostel told us was free parking, and started walking into the center of town. We took my Mom to dinner at the Hofbrauhof. This is a very old very famous beer hall and restaurant. This was our first time there for dinner, we've previously been for lunch, and it was extremely busy. There was a live band playing Bavarian music in their lederhosen. And lots of noise from tourists and locals eating and having a good time all around. It's a good thing we got my Mom a radler I think because I don't know if I'd want to see her after a mass (1 liter) of full Bavarian beer in her after getting off such a long flight. :) A radler has a very low alcohol content since it is half beer half lemon soda.
After dinner we walked back to our hostel for bed.
The next morning we got up and checked out of the hostel ready for our drive to Nuremburg and then on to Dresden. We took our bags to the car and.... there was no car. This was not good. We went back to the hostel and they called the police but weren't able to find anything out. At that point we thought the car was stolen. At the hostel they said they never tow in Munich unless you are in a fire lane and we didn't believe we were in a fire lane. The nice guys at the hostel let us store our bags there and directed us to the nearest police station. In the rain we walked to the police station. At the station it took some searching because we didn't know the license plate number, but finally found out the car was not stolen. It had been towed because we had parked in a fire lane. So the officer explained how to get to the S-bahn (subway) to get to where the car had been towed. When we arrived it was just a parking lot. They towed us to a parking lot across the city. We got in the car a drove away. There was a ticket (soaking wet) on the windshield, but we didn't have to do anything right then. That turned out to be less of a hassle than it could have been. And at that point we would have paid a lot just for the car not to have been stolen. Praise God.
We drove back to the hostel, told them what happened, collected our bags, and were on the road. We arrived in Nuremburg and we were hungry. Ryan and I fell in love with the falafel we had here the last time we came to we headed straight for that. It was just as good this time. We walked up to the castle with my Mom that we'd been to once before that led us through their market square with tents selling various products. On the way back we stopped and Ryan and I got another falafel to share because it really is that good. Then on the way back to the car I spotted a shop I'd seen in my Rick Steve's book, Vom Fass. So we stopped in. This store sells oils, vinegars, wines, and liquors all from the tap (that is what Vom Fass means "from tap"). So we got a couple half bottles of honey wines and my Mom got some truffle oil to take home to a friend. At check out we mentioned we live in Garmisch and learned Vom Fass is a chain and there is one in Garmisch. To this day we haven't been to the one here, but I keep meaning to go. Ryan and I think we should open a similar store at home in the States. My Mom got on the net at home and saw that Vom Fass has just recently entered the US market with their first store in Jackson Hole.... what are the chances?
From Nuremburg we headed to Dresden. Thanks to the long summer nights we had back then it was still light when we arrived. We checked into our hostel and moved into our room. As we were settling in another guy sharing our room came in and we chatted with him a bit. His name was Jens Von Holzen (what a cool name) and he was from Switzerland. We were ready to go to dinner and invited him to come along. At this point it was POURING rain. I put that in caps for a reason I don't know how to better explain how the sky had opened itself up and dumped every ounce of water it could squeeze out of itself. I saw on a map an Indian restaurant but once we got all the way to the end of the street realized that I don't think it was there anymore or we just couldn't find it. We walked back up the street and stopped in a Kebab place, but then Jenz commented that he thought it smelled funny so we asked if he wanted to leave and he said yes, so we did. :) It was kind of funny. We ended up all the way at the opposite end of the road pretty close to our hostel but by this time we were all soaked to our core. I actually enjoyed being wet because it wasn't cold and sometimes I think it is fun to be wet from the rain and today was one of those days. The other people in my party though I don't think shared the same feelings. The meal was quick and after that we went to the bar right across the street from our hostel and all had strawberry daiquiris. We had seen they were on special on a sign when we arrived for only 4 euro (super cheap for a cocktail in Europe) and they sounded good. Jens had a beer, but we thoroughly enjoyed our daiquiris. Then we walked across the street to our hostel and got ready for bed and fell asleep.
The next day was meant to explore Dresden. We checked out of our hostel in the morning, stowed our luggage in the car, and headed from the New Town where we were to the Old Town across the bridge. The most interesting and unique aspect of Dresden it that the "Old Town" is actually quite new. Dresden almost completely burned down during the war. It was so different to go into churches that you would expect to be thousands of years old that were actually finished a mere five years ago. They did try to recreate an old look. In fact some of the building use stones from the original buildings that were salvaged from and used in what they claim in the exact same places in the buildings today.
Another unique characteristic of Dresden is that this is where Martin Luther is from and where he started the Protestant movement. So instead of the largest church of the city being a catholic church it is a protestant church, although there is also a catholic church in the city as well because it still is Europe. :) We visited all the churches. And we saw a statue of Martin Luther.
It was raining just as much on this day as the night before so we were very wet and soggy. It was raining so much that when I ran through a fountain I barely noticed a difference in how wet I was. :) And it was really fun.
In my travel book I found a restaurant right across the street from the last church we saw that was known for oraganic food, tea, vegetarian food, and soup. I'm so glad we ate here. It was so delicious. We shared a delicious pot of tea and a couple bowls of soup. Oh I would go back just for this restaurant. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm I'm hungry just thinking about it.
We got a little turned around on our way back to the car, but found our way with time. We stopped at a sewing store for my Mom. My whole life I'm used to stopping in sewing stores of children's stores. In fact now I often will wander into children's stores on my own to compare and contrast with out store... but not so much sewing stores.
Back to the car it had stopped raining and we were trying to dry out. Soon we were on the road to Prague.
In Prague we stayed at the cheapest places I've ever stayed. I was so excited to find it. It was outside of the Old Town (city center) but that was okay because we benefited from free parking and the one day tram pass into town was cheap and easy to use. We were staying at a Penzion this time which was sort of more like a hotel except the bathroom was still in the hall and our room was still a four person dorm. The first night there was someone else we never met in with us, but the second night it was just the three of us.
We wanted dinner and there was virtually no where to eat around our Penzion, because it was all residential, except for the restaurant attached to the Penzion which didn't interest us. I'm so glad we decided to go into the Old City. When we arrived it was sunset and the orange sun made the pinkish buildins glow. I felt like I was standing at a square inside Disneyland. It was gorgeous. We had to exchange some money and then set out to find a vegetarian restaurant in my travel book. It took awhile to find and when we got there they had just closed their kitchen but said we could order cold dishes or quesadillas. My Mom and Ryan had quesadillas they really enjoyed. I had soup and I think we had hummus and another appetizer. It was all really good. If I go back to Prague I'll definitely go there again. After dinner we had to get back to the tram to catch the last one of the night back to our Penzion.
The next day we got up and had coffee in the lobby just to find out it wasn't in fact free like we believed, so we had to pay... oh well... it was good. :) Then we went to catch the tram into town. We went to a bakery (surprise surprise) to get some breakfast before we were going to meet the free tour group. There ended up being two companies doing free tours. We went with the one leaving a little earlier just to get on with our day. I actually didn't love this tour though. Maybe I just wasn't in the mood. I had trouble understanding out guides Czech accent though and I didn't think she was very entertaining. When I go on a tour I looking for information in an entertaining way, not just information. My Mom enjoyed the tour though, which I was glad of so she didn't feel like her time there was wasted since the tour was three hours. We started by watching the clock strike 11 and then little figures popped out and did things and then it ended with a man blowing a trumpet off the top of the tower. We walked around the whole city from the Old Town to the Jewish Quarter. I don't really remember a lot of what we saw or learned because I wasn't enthralled with any of it. Mom if anything sticks out in your mind that you want to share you can post a comment to this post.
After the tour we went to lunch at Bohemian Bagles and had bagel sandwiches that were delicious. Then we caught a tram back to our Penzion where we got in the car and headed an hour out of town. I'd heard, from friends who had been before, about a bone church that was really cool. It was a nice drive although the rain had gone and it was very hot and sunny (we loved it) so the windows were our AC since the car doesn't have any. We arrived in a super tiny little town. The church seemed small too from the outside and it wasn't big by any means, but once you entered it did drop down a level and opened up a little bit. It was crazy to see so many human bones nearly 40,000 bodies worth. And it wasn't gross at all... at least to any of us. There was no mass slaughter they simply ran out of room to bury people outside and they started using the church as overflow. Some monks went to Palestine and brought back some soil and sprinkled it around the church, so during the 30 Years War everyone wanted to be buried here because of the soil from the Holy Land. Since I love scull and cross bones I took a lot of pictures of the skulls with bones crossed under their chins. I tried to pick my favorite skull. They had ever single bone in that church that we have in the human body. In fact there is a chandelier made out of bones hanging from the ceiling that they said has at least one of each bone of the body. If you are interested in reading more about the history of it check out this website I found or you can google it yourself. So after we'd been there for awhile and took a lot of pictures we drove the hour back to Prague for the night. We went back into the city and walked all around. I got us a bit lost but we finally made it back to our beds by the end of the night. We'd really wanted to find a dessert local to the area but weren't able to, so that was on our agenda for our last day.
The next morning we got up and went to the castle. We paid for the ticket that allowed us to see a few rooms but not all. I'm glad we got that one because we didn't have a ton of time and it wasn't as cool as I was expecting it to be. There was a HUGE line to get into the cathedral which was free to go into and it wasn't worth it to us to stand in line. We went back though before we left Prague and the line was short and we were able to see it. This was definitely my favorite part of the Castle complex.
As we left the castle and walked toward the Old Town there were people selling artwork they'd made. Ryan and I bought a beautiful painting that he currently has hung in his room after a little battle with me because I wanted to hang it in my room. I guess we should have bought two.
In the Old Town we went to lunch at a different restaurant owned by the same people that owned the one we went to on the first night. It was also really good. I was excited they had a vegan version of Goulash on the menu. Goulash is a traditional Czech meal (along with several other European countries I have realized) and I wanted to try it but the main ingredient is meat, so I wasn't willing to. But I did enjoy it and I'd love to try and someday come up with a vegan version myself that I can make. My Mom and Ryan really liked their food as well. If for no other reason I'd go back to Prague for the good vegetarian and vegan restaurants that we ate at. :) And before we left the Old Town we did find the traditional dessert. It wasn't overly sweet at all and I actually liked it. It was a dumpling like ball that was pretty doughy with a plum inside and the whole thing was boiled and then the shredded what they called "farmers cheese," it was rather flavorless on the top. Ryan had a different filling, but I can't remember what it was. I liked them though although it wasn't like a party in my mouth.
Overall I liked Prague, but I wasn't as thrilled with it as most everyone I know tells me they were. So either there was something wrong with Prague or something wrong with me. I'd like to think it was not the later. And I have an idea what didn't thrill me with the city itself. Being the beginning of summer tourist season was upon us and the city was swarming with people from around the globe. Unlike some busy cities I've been to though I felt like Prague was a cruise ship port because there were so many buses that would bring people in for a day or two and during certain hours of the day it would be mad. I think I would like it better without this added chaos and maybe a little more exploring on my own rather than the tour. So if presented the opportunity I would go back.... like I said if only for the vegetarian food. :)
So that was our first trip with my Mom. We came back to Garmisch that evening. It was my Mom's first time in Garmisch, remember, since we never came back after she arrived. And if I even need to say it... she loved it. :) Well enough for this post I think. I'll have to tell you about the rest later. :)
This was my Mom's first time to Europe and we were excited to show her a good time. If any of you have talked to her since she got back I'm sure she eagerly expressed that she did in fact have a very good time.
We were planning to meet her after we got off work at the Hauptbahn Hof in Munich, but unfortunately her luggage was left behind somewhere and so she waited at the airport for a later flight to bring it. It was nice of someone at the lost baggage counter to help her call my phone. Although Ryan and I were already at the train station waiting we jumped in the car and were able to greet her at the airport.
We headed back downtown to our hostel in Munich where we had arranged to stay for the night. From the moment we got out of the car she was taking pictures. And to be honest I think she was a little star struck because the buildings she was taking pictures of weren't even the pretty ones (although she'd argue that statement).
We checked into the hostel, dropped our bags in our rooms, moved the car to a different street the hostel told us was free parking, and started walking into the center of town. We took my Mom to dinner at the Hofbrauhof. This is a very old very famous beer hall and restaurant. This was our first time there for dinner, we've previously been for lunch, and it was extremely busy. There was a live band playing Bavarian music in their lederhosen. And lots of noise from tourists and locals eating and having a good time all around. It's a good thing we got my Mom a radler I think because I don't know if I'd want to see her after a mass (1 liter) of full Bavarian beer in her after getting off such a long flight. :) A radler has a very low alcohol content since it is half beer half lemon soda.
After dinner we walked back to our hostel for bed.
The next morning we got up and checked out of the hostel ready for our drive to Nuremburg and then on to Dresden. We took our bags to the car and.... there was no car. This was not good. We went back to the hostel and they called the police but weren't able to find anything out. At that point we thought the car was stolen. At the hostel they said they never tow in Munich unless you are in a fire lane and we didn't believe we were in a fire lane. The nice guys at the hostel let us store our bags there and directed us to the nearest police station. In the rain we walked to the police station. At the station it took some searching because we didn't know the license plate number, but finally found out the car was not stolen. It had been towed because we had parked in a fire lane. So the officer explained how to get to the S-bahn (subway) to get to where the car had been towed. When we arrived it was just a parking lot. They towed us to a parking lot across the city. We got in the car a drove away. There was a ticket (soaking wet) on the windshield, but we didn't have to do anything right then. That turned out to be less of a hassle than it could have been. And at that point we would have paid a lot just for the car not to have been stolen. Praise God.
We drove back to the hostel, told them what happened, collected our bags, and were on the road. We arrived in Nuremburg and we were hungry. Ryan and I fell in love with the falafel we had here the last time we came to we headed straight for that. It was just as good this time. We walked up to the castle with my Mom that we'd been to once before that led us through their market square with tents selling various products. On the way back we stopped and Ryan and I got another falafel to share because it really is that good. Then on the way back to the car I spotted a shop I'd seen in my Rick Steve's book, Vom Fass. So we stopped in. This store sells oils, vinegars, wines, and liquors all from the tap (that is what Vom Fass means "from tap"). So we got a couple half bottles of honey wines and my Mom got some truffle oil to take home to a friend. At check out we mentioned we live in Garmisch and learned Vom Fass is a chain and there is one in Garmisch. To this day we haven't been to the one here, but I keep meaning to go. Ryan and I think we should open a similar store at home in the States. My Mom got on the net at home and saw that Vom Fass has just recently entered the US market with their first store in Jackson Hole.... what are the chances?
From Nuremburg we headed to Dresden. Thanks to the long summer nights we had back then it was still light when we arrived. We checked into our hostel and moved into our room. As we were settling in another guy sharing our room came in and we chatted with him a bit. His name was Jens Von Holzen (what a cool name) and he was from Switzerland. We were ready to go to dinner and invited him to come along. At this point it was POURING rain. I put that in caps for a reason I don't know how to better explain how the sky had opened itself up and dumped every ounce of water it could squeeze out of itself. I saw on a map an Indian restaurant but once we got all the way to the end of the street realized that I don't think it was there anymore or we just couldn't find it. We walked back up the street and stopped in a Kebab place, but then Jenz commented that he thought it smelled funny so we asked if he wanted to leave and he said yes, so we did. :) It was kind of funny. We ended up all the way at the opposite end of the road pretty close to our hostel but by this time we were all soaked to our core. I actually enjoyed being wet because it wasn't cold and sometimes I think it is fun to be wet from the rain and today was one of those days. The other people in my party though I don't think shared the same feelings. The meal was quick and after that we went to the bar right across the street from our hostel and all had strawberry daiquiris. We had seen they were on special on a sign when we arrived for only 4 euro (super cheap for a cocktail in Europe) and they sounded good. Jens had a beer, but we thoroughly enjoyed our daiquiris. Then we walked across the street to our hostel and got ready for bed and fell asleep.
The next day was meant to explore Dresden. We checked out of our hostel in the morning, stowed our luggage in the car, and headed from the New Town where we were to the Old Town across the bridge. The most interesting and unique aspect of Dresden it that the "Old Town" is actually quite new. Dresden almost completely burned down during the war. It was so different to go into churches that you would expect to be thousands of years old that were actually finished a mere five years ago. They did try to recreate an old look. In fact some of the building use stones from the original buildings that were salvaged from and used in what they claim in the exact same places in the buildings today.
Another unique characteristic of Dresden is that this is where Martin Luther is from and where he started the Protestant movement. So instead of the largest church of the city being a catholic church it is a protestant church, although there is also a catholic church in the city as well because it still is Europe. :) We visited all the churches. And we saw a statue of Martin Luther.
It was raining just as much on this day as the night before so we were very wet and soggy. It was raining so much that when I ran through a fountain I barely noticed a difference in how wet I was. :) And it was really fun.
In my travel book I found a restaurant right across the street from the last church we saw that was known for oraganic food, tea, vegetarian food, and soup. I'm so glad we ate here. It was so delicious. We shared a delicious pot of tea and a couple bowls of soup. Oh I would go back just for this restaurant. Mmmmmmmmmmmmm I'm hungry just thinking about it.
We got a little turned around on our way back to the car, but found our way with time. We stopped at a sewing store for my Mom. My whole life I'm used to stopping in sewing stores of children's stores. In fact now I often will wander into children's stores on my own to compare and contrast with out store... but not so much sewing stores.
Back to the car it had stopped raining and we were trying to dry out. Soon we were on the road to Prague.
In Prague we stayed at the cheapest places I've ever stayed. I was so excited to find it. It was outside of the Old Town (city center) but that was okay because we benefited from free parking and the one day tram pass into town was cheap and easy to use. We were staying at a Penzion this time which was sort of more like a hotel except the bathroom was still in the hall and our room was still a four person dorm. The first night there was someone else we never met in with us, but the second night it was just the three of us.
We wanted dinner and there was virtually no where to eat around our Penzion, because it was all residential, except for the restaurant attached to the Penzion which didn't interest us. I'm so glad we decided to go into the Old City. When we arrived it was sunset and the orange sun made the pinkish buildins glow. I felt like I was standing at a square inside Disneyland. It was gorgeous. We had to exchange some money and then set out to find a vegetarian restaurant in my travel book. It took awhile to find and when we got there they had just closed their kitchen but said we could order cold dishes or quesadillas. My Mom and Ryan had quesadillas they really enjoyed. I had soup and I think we had hummus and another appetizer. It was all really good. If I go back to Prague I'll definitely go there again. After dinner we had to get back to the tram to catch the last one of the night back to our Penzion.
The next day we got up and had coffee in the lobby just to find out it wasn't in fact free like we believed, so we had to pay... oh well... it was good. :) Then we went to catch the tram into town. We went to a bakery (surprise surprise) to get some breakfast before we were going to meet the free tour group. There ended up being two companies doing free tours. We went with the one leaving a little earlier just to get on with our day. I actually didn't love this tour though. Maybe I just wasn't in the mood. I had trouble understanding out guides Czech accent though and I didn't think she was very entertaining. When I go on a tour I looking for information in an entertaining way, not just information. My Mom enjoyed the tour though, which I was glad of so she didn't feel like her time there was wasted since the tour was three hours. We started by watching the clock strike 11 and then little figures popped out and did things and then it ended with a man blowing a trumpet off the top of the tower. We walked around the whole city from the Old Town to the Jewish Quarter. I don't really remember a lot of what we saw or learned because I wasn't enthralled with any of it. Mom if anything sticks out in your mind that you want to share you can post a comment to this post.
After the tour we went to lunch at Bohemian Bagles and had bagel sandwiches that were delicious. Then we caught a tram back to our Penzion where we got in the car and headed an hour out of town. I'd heard, from friends who had been before, about a bone church that was really cool. It was a nice drive although the rain had gone and it was very hot and sunny (we loved it) so the windows were our AC since the car doesn't have any. We arrived in a super tiny little town. The church seemed small too from the outside and it wasn't big by any means, but once you entered it did drop down a level and opened up a little bit. It was crazy to see so many human bones nearly 40,000 bodies worth. And it wasn't gross at all... at least to any of us. There was no mass slaughter they simply ran out of room to bury people outside and they started using the church as overflow. Some monks went to Palestine and brought back some soil and sprinkled it around the church, so during the 30 Years War everyone wanted to be buried here because of the soil from the Holy Land. Since I love scull and cross bones I took a lot of pictures of the skulls with bones crossed under their chins. I tried to pick my favorite skull. They had ever single bone in that church that we have in the human body. In fact there is a chandelier made out of bones hanging from the ceiling that they said has at least one of each bone of the body. If you are interested in reading more about the history of it check out this website I found or you can google it yourself. So after we'd been there for awhile and took a lot of pictures we drove the hour back to Prague for the night. We went back into the city and walked all around. I got us a bit lost but we finally made it back to our beds by the end of the night. We'd really wanted to find a dessert local to the area but weren't able to, so that was on our agenda for our last day.
The next morning we got up and went to the castle. We paid for the ticket that allowed us to see a few rooms but not all. I'm glad we got that one because we didn't have a ton of time and it wasn't as cool as I was expecting it to be. There was a HUGE line to get into the cathedral which was free to go into and it wasn't worth it to us to stand in line. We went back though before we left Prague and the line was short and we were able to see it. This was definitely my favorite part of the Castle complex.
As we left the castle and walked toward the Old Town there were people selling artwork they'd made. Ryan and I bought a beautiful painting that he currently has hung in his room after a little battle with me because I wanted to hang it in my room. I guess we should have bought two.
In the Old Town we went to lunch at a different restaurant owned by the same people that owned the one we went to on the first night. It was also really good. I was excited they had a vegan version of Goulash on the menu. Goulash is a traditional Czech meal (along with several other European countries I have realized) and I wanted to try it but the main ingredient is meat, so I wasn't willing to. But I did enjoy it and I'd love to try and someday come up with a vegan version myself that I can make. My Mom and Ryan really liked their food as well. If for no other reason I'd go back to Prague for the good vegetarian and vegan restaurants that we ate at. :) And before we left the Old Town we did find the traditional dessert. It wasn't overly sweet at all and I actually liked it. It was a dumpling like ball that was pretty doughy with a plum inside and the whole thing was boiled and then the shredded what they called "farmers cheese," it was rather flavorless on the top. Ryan had a different filling, but I can't remember what it was. I liked them though although it wasn't like a party in my mouth.
Overall I liked Prague, but I wasn't as thrilled with it as most everyone I know tells me they were. So either there was something wrong with Prague or something wrong with me. I'd like to think it was not the later. And I have an idea what didn't thrill me with the city itself. Being the beginning of summer tourist season was upon us and the city was swarming with people from around the globe. Unlike some busy cities I've been to though I felt like Prague was a cruise ship port because there were so many buses that would bring people in for a day or two and during certain hours of the day it would be mad. I think I would like it better without this added chaos and maybe a little more exploring on my own rather than the tour. So if presented the opportunity I would go back.... like I said if only for the vegetarian food. :)
So that was our first trip with my Mom. We came back to Garmisch that evening. It was my Mom's first time in Garmisch, remember, since we never came back after she arrived. And if I even need to say it... she loved it. :) Well enough for this post I think. I'll have to tell you about the rest later. :)
Lake Bled
A couple weeks ago Ryan and I went to Lake Bled in Slovenia. To get to Slovenia (a country I had never heard of before I moved to Germany) we drive all the way through Austria from West to South East and Lake Bled isn't too far into Slovenia. It took about 4.5 hours to get there.
We left after work on Tuesday. The car was packed very full because we decided to camp. I've been wanting to get a lot more camping in this summer than we have been able to and realized if we were going to go we better get on it before the weather turned poor. And I've been wanting to go to Lake Bled ever since my neighbor told me it is his favorite place he's been and he has been here for two years now, so I took that as quite the recommendation.
We arrived at the camp ground around 8. It was very full, but we found a good spot and set up camp. It was a very nice camp ground. It was right across from the lake, there were nice bathroom facilities, and even a game area with a basketball court, ping pong, tennis, sand volley ball, trampolines and arcade games, but some of those things you had to pay additional for.
For the past several months I feel like our lives have been go, go, go and I've been very worn out. My Mom came in June, soon after we did our big trip to the Middle East, the Michelle arrive only two days after we got back with Barb coming in the middle of Michelle's visit. Then it took another week to get back on a normal work schedule because of having one day weekends to make up for our time off. So more of less I just felt like I was trying to keep my head above water for a long time. This weekend I wanted to relax, but outside of Garmisch. Lake Bled turned out to be the perfect place to do just that.
Wednesday morning we woke up and it was raining quite a lot. So we stayed in tent and did nothing exhausting... no work, no errands, no adventures.... it was perfect. I read my Bible for several hours and Ryan read a book I had brought with me. Eventually the rain stopped and the sun even peaked it's head out, so I got up, showered, and prepared for what was left of the day.
The lake only had a circumference of 6km, not much at all, so we set out to walk around it. Oh first we stopped at a grocery on our campground and bought a salad and a 1/4 of a watermelon and sat on the edge of the lake eating that. There were lots of swans around and some children jumping off a dock. The water looked incredible. So clear that you could see the stones on the bottom quite a ways out.
As we walked around we saw several places to rent wooden row boats. We thought about it for the next day, but ended up not doing it. There is an island in the lake that is only big enough to have one church on it. So that is the main reason people rent the boats, but we decided we didn't care enough and we'd save it for next time.
While we walked I kept seeing fish in the water and I'd follow them along the boardwalk we were on until I saw another and then follow that one. I guess because of this I reminded Ryan of Dory from Finding Nemo. Then as we got further around the lake we stopped to look at a menu outside a restaurant and on the menu under Fish was "Grilled Dory Fish," I couldn't believe it. :)
We saw a sign for a tourist office, so went in. I had heard of Slovenian wine (plus I like to try wine everywhere I go) so I asked if they knew anywhere we could go wine tasting. The man told me there were no vineyard around, but gave me a map and marked a wine shop that did wine tasting.
When we got to the wine shop the woman said they normally only do wine tastings for large groups, but she could let us try some wine. It was interesting though because her method of letting us "try" wine seemed just like a wine tasting to me. Slovenia does have very good wine. They have several different growing regions. One is more up north and a little more mountainous and produces most of their whites and then to the south on the border with Italy they produce some really great reds. Of course we had to purchase a couple bottles to add to our European collection. We have an ever growing collection, but we haven't drank any yet. We will need to get on that because I'd be afraid to know how much it would cost to ship them home using the German Post since we can't ship alcohol through USPS.
After we left the shop somehow Ryan was a bit tipsy... I however was fine. I don't understand how that is possible, but he was pretty funny. We kept walking around the lake and saw a sign for Corn which Ryan got overly excited about and b-lined for. :) I wish I could take a picture that shared with you how funny he was. But as it turned out this was some really incredible corn. The man had a stand on the side of lake with fresh popcorn, no butter, but heavily salted... just the way I like it. And corn on the cob. He had a special thing on his barbecue that he set the corn in which helped blacken it. Then he salted that too. Oh it was so good. So good in fact we made it our last stop the next day before we left.
We continued on our walk as we ate our corn. We made it back to the camp ground and decided it was time for dinner. We drove around the lake to an area we thought had a restaurant the woman at the wine shop recommended, but I'm pretty sure where we ended up eating wasn't what she recommended. We wanted fish and there was fish on the menu, so we went in. We each had really good soup to start. Ryan had french onion and I had Tuscan bean. But unfortunately our fish wasn't as good as we hoped. Ryan had tuna, but it was cooked all the way through. We like it seared so it is still raw in the center. And now we know we dislike it cooked all the way through... unless it is in a can. So, oh well with dinner. We were stuffed when we left though so at least we didn't go hungry.
When we got back to camp we went straight to bed. That is part of what I love about camping. Your day starts when the sun comes up and ends when the sun goes down (more or less).
The next morning we had to be checked out of the campground by noon, so we got up much earlier than the day before and packed up. We left the car parked at the campground and then headed to the lake for a swim across the street. The water really was fantastic. And today the sun was out and it was fairly warm. After our swim we bought a piece of Bled cake at the grocery because it is supposed to be a specialty of the area and you all know how I am about food and wanting to try things unique to certain places. Well we really didn't care for the cake, so special or not we wouldn't recommend it. Then we got in the car and drove around to the corn guy. We each got an ear of corn and shared a bag of popcorn that we watched pop... oh so so so good. And then we were on the road again heading back to Garmisch.
That night I had couchsurfers staying with me, so we needed to be back before too late. They had texted me that morning (texting is called SMS in Europe) and I'd told them we'd be back between 4 and 5. It was fun to spend the evening with them chatting about life and traveling. I hope that we can go visit them in Wurzburg, northern Bavaria, before we leave.
I feel like I didn't have much to share from this trip because we didn't do a whole lot. We just enjoyed the beauty of the area, being out in God's creation, and having NOTHING that we HAD to do. Ahhh what a marvelous weekend it was. Maybe before we leave we'll get to spend at least one more weekend like this one.
If we go back to Lake Bled though I do have a couple things on my agenda. There is a castle we didn't hike up to that allows you to bottle your own wine- obviously up my alley. And there is something called canyoning that I'd really like to do. A guide takes you hiking up a mountain in a wet suit and then you repel down waterfalls until you are halfway down and then jump into the water below. And at the end if you are brave enough you can jump all the way down the waterfalls. And then once you've finished the part of repelling and jumping you just float down the river in your wet suit to the place you started the whole adventure from. We know a lot of people who have done this and rave about it. So we'll see if we are able to fit it in to our dwindling days here.
We left after work on Tuesday. The car was packed very full because we decided to camp. I've been wanting to get a lot more camping in this summer than we have been able to and realized if we were going to go we better get on it before the weather turned poor. And I've been wanting to go to Lake Bled ever since my neighbor told me it is his favorite place he's been and he has been here for two years now, so I took that as quite the recommendation.
We arrived at the camp ground around 8. It was very full, but we found a good spot and set up camp. It was a very nice camp ground. It was right across from the lake, there were nice bathroom facilities, and even a game area with a basketball court, ping pong, tennis, sand volley ball, trampolines and arcade games, but some of those things you had to pay additional for.
For the past several months I feel like our lives have been go, go, go and I've been very worn out. My Mom came in June, soon after we did our big trip to the Middle East, the Michelle arrive only two days after we got back with Barb coming in the middle of Michelle's visit. Then it took another week to get back on a normal work schedule because of having one day weekends to make up for our time off. So more of less I just felt like I was trying to keep my head above water for a long time. This weekend I wanted to relax, but outside of Garmisch. Lake Bled turned out to be the perfect place to do just that.
Wednesday morning we woke up and it was raining quite a lot. So we stayed in tent and did nothing exhausting... no work, no errands, no adventures.... it was perfect. I read my Bible for several hours and Ryan read a book I had brought with me. Eventually the rain stopped and the sun even peaked it's head out, so I got up, showered, and prepared for what was left of the day.
The lake only had a circumference of 6km, not much at all, so we set out to walk around it. Oh first we stopped at a grocery on our campground and bought a salad and a 1/4 of a watermelon and sat on the edge of the lake eating that. There were lots of swans around and some children jumping off a dock. The water looked incredible. So clear that you could see the stones on the bottom quite a ways out.
As we walked around we saw several places to rent wooden row boats. We thought about it for the next day, but ended up not doing it. There is an island in the lake that is only big enough to have one church on it. So that is the main reason people rent the boats, but we decided we didn't care enough and we'd save it for next time.
While we walked I kept seeing fish in the water and I'd follow them along the boardwalk we were on until I saw another and then follow that one. I guess because of this I reminded Ryan of Dory from Finding Nemo. Then as we got further around the lake we stopped to look at a menu outside a restaurant and on the menu under Fish was "Grilled Dory Fish," I couldn't believe it. :)
We saw a sign for a tourist office, so went in. I had heard of Slovenian wine (plus I like to try wine everywhere I go) so I asked if they knew anywhere we could go wine tasting. The man told me there were no vineyard around, but gave me a map and marked a wine shop that did wine tasting.
When we got to the wine shop the woman said they normally only do wine tastings for large groups, but she could let us try some wine. It was interesting though because her method of letting us "try" wine seemed just like a wine tasting to me. Slovenia does have very good wine. They have several different growing regions. One is more up north and a little more mountainous and produces most of their whites and then to the south on the border with Italy they produce some really great reds. Of course we had to purchase a couple bottles to add to our European collection. We have an ever growing collection, but we haven't drank any yet. We will need to get on that because I'd be afraid to know how much it would cost to ship them home using the German Post since we can't ship alcohol through USPS.
After we left the shop somehow Ryan was a bit tipsy... I however was fine. I don't understand how that is possible, but he was pretty funny. We kept walking around the lake and saw a sign for Corn which Ryan got overly excited about and b-lined for. :) I wish I could take a picture that shared with you how funny he was. But as it turned out this was some really incredible corn. The man had a stand on the side of lake with fresh popcorn, no butter, but heavily salted... just the way I like it. And corn on the cob. He had a special thing on his barbecue that he set the corn in which helped blacken it. Then he salted that too. Oh it was so good. So good in fact we made it our last stop the next day before we left.
We continued on our walk as we ate our corn. We made it back to the camp ground and decided it was time for dinner. We drove around the lake to an area we thought had a restaurant the woman at the wine shop recommended, but I'm pretty sure where we ended up eating wasn't what she recommended. We wanted fish and there was fish on the menu, so we went in. We each had really good soup to start. Ryan had french onion and I had Tuscan bean. But unfortunately our fish wasn't as good as we hoped. Ryan had tuna, but it was cooked all the way through. We like it seared so it is still raw in the center. And now we know we dislike it cooked all the way through... unless it is in a can. So, oh well with dinner. We were stuffed when we left though so at least we didn't go hungry.
When we got back to camp we went straight to bed. That is part of what I love about camping. Your day starts when the sun comes up and ends when the sun goes down (more or less).
The next morning we had to be checked out of the campground by noon, so we got up much earlier than the day before and packed up. We left the car parked at the campground and then headed to the lake for a swim across the street. The water really was fantastic. And today the sun was out and it was fairly warm. After our swim we bought a piece of Bled cake at the grocery because it is supposed to be a specialty of the area and you all know how I am about food and wanting to try things unique to certain places. Well we really didn't care for the cake, so special or not we wouldn't recommend it. Then we got in the car and drove around to the corn guy. We each got an ear of corn and shared a bag of popcorn that we watched pop... oh so so so good. And then we were on the road again heading back to Garmisch.
That night I had couchsurfers staying with me, so we needed to be back before too late. They had texted me that morning (texting is called SMS in Europe) and I'd told them we'd be back between 4 and 5. It was fun to spend the evening with them chatting about life and traveling. I hope that we can go visit them in Wurzburg, northern Bavaria, before we leave.
I feel like I didn't have much to share from this trip because we didn't do a whole lot. We just enjoyed the beauty of the area, being out in God's creation, and having NOTHING that we HAD to do. Ahhh what a marvelous weekend it was. Maybe before we leave we'll get to spend at least one more weekend like this one.
If we go back to Lake Bled though I do have a couple things on my agenda. There is a castle we didn't hike up to that allows you to bottle your own wine- obviously up my alley. And there is something called canyoning that I'd really like to do. A guide takes you hiking up a mountain in a wet suit and then you repel down waterfalls until you are halfway down and then jump into the water below. And at the end if you are brave enough you can jump all the way down the waterfalls. And then once you've finished the part of repelling and jumping you just float down the river in your wet suit to the place you started the whole adventure from. We know a lot of people who have done this and rave about it. So we'll see if we are able to fit it in to our dwindling days here.
Friday, August 27, 2010
There is so much more to catch up on.....
I don't even know where to begin past Israel. But I think I will just shoot out some random things that I haven't blogged about yet.
In May I was the housekeeping departments nominee for employee of the month. I got a certificate, a $200 bonus that was taxed :(, 10 ticekts for lunch in the staff cafeteria, and two dinner vouchers for Pullman Place the nicest restaurant in the hotel. I was not selected employee of the month for the whole hotel, but that person gets and additional $350, a free night stay at the hotel, a free tour with the hotel, 20 tickets for staff caf and is in the running for employee of the year which gets a free week for two at the shade of green AFRC hotel in Florida with passes to Disneyworld and $1000 spending money. Pretty cool. Too bad I'm not in the running for that. But I was honored all the same. I missed the party to collect my award because we were traveling with my Mom, but that is okay because you know when you stand up in front of people waiting to hear a winner deep down hoping it will be you and then it isn't.... well that is sort of awkward I think, so I'm kind of glad I wasn't there.
Also recently I was given a permanent section at work. Section 8 on the 3rd floor is all mine. :) I like having my own section so I can see what to expect in the days to come and I know when blankets and such were changed out last etc. Tatijana had a minor stroke awhile back and has finally come back to work, but her doctor said she can't clean rooms until at least January. So for now she is in laundry. And instead of having people rotate in and out of this section for all those months they gave me her section based off of my lead, Larry's recommendation. Once again I was honored he thought enough of me and my work to recommend me for this. The other major benefit to this section is there are no loft suits.... so wonderful. I do have 14 rooms though and often extra on top of that, but still no loft suits is a treat.
Let's see what else.... well this is recent, but Ryan and I and a few friends went to the nice restaurant in the hotel for dinner. It was the last night for their special summer menu that was 4 course for $25 and we get an employee discount of 25% off. It was pretty good. I'd say only dessert was really disappointing and I've heard they don't make any desserts from scratch. But my tomato basil soup to start was delicious and the fish for my entree was also very good.
Then just yesterday, Thursday, I got to go to the "We Care" luncheon. This is when a select few based on your last name are invited once a month to meet with the General Manager, his wife head of HR, and the hiring manager to share likes and dislikes about work while sharing a three course meal. Again I was not impressed with dessert and the salad and entree were pretty good, but hey it beat eating in the staff caf and I'm sure all of you will have no problem believing me when I tell you I had the most to say out of the group. :)
OH my goodness... then there are the Fests. Garmischer Fest started on Michelle's last night with us, so we drug her along. She didn't love it, but it was super crowded that night and I had more fun on other nights. We went three times I think to the first one. There is a live band every night playing Bavarian music and live dancers performing traditional dances in traditional costumes. Everyone dresses in their dirndls and lederhosen to attend. The prompted Ryan to start search for some of his own on the internet which sadly weren't here in time for our Fests but he'll wear them to October Fest in Munich. I got many many compliments on my dirndl which my Mom made me and sent me for my birthday. :)
I liked Partenkirchen Fest even better than Garmischer. Part of this heavily had to do with the fact there was cotton candy and I love cotton candy believe it or not, even the health nut I am. I had one every night we went and one night we drove over there just to get cotton candy and I had two on the last night of Fest. But don't worry I shared with at least Ryan and sometimes a few others... just to be nice though I didn't necessarily want to. ;) We ate a couple times at Fest and the food was delicious. The beer at the second one was Ettaler which is made by monks just 20 minutes away. I liked this a lot too since Garmischer served Lowenbrau which is a much larger mass produced and high distribution brewery. Partenkirchen also had a larger more decorated tent. We went on one night that they had stone lifting where HUGE guys would be on the stage standing on a table trying to see who could lift crazy amounts of weight. We knew a guy from the Edelweiss who did it (but at a little bit lower weight that they finished at). He paid 1 euro to enter and received a free mass of beer (1 liter) a nice decorative plate, and a set of trekking poles. That was pretty cool. Then a couple nights later we went for the whip night. There are groups of men who whip the air to the tune of the music. First the youngest guys went then the middle age guys and then the ones who were most well practiced and they were really really good. On the last night people would stand on the benches of the picnic tables we sat at and had moves to these German songs and we tried to follow along. It was so fun. They even did a little YMCA that night. The same night we went solely for cotton candy we also shared a gun for the shooting game. We got five shots and between the two of us neither hit a thing. The sad thing was there was a five year old girl and 7 year old boy standing next to us that hit all five of their shots. Although I've heard mixed reviews on October Fest due to crowds and over commercialization I'm still excited after these experiences. It is better for my bank account that Fest is over and I'm nto staying out as late, but it was a fun few weeks.
Gosh, what else has been going on?
I have a new roommate. It worked out perfect that she came the day after Michelle left, so Michelle was able to have a bed and closet the whole time she was here and made things not crowded at all while Barb was here too and we all shared my room. My roommate is named Lindsay. She is from Dallas Texas. She is 25 years old. She went to Texas Tech. I think her degree is in something like English and creative writing or something. Her job here in in Alpine Adventure which means she does several things including the gift shop, the kids programs during the day and at night, and leads tours although she still has to train for that. She's super nice and I feel very lucky that she's the one I ended up with. I hope she thinks I'm as good of a roommate as I've found her to be.
I feel like those are all the bigger little things to catch up on. Everything else has to do with traveling. I'm thinking of referring everyone to Michelle's blog in regard to wahat we did while she was here for THREE whole weeks because if I try o write about it all myself I may never dig myself out of this blogging backlog I'm in. Yes, I think I'll just give you her address right now. It is .com I haven't read it yet, so if I think I need to fill in holes or can't stand not putting in my two cents then I'll do that at a later date. And I'll tell you about Ryan and my relaxing weekend trip to Lake Bled, Slovenia and then of course there was the two weeks my Mom was here that was so fantastic. If I asked my magic eight ball if I could accomplish all this before my friends Jamie and Andy come next week I think it would tell me "chances are doubtful" or "the outlook is not good" but we'll see and I'll do my best. I feel a sense of accomplishment just finishing Israel.
Oh and one last thing I've done that has been awesome is host couch surfers like when Pepe and Noelia hosted Ryan and I in Cairo. Two nice guys stayed here on Michelle's second to last night that came from the Berlin area to hike the Zugspite. Then Betsie who is from Florida, but is currently studying abroad in Florence came for a couple days. Ryan and I went on an incredible hike with her and took her to Fest with us. And then just last week a couple from Wurzberg stayed with me for a night on their way home from a two week trip through Italy. Chris and Conny, such nice people. I have loved every experience and all the people. I think it is an incredible program and I'm glad I was able to host a few people after being hosted myself. I'm currently looking for a host for Krakow Poland. I'm going there with Renee and a girl named Taylor from the 30th of September to the 2nd of October. The three of us really want to see Auschwitz, something Ryan didn't really care about. I am sad he won't be coming though and I'm sure I'll miss him a lot, but I'm super excited since I've read about this place in books since I was a little girl.
Okay I've got to go to sleep now. My pillow is calling my name.
In May I was the housekeeping departments nominee for employee of the month. I got a certificate, a $200 bonus that was taxed :(, 10 ticekts for lunch in the staff cafeteria, and two dinner vouchers for Pullman Place the nicest restaurant in the hotel. I was not selected employee of the month for the whole hotel, but that person gets and additional $350, a free night stay at the hotel, a free tour with the hotel, 20 tickets for staff caf and is in the running for employee of the year which gets a free week for two at the shade of green AFRC hotel in Florida with passes to Disneyworld and $1000 spending money. Pretty cool. Too bad I'm not in the running for that. But I was honored all the same. I missed the party to collect my award because we were traveling with my Mom, but that is okay because you know when you stand up in front of people waiting to hear a winner deep down hoping it will be you and then it isn't.... well that is sort of awkward I think, so I'm kind of glad I wasn't there.
Also recently I was given a permanent section at work. Section 8 on the 3rd floor is all mine. :) I like having my own section so I can see what to expect in the days to come and I know when blankets and such were changed out last etc. Tatijana had a minor stroke awhile back and has finally come back to work, but her doctor said she can't clean rooms until at least January. So for now she is in laundry. And instead of having people rotate in and out of this section for all those months they gave me her section based off of my lead, Larry's recommendation. Once again I was honored he thought enough of me and my work to recommend me for this. The other major benefit to this section is there are no loft suits.... so wonderful. I do have 14 rooms though and often extra on top of that, but still no loft suits is a treat.
Let's see what else.... well this is recent, but Ryan and I and a few friends went to the nice restaurant in the hotel for dinner. It was the last night for their special summer menu that was 4 course for $25 and we get an employee discount of 25% off. It was pretty good. I'd say only dessert was really disappointing and I've heard they don't make any desserts from scratch. But my tomato basil soup to start was delicious and the fish for my entree was also very good.
Then just yesterday, Thursday, I got to go to the "We Care" luncheon. This is when a select few based on your last name are invited once a month to meet with the General Manager, his wife head of HR, and the hiring manager to share likes and dislikes about work while sharing a three course meal. Again I was not impressed with dessert and the salad and entree were pretty good, but hey it beat eating in the staff caf and I'm sure all of you will have no problem believing me when I tell you I had the most to say out of the group. :)
OH my goodness... then there are the Fests. Garmischer Fest started on Michelle's last night with us, so we drug her along. She didn't love it, but it was super crowded that night and I had more fun on other nights. We went three times I think to the first one. There is a live band every night playing Bavarian music and live dancers performing traditional dances in traditional costumes. Everyone dresses in their dirndls and lederhosen to attend. The prompted Ryan to start search for some of his own on the internet which sadly weren't here in time for our Fests but he'll wear them to October Fest in Munich. I got many many compliments on my dirndl which my Mom made me and sent me for my birthday. :)
I liked Partenkirchen Fest even better than Garmischer. Part of this heavily had to do with the fact there was cotton candy and I love cotton candy believe it or not, even the health nut I am. I had one every night we went and one night we drove over there just to get cotton candy and I had two on the last night of Fest. But don't worry I shared with at least Ryan and sometimes a few others... just to be nice though I didn't necessarily want to. ;) We ate a couple times at Fest and the food was delicious. The beer at the second one was Ettaler which is made by monks just 20 minutes away. I liked this a lot too since Garmischer served Lowenbrau which is a much larger mass produced and high distribution brewery. Partenkirchen also had a larger more decorated tent. We went on one night that they had stone lifting where HUGE guys would be on the stage standing on a table trying to see who could lift crazy amounts of weight. We knew a guy from the Edelweiss who did it (but at a little bit lower weight that they finished at). He paid 1 euro to enter and received a free mass of beer (1 liter) a nice decorative plate, and a set of trekking poles. That was pretty cool. Then a couple nights later we went for the whip night. There are groups of men who whip the air to the tune of the music. First the youngest guys went then the middle age guys and then the ones who were most well practiced and they were really really good. On the last night people would stand on the benches of the picnic tables we sat at and had moves to these German songs and we tried to follow along. It was so fun. They even did a little YMCA that night. The same night we went solely for cotton candy we also shared a gun for the shooting game. We got five shots and between the two of us neither hit a thing. The sad thing was there was a five year old girl and 7 year old boy standing next to us that hit all five of their shots. Although I've heard mixed reviews on October Fest due to crowds and over commercialization I'm still excited after these experiences. It is better for my bank account that Fest is over and I'm nto staying out as late, but it was a fun few weeks.
Gosh, what else has been going on?
I have a new roommate. It worked out perfect that she came the day after Michelle left, so Michelle was able to have a bed and closet the whole time she was here and made things not crowded at all while Barb was here too and we all shared my room. My roommate is named Lindsay. She is from Dallas Texas. She is 25 years old. She went to Texas Tech. I think her degree is in something like English and creative writing or something. Her job here in in Alpine Adventure which means she does several things including the gift shop, the kids programs during the day and at night, and leads tours although she still has to train for that. She's super nice and I feel very lucky that she's the one I ended up with. I hope she thinks I'm as good of a roommate as I've found her to be.
I feel like those are all the bigger little things to catch up on. Everything else has to do with traveling. I'm thinking of referring everyone to Michelle's blog in regard to wahat we did while she was here for THREE whole weeks because if I try o write about it all myself I may never dig myself out of this blogging backlog I'm in. Yes, I think I'll just give you her address right now. It is .com I haven't read it yet, so if I think I need to fill in holes or can't stand not putting in my two cents then I'll do that at a later date. And I'll tell you about Ryan and my relaxing weekend trip to Lake Bled, Slovenia and then of course there was the two weeks my Mom was here that was so fantastic. If I asked my magic eight ball if I could accomplish all this before my friends Jamie and Andy come next week I think it would tell me "chances are doubtful" or "the outlook is not good" but we'll see and I'll do my best. I feel a sense of accomplishment just finishing Israel.
Oh and one last thing I've done that has been awesome is host couch surfers like when Pepe and Noelia hosted Ryan and I in Cairo. Two nice guys stayed here on Michelle's second to last night that came from the Berlin area to hike the Zugspite. Then Betsie who is from Florida, but is currently studying abroad in Florence came for a couple days. Ryan and I went on an incredible hike with her and took her to Fest with us. And then just last week a couple from Wurzberg stayed with me for a night on their way home from a two week trip through Italy. Chris and Conny, such nice people. I have loved every experience and all the people. I think it is an incredible program and I'm glad I was able to host a few people after being hosted myself. I'm currently looking for a host for Krakow Poland. I'm going there with Renee and a girl named Taylor from the 30th of September to the 2nd of October. The three of us really want to see Auschwitz, something Ryan didn't really care about. I am sad he won't be coming though and I'm sure I'll miss him a lot, but I'm super excited since I've read about this place in books since I was a little girl.
Okay I've got to go to sleep now. My pillow is calling my name.
Our last day in Israel
July 9th
Okay faithful readers, can any believe I've finally reached my last day of Israel. Goodness gracious, thank you for being so patient.
We woke up and got ready for the day before heading to the beach first thing. It was really nice to spend our first and last days in Israel both in Yafo, soaking up the sun and relaxing. Goodness knows we needed it since we were about to come back to Germany to work 10 days in a row.
We laid on the hot white sand and played in the warm waters of the Mediterranean for several hours I'd guess. Oh gosh I almost forgot that on the way to the beach we did make a pit stop. We stopped at the oldest bakery in Jaffa and bought A LOT including some pita bread we brought back with us for a few days later as a treat. It was all really good and they even threw in a few things on the house. I guess we can't stay away from bakeries no matter where we are. :)
After the beach we went to lunch at the same place we did with Ari on that first day. I had falafel and Ryan had shwarma and we each stuffed ourselves silly with the free "salad" bar items. Oh it was so good. I still miss these types of places.
Then it was shopping time. We went into the covered market area for the first time. I got a cool tapestry similar to ones I got in India. Now it is hanging over my bed from the ceiling and looks really cool. I also got a couple pairs of loose baggy pants like I'm a big fan of, so I was a happy camper. Ryan also bought me a scull and cross bones bracelet made of burnt bone and leather that I love. Ryan bought huka... you can smoke fruit flavored tobacco out of it (well you can smoke an assortment of things out of it but that is what his plan is). And I can't really remember if we picked up anything else. But we were happy with our purchases and felt satisfied with how we spent our last day.
We went back and packed our bags to travel home and then said goodbye to our last hostel. We walked from there back to our first hostel in Tel Aviv because Ryan forgot a shirt he put outside to dry and thankfully it was in the exact place he left it because it was his favorite shirt and he'd been thinking about it all week. Then we walked to the main road and caught a bus to the train station where we took the train to the airport. Everything at the airport went pretty smoothly. We did give ourselves plenty of time just in case. They questioned the two of us A TON about how we knew each other, if we lived together, how often we saw each other, what we had done in Israel, etc etc. And kept looking at our passports and our faces very intently. After awhile they asked me for another ID, I guess I looked different to them in person compared to my passport. But eventually we went through. Then only I had to have my bag inspected my an agent but the thing she questioned me on most was where I got my books which were all library books. Who knows why? But I didn't mind it, better safe than sorry and I understand why they do it. Then at customs the gal Ryan went up to actually had someone else come and look at him and his passport because she wasn't sure she thought it was him. But we both got through.
At our gate a German sports team showed up and was all together. Ryan thought it could be the German Fussball team (soccer team) since they had just lost in the world cup, but I knew they had a game to play yet to decide 3rd and 4th places and these boys were too skinny to be professional soccer players if you asked me. As it turned out they were the German cycling team. Interesting.
We made it to Garmisch. The flight was thankfully uneventful. We almost had to sit surrounded my a bunch of loud and obnoxious high school age Israeli kids, but there were two open seats in the emergency exit row that we moved to which was good two fold because it also allowed Ryan to have a lot of leg room.
There you have it folks. It was a great trip, and incredible adventure, and truly a blessing to have such an opportunity. We were thankfully praising God the whole trip for how smoothly everything went and I do believe He played a big role in all of that. I do hope to someday return to Israel, so if anyone wants to go just let me know.
Okay faithful readers, can any believe I've finally reached my last day of Israel. Goodness gracious, thank you for being so patient.
We woke up and got ready for the day before heading to the beach first thing. It was really nice to spend our first and last days in Israel both in Yafo, soaking up the sun and relaxing. Goodness knows we needed it since we were about to come back to Germany to work 10 days in a row.
We laid on the hot white sand and played in the warm waters of the Mediterranean for several hours I'd guess. Oh gosh I almost forgot that on the way to the beach we did make a pit stop. We stopped at the oldest bakery in Jaffa and bought A LOT including some pita bread we brought back with us for a few days later as a treat. It was all really good and they even threw in a few things on the house. I guess we can't stay away from bakeries no matter where we are. :)
After the beach we went to lunch at the same place we did with Ari on that first day. I had falafel and Ryan had shwarma and we each stuffed ourselves silly with the free "salad" bar items. Oh it was so good. I still miss these types of places.
Then it was shopping time. We went into the covered market area for the first time. I got a cool tapestry similar to ones I got in India. Now it is hanging over my bed from the ceiling and looks really cool. I also got a couple pairs of loose baggy pants like I'm a big fan of, so I was a happy camper. Ryan also bought me a scull and cross bones bracelet made of burnt bone and leather that I love. Ryan bought huka... you can smoke fruit flavored tobacco out of it (well you can smoke an assortment of things out of it but that is what his plan is). And I can't really remember if we picked up anything else. But we were happy with our purchases and felt satisfied with how we spent our last day.
We went back and packed our bags to travel home and then said goodbye to our last hostel. We walked from there back to our first hostel in Tel Aviv because Ryan forgot a shirt he put outside to dry and thankfully it was in the exact place he left it because it was his favorite shirt and he'd been thinking about it all week. Then we walked to the main road and caught a bus to the train station where we took the train to the airport. Everything at the airport went pretty smoothly. We did give ourselves plenty of time just in case. They questioned the two of us A TON about how we knew each other, if we lived together, how often we saw each other, what we had done in Israel, etc etc. And kept looking at our passports and our faces very intently. After awhile they asked me for another ID, I guess I looked different to them in person compared to my passport. But eventually we went through. Then only I had to have my bag inspected my an agent but the thing she questioned me on most was where I got my books which were all library books. Who knows why? But I didn't mind it, better safe than sorry and I understand why they do it. Then at customs the gal Ryan went up to actually had someone else come and look at him and his passport because she wasn't sure she thought it was him. But we both got through.
At our gate a German sports team showed up and was all together. Ryan thought it could be the German Fussball team (soccer team) since they had just lost in the world cup, but I knew they had a game to play yet to decide 3rd and 4th places and these boys were too skinny to be professional soccer players if you asked me. As it turned out they were the German cycling team. Interesting.
We made it to Garmisch. The flight was thankfully uneventful. We almost had to sit surrounded my a bunch of loud and obnoxious high school age Israeli kids, but there were two open seats in the emergency exit row that we moved to which was good two fold because it also allowed Ryan to have a lot of leg room.
There you have it folks. It was a great trip, and incredible adventure, and truly a blessing to have such an opportunity. We were thankfully praising God the whole trip for how smoothly everything went and I do believe He played a big role in all of that. I do hope to someday return to Israel, so if anyone wants to go just let me know.
My Favorite
July 8th
Since July 7th was our last night sleeping on the east side of Israel this was my last chance to see a great sunrise. I've always been more of a sunset person, but I think it is possibly because I grew up on the West Coast. There is nothing like the sun setting over the horizon of Bellingham Bay. But being on the east side of a country showed me that watch the sunrise from the east can also be a very special thing. So I decided to set my alarm to go sit on the bank of the Dead Sea and watch the sunrise. When my alarm went off I walked over to the window and saw a glow in the sky, but decided to crawl back in bed and sleep for 10 more minutes. Ten minutes later I was awoken again, I walked to the window to see the bright orange ball climbing it's way up the sky, but again I couldn't muster what it took to put on shoes and go outside and I went back to bed. I'm sure people were thankful in the room that I kept having my alarm ring and then go to the window.
When we got up for good we went to breakfast, which was included in the price. It was a pricey hostel, so I'm glad breakfast was such a feast. They had canned fruit, yogurt, granola, coffee, tea, eggs scrambled and fried, toast, bread, lettuce, mixed salad, pickled fishes, and I know I'm forgetting things. We ate till we were full, but I know we could have stayed until we were uncomfortable if we'd chosen to.
After breakfast we checked out of our room and stored our bags in a room at the hostel. Unfortunately we had to put up a bit of a fight about the payment because the rates at the hostel were more than if we booked online which we tried to do. Eventually the desk clerk got his boss who checked his email and our names and acknowledged that he had received our message and honored the price on the internet. I hate price games. I just wish that there would be a set price. Same with airline tickets, as a side note, I just wish that they'd be one price based on distance or whatever and you wouldn't have to play games and search for hours upon days to find good prices and then get on the plane knowing that people on either side of you paid something else. Ugh.
Directly behind our hostel was the National Reserve. Our hostel was nice enough to give us a voucher for 10% off the entrance fee. Before we even went in the gates we were spotting wild animals. And as soon as we paid and entered we were on the trail. We didn't go as high up as you could, but we still climbed a fair amount. As we went along pretty much everything was brown, but then a pool of water with a waterfall pouring into it would appear as an oasis. The first one had a lot of people stopped at it, so we continued. When we reached the second one we got down to our bathing suits under our clothes and got in. The water was perfect. Everything about this was perfect. The next waterfall was the largest, called David's waterfall, but no swimming was allowed because of the chance of falling rocks. From there we started our ascent to David's Cave which was where our end destination was before climbing down. My friend, Ari, had told us about this and highly recommended it. When we got there it was apparent why she raved about it. We climbed down from the path into the cave area. There was a nice pool of clear water with some itty bitty fish in it. A waterfall pouring into the pool as down below. And this pool was right about David's waterfall thus creating the waterfall. And there was a percect view out over the Dead Sea and the mountains of Jordan in the background. Oh and to top off the fairy tale we were in there were little red dragon flies buzzing about. It was one of the best experiences of my life I would say without exaggeration. I loved it. It was my favorite part of Israel.
We spent awhile enjoying the cave, the water, and the view before putting out clothes and shoes back on and climbing back up to the trail. We walked further south before descending to make a circle. We went by an archeological site of an old synagogue that we could walk through for free after paying the Park's fee before we started hiking. We got back to the beginning and shared a treat from the little souvenir store. It was a prepackaged thing of dippin' dots with a different name. I convinced Ryan to get it (I didn't have money on me) saying that it was probably my only chance while living abroad to have dippin' dots which I love. Then (jumping ahead) we saw them and I got them in Italy with Barb and Michelle a few weeks later. And since then I've seen them another time. Oh well. They were still good and refreshing in the hot hot heat.
Then came the time I'd been waiting for for years. Ever since I first heard of the Dead Sea and the uniqueness of this body of water I've wanted to go at some time in my life. There was a camping area, store, restaurant, gas station, and beach entry all across the road and not to far down from our hostel and the National Reserve. You want into the water and then sit down, but you don't sink. I can try to explain it but really I don't think anyone will ever completely comprehend until they experience it for themselves. If I was on my stomach I would have to work super hard to right myself. The easiest thing to do was roll from back to belly. Sort of like a baby learning to move I suppose. It was trippy. You could sit in a chair position no problem. There was a family of four there from Maryland. The son and daughter were pretty young. The little boy kept saying, "my butt hole hurts." The little girl kept saying, "my vagina hole hurts." And not to be too graphic for anyone but I wanted to let them both know that they weren't the only one experiencing those feelings (although I kept it to myself and told Ryan privately). For this reason and the fact that the water was far from refreshing and actually very warm we didn't stay in the water too long. Probably only about half and hour. You have to be so careful not to get any of it in your eyes. Ari had told me she got the tiniest drop in her eye and couldn't see out of it for 15 minutes. Yikes. I had been worried about some blistered I had that were a few days old and that stinging, which it did a little. I just hadn't thought of the other areas of my body having the issues they did. It was still so cool and if I go back to Israel I want to go to the spa a ways down the road and try the Dead Sea mud that people cover themselves with on the beach and is supposed to be very good for you skin and your health in general.
After showering off we walked back to our hostel, collected our bags, refilled our waters and then waited in the shade until it was closer to time for our bus. Once we went to bus station we didn't have to wait to long for a bus to arrive, however it was packed full. Ryan and I were standing in the aisle way of this coach style bus. I thought maybe the driver let us on because he knew people would get off soon. But I stood in that aisle way for the entire hour and half back to Jerusalem. Some teenagers sitting on either side of us asked if we were married and we said no. Then they asked if we were siblings and Ryan said no, we were a couple. Then they didn't understand why we weren't married if we loved each other and thought it would be a great idea for Ryan to propose right there in the aisle of the bus and told him to get down. One boy looked at me and said it would be romantic and the other looked at me and said it would be sexy. Ryan told them he wouldn't do that while laughing off the idea and told them I'd say no. He's right I would. I don't really find that sexy or romantic. But it was funny to hear them probe.
In Jerusalem we walked back to the Old City from the bus station. Along the way we got lunch/dinner in "New Jerusalem" on Ben Yehuda street at Moshiko's where my teacher from high school had recommended. I don't even know if I need to specify what we had. I had falafel and Ryan had shwarma. :) It was good. What do you know?
We headed straight for the Damascus Gate where the bus station was that goes in and out of the West Bank. It took a little time to search out where exactly the bus was to get to Bethlehem, but we finally found it and didn't have to wait too long to leave. I really wanted to experience the West Bank while we were there and I really wanted to visit Bethlehem. Jerusalem and Bethlehem also have a peach agreement which makes it one of the safest areas of Palestine to go to.
The bus we took in dropped us in the town without us having to cross the border on foot. As soon as we got off the bus a taxi man was at our beck and call. Of course trying to over charge us but eventually we got a price I thought was something worth paying since we'd never make it to the church of the Nativity walking before it closed and it was all uphill and we were pooped. Along the way he tried to play tour guide and tried to get us to accept his services to drive us all over Bethlehem and beyond but we bid him adieu when we got out of the cab.
Have I mentioned this yet. I never go back and read what I write. It is far too long for me, but I often forget what I've already said. What struck me most about Bethlehem was how mountainous it is. Anytime I picture Mary and Joseph searching for the Inn I think of long straight flat roads. This is not what the landscape is at all. Upon returning home to Garmisch the first thing I read in my Bible was the title "Mountainous Israel" and throughout the last chapter I read in Ezekiel it clearly discussed the landscape of the Holy Land. This was a good wake up call to me that I should obviously pay more attention to what I read. I think often I search so hard for lessons to be learned that I miss out on things like that. And after knowing what it is really like, the thought of a woman in labor climbing hills, that I paid a taxi to drive me up, sort of changes the story for me. It makes thing come to life a bit more in my head and I think helps bridge the gap a bit between my head and my heart, from reading words and stories on a page to truly understanding what it was probably like.
You enter the church through a very low door and emerge into a small room like a foyer, I guess. Then you enter another door into the sanctuary of the church. On the floor was large wooden slats that I wasn't sure about. I think maybe it was the entrance to the Inn of the Manger or I could be all wrong, but it struck me that it was somehow significant. When you walk down stairs that go under the alter of the church there is a small room that has a hole in the floor that is supposedly where little baby Jesus was born, on that spot. How they know I do not know. But they all do seem to have some archeological evidence that has led them to their conclusions and it isn't totally out of thin air. So of course Ryan and I joined in the tradition of stooping down and touching the floor. For me the significance is less in the idea that I am touching the exact spot Jesus was born and more in the fact that I was in Bethlehem which has so much Biblical significance. It was more just being on the same ground Jesus walked on that it was all these specifics, yet that was cool to see too while we were there.
When we left the church it was getting quite late and any other site was closed. So we negotiated for a cab and he took us to the border crossing where we would enter back into Israel on foot. This was something else I had wanted to to after it was recommended to us by the Swedish woman we shared a cab with in Egypt on the very first day of our trip. As a reminder she had been working in Jerusalem for months and said this was a good experience to see what the Palestinian's go through on a daily basis.
As we walked along the narrow path between the wall and the fence I felt like a prisoner. And then I saw a heart breaking image. There was a lot of art and writing on the wall, but the image that stood out to me was the head of a woman who wore a head covering and next to the image was written "I am not a terrorist." THIS is what these people must go through on a daily basis. They have no choice but to come to find work on the other side of the wall while few Israelis ever cross over to their side. We spoke with two young guys from Israel probably about our age and that day was their first time ever going to Bethlehem or anywhere in the West Bank and they had each lived in Jerusalem their entire lives. I don't really care what people's opinions are politically speaking on the whole situation. I do not think that this is a human way for people to live... in fear and in a cage. I don't think it is too much to ask for for all of us to live in peace and harmony. I never think it is okay for one person to feel scared in their own home. And then as we went through the bag scanners and metal detectors and several guards not one of them opened our passports once they say we were Americans. I felt almost like I wanted to say, hey treat me like you treat everyone else who comes through here. I'm just like they are and they are just like me. We are all just human and there is equally as much chance I could be a terrorist as they could be. All this being said I am glad I made this part of my experience and I will never forget it.
We had to catch a bus back but kept having a taxi guy haggle us to take his cab. Then he came over to us at our bus stop and told us we missed the last bus, which I didn't think was true. This is when we met those Israeli guys who had just been to Bethlehem for the first time in their lives. Thankfully as the cab driver was still trying to take us for way more than we were willing to pay the bus arrived and by then there were five of us ready to get on and escape the cabbie.
Back in the Old City we went to our former hostel collected our things and took a city bus back to the Main Bus terminal. There we took a bus back to Tel Aviv for the night. This time we wanted to stay where Ari had before. They had places to sleep on the roof, which we really liked doing. The cool thing about this night was that it was Thursday. Thursday night is like what we are used to on Fridays since Friday and Saturday are Shabbat and make up the weekend days in Israel and much of the middle east that I'm aware of. So the streets were packed. There were people set up selling things all along the sidewalks and the noise level was intense. But despite it all happening on the streets all around our new home for the night after we showered and changed we were quickly caught up in dream land for our last night in Israel.
Since July 7th was our last night sleeping on the east side of Israel this was my last chance to see a great sunrise. I've always been more of a sunset person, but I think it is possibly because I grew up on the West Coast. There is nothing like the sun setting over the horizon of Bellingham Bay. But being on the east side of a country showed me that watch the sunrise from the east can also be a very special thing. So I decided to set my alarm to go sit on the bank of the Dead Sea and watch the sunrise. When my alarm went off I walked over to the window and saw a glow in the sky, but decided to crawl back in bed and sleep for 10 more minutes. Ten minutes later I was awoken again, I walked to the window to see the bright orange ball climbing it's way up the sky, but again I couldn't muster what it took to put on shoes and go outside and I went back to bed. I'm sure people were thankful in the room that I kept having my alarm ring and then go to the window.
When we got up for good we went to breakfast, which was included in the price. It was a pricey hostel, so I'm glad breakfast was such a feast. They had canned fruit, yogurt, granola, coffee, tea, eggs scrambled and fried, toast, bread, lettuce, mixed salad, pickled fishes, and I know I'm forgetting things. We ate till we were full, but I know we could have stayed until we were uncomfortable if we'd chosen to.
After breakfast we checked out of our room and stored our bags in a room at the hostel. Unfortunately we had to put up a bit of a fight about the payment because the rates at the hostel were more than if we booked online which we tried to do. Eventually the desk clerk got his boss who checked his email and our names and acknowledged that he had received our message and honored the price on the internet. I hate price games. I just wish that there would be a set price. Same with airline tickets, as a side note, I just wish that they'd be one price based on distance or whatever and you wouldn't have to play games and search for hours upon days to find good prices and then get on the plane knowing that people on either side of you paid something else. Ugh.
Directly behind our hostel was the National Reserve. Our hostel was nice enough to give us a voucher for 10% off the entrance fee. Before we even went in the gates we were spotting wild animals. And as soon as we paid and entered we were on the trail. We didn't go as high up as you could, but we still climbed a fair amount. As we went along pretty much everything was brown, but then a pool of water with a waterfall pouring into it would appear as an oasis. The first one had a lot of people stopped at it, so we continued. When we reached the second one we got down to our bathing suits under our clothes and got in. The water was perfect. Everything about this was perfect. The next waterfall was the largest, called David's waterfall, but no swimming was allowed because of the chance of falling rocks. From there we started our ascent to David's Cave which was where our end destination was before climbing down. My friend, Ari, had told us about this and highly recommended it. When we got there it was apparent why she raved about it. We climbed down from the path into the cave area. There was a nice pool of clear water with some itty bitty fish in it. A waterfall pouring into the pool as down below. And this pool was right about David's waterfall thus creating the waterfall. And there was a percect view out over the Dead Sea and the mountains of Jordan in the background. Oh and to top off the fairy tale we were in there were little red dragon flies buzzing about. It was one of the best experiences of my life I would say without exaggeration. I loved it. It was my favorite part of Israel.
We spent awhile enjoying the cave, the water, and the view before putting out clothes and shoes back on and climbing back up to the trail. We walked further south before descending to make a circle. We went by an archeological site of an old synagogue that we could walk through for free after paying the Park's fee before we started hiking. We got back to the beginning and shared a treat from the little souvenir store. It was a prepackaged thing of dippin' dots with a different name. I convinced Ryan to get it (I didn't have money on me) saying that it was probably my only chance while living abroad to have dippin' dots which I love. Then (jumping ahead) we saw them and I got them in Italy with Barb and Michelle a few weeks later. And since then I've seen them another time. Oh well. They were still good and refreshing in the hot hot heat.
Then came the time I'd been waiting for for years. Ever since I first heard of the Dead Sea and the uniqueness of this body of water I've wanted to go at some time in my life. There was a camping area, store, restaurant, gas station, and beach entry all across the road and not to far down from our hostel and the National Reserve. You want into the water and then sit down, but you don't sink. I can try to explain it but really I don't think anyone will ever completely comprehend until they experience it for themselves. If I was on my stomach I would have to work super hard to right myself. The easiest thing to do was roll from back to belly. Sort of like a baby learning to move I suppose. It was trippy. You could sit in a chair position no problem. There was a family of four there from Maryland. The son and daughter were pretty young. The little boy kept saying, "my butt hole hurts." The little girl kept saying, "my vagina hole hurts." And not to be too graphic for anyone but I wanted to let them both know that they weren't the only one experiencing those feelings (although I kept it to myself and told Ryan privately). For this reason and the fact that the water was far from refreshing and actually very warm we didn't stay in the water too long. Probably only about half and hour. You have to be so careful not to get any of it in your eyes. Ari had told me she got the tiniest drop in her eye and couldn't see out of it for 15 minutes. Yikes. I had been worried about some blistered I had that were a few days old and that stinging, which it did a little. I just hadn't thought of the other areas of my body having the issues they did. It was still so cool and if I go back to Israel I want to go to the spa a ways down the road and try the Dead Sea mud that people cover themselves with on the beach and is supposed to be very good for you skin and your health in general.
After showering off we walked back to our hostel, collected our bags, refilled our waters and then waited in the shade until it was closer to time for our bus. Once we went to bus station we didn't have to wait to long for a bus to arrive, however it was packed full. Ryan and I were standing in the aisle way of this coach style bus. I thought maybe the driver let us on because he knew people would get off soon. But I stood in that aisle way for the entire hour and half back to Jerusalem. Some teenagers sitting on either side of us asked if we were married and we said no. Then they asked if we were siblings and Ryan said no, we were a couple. Then they didn't understand why we weren't married if we loved each other and thought it would be a great idea for Ryan to propose right there in the aisle of the bus and told him to get down. One boy looked at me and said it would be romantic and the other looked at me and said it would be sexy. Ryan told them he wouldn't do that while laughing off the idea and told them I'd say no. He's right I would. I don't really find that sexy or romantic. But it was funny to hear them probe.
In Jerusalem we walked back to the Old City from the bus station. Along the way we got lunch/dinner in "New Jerusalem" on Ben Yehuda street at Moshiko's where my teacher from high school had recommended. I don't even know if I need to specify what we had. I had falafel and Ryan had shwarma. :) It was good. What do you know?
We headed straight for the Damascus Gate where the bus station was that goes in and out of the West Bank. It took a little time to search out where exactly the bus was to get to Bethlehem, but we finally found it and didn't have to wait too long to leave. I really wanted to experience the West Bank while we were there and I really wanted to visit Bethlehem. Jerusalem and Bethlehem also have a peach agreement which makes it one of the safest areas of Palestine to go to.
The bus we took in dropped us in the town without us having to cross the border on foot. As soon as we got off the bus a taxi man was at our beck and call. Of course trying to over charge us but eventually we got a price I thought was something worth paying since we'd never make it to the church of the Nativity walking before it closed and it was all uphill and we were pooped. Along the way he tried to play tour guide and tried to get us to accept his services to drive us all over Bethlehem and beyond but we bid him adieu when we got out of the cab.
Have I mentioned this yet. I never go back and read what I write. It is far too long for me, but I often forget what I've already said. What struck me most about Bethlehem was how mountainous it is. Anytime I picture Mary and Joseph searching for the Inn I think of long straight flat roads. This is not what the landscape is at all. Upon returning home to Garmisch the first thing I read in my Bible was the title "Mountainous Israel" and throughout the last chapter I read in Ezekiel it clearly discussed the landscape of the Holy Land. This was a good wake up call to me that I should obviously pay more attention to what I read. I think often I search so hard for lessons to be learned that I miss out on things like that. And after knowing what it is really like, the thought of a woman in labor climbing hills, that I paid a taxi to drive me up, sort of changes the story for me. It makes thing come to life a bit more in my head and I think helps bridge the gap a bit between my head and my heart, from reading words and stories on a page to truly understanding what it was probably like.
You enter the church through a very low door and emerge into a small room like a foyer, I guess. Then you enter another door into the sanctuary of the church. On the floor was large wooden slats that I wasn't sure about. I think maybe it was the entrance to the Inn of the Manger or I could be all wrong, but it struck me that it was somehow significant. When you walk down stairs that go under the alter of the church there is a small room that has a hole in the floor that is supposedly where little baby Jesus was born, on that spot. How they know I do not know. But they all do seem to have some archeological evidence that has led them to their conclusions and it isn't totally out of thin air. So of course Ryan and I joined in the tradition of stooping down and touching the floor. For me the significance is less in the idea that I am touching the exact spot Jesus was born and more in the fact that I was in Bethlehem which has so much Biblical significance. It was more just being on the same ground Jesus walked on that it was all these specifics, yet that was cool to see too while we were there.
When we left the church it was getting quite late and any other site was closed. So we negotiated for a cab and he took us to the border crossing where we would enter back into Israel on foot. This was something else I had wanted to to after it was recommended to us by the Swedish woman we shared a cab with in Egypt on the very first day of our trip. As a reminder she had been working in Jerusalem for months and said this was a good experience to see what the Palestinian's go through on a daily basis.
As we walked along the narrow path between the wall and the fence I felt like a prisoner. And then I saw a heart breaking image. There was a lot of art and writing on the wall, but the image that stood out to me was the head of a woman who wore a head covering and next to the image was written "I am not a terrorist." THIS is what these people must go through on a daily basis. They have no choice but to come to find work on the other side of the wall while few Israelis ever cross over to their side. We spoke with two young guys from Israel probably about our age and that day was their first time ever going to Bethlehem or anywhere in the West Bank and they had each lived in Jerusalem their entire lives. I don't really care what people's opinions are politically speaking on the whole situation. I do not think that this is a human way for people to live... in fear and in a cage. I don't think it is too much to ask for for all of us to live in peace and harmony. I never think it is okay for one person to feel scared in their own home. And then as we went through the bag scanners and metal detectors and several guards not one of them opened our passports once they say we were Americans. I felt almost like I wanted to say, hey treat me like you treat everyone else who comes through here. I'm just like they are and they are just like me. We are all just human and there is equally as much chance I could be a terrorist as they could be. All this being said I am glad I made this part of my experience and I will never forget it.
We had to catch a bus back but kept having a taxi guy haggle us to take his cab. Then he came over to us at our bus stop and told us we missed the last bus, which I didn't think was true. This is when we met those Israeli guys who had just been to Bethlehem for the first time in their lives. Thankfully as the cab driver was still trying to take us for way more than we were willing to pay the bus arrived and by then there were five of us ready to get on and escape the cabbie.
Back in the Old City we went to our former hostel collected our things and took a city bus back to the Main Bus terminal. There we took a bus back to Tel Aviv for the night. This time we wanted to stay where Ari had before. They had places to sleep on the roof, which we really liked doing. The cool thing about this night was that it was Thursday. Thursday night is like what we are used to on Fridays since Friday and Saturday are Shabbat and make up the weekend days in Israel and much of the middle east that I'm aware of. So the streets were packed. There were people set up selling things all along the sidewalks and the noise level was intense. But despite it all happening on the streets all around our new home for the night after we showered and changed we were quickly caught up in dream land for our last night in Israel.
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