We left Domburg today to head back to Hattingen. The rain had moved in overnight, which called things down significantly, but it was also raining just hard enough that having our window open as much as we did left a damp patch on the carpet of our room. Oh well!

After finishing breakfast, we packed our things and walked around the corner to meet Alina and Alicia at the car. We were making a short trek to a nearby town called Veere before heading back to Germany. Veere is a small harbor town; it was quite cozy :)

In Veere, we walked around the shops, of which there were a handful of specialty stores, including a shop with homemade sweets, as well as one that sold products made from sheep’s wool. Many of the stores had beautiful wares, but they were either quite pricy or far too fragile to consider. I did find a couple photo coasters that had some nice photos and said ‘Holland’ on them. The teenage boy checking us out also seemed like he was learning the job as the older woman next to him walked him through the transaction (he did a good job!). 

Before getting all the way back to the car, we stopped in a cafe called Sister Anna, named after a nun from a few hundred years ago. We all had something to drink; it was my first flavored coffee in Europe (‘twas hazelnut and it was grand!), and we got some food. Brandon had a pulled chicken BBQ sandwich with coleslaw, I got tomato soup that had far more veggies in it than I expected, but was also very delicious, and Alina and Alicia shared a slice of apple cake. The bathrooms at the cafe were downstairs in an area that reminded me of an old wine cellar or cave (I know those are VERY different things, but that’s what I got lol).

The trip back involved lots of napping. It tends to happen when I’m a passenger in the car… We arrived back in Hattingen in the late afternoon and then spent the rest of the day chilling. Brandon and I played some cards (he beat me handily at rummy), ate a small dinner, and then we watched Holes. Boy, did I forget how much I enjoyed that movie!

Not sure what tomorrow may bring, but I’m sure it will be something! Until then, friends!

Not much sleep was had last night as it was still in the upper 80s by the time we *tried* to go to sleep. Brandon eventually nodded off, but I tossed and turned and sweated my butt off until the alarm went off.

Our breakfast at this B&B was a bag of goodies that we weren’t expecting. (Keep in mind, the last several times we’ve had a bag breakfast, it has been a granola bar, some yogurt cups, and a little bottle of water, give or take an item or two.) Our bag of deliciousness contained multiple bread rolls, some yogurt, fruit, meat and cheese, mini muffins, and fresh orange juice. It was all so good!!

After we finished eating, we went for a walk to a local youth hostel that Brandon stayed at back in 2010 when he went on a school trip with the daughter of some of the neighbors. The hostel is in an old castle called Westhove. It was smaller than I expected given the photos Brandon had shown me, but the property was beautiful! It took about half an hour to walk there, which went by super quick because we were chatting the whole time. About 5 or 10 minutes from the castle, we heard someone yell to us and it turned out to be Alina and Alicia riding by us on bikes! They went for a nice ride around Domburg while we did our walk to and from Westhove.

The weather for the day was much cooler than yesterday, but it was still quite humid as there was rain on and off in the forecast. We had a couple bouts of drizzling while on our walk, as well as during our time shopping around. There was a store on the Main Street I had seen something in yesterday, but it had closed by the time we passed it. Today, I checked it out, but I didn’t end up buying anything. I did pick up a couple postcards, and in a different store, I found a little lunchbox similar to a container that was in our breakfast bag that I really liked. I figured out when we got back to the hotel that the box itself doesn’t come with the bento box style inserts, but I will order those :)

We met Alina and Alicia for midday coffee and snacks before getting ready to go chill on the beach again. Because it was cooler, we didn’t really go in the water, but we played catch for a while. I also got in a nice set of beach naps to make up for my lack of sleep from the night before. When we got ready to go, we made a plan to meet back at one of the beachside restaurants for dinner around 7.

Dinner was delightful! We ate at a place that had a variety of things to choose from, including Flammkuchen! After dinner, we went for a little stroll around town again before getting some ice cream and then going our separate ways for the night.

Brandon and I caught up on the newest episode of Better Call Saul (he had watched it already, I had not). We had a little bit of trouble getting our device(s) hooked up to the TV so that we could watch easily, but we eventually got my iPad up and running. After that, it was quite late, so we went to sleep.

Another double post day (it’s becoming a trend!), so stay tuned!!

As I have been made aware, it is HOT many places, including where we found ourselves today.

We got up and had some toast before packing a couple days worth of clothes for each of us into Brandon’s suitcase (mostly because his rolls more easily). We were heading out of town with Alina and Alicia to go to Domburg, a beach town in the Netherlands.

In 2010, Brandon got to stay in a youth hostel in Domburg when he visited. He had gotten the chance to go on a class trip with the daughter of some of Alina and Peter’s neighbors at the time. The class had come to the beach, but he chose not to go in the water then. Today, we all swam in the North Sea a few times. Alina had warned me it was going to be chilly, but I had underestimated it given how hot it was. It felt nice, though, and I even got in my classic beach nap!

Prior to getting to the beach, we all tried to check in to our respective lodgings early. Alina and Alicia are staying at a B&B around the corner from the one Brandon and I are at, but both are overseen by another hotel nearby where all the check-ins happen. The neat thing about both places is all the keys for the entryways and rooms are digital! It’s equal parts handy and mildly concerning because if your phone isn’t working, you aren’t getting in anywhere lol.

We spent a few hours on the beach, grabbing some food at one of the lounges on the sand. Around 5:30, the tide was starting to come in and creep up on us, so we packed up and headed to our hotels to clean up. Around 7, we met Alina and Alicia at an Italian restaurant nearby and had some very good food! We kept seeing people with ice cream, and we did get some eventually, but we took a walk first.

On our walk, we went back by the beach to take some pictures. Even later into the evening, it was very warm and we were sweating! As I write this blog, I am sweating! It is atrocious! The ice cream helped cool us down slightly, but we were all pretty tired by the time we finished eating, so we went our separate ways with a tentative plan to meet after breakfast tomorrow morning. There is rain in the forecast for tonight and tomorrow, plus a significant cooldown, but I’ll believe it when I feel it!

It’s hard to believe we are into the 40s with the number of days we’ve been trekking! It’s been a wonderful time, but I continue to look forward to each new day :) Enjoy the photos!

We let ourselves chill for a while this morning since we are back in Hattingen. There was nothing immediate or urgent on the agenda, so we relaxed until about 9:30. By that time, we were both pretty awake and getting a little hungry.

Peter came down to say hello shortly after we had both gotten cleaned up, having heard us puttering about. Unfortunately, he was back to work again today despite he, Alina, and Alicia only arriving home from their Greek vacation late last night. He swapped some laundry around while we caught up a bit, and then Brandon and I got ready to head into Hattingen Mitte.

Alina had come back from the store by the time we actually got upstairs to leave. She told us she and Alicia would also be going into town to run a few errands, so we kept in the back of our heads to catch up with them if we could.

In town, we grabbed some food, Brandon picked up some new sneakers (the treads on his are DONE), and I got a couple things I needed at dm. Around lunchtime, we messaged Alina to see if she and/or Alicia wanted to grab food with us. Alicia thought about it but then changed her mind. So, Brandon and I ate some lovely Italian food and went back to the house.

We relaxed for a bit, I reorganized my suitcase, and then Alina came down to see if we would be ready to go to the local pool soon. We got changed and headed to the Freibad. It was a really nice little complex with a couple of pools, two of which were for little kiddos and infants. The big pool had a set of diving boards, one of them I meant to go on and then never did. We spent a couple hours there before Alicia found a friend whose dad offered to let her keep hanging out so Alina, Brandon, and I could head home.

At the house, Brandon and I played a couple rounds of rummy before helping Alina with dinner prep. On the menu was homemade pita, carrot chili, and rice. It was SO GOOD! WE hung out on the deck for a few more hours after that chit chatting. We are in “strictly German” mode, for the most part, now. Words, in German and in English, have been hard today. I’m not sure why, but hopefully they show themselves soon!

Again, not so many photos today, but enjoy them nevertheless!

As promised, a second post for the day!

We had a lovely breakfast at our hotel in Cölbe this morning before making our way to the train station. We caught a regional train to Willingen, which was a delightful multi-hour ride. From Willingen, we caught a different regional train to Dortmund Hauptbahnhof. By this point, I wasn’t super hungry, but it was lunchtime. Brandon hadn’t eaten as much at breakfast as I had, so he had a little more of an appetite. We grabbed a small snack and drink at Dortmund, then hopped our final regional train to Bochum.

In Bochum, we got lunch at KFC since it was at the station (I didn’t feel like dragging our luggage somewhere else…plus it’s Sunday so the options for open places was limited). IT was okay. The ordering process was frustrating because we tried using the screens and it wouldn’t let us pay at the end, but it also wouldn’t print a ticket so we could pay at the counter. At the counter, the meal options were not the same as on the screen, either. It was confusing and a little aggravating, but it was food.

In Bochum, we got the Straßenbahn back to Hattingen. Thankfully, the Rolladen weren’t down in the back, so we cam in through the downstairs area we are sleeping in rather than bringing all our things down the stairs by coming in the front door. We threw our dirty laundry in the washing machine and sat on the couch to play some cards. Brandon beat me at rummy, which made me sad :/

Around dinner time, we headed to Essen. We weren’t eating dinner, but we were going to go see Thor: Love and Thunder. There was an English screening, and I enjoy the Marvel movies, so Brandon got us tickets! The movie was good, a bit goofy, but good. Afterwards, we hopped another series of familiar trains back to Hattingen and then got ready for bed. It was a long, but lovely day :)

I have next to no pictures for today, but enjoy these two, which show a tactile model I found in Bochum Hauptbahnhof of the station layout, as well as the sky outside the theater. It was still pretty light, even at 9:30 pm!

The day began, as always, with breakfast before we got all our things collected and headed to the train station in Heidelberg. Breakfast was a little more chaotic than usual, however, because we had a very persistent little bee that would not leave us alone! And we were inside! We had three of the hotel staff trying desperately to coax the little guy outside, which included taking my plate of food because the bee had landed on it several times, so we figured he had a thing for bread with cold cuts lol. We moved tables, I got new food, and we ate quickly in case another bee came around.

At the station, we first caught a Flixtrain, a first for us on this trip. Brandon had to print out luggage tags for us and reserve seats, and there seemed to be a bunch of regulations about bag sizes and quantities limits, so I was nervous we’d have too much stuff (or, I would). I, naturally, worried for nothing because the train wasn’t all that full and no one even checked out our stuff. From the Flixtrain, we caught a regional rail to our “final” destination of Cölbe, which is a small town outside our planned exploration destination of Marburg.

We checked into our hotel, walked back to the train station and headed to Marburg. Marburg is known as a Blindenstadt, which is a city specially designed to be as accessible as possible for individuals with visual impairments. Some of the things that make this a qualification include the presence of audible pedestrian signals, tactile markers on the sidewalks, tactile models of buildings, and other things. Being a teacher of the visually impaired, I was excited to check it out!

The first thing we found out about Marburg, once we started heading to the Altstadt, is that it is HILLY. Brandon had done some additional research for me and found that part of Marburg’s original design was to do this so that blind folks, at least nowadays, know they are headed to the old city. The grade of the hills was killer! We found a tourist information center that had a pamphlet containing a map of some specific spots to check out to really showcase the Blindenstadt, so we went to a few. Mostly, we went and located the tactile models of some of the areas of the city. This included the Altstadt marketplace, Elizabethskirche, a synagogue, and (the one we didn’t get to) the castle. We also wandered into the university library, which was not on the list of “attractions,” but had SO MANY tactile markers on the floor for cane users that I nerded out pretty hard :)

Fun fact: A third of the visually impaired university students in Germany attend the university in Marburg! I would have loved to check out the rest of the university, but we were getting tired and it was a Saturday, so we weren’t sure how much would be open. So, we headed back to the train station to make our way back to Cölbe. We grabbed some food at the station and ate it back in our hotel room.

It’s back to Hattingen from Cölbe, where we enjoyed a delicious breakfast this morning (it’ll be another double post day)! Tomorrow is a relaxation day and then it’s a couple day beach vacation with Alina and Alicia coming up after that!

​Enjoy the pictures!

I was a little nervous going into today. I got to meet someone in person I have only had written correspondence with so far…

We had breakfast at the hotel before catching a series of trains and buses, Destination: Altrip. Altrip is a small village outside of Mannheim, and it is a sister city with Kutztown, Pennsylvania, where Brandon and I once went to college and now live near.

A few years ago, the mayors of Kutztown and Altrip created a sister city program with one another. Part of this program involved collaboration from the libraries in each town to create a pen pal program for interested parties to be able to connect and write to each other to learn about each location. When the program began, we were still living in Pittsburgh, but Kutztown’s library left the pen pal participation up to anyone who used to be there or loved it a whole lot :) Knowing we’d be back in the area eventually, and looking for an opportunity to practice my German, I signed up. It took a little while, but I was eventually paired up with a woman named Rita.

For the better part of at least the last two years, Rita and I have been writing letters, then emails, back and forth, in German. I got to know about some of her hobbies, her family, and her upcoming trip to Crete, to name a few. I had told her we were planning on visiting Germany and hoped to get to Altrip, and she, like I, was hopeful we could connect in person. Yesterday, on the train, I finally got to answering her most recent email to me (which had been in my inbox 10 days already. I felt terrible!) and after a frantic series of back and forth correspondences, we got to meet today!

As I said at the beginning, I was nervous. She was so nice in our letters and emails, and I had no doubt she would be in person, but I always get anxious about how someone will take me, in person, when they first meet me. I think it’s a little bit of a lack of self-confidence thing, but I digress…I was also slightly concerned about how well I would do with my German. She had told me before in her letters that her English is not very good, so even if that meant she was better at it than she gave herself credit for, I was determined to stick to German so she was comfortable. 

The ride to Altrip was almost uneventful except for the final leg, which involved a “minibus” (as it was listed by Deutsche Bahn) showing up late. Rita and I had exchanged numbers the day before via email, and I was a message from asking her to come get us when a taxi marked with “Altrip” finally pulled up to the stop. We found put as the ride progressed that the reason it was running behind is because the driver was waiting for the ferry (yes, ferry) to take off. So, we got to experience being in a car on a ferry boat, which was very cool!

Rita was at the bus stop when we arrived and she was even kinder than I imagined! We got to spend a lot of time at her home today. She made a breakfast spread for us and we ate with her and her daughter, Milena, who is a few years younger than Brandon and I. Her husband, Manuel, joined us eventually and then it was like sitting at the table with family :) We talked and laughed and enjoyed a LOT of watermelon. They also gave us a bag with two coffee mugs from the chemical plant Manuel works at, as well as 6 different chocolate bars!

We went for a walk through Altrip, including past the Rathaus where the partner cities signs are. We went on a trail along the Rhein. We also got to meet the mayor of Altrip, who just so happens to be Rita’s great-nephew. He was lovely, and he very graciously gave me a gift, which is a hardback book about the history of Altrip! The town has existed for 1650 years, which I thought was amazing! After the mayor left, Rita and Manuel treated us to dinner at a local Greek restaurant. The food was soooo good! Then, they graciously dropped us off at the main train station in Mannheim so we could get back to Heidelberg.

Despite my concerns, I managed fairly well with my German today. Past tenses still get me all mixed up, but Brandon reminded me that I’m a work in progress and reassured me that I was clearly understood because I was getting responses to things I said. I’m just so glad that I was able to finally meet Rita and am hopeful that she and her family may get to the States, and to Kutztown, one day so we can repay the gracious hosting they showed us today :)

Tomorrow it is a much earlier departure for us than usual, so let’s hope I’m coherent enough to write and make sense tomorrow lol…Enjoy the photos!

Second post of the day!

We started the day with finishing final packing of charging cords and toiletries before going back to California Bean to have breakfast. We went a little later in the morning than when we went on Tuesday, but I am thankful we arrived when we did because after we got seated I felt like people just kept coming! It got so busy! I had an apple mango smoothie to drink which was equal parts sweet and a little tart, but 100% delicious :) To eat, Brandon got the Bavarian Deluxe pancake special, which was pancakes stacked with bacon, sausage, and ham. It also came with homemade potato salad. There was also a little mustard on them, which sounds weird, but tasted great! I had a “skillet” thing called Coronado Beach that came with sausage, fried potatoes with onions, over easy eggs, and some toast. Again, DELECTABLE!

We finished breakfast and went back to the hotel to grab our things before heading to the train station. Our destination today was Heidelberg. Brandon had reserved seats for us on the train, which seemed to be a good thing because the Deutsche Bahn app was reporting there was “exceptionally high demand” for our train, so I was glad to get away from the potential of elbowing people for a seat :)

At the station, we picked up sandwiches to eat around lunchtime and I got around to writing about yesterday. We also saw an incredibly chunky pigeon! The train came on time, and we took off. It was a HOT one today, despite there being some cool air on the train. I was sweating! Unfortunately, the train ended up getting caught in a couple different situations, including having to go completely around Stuttgart (apparently there was some nonsense going on there with some of the lines due to a bird?), so we got into Heidelberg an hour later than originally scheduled. No biggie, though. We had no major plans.

We took a very warm 10-minute walk to our hotel, which is the Staycity. It is HUGE! We checked in, chilled out, then went back out for some Chinese for dinner. We came back to the hotel after that and got cleaned up and then caught up on the new episode of Better Call Saul (Non-spoiler spoiler: It was intense!). Tomorrow, we’re out the door earlyish to go somewhere special!

Thanks for sticking with us and enjoy the photos!

The morning got off to a little bit of a later start than originally planned, mostly because we decided to lay in bed a little while longer.

For those of you following along, yes, I know this is a late post. I apologize. I was tired and the tech wasn’t working for me, so it’ll be a double post day :)

The first thing we wanted to do yesterday was get some laundry done. We had found a Waschsalon down the street and figured, while it wasn’t entirely necessary, doing some wash would be helpful so we have less to do when we arrive back in Hattingen on Sunday. So, we dropped our clothes off, eventually figured out how the process worked (you had to pay your money, select a machine, and then push start on the machine…it was mildly complicated), then went back to the hotel to have breakfast. 

After breakfast, we went back to our laundry, which had more time left on it than we expected, and we hung out until it finished and we had run it through a few dry cycles. The dryers were even more confuzzling to figure out. It was a time lol :)

Post-laundry, we dropped the clothes back at the hotel, collected all the souvenirs we’ve gotten on this trek so far (minus the ones left back at Alina and Peter’s) and headed to Deutsche Post. My parents are going camping for a week starting today, so I had texted them about where to send our box of goodies. My mom suggested my grandma, so that’s what we did! At Deutsche Post, we were able to get a big box that fit all the things we were trying to ship. I accidentally filled out the wrong packing slip, but the gentleman behind the counter steered me back in the right direction. We got everything paid for (thankfully we had enough cash as they did not take Visa) and headed on our way.

By this point, it was lunchtime, so we found a place called Cafe Luitpold and had some Flammkuchen (it’s becoming a favorite staple of mine) and then we went to the Residenz Munich, which is where King Max I and Queen Maria lived. We didn’t go in, but the outside perimeter and gardens were a delight to explore! By the time we finished that, we were both a little fatigued, but we popped into a dm first to print out tickets for one of our upcoming train journeys before going to the hotel for a break.

We chilled for a while; I had the intention of napping but never did. By dinner time, we decided to try a place Brandon had found that was about 10 minutes by train from where we were. It was called Neuhauser Augustiner. The food was great, but we kept getting swarmed by flies and bees, which has been a regular issue for us. I swear we are showering! After dinner, we went back to the hotel and got our things put together so we didn’t have to rush around this morning. 

Today…well…I’ll write about that later :) Enjoy some pictures from yesterday!

Today, we headed out of Munich for the day for a journey to the castle that inspired Disney!

We fueled up this morning at a local cafe called California Bean where they make fresh-squeezed juices and delicious breakfast items. I had banana Nutella pancakes while Brandon got a very nice omelette. Our journey today was our first with an official tour group of any variety, and, luckily, the meeting place was only a block from where we’re staying (California Bean is basically across the street from us), so we had plenty of time to make our short initial trek.

If you’re not sure what castle I am referring to in my initial statement, I will say our tour today was of Neuschwanstein. If that still doesn’t sound familiar, I invite you to Google it and I am certain your memory will be jogged :) Anywho, we were going with a company called Radius Tours, which is one of the longest-running English language touring companies in Munich. Additionally, it ONLY exists in Munich (it’s a “mom and pop” operation), is (I think) the only one “endorsed” by Rick Steves (you can also Google him; we’ve heavily relied on tips and tricks we have learned from his website), and is the first touring company to establish a relationship with the Dachau Memorial Site so that their tour guides are excellently trained in the history of the site. Additional fun fact: all their tour guides are freelancers and don’t run on any given scripts, so all the history you are provided is presented authentically by that individual sharing their knowledge! I highly recommend taking a tour, whether the Neuschwanstein tour or one of the other Munich-based tours, with them if you get here!

There were a little over 40 people in our tour group today, so we had two guides that split the group between themselves. Their names were Michelle and Charlie. Charlie sounded like he is originally from England. We were in Michelle’s group and learned she is originally from Detroit but moved to Germany in 2012 because she fell in love with the lifestyle (mood). In our group, we also had folks from other parts of the states, including a couple from Pittsburgh(!), as well as a couple from Mexico and another who were from the Bremen area of Northern Germany and were taking the tour due to the knowledge it was in English, so they wanted to challenge themselves to improve!

We hopped on a regional rail train that took us from Munich to Füssen. The ride was about 2 hours, and during that time, Michelle began giving us a history of the monarchy, specifically about Ludwig II and the events and decisions leading to the building of not only Neuschwanstein, but two other castles in the area. Michelle was a very good storyteller, and she kept us well engaged during our history lesson! When we arrived in Füssen, we took a 10 minute bus ride then to the “center” of town, near the castle. We had a little bit of time to eat and putz while Michelle picked up our castle tour tickets. After our break, she took our group by the Alpsee and Hohenschwangau, again giving us a nice history lesson as we walked.

From this point, the option was given to those who wanted to split from the group and walk around town for a little bit before catching a bus up the hill to the castle, or, you could remain with Michelle and the group and walk. Brandon, myself, and one other woman from the group opted to use the bus. For all of us, the steepness of the hill, and for Brandon and I the fact we’ve been walking so much recently, it just made sense to give ourselves that break.

About an hour later, we caught back up with the group by the castle where we were given our tour tickets and a reminder that we’d have some free time after the tour to putz before we needed to meet back with everyone to get ready to go back to the station by about 4:30. The castle tour was 30 minutes and went through 4 of the finished rooms of Neuschwanstein. Fun fact: it is technically unfinished as Ludwig II died before completion. Also, much of it was meant as a dedication to Richard Wagner, the composer, but he died before construction started, so rooms meant to be for Wagner when he visited are largely unfinished. We got to see the king’s bedroom, which has LOADS of phenomenal woodwork. We also saw his “living room,” the throne room (there is no throne as Ludwig ran out of money before it was constructed and the throne builder said “No payment, no throne”), and the singer’s hall. The paintings on the walls were incredible! All were inspired by the fairy tales that Wagner wrote operas of. Ludwig II was *kinda* obsessed. We couldn’t take any photos during the tour, so definitely check it out if you are able to get to Germany!

After the “official” tour, there was still some sections you could walk through independently, including the gift shops (which take up some of the unfinished rooms meant for Wagner), the kitchen (SO MANY COPPER POTS), and one of the balconies on the essentially unfinished side of the castle. All were very cool!

Leaving the castle, we found we were running at about 45 minutes to our meeting time, so we opted to try and start making our way back down the hill. One of the ways to do that was a horse-drawn carriage! Of course, that’s what we chose :) The ride lasted about 15 minutes, and the horses were lovely! We got off the carriage and headed to our meeting point to catch up with the group. Then, we took the bus back to the station and had another 2 hour ride back to Munich. We got back at about 7:30 and opted for an Italian restaurant around the corner from the hotel for dinner. It was delicious! I got risotto and Brandon had spaghetti with shrimp. Then, it was back to the hotel to settle.

Tomorrow is our last full day in Munich, but we’ve got some plans in mind, so keep reading to find out what fun we can find!