Exhausted from such a great day yesterday, getting out of bed when the alarm went off this morning was ROUGH. Once again, Brandon was alive and functional ahead of me, which also threw me off, but c’est la vie :) We got ourselves up, had some breakfast, and got our things together to head to the Straßenbahn for a little before 9. On the docket today was the city of Wuppertal, where we were told we’d find a zoo (and you all know how we feel about our zoos!).
Contrary to many of our outings so far, we rode the Straßenbahn to Hattingen Mitte and then we hopped on a bus to Wuppertal! While not our first bus ride in Germany, it certainly was the longest so far. The ride to Wuppertal Hauptbahnhof took about an hour, and then we got on a very cool train called the Schwebebahn. “But Alicia, why is it very cool?” I am so glad you asked! The Schwebebahn is so cool because the track runs over top of the train, so the cars are suspended in mid-air! It’s a very smooth ride :) We took the Schwebebahn to a station about 2 blocks from the zoo, and then it was all uphill to the entrance. The zoo itself was lovely, and like the trek to the entrance, HILLY. For having lived in Pittsburgh for four years, I don’t think my legs ever got so much of a workout as they did today at this zoo, which, just for the record, is about 17 acres smaller than the Pittsburgh Zoo (If anything, it felt like it was 17 acres bigger. But that may have just been the hills). Anyhow, this zoo had a plethora of animals on display, including all kinds of birds, two monkey houses, a herd of elephants, some lions (that were very hard to find), tigers (that we didn’t see), fish, penguins, guinea pigs, and a bunch of other things! There were also a number of kindergartens, not on display though, just exploring the zoo ;) In fact, we had to contend with some of the little guys today when it came time for lunch because there were many of them in line and they did not order as a whole group. But it was adorable to watch and listen to them because small children are adorable! We spent about 4 hours at the zoo before I was feeling nearly spent. So, we headed back to the Schwebebahn, which we rode end-to-end. That trip took about 30 minutes and gave us a nice view of Wuppertal! On the return trip, we only rode the Schwebebahn to the Hauptbahnhof so we could work our way back to Hattingen. Because of the time we got to the station, we would have had to wait about an hour for the bus we had originally taken, so Brandon found us an S-bahn to Essen, and that would allow us to get a connection to Hattingen. The S-bahn was nice and arguably the least crowded of all the transportation we took today. Once in Essen we deboarded one S-Bahn to go across the tracks (which involved going down one set of stairs and up the next) to catch a second S-bahn that took us to Hattingen. We got off the train in Hattingen a little over a kilometer from Alina and Peter’s house, so we walked along the bridge back to the house. My legs were so tired, and I was ready to crash and burn. However, as “second winds” would have it, we had a seat on the porch with everyone and caught up about our days. That rest helped because then Alicia and I did some art, and we attempted to finish a puzzle we started over a week ago (we are as of yet unsuccessful…ocean life…you don’t realize how close in color it all is until you’re having to finish a puzzle of it :P). Again, as always, it was a delightful day. Tomorrow, the weather is not looking so great, which stinks, but we have some fun plans on the agenda. Not to mention it’s also my birthday :) Until then, a few photos from the zoo for your enjoyment! Thank you, as always, for reading!!
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