Konigssee, Bavaria

In June, we decided to enjoy the great outdoors by taking a trip to one of the most scenic locations in Germany, Konigssee.

This is actually Obersee

Konigssee is located in Berchtesgadener Land, a national park in the Bavarian Alps on the Austrian border. Konigssee is best known for a few things. First, the close proximity to the Eagle's Nest which encourages a lot of visitors with interest in WWII history. Secondly, the famous "horn echo" which occurs when a horn is blown from a certain spot on the lake, causing an echo throughout the Alps which sounds like a symphony of horns playing. Finally, the beautiful views and amazing hikes through practically untouched Alps speckled with traditional wooden buildings and milk cows. German travel websites are covered with picturesque Bavarian scenes from Konigssee and the surrounding area.

Our main reason for making the trip was to enjoy a hike in the mountains, which we hadn't gotten to do since we lived in Colorado. On Friday afternoon, we packed up Augustus and the Jeep and set out for the southern-most portion of Germany. Unfortunately, we didn't get out fast enough to avoid traffic, so our road trip took almost 3 hours longer than anticipated. When we got to our hotel, the staff had gone to bed, so they left our key at the desk with a welcome note.

The next morning, we got up early to catch one of the earlier boats out. Konigssee can only be crossed on a particular kind of electric boat. No other vehicles are allowed on or near the lake to preserve it's crystal clear water. There are only two different stops to get off of from the boat and you pay by how far you plan to go. Each boat stops at a particular point to blow the trumpet in order to hear the echo.

On the day we went, it was soaking wet and pretty cold outside. We dressed Augustus in his best hoodie, put on our thickest rain coats and took a seat on the boat next to a group of British college kids. They all sort of laughed at Augustus cuddled up asleep in Greg's lap the whole trip. He barely noticed the trumpet playing, which, due to the weather, was pretty anticlimactic. The echo didn't have the same triumphant effect in the pouring rain, but it was still kind of cool. There is a famous chuch on the water which is where most people exited, but we stayed on until Salet which is the trail head for a path to Obersee and the Rothbach waterfall, the tallest in Germany.

Obersee is only a short and easy walk from the Salet port, maybe 10 or 15 minutes. However, there is a longer trail which leads along the edge of Obersee and through the mountains until it reaches a cottage which sells fresh milk. If you continue to follow the trail, it ends at the Rothbach waterfall. Despite the rain, we decided to hike it. We weren't totally prepared for that much hiking. Because of the weather, we assumed we wouldn't want to spend that much time outdoors so we didn't dress for the occasion. We ended up hiking several miles anyway.

Augustus was awesome. He only got tired and had to be carried for a short period, and I think it was more so because he was so wet and not because he was necessarily tired. He climbed up the steps carved into the rocks and carefully approached the cows blocking the path to see if he could venture forward. We even saw the British kids later in the hike who mentioned how good he was as hiking.

We stopped at the milk cottage and got some beer. It kind of grosses me out that people were stopping to get luke warm milk while hiking. Augustus got cold from all the rain so we had to wrap him up in Greg's hoodie to dry him off. The views were absolutely beautiful and worth the walk. After a short break, we decided to walk towards the waterfall before heading back to the boat. We didn't walk all the way down the waterfall trail, but instead stopped and allowed Augustus to run around for a little while in the cow pasture. He was interested in the cows, but not enough to attempt to approach them.

Luckily, the hike back was much more dry and the boat much less crowded. Augustus was so exhausted that he curled up in a nest he made in Greg's hoody and fell asleep. All of the Germans were watching him and laughing as he dug his way up under it to sleep "under the covers." This was definitely the longest hike he's taken since we moved to Germany.

Once off the boat, we dropped Augustus at the hotel to rest and ate an amazing Bavarian dinner on the water overlooking the lake. It was a nice end to the trip. At the hotel, we learned that it was a common practice for travelers in the area to return to their hotel at night for dinner. Most of the hotel guests did this. They even reserved a table for each of the hotel guests. We decided to go down to the restaurant for beer and cake.

There were more things that I had wanted to do in that area before we returned, but the weather was so bad that it wasn't worth it. There is a cable car that you could take to the top of a mountain overlooking the lake, but we didn't bother since the clouds were so low that you couldn't even see to the top of the mountains. There wouldn't have been much to see. We didn't go to the Eagle's Nest because we didn't have much interest. We considered stopping through Salzburg, Austria, on our way back, but I forgot to bring our passports so we didn't.

We most likely won't make it back down that direction again unless we try to go snowboarding in the area this winter. The drive to Bavaria/Austria is miserably slow. The scenery is certainly beautiful but that's pretty much all we are interested in around that area. I don't have any huge desire to visit Munich especially after realizing that Oktoberfest can be had in just about any city, but with less tourists and a smaller crowd. Maybe we will return to Garmisch at some point if we have time.

Strasbourg, France and Other Forgotten Local Trips

When we first moved to Germany, I thought I would document every single thing we did and every single trip we took. Then, after visiting a lot of places, I've gotten pretty lazy.

We've decided to try to visit a new place at least every other weekend. We hope to continue that trend through summer as it will probably be our last full summer in Europe. So far, we have done a lot of traveling both near and far since May!

Several weekends ago, we took a trip to Strasbourg, France. Strasbourg is the home of the United Nations headquarters and is located in the Alsace region of France which has traded hands multiple times through history between France and Germany. The inhabitants of Alsace now speak both French and German with a very distinctive accent... or so I'm told.

Strasbourg was a beautiful city which is only 2 hours from our house. It's actually how I imagined most German cities would look before we moved here. The buildings seem to mimic the Bavarian architecture with their own extremely intricate markings which made them look much more artistic and, well, French. I actually told Greg that I think the most beautiful building I've ever seen was in Strasbourg. He didn't completely agree with that sentiment, but did comment that the architecture was more unique than in Germany.

We didn't do a whole lot in Strasbourg other than walk around and eat. The food was great and the town was beautiful, which was good enough for a day trip. It's also fun to be able to say that we can drive to France for a day from our house.

I love this picture of Greg.
(Obviously, this is not the day that it rained)

Twice in the past few months, we've driven up to Bozerwolf off-road park a little over an hour from our house to take the Jeep off-roading. Once, we camped out overnight for Jeep Topless day, which was unfortunately far too cold and rainy to actually take the top off of the Jeep. This was our first European camping experience. It is mostly illegal to go backpack camping here in Germany, so we have to plan out a campsite in advance.

Each weekend we've been in town, we've attending at least one festival in our local area. Wine festivals are just beginning in the Rhine-Main region and we are more than happy to attend. Our own local wine festival won't start until next month, so we have several more weekends to enjoy the festivities in our area. Germans definitely love to party outdoors in the summer!

Finally, we've also taken two bigger trips, one to hike in Bavaria at Konigsee, and another to Rome, Italy with a minor detour to the Naples area to visit the ruins of Pompeii. I'm already working on those posts, so bare with me as I slowly catch up on our adventures!

Backlog Blog

I promise that I have not forgotten about this blog. I have lots of day trips to update about but haven't had the time or energy to do it. This weekend we should have plenty of down time which should allow me to do some blogging! Until then, here is a cute picture of Augustus in a hoody.

Long Weekend: Normandy, France

This summer marked the 70th anniversary of the D-Day landings on the beaches of Normandy. We thought it would be pretty cool to be able to see Normandy on the 70th anniversary, but that was not realistic. However, we definitely did want to visit while we lived in Germany, it was just a matter of planning the best possible trip.

Omaha Beach

Berlin: ICE Trains and Beer Festivals

Fair warning, even though this was a short trip to Berlin, this will probably be a very long and detailed post. On Monday, I found a flier at the gym advertising the Berlin International Beer Festival this weekend. Since we've never been to Berlin, we figured this may be the best time to make a trip over to the east. The next day, we booked train tickets and a hotel. So, this was definitely a more spontaneous trip than we usually take. Aside from my trip via ICE train to Nuremberg to visit Greg when he was at training, this was our first long distance train adventure. There were a lot of bumps in the road along the way, but we made it there and had a pretty awesome time on our mini vacation.

Day Trip: Triberg & the Black Forest

It's been a pretty busy week in our home! One of Greg's friends from growing up and his wife came to visit for the week while they were touring Germany. Last weekend was a "4 day", so it gave us all time to hang out before I went back to work. Greg took the week off to show his friends around for a few extra days.

Most of the day trips we took were to places Greg and I had already visited before. The only exception was Saturday, when we took the Jeep down to Triberg in the heart of the Black Forest.

Tulip Season in Holland: Amsterdam, Zaanse Schans, Voldendam and the Keukenhof gardens

Next on the blogging agenda is our trip to Holland for tulip season! Spring time is the peak of tourism for the Netherlands because of their world famous tulip fields and gardens. If you've scrolled through the travel boards of Pinterest, you've probably stumbled across at least one beautiful picture of a big wooden windmill surrounded by colorful fields striped with tulips as far as the eye can see. Of course, we had to be one of the millions worldwide who venture to Holland from mid-March to mid-May to check out the Keukenhof tulip gardens. We had a lot of fun, but I will say that it was a good reminder that when you're traveling, sometimes you have to accept that expectations do not equal reality.

Day Trip: Cochem and Reichsburg, Germany

In the past few weeks, it finally getting sunny and warm outside! This glimpse of spring time sadly did not last long before it started raining every single day. Of course, in a month it will be burning hot and neither our house nor work have air conditioning, so we have to enjoy the weather before it turns miserable again. Several weekends ago, we drove to Cochem with some friends of ours to get out of the house and explore somewhere new.

Local: Fasching (or Fasnacht Day) 2014

I remember when I was very young living in Pennsylvania and "celebrating" Fasnacht Day. For my non-German-American readers, Fasnacht Day is better known as Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday, Carnival or, more simply put, the day before Lent begins. A fasnacht is like the German equivalent of a King's Cake, for lack of better comparison. It's a huge, fatty doughnut possibly made out of potatos. As a kid, I don't remember doing anything for Fasnacht Day other than acknowledging it. I'm not sure if I've ever actually had a fasnacht, but I would probably take a whoppie pie from an Amish bakery before a fasnacht anyway.

A few months ago, we were over at our friend's house flipping through a catalog about happenings in our area when I saw an advertisement for a Fasching cruise. I immediately asked if Fasching was the same as Fasnacht Day, and no one seemed to know what I was even talking about. Turns out, Fasching is basically the German Carnival and Faschnut Day is, of course, still the Tuesday before Lent right in the middle of the Fasching celebration.

Fasching is basically a giant, week long party here in Germany. Most of it involves dressing up in costumes (like Halloween), parades, heavy drinking and breaking glass all over the streets. Occasionally, you'll also see young men trying to persuade women to kiss them, but mostly it's just drunken craziness in costumes. Yet somehow, it's also relatively family friendly.

2 Year Anniversary: Trier, Germany

Sunday was our 2 year wedding anniversary! I must say, the second year was much more stressful and trying than our first year. Actually, despite Greg being deployed for most of it, our first year of marriage was a cakewalk compared to this past year. Hopefully year three will be a little more quiet!

Nuremberg and Our First Train Experience

I have been a miserably bad blogger recently. I currently have at least 3 posts saved as drafts that I have yet to finish. I'd like to say that I have been busy lately, but that's not entirely true. Although I have been somewhat more busy over all, I also had enough free time to binge watch all of Dexter on Netflix last weekend and feel horrible about myself afterwords. One of these days, I may just pick up a hobby that doesn't involve my computer.

Anyway, Greg left several weeks ago to play Army at a school in Bavaria. He's nearly done and has been very proud of himself for everything he's accomplished, so we decided to have some fun this weekend while he was off. We decided to head to Nuremberg!

LEGOLAND Deutschland

On Saturday, Greg and I went with some friends of ours and their three children to Legoland. Our original plan for this weekend was to go hiking in the Black Forest to enjoy the peak time for viewing the leaves. Unfortunately, the weather called for heavy rain in the Black Forest area all weekend, so we scrapped that plan and decided last minute to go to Legoland. The USO here sells discounted tickets, so both of us got into the park for about the price of one ticket to Six Flags.

It still rained for most of the day, but the rain was usually just a light drizzle. We don't get many heavy thunderstorms in Germany.

The park itself was a bit different than American amusement parks. In America, amusement park rides seem to typically be geared towards older children and teenagers with tons of roller coasters and thrill rides. Legoland, and apparently many of the other amusement parks in Germany, cater more to families with young children. The rides were mostly some variation of a car going around a set track. There were three roller coasters that were all very small and child-friendly. Ironically, safety features in America aren't so present in Germany. Some friends explained to us that at other parks, the rides were often not manned and designed for a parent to simply put their child in the ride, hit a button, and take off. Legoland rides were manned by employees, but some of them were as simple as an individual just waving you to jump off the platform into the moving vehicle. It was much different than all of the safety features we were use to in America.

At one point, Greg was on the most "thrilling" roller coaster with his friend, his friend's daughter, and a friend of the daughter (confusing enough?) when his friend's daughter began slipping out of the seat of the coaster from beneath the bar. When Greg reached around the back of his seat to attempt to help grab her, he hit his hand against a nearby tree. Her dad ultimately held her in the seat until the ride ended and everyone was safe, but very shaken. On a more positive note, the picture taken from the roller coaster camera was probably one of the most hilarious pictures imaginable. Since everyone made it out alive and our friend's daughter was only slightly traumatized, they bought the picture in the form of a magnet for their refrigerator.

I don't really like rides, so I mostly stuck to the kiddie stuff. Greg and I wrote a little car around a Lego safari complete with animals built entirely out of Legos.

It was pretty impressive how everywhere in the park, all of the decorations were made of Legos.

There was also a pretty huge area called Lego City that was nothing but sculptures and replica towns made out of Legos. They had everything from scenes out of the Star Wars movies to a full model airport, multiple castles, a stadium complete with lights and sound and multiple European cities. Greg was really excited about Star Wars, but I really liked the replica cities. I have hundreds of pictures and Blogger takes about 5 minutes to upload just one, so my Facebook album is the best way to see all of the Lego town goodness.

All of the seats were filled with little Lego people wearing their team's  colors.

The drive there and back was three hours, so it made for a pretty long day. We didn't get back home until almost midnight. On Sunday, we both woke up feeling like we had been binge drinking all day. I'm sad to say that I'm not quite 24 and I'm already too old to stay out past midnight.

Next weekend, we're hoping it will be nice enough to go hiking, although I'm guessing most of the trees will have lost their leaves by then. Also, we just started planning our first out-of-country/overnight trip to Switzerland to go snowboarding over Thanksgiving weekend. Greg's three-week long class he was supposed to attend last month was postponed, so he will most likely be leaving again soon. As sad as I am to see him go, I'm going to enjoy some solo travel while he's gone. I'm tired of hanging out around our house all the time.

Day Trip: Gamescom in Cologne, Germany

Yesterday, Greg and I took another road trip to Cologne, this time for Gamescom. I never thought in my life that I'd be going to a gaming convention, but it wasn't too horrible.

We didn't pre-order tickets since we decided to go pretty last minute, so instead we had to wait in line for close to 2 hours before actually getting inside. It started drizzling towards the end, but not so bad as to make it miserable. Once in, the Koelnmesse was filled to the brim with nerddom and angst and we were probably the oldest people there who weren't someone's parents, but it was an interesting experience. I was surprised there weren't more people dressed up. I've never been to Comicon or Dragoncon, but I know it's pretty typical for people to dress up like their favorite game/comic/TV characters.

We found the Nintendo area pretty quickly, which was the main thing Greg wanted to see. I wouldn't say my husband is an avid gamer, as he probably only plays video games for maybe a few hours a week and frequently falls out of interest with them for long periods of time. Also, unlike much of the male population, he's not so interested in fighting games. We don't own an Xbox or Play Station, but we do have a GameCube, WiiU and matching Nintendo 3DS XL's. Obviously, Greg is a big fan of Nintendo.

The layout was extremely confusing and we constantly ended up walking in circles. We missed probably 75% of the conference because we had no idea where we were going, but ultimately Greg was happy just seeing the Nintendo games and eating a wurst.

I'm going to be so over this by the time we leave Germany.

It's hard to come up with things that Greg enjoys doing around here because he isn't a fan of sight-seeing and doesn't enjoy traveling just to look at things. Most of the places that he would like to visit are too far for us to just take a short trip, so having one of the biggest gaming conventions in the world an hour and a half drive away every year is nice. The drive is very beautiful and scenic as well.


Today, it is cold, dreary and rainy, just like everyone told us it would be in Germany. It's the kind of weather that makes it difficult to get out of bed. In celebration of this wonderfully messy day, I finally replaced my camera! You may recall from my previous posts that my beloved Elph that I've had for years now started leaving white lines in my photos several months ago. I'm extremely money conscious and it's almost impossible for me to buy anything without thoroughly considering all of my options. I've spent months reading reviews of every camera in my price range, but was having a hard time making a decision. I had narrowed my options down to the Nikon D3100 or the Canon Rebel T3i. The PX was having a sale on Nikon cameras this weekend and offering the D3200 for $150 off, making it much less than the Rebel T3i with more features. I finally broke down and invested the money in it. Considering I've had Canons for years with no issues, I can only hope for the same from my Nikon! Now I just need a good trip to test it out!

Local: Rheingau Wine Festival

Today marks the last day of one of the biggest festivals in our city. Rheingau is an area of Germany around the Rhine river known for it's Riesling. I'm not a fan of Riesling because I think it's entirely too sweet, but considering we live in an area known for a particularly wine, it felt necessary to go to the fest.

When I try to describe German festivals to friends or relatives back in America, it's almost impossible. In America, a festival is generally more of a craft fair dedicated to selling random overpriced homemade trinkets in a park or maybe based around a parade. Food served at an American festival is mostly deep fried sweets of some kind that cost about 20 cents to make and are sold for closer to $5. In America, everything is catered towards families and festivals are usually overly "kid-friendly" in that they often center around some sort of entertainment for children, are completely alcohol-free and end by 7 pm. I've never heard of anyone between the ages of 12-40 being excited about going to a festival in America. And why would they? American festivals are boring.

In Germany, when a town is having a festival, it's typically positioned right in the downtown of the city and often requires closing down several main streets for days or weeks on end. Vendors will be out most of the day and pretty much all night. German festivals are almost always centered around food and drinking. Whole squares and streets will be filled with tables and surrounded by places to buy fresh made wurst, pasta, pizza and kettle cooked chips. In certain areas, you can sit and be served like a giant outdoor restaurant. There will usually be a stage with a band covering some American music with thick German accents. Children are welcome and free to play in the open grassy areas, but you won't always find much entertainment for them. Some festivals will have areas with fair rides, but not always. People go all out for these events, too. You'll usually see them dressed as if they are attending a wedding or church service while they're maneuvering through the huge crowds of people who turn up for the fest. When you show up in jeans and a t-shirt, everyone knows you're American.

I don't think Americans can wrap their heads around the concept of German festivals for a vast number of reasons. The main one being that this kind of event would probably be in some way illegal in America. People drinking and smoking in public around small children seems outrageous in the States. Closing businesses for what's deemed as a "party" is practically scandalous. One person would complain because it was too loud or not safe enough, and the whole event would be cancelled. Americans aren't taught to control themselves. They don't teach their children how to behave in what is deemed as adult situations. We cause this separation in having a family and enjoying yourself. I remember living near Savannah, Georgia in college and every year when St. Patrick's Day came around, Savannah's streets became flooded with drunk college students partying along the river to the point of throwing up or blacking out. There were areas of the city sectioned off as almost a "family friendly" zone. You could take your kids to one area of the city to have their faces painted and ride a little green train in a circle or you could go down to River Street and drunkenly throw up into a dyed green river (so long as you weren't double-fisting, because that's still illegal). There's no middle ground. Festivals, especially ones dedicated to a particular kind of alcohol, will never work in American culture, so we have to enjoy them in Europe while we can. As I've heard others here say, "Americans would take something wonderful and ruin it."

Aside from the wine fest, we ventured out even a little more by getting sushi. It seems ridiculous that we would consider that venturing out, but ordering food is always a terrifying experience for us. I've picked up on enough words to know when something is beef or pork and I know how to recognize if a dish is made with salmon or tuna rather than shellfish. That seemed reason enough to try ordering sushi! It wasn't a total disaster, but it didn't go very well either. We thought we were going to a place that a friend recommended which was more English friendly, but we were wrong. After lots of pointing and confusion, we got something that we didn't mean to order from a very sweet waitress who was trying her best to please us. So, we ate it and felt like idiots for not being able to communicate better. I've picked up a little bit of German, but I doubt I'll ever feel fully comfortable walking into a restaurant and ordering food.

In other news, being back to work has been great. In February, I'll be starting a program to become a certified lactation consultant. I wish I could be working full time rather than part-time, but anything helps at this point. I'm happy to be able to keep my skills up and continue to learn new things while also living abroad. We are definitely much luckier than most!

Day Trip: Cologne, Germany

Today, we took our first real adventure outside of the comfort zone of our city or a neighboring military installation. We packed up the GTI and headed to Cologne!