About two weeks ago Ryan was on his Spring Break and Tim had Block Leave. We piddled around and were indecisive about what we were going to do during that time. Once we finally did decide, most of the stuff that we wanted to do was already booked.
So we decided to take a few different day trips. I have a few friends back home who are great trip planners and/or have been here recently. I emailed them for some help and within a few days one friend, Kelly, sent me a FULL, DETAILED, 3 DAY trip! Complete with directions, links to attractions and what hotels to stay at!!! (Yes, my friends are awesome!!) She also gave some suggestions for a few day trips as well.
The only downfall was that it was a 3 day trip through Europe; including part of France and Italy. At this point, we still don't have our travelers passports. We heard multiple people tell us before we came that we needed them/didn't need them, and we've heard the same variation of answers since being here. We decided to play it safe though. We applied for our travelers passports that week and are still waiting for them to come in. We figured there is plenty to see in Germany anyways and if we move to Italy in a year, we will have more opportunities to see what is South of us later. Our big picture goal is to hit what's up North now, and what's South of us could always be saved for later. Generally speaking. Cause we didn't really go North during our trips. Anyway. I'm babbling.
We ended up taking some of what Kelly suggested, plus some of what we wanted to do/see and tried to work it out. Let me tell you it was stressful and overwhelming!!!! I was trying to make the most of our trips and maybe plan out 2 to 3 stops along one route. When looking at Google Maps though I would be planning it out and there would be 5 places in between Point A and Point B that I've heard great things about and I know we should go there...although I didn't always know for what. It was really hard deciding what to do and what to skip.
For our first trip we decided to drive over to Ramstein, an Air Force Base, about 3.5 hours away. Ramstein is one of the biggest Military Base's and Tim wanted to go see what they had. Our PX is super tiny, so I figured maybe I could find a few things I needed there. The plan was then to hopefully get into guest housing, stay the night, and head out the next morning to Heidelberg. You can only book guest housing 24 hours in advance..and by the time I got through on Monday morning they were all booked. So we found a Best Western, with breakfast included (yeah for a semi-American hotel!) about 30 minutes away and I booked it for the night!
Ramstein is definitely big! But let's skip past that and get to Heidelberg! Heidelberg was my choice. I was born in Heidelberg when my parents were stationed there. Through the years I have heard nothing but exceptional comments on Heidelberg. Ones along the lines of "Oh, that was my favorite place!" "Heidelberg is beautiful!" People raved about it in general. It wasn't necessarily on my list of places to visit "right away", but it was only an hour from Ramstein and on a route back home (but around here, just about anything could be on your route back home), so we decided to give it a go.
We had complications first thing Wednesday morning. It was raining. We (I particularly) were (extremely) bummed. We were once again indecisive. Should we go to Heidelberg, or go home? I hated to have come all that way and not have done anything. Our first trip out on our own was not going smoothly...and I definitely struggled with that. In our fickleness we drove back to Ramstein. We ended up hanging around long enough to get lunch and then decided to push through it and headed to Heidelberg. The rain was off and on during our drive. We located the Schloss (Castle) and even found parking!!! Yeah us in our Mini-Van!!! I'm pretty sure we completely over fed the parking meter. It was a bit chilly so we bundled everyone up (I think we had brought a whole bag just of coats not knowing what the weather was going to be) and headed down the stairs.
No sooner that we (Tim) carried the stroller down three or four, large, flights of stairs it started raining. Thankfully we were able to duck into a little crypt-like area that was partly blocked off for reconstruction to try and keep dry. Then it started raining harder. We waited it out about ten minutes or so and it started to soften, so we decided to venture out. I managed to sneak my camera out of my coat for a few quick shots.
This is a side view of the Schloss. Lots of construction going on.
Same side view and down into the city of Heidelberg. (Plus rain drops.) The bridge in the distance is the Carl Theodor Bridge, aka Old Bridge; which is also a huge monument in itself.
This was as far as we made it. It was still raining. We had winter coats on, but they weren't water proof. I didn't even bring the plastic rain cover for the stroller, so Blaine was getting wet too. We did manage to find a pathway that let back up the the parking lot, so we (Tim) didn't have to carry Blaine up all those stairs. As we were driving back down the hill it stopped raining. :)
Even in writing this, the idea of traveling in a foreign country is stressing me out! I want to go to the Old Bridge, and walk their downtown. I definitely want to go back to the castle. I'm pretty sure I've read you can walk from the Bridge to the Castle. It sounds so simple. I'm still bummed about this trip, and we have every intention of going back, but I still feel lost in the details of it all!
To leave you on the lighter side of things...in Germany you are free to pee wherever. There are multiple pull offs available alongside the autobahn for you to take advantage of this freedom. And the boys did. :) (If you look closely you can see Colin hasn't quite mastered the art of peeing outside without completely dropping his pants. hehe.)
I, in the meantime, held it.
(More to come on our other adventures!)
