Walking the walls, the city, the countryside

Our first full day in Rothenburg was indeed a "full day"!

We began this morning sharing our breakfast table with a lovely couple from California. They were heading from here to Prague also, so we had much to talk about. After breakfast we went to the train station and got our reservations to Prague on Friday and from Prague to Munich on Sunday afternoon. These reservations are required because we want to make sure we have seats on those busy trains in order to make our schedule for worship on Sunday.

Our first real sightseeing event of the day was a walk on the city walls. Rothenburg is a true walled city, and as the nightwatchman told us last night, "you can't get lost and wander out in the country accidentally because there are walls around the city." Most of the walls around the city are covered, and walking on the ramparts is an experience not to be missed in Rothenburg. The information we read said that the walk was about a mile and a half and could be completed in about an hour.

Whoever wrote the instructions we read for the ramparts walk either never owned a camera or had run out of memory cards the day he timed the walk, because it took us all morning to complete the walk. I know this because when the churchbells in the town (and there are many!) sounded the noon hour we were still gazing over the red-tiled rooftops of historic Rothenburg from the ramparts walk. When we finally completed the walk, we grabbed a baguette sandwich, a bag of potato chips and dashed into our hotel room for a snack before our afternoon activities.

We joined a walking tour after lunch, led by a young man who spoke very good English and had an abundance of knowledge about Rothenburg to share. About 2,000 people live within the old city walls today, and even though it is abundantly picturesque, he could not name but one movie that has done major filming in Rothenburg... "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang". We learned much history about the city, as we walked and he pointed out historical sites.

After the tour, we walked across the street to the Kathe Wolfhart store, the world-famous site to market Kathe's special Christmas ornaments and other items. Now, Olen is not the twinkly-lights type of person, so he only tolerated a brief walk-through. When we first walked in, a gentleman thrust an English brochure in my hand and said, "Velcome. Ve have a wery large shop. You look. Ve ship!"

Somehow I managed to get through the "wery large" store without having to use his offer to ship. However, outside the shop is a huge nutcracker, and since one of my granddaughters (Kara) loves nutcrackers, I had to have my photo made with the nutcracker. Our next stop was at the town hall, which has a 200-foot tower in the 13th century building. As it turns out, they will allow anyone with bitty sense and two Euros to climb the 214 steps to the top. The climb was not bad at first, but got progressively more difficult. The last level was conquered by using a ladder. If I had known before I got there I might have made a more sensible decision, but having gone that far, I finished the climb and the view was, indeed worth the two Euros...not sure it was worth the gray hairs it cost me. In the photo above, you can see how high we were. You can even see our green hotel with the red and white shutters on a side-street below. The tower is shown in the photo. Viewing platform is at the very top. You can not see the legs of the people at the top trembling from this distance, but, believe me, they ARE trembling.

After that, we decided to take what the book described as "A walk in the countryside". It was a paved path, and sounded lovely on a sunny afternoon. The detail the book did not have listed is that the first part of the walk (the part to get you to the countryside) was probably designed by billy goats. It went down so steeply that our toes pushed into the front of our shoes with major pressure. As you might figure, on the way back it was one of those walk-a-few-feet-stop-for-breath hikes! However, the countryside part was very nice, and we went by a 600-year-old house once owned by Rothenberg's Mayor Toppler. Possibly he had the house in the countryside to prove to the people of Rothenburg that it was safe outside the city walls...or maybe he just wanted a place to get away from his constituants, and Martha's Vineyard had not been discovered 600 years ago.

So, we were too tired to go out to eat tonight. We bought some freshly-squeezed apple juice from a booth at Market Square, some Swiss cheese and crackers at a small market, and gelato for dessert. I think we will top this feast off with a Tylenol PM. 'Sounds good to me.

Gutenberg and Rothenberg

We left Bacharach this morning headed toward Rothenburg (silent "h"...go figure!) Please note that this is Rothenburg aub der Tauber. (I found out the hard way that there are several "Rothenburgs" in Germany!)

However, on the way to Rothenburg we decided to get off the train at Mainz for a while. Mainz is the birthplace of Gutenberg, and now has a Gutenberg Museum. The musuem in shown in the photo, however, the section with the Gutenberg items is in an ultra-modern portion of the building directly behind this facade. Of the presumed 180 original Gutenberg Bibles, only 49 are known to have survived to this day. Three of these are available for viewing in the museum, and can be "easily" located behind double steel doors in a dimly-lit vault room. Once you enter the room, you can get as close as 6-8 inches from the valuable books, with alarmed glass between the viewer and the books. However, it was a thrill to see them.

A statue of Gutemberg in is the plaza near the museum, and today was a market day, which was very colorful. The open-air market had fresh fruit, vegetables, and food of all types. Locals went from booth to booth filling their baskets with delicacies to take home for dinner. Tourists went from booth to booth with their cameras and backpacks, drolling over the delicious items. We returned to the Mainz train station and stopped to have a bagle-sandwich for lunch. They also had chocolate muffins for sale. We had to buy one and share it in honor of the two young men we traveled with this past summer. ("It was a MUFFIN!")

Our next train took us to Frankfurt. We did not do any sightseeing in Frankfurt, just changed trains. However, by looking out the train windows we could tell that Frankfurt is an ultra-modern city with skyscrapers and a skyline similar to many cities in the United States. As we rode on toward Rothenburg we passed beautiful German farmland and quaint little towns. Once we arrived in Rothenburg we were not disappointed. Rothenburg is Germany's best-preserved medieval walled city. We left the train and headed toward Market Square in the center of the old town area. Once there we located our hotel, only two doors off of Market Square! Our room for the next three nights is in a beautiful 600-year-old home that was once occupied by Rothenburg's Mayor Toppler, who was town mayor during the heyday of Rothenburg in the 1400's. Our hotel is the green building with the barber-pole-looking red and white shutters. (What a combination!) Our room is on the second floor, the first window on the left, right above the door to the hotel. Mayor Toppler must have been a short man, because the door to our room is one that Olen can barely enter without ducking his head. Our room is delightful, with a window overlooking Market Square and the lovely buildings surrounding it. This is the view from our window. Perfect!

We had dinner outside at an open-air street-side cafe where our entertainment was people-watching and gazing at the lovely buildings. Olen reead the tourist guide while we waited for our dinner. We are really looking forward to our stay here! At 8 PM we went to Market Square to take a walking tour with the "Nightwatchman". This clever tour is led by a man dressed as a nightwatchman during medieval times...and he carried a lantern and habard like the nightwatchmen of the era. He related the history of Rothenberg while we followed along walking through the town. It was extremely educational, and extremely entertaining at the same time. He had a wonderful talent for telling historical tidbits with a splash of comedy...if you were listening closely. We loved it! (Thanks for the tip, Susan!)

We are looking forward to three nights in this wonderful town. There is much to see and do here.

We hope each of you can learn something today, with a splash of comedy thrown in! "A little bit of sugar helps the medicine go down..."

A day with Kathy. (Who is Kathy, you ask.)

We left Bacharach early this morning and took the train to Koblenz. Once in Koblenz we were discussing which train to take to Moselkern when a lady near us told us that we were in the right place to catch that particular train. We recognized her as a lady we had seen get on the train at the same time we did in Bacharach this morning. She was from Arizona, and her name was Kathy.

Since we were staying at the same town and had plans to go to the same place today, we began to talk with her. As it turned out, she was traveling alone and was a hard-core Rick Steves traveler. She had even dis-assembled her tourbook as we had! At Rick Steves suggestion, she had decided to go to see Burg Eltz castle today, just like we had. She told us that she had eaten too much German food lately, so she planned to hike up to the castle from the train station at Moselkern for the exercise. We had pre-decided to take some sort of transportation to the castle (taxi or shuttle bus of some type).

The train ride to Moselkern was delightful, following the Mosel River past castles, old churches, typical German villages and many vineyards. When the train stopped at Moselkern, the three of us were at the train door ready to exit. The train stops only momenatarily at small villages, so we knew we did not have much time to make our exit, and we were obviously the only ones getting off there. Kathy hit the "automatic open" button to open the doors so we could get out. Nothing happened. Quickly, Olen hit it, and then I did the same thing. At this point the train started moving on, with us still on it. (This is something unplanned...so it is an "adventure", remember?)

The three of us looked at each other and decided to ride to the next little town, get off, and catch the next train back to Moselkern and hope the exit doors work on our second pass-through. This wasn't much of a decision. We didn't have any other choices other than possibly jumping off a train moving at 60+ mph. It was not long until the train arrived in a town no one ever heard of called Muden. Muden has no train station, no places of business, and only a few houses, and the people who lived in them were still in bed, except for one lady who was watering her geraniums. There was, however, a sign, so we had our picture taken by it.

It really wasn't long until another train came by, we hopped on it and went back to Moselkern, finally arriving at our destination for stop #1 today. Kathy began to walk toward the castle while we looked around for a means of transportation. There was none. Since we had come this far (including the side trip to Muden) we were not going to miss seeing Burg Eltz, so the three of us started the hike together.

Mind you, this is a 90-minute-up-a-mountain hike we had not planned on taking today. We had to do some convincing with our leg muscles and feet, but we did it.

Now, Burg Eltz is a wonderful castle. It has never been desstroyed in a war. The Eltz family still lives there in one part of the castle, and they have tours available in English. This castle is authentic with original furnishings in all 80 rooms. Burg Eltz dates from 1157 and by 1430 the castle looked like it looks today...well almost. This is the year that they have chosen to shore up the castle to make sure it remains available for future generations to enjoy. Therefore, there is scaffolding obscuring the beautiful view of the castle. But...that is the way it looked the day we were there, so that is what is in the photo. Regardless of the photography problem, we enjoyed the tour and were glad we had gone to have seen it. Kathy, Olen and I found out that we could call for a taxi at the gift shop and ride down. We elected to share the price of the taxi and save our muscles a 90-minute hike back to Moselkern...a very wise decision.

We all boarded another train in Moselkern and went to Koblenz, where we bid good-bye to our new friend, Kathy. It was a nice experience. She was a great travel partner, and we enjoyed visiting with her as we hiked together.

Once in Koblenz Olen and I decided to take the train back to Bacharach and perhaps climb to the castle if we could convince our leg muscles to cooperate. The hike to the top of the mountain where the castle is located was not too bad, and we got some excellent photos in the late-afternoon sunlight. We had our photo taken from the castle with the Rhine River below us. This castle is the one that is now used as a local pension, and the castle courtyard was full of activity. Lots of children were enjoying a night of sleeping in a real castle. Their parents were just seated at one of the outdoor tables drinking a cool beverage and enjoying the view.

Once we got down the mountain we decided that we needed some "comfort food" since we had used up so many calories today that we were no longer concerned about counting calories. We figured that climbing two mountains today qualified us for something...like pizza. We went in a small establishment with the colorful title, "Bacharacher Pizza and Kebap Haus". It sounded interesting. While our pizza was cooking, we tried to talk to the owner. He spoke very little English, but was able to tell us that he was originally from Turkey. (We had already figured out that he was not local!) So, here we were in a small town in Germany eating Italian pizza prepared by a Turkish man. How is that for international flavor? (Inexplicably, the pizza was very good.)

We strolled down the little street and stopped at the gelato shop for a cone of ice cream for dessert, sort of like a "progressive dinner". (Does my husband know how to show a girl a good time, or what?!) Then, after our multi-cultural evening we walked back to our room at the zimmer and are powering down for the night. Tomorrow we have to leave this lovely place, but we have faith that more wonderful experiences lie ahead of us.

We wish for each of you wonderful experiences in the day ahead, also.

How did you get to worship today? Well, we took a train, walked a kilometer, took a ferry across the Rhine, took yet another train, and finally arrived in Wiesbaden, where one of the members of the church picked us up in his Honda van!

Even though it was time-consuming and confusing to get to a place where Christians meet, it was a very rewarding experience. We had previously been in contact through e-mail with two couples who worship at the congregation, so it was nice to finally get to meet them in person. The worship service was in both German and English, and they had learned to manage a two-language service with ease. The lesson of the morning was on "Relying Fully on God". We had both a German and an English songbook, and sometimes we sang in one language, and sometimes another. If a particular song happened to be in both books, everyone sang in his own language. It was a little like a jumble of sounds, but I know God hears in all languages, and He must have been pleased. There was a lady who had studied the Bible through the internet, and had come to be baptized, so we were thrilled to be present for that.

Our new friend, Louis, took us back to the train station after the service, and we rode to Bingen where we waited for a boat to take an afternoon cruise on the Rhine River. While we were sitting on the banks of the Rhine River in Bingen, I took out my laptop and my air card and had wonderful internet service, so I posted yesterday's blog from there. I have discovered that my air card won't work from Bacharach...not enough cell-phone bars to make it work. (I told you this was a quaint little town!)

Our cruise on the Rhine was so very nice...and the cost of it was covered with our EuRail pass, which made it even better. There are so many castles along the Rhine that it is unbelievable. We many photos, but I will share just a few. We sailed past the town where we are staying, Bacharach, but we decided to stay on the boat for a few more stops. We got off at St. Goar where we walked around the little village while waiting on a local train to take us back to Bacharach. For several minutes we sat on a bench beside the Rhine and watched boats passing and viewed the castle across the river. We took late afternoon photos of the zimmer where we are staying. The photo is posted below.

Back at Bacharach we decided to have dinner at Altes Haus, the oldest building in town (fourteenth century). We had a wonderful meal and were seated beside a window with a great view of the street of Bacharach, and some top-notch people-watching.

Tonight we have internet service at the zimmer, so we should get caught up on our posts. It is our hope that each of you have had as wonderful a day of worship as we have enjoyed. Tonight we wish that our seven "little princesses" at home could have enjoyed seeing all of the castles we saw today. Hopefully, someday...

Castles,castles and more castles!

I knew I would forget to mention something in yesterday's blog, since I was in a state of serious jet-lag, and today I thought of it. So, I will add it here. Yesterday while we were at the Munster in Basel there was a wedding party celebrating in the back area of the building overlooking the Rhine. We picked up enough of the activities to know that they were soon to release two white doves as a symbol of the couple going off on their own to make a new life. They did, indeed, release the doves, but someone had not told the doves what they symbolized, because when they were released they both flew to freedom...in completely opposite directions. Not too good on the symbolism!

But, that was yesterday.

It rained during the night last night, making soft pattering sounds on the cobblestone streets of Staufen. This morning the air was clear and much cooler (58-degrees). We had to get up early to catch a local train in order to make our schedule for the day, which meant we had to miss our breakfast at the inn where we were staying. We were the only ones up in the sleepy little village, which we have decided is truly a "little-known gem" of Germany. In the early morning light the castle on the hill was still beautiful, the stream still made its pleaseant, gurgly sound, and an occasional heron flew over silently.

The one person who was up this early on a Saturday morning was the town baker, who was located strategically beside the train tracks. We decided to buy a pastry there for breakfast, and chose some sort of an apple "thingy" (She spoke no English, we spoke no German, so we are not exactly sure what it was...but it was delicious.) Note for Jacob and Bailey: She did not have any chocolate "muffins" this morning.

I have decided that I will never conquer the German language. Apparently they have no rule for "I before E", and the suffix "burg" seems to be spelled with a "u" or an"e" or even "eu" on occasions.

Our train sped through Karlshrue this morning. Karlshrue is a town my friend, Sandra has called "home" in the past. I tried to take some photos for her, but since the train stopped there for only two minutes I had to snap what I could from the train. I ended up with a sign, obstructed by many fuzzy people in the foreground, and a very unusual water tower. Sorry, Sandra. I did the best I could.

Although it was not originally on our list, we added a stop in Heidelberg, thanks to the recommendations of two of my friends, Susan and Sharon. Thank you both! We spent most of the day there and it was extremely enjoyable. We did not have bright-sunshiny-Kodak weather, so the photos are not as good as they would have been on a better day, but the dampness and occasional spitting rain didn't stop us...although it does help explain my slightly droopy hairstyle today. Heidelberg was the headquarters for US military forces in Europe during WWII, so many Americans have spent time there. There may be some of the scenes some of you recognize.

We took a bus from the train station to Alstatt (old town) where we saw all of the typical tourist sites. We walked across the old stone bridge, which was erected 1786-1788 over the Neckar River. One side of the bridge has a medieval bridge gate and the famous (?) "bridge monkey". The monkey-statue holds a mirror to remind those leaving the city that they are no better than those outside the city gate. A bridge monkey has been there since the 15th century, but this one dates to only 1979. Local lore says that if you touch the mirror you will have wealth; touch his fingers and you will return to Heidelberg. I managed to touch both!

From the bridge we saw some people viewing the town from one of the towers of the Church of the Holy Ghost, so we wandered in and climbed 202 steps up the tower for a bird's eye view of Heidelberg before pressing on to the castle area. The castle was originally built in 1398 and several rulers added to it. Wars and lightening have taken their toll on the structure, but it is now under repair and is used for banquets and theater performances. We decided before leaving home that we had neither the time nor the money to tour every castle in Germany, so we are being very selective, starting today. We climbed the 314 stone steps up to the castle and walked around the grounds and took photos, but we did not take the tour...not this time. (You always have to leave some things to come back and do!)

Another train ride (with several changes) and we were in Bacharach. It is a small village, but is serviced by the trains. However, the lady at the counther in Heidelberg had to look it up, because she had never heard of it! I assurred her that trains went there, and she eventually found it. This small town is delightful with cobblestone streets, half-timbered houses, and the Stahleck Castle looks down from a mountain above town. The castle here is still in use...as a hostel for tourists and backpackers. We considered staying there ourselves, but when we considered the length of the hike up and down, we decided to stay at a local zimmer that straddles the ancient city wall (1300's). There is a "babbling brook" (their description, and totally true) that flows right beside our window. We should sleep well tonight for lots of reasons.

When we got to Bacharach, they were having a "Culinary Summer Night" festival. (Of course that is not the exact name, just the English translation.) It was being held on the grassy area right beside the Rhine River, so we went to see what was going on. It was really nice. Most of the local restaurants had tents set up and were serving their specialties for a price. We couldn't read German, but managed to get several items of interest. One was a fried potato on a stick (Difficult to describe. Must see photo.) Anyway, we enjoyed ourselves, then walked back to the main street and got ice cream cones for dessert before retiring to our room to listen to the "babbling brook" and rest our tired feet.

So, from the castle in Staufen this morning to the castle in Heidelberg during the mid-day, to the castle looking over our bed and breakfast for tonight...it has been a "princess" day. We hope your day made you feel like a princess (or prince) also.

Canals, Castles and Chocolate

We are definitely going to call it a night early tonight. We have had a busy two days.

We got to Atlanta much earlier than we had planned. We were at the Huntsville airport early, and we noticed a plane loading passengers for Atlanta. Olen went and asked if we could just take that flight over and spend our extra time in Atlanta rather than Huntsville. The attendant asked if our luggage had already been checked on the other plane. When Olen told him we had no luggage, he immediately printed out two boarding passes, and we headed for Atlanta, thus taking no chances on our flight being delayed for mechanical problems or weather. I guess the ability to switch from one flight to another is yet another reason to carry it all with you!

We got to Atlanta with enough time for Olen to lie on the floor and take a nap before we left for Zurich! We were watching the sun come up somewhere over France or Germany this morning at about 11 PM Alabama time. I told you it was a short night! The flight to Zurich was just under nine hours, and after a semi-restless night we landed in Switzerland in hazy early-morning sunshine. We passed through passport control and had our rail ticket validated and were on the train headed toward Basel before 8:45.

We made a brief stop in Basel, Switzerland mainly to see the Munster (cathedral) where two historical figures were buried. We were a little jet-lagged at the time, and were having a problem deciding which tram to take to get to the Munster when a local lady came to our aid. She gave us exact directions (in fairly good English), and even paid for one of our tickets because we did not have the correct change. Aren't people wonderful? The Rhine River in Basel, Switzerland

At the Munster we visited the grave of Desiderius Erastmus who influenced Martin Luther's work. Olen also wanted to see the grave of Jacob Bernoulli, who was a mathematician and scientist. I am not the scientist of the family, but I do know that Bernoulli discovered a principle that has something to do with air flow over the wings of airplanes, thus enabeling them to fly. Since I like to travel, this has some meaning to me, but that is about as detailed as I can get on scientific principles.

We rode back to the train station by rickshaw! A young man with a bicycle pulling a double seat was earning his money by doing this, and we thought it was an interesting experience, and about the same price as a tram ticket.

We boarded a train and headed north into Germany. Germany is about half the size of Texas and is bordered by nine countries. Our first stop was in Freiburg, which is a pedestrain town, with more hikers and bikers than cars. It is also known for its miniature canals which have been running since the 13th century. They were originally used to keep fires from spreading, and later to provide water for the people and animals. Now, they are just fun. It was a very warm day today, and small children were enjoying the cool water. One cute little girl had the perfect combination...cool water on the feet and an ice cream cone in the hand!

Our final stop for the day was another train ride to the small town of Staufen where we are staying tonight. Staufen is not on the way to anywhere! We took a small train through cornfields, asparagus fields and beautiful vineyards to Staufen (population 7,500). When we arrived at the tiny railroad station in town, we went in one door and asked the man who greeted us if we could get a schedule for leaving Staufen in the morning and heading toward Heidelberg.

"Wrong door. Go next door", he said.

We walked probably eight or ten feet and opened the door. There was the same man, but this time he was behind a counter, and this time he was glad to help us with our schedule!

We managed to get the schedule and get outside the building before laughing!

Like Freiburg, Staufen has the small canals in the pedestrain-only part of town. Olen sneaked some water shoes in his backpack before we left home, and enjoyed a few refreshing minutes wading in the water. Staufen has a wonderful old castle on a hill overlooking the town, and the entire area is surrounded by beautiful vineyards. Tonight we are staying in a small guesthouse right in the middle of the historic area of town. Staufen is a charming little town, and there are not many tourists here, so we feel like part of the town itself.

So here we are in the most picture-perfect little German town, completeAnd with bubbly canals and church bells. There is even a chocolate the innkeeper left beside my bed. Life is good. After a good night's sleep we will be ready to see what lies ahead of us tomorrow.

“Cheap seats”, B & Bs, picnics, and no souvenirs

Dear friends, you have so many questions… I’ll see if I can answer a few before we leave. (If you don’t have any questions about our trip, just skip this post.)

No. We don’t rob banks to make trips like this. First, we use all of the money we could have spent on beer, alcohol and cigarettes in 68 years, and start with that sum.

Let that thought sink in for a few minutes…

Then, we look for bargains on airline tickets and travel in the “cheap seats”.(Remember that the “cheap seats” arrive at the same place and at the same time as the expensive ones!) We feel like we get the most “bang for our buck” in Europe by purchasing EuRail tickets in the US before our trip. We do not stay in 5-star hotels. All of the places we have stayed have been clean, even though on many occasions we have to walk down the hall to share the bathroom with other guests. Meals are inexpensive for us. Most of our overnight stops have a light breakfast included in the price of the room. We also carry snacks with us…granola bars, beef jerky, peanut butter crackers and dried fruit, among other items. As we snack, our backpacks get lighter (and our bodies get heavier, I guess). We shop at grocery stores (which is great entertainment in a foreign country) and buy fresh fruit, cheese, and other items. We picnic a lot, which saves both time and money. We study the areas to visit before we leave home, and we read guidebooks as we visit a town, so we rarely pay additional fees for guided tours (which tend to include too many cathedrals for our taste). Usually the host at our bed and breakfast will tell us about the “don’t miss” places in the area. We are past the age of wanting to bring back trinkets to gather dust, and since weight in our backpacks is an issue, we don’t spend money on souvenirs. Our photos and our wonderful memories are our souvenirs.

Trains?? Really?? If you have never travelled on the train system in Europe, I am sure you have some misconceptions like I did. There is no chugga-chugga, choo-choo and no clickety-clack, clickety-clack that we think of as typical of trains because European trains run on electricity. EuRail trains are quiet, smooth, immaculately maintained, and dependably punctual. The train stations are clean with unmistakable directions to the various trains. Many larger cities have railway stations inside the airports. (How handy is that?!?) I often wish we had a system like this in the U.S. Perhaps it might eliminate some of the zoo-like atmosphere at the Atlanta airport…or not.

Yes, you can take three weeks worth of clothing in a 15-pound backpack, which is the weight I find comfortable to carry. Olen’s backpack is a bit heavier (20 pounds). With my 15-pound limit I still take my small laptop computer, which allows even less weight for clothing. We choose a very few items of quick-drying clothing and every three or four nights we hand wash some essentials. Shoes are heavy to carry in a backpack, so we choose one really comfortable pair and wear them the entire time. Hairdryers and curling irons are heavy, too, so they stay at home. Makeup items would add weight, and the women in Europe wear very little makeup, so makeup items stay at home, also. Soap and water and sunscreen…and go!

"Must-have items": Collapsible trekking poles, laptop computer, train schedule and snacks.

What about Sundays? That is the first thing we think about when we plan a trip like this. We decide where we will be, or where we need to be, on the Lord’s Day each week. We have been able to locate a group of Christians who meet close to our location, or perhaps a congregation may be an early-morning train ride from our location. The services are not always in English, but we usually find someone who can help us with the language problem, and it is amazing how much you can pick up from the service. It is such a great thrill to meet servants of the Lord around the world. On this trip we have already had lengthy e-mail correspondence with several of the people we plan to meet on the Sundays we will be gone. It will be great to put a face to the people we have contacted.

Sickness? We don’t plan to get sick or hurt while we are gone, but that is always a consideration. At our age and stage in life, we buy the trip insurance and then we don’t worry about trip cancellation or interruption. It is a cheap price to pay for peace of mind.

What about problems like bad weather…missing a train…delayed plane schedule…etc.? We don’t have any “problems”. We have adventures! Things that go unplanned on a trip often open doors to even better experiences…or things to laugh about later (when it is all behind us!). Note: You may need to remind me of this statement later in the trip.

Did I cover all of your questions? Then, here we go! It is almost time to leave for our great adventure. Thanks for following along.

We can't make a trip this year...or can we?

Some people do strange things on a routine basis. I check the prices of airline schedules on Tuesdays. I have noticed that the airlines usually post their lowest fares on Tuesdays. One Tuesday morning in May, I was explaining to Olen why we could not consider another long trip this year since the airline fares had gone up so much since last year. To prove my point, I went to the Delta site on the internet and typed in “Huntsville to Zurich”. To my utter shock, the price had gone down almost 50% per ticket for a late-August departure!

To make a long story short, we purchased two tickets before Delta could realize what numbers they had posted as prices. The next step was purchasing Eurail tickets, which we did online also. A 21-day Global Pass was on sale until the first week in June, so within days we had the airline tickets and train tickets for a three-week trip to Europe. Our train tickets will allow us to ride as much as we want to and visit as many countries as Eurail covers over a 21-day period, so the next question was where to go!

We had talked about going to Germany, and really wanted to visit Mike Morrow in Prague in the Czech Republic, so from Zurich we plan to take the train to both areas, with rough plans to end up with a day or two in Austria and several days in Switzerland. (We will never be able to get enough Alp-time!)

We plan to backpack again, carrying all our possessions with us, but we will sleep in real beds in bed and breakfast establishments, small hotels, and private homes that rent rooms. No camping! We spent over a year making preparations for our trip last year, but there was no time for that type of detailed planning this year, so “flexibility” is going to be the key word for this trip. With the unlimited rail passes we have choices, so our plans may change from time to time.
We are getting ready! We have taken our guidebooks apart and have selected the information on the areas where we plan to visit. They are in small, lightweight sections so we can carry only the information we need for each day.

So, again you have the scenario: Two senior citizens with backpacks on backs and train tickets in hand spending three weeks wandering around portions of Europe. We plan to blog each night (if possible) and share photos of our day. We would love to have you join us through the blog, and would be honored if you choose to do so. Departure day is Thursday, August 25. It is time to get packed!