Rigi Kulm and Auf Wiedersehen

We took a cog train up the Rigi Kulm to get to the top of the mountain.



We did this exact same trip 27 years ago and had wonderful memories of our stay. To our surprise, there was snow at the top of the mountain and we had a little bit of winter at lunch.




After Rigi, we headed to our last stop on the tour, Stein am Rhein. A small quaint medieval town located on the Rhine River. We stayed in a 16th century hotel and had a wonderful local fish dish to finish off our time together.

It was a great last night and sad too that our wonderful time together would end.




Thanks goes to grandma who put the whole trip together, it will be one that the kids and grandkids will never forget.

Auf Wiedersehen.

Luzern Switzerland

We traveled to Luzern and stopped at the transportation museum, the kids just loved it. What a beautiful town Luzern is located on Lake Luzern.




The next day we explored the glacier museum, which included a hall of mirrors (go figure) and walked on the Kapellbrücke (Chapel Bridge) a wooden bridge first built in the 14th century.



We finished off the day by taking a boat on the lake to get from Luzern to Weggis, where our hotel is located. It was a great day.

Bern Switzerland

We spent the day in Bern Switzerland,
a place where water is celebrated and the Aare River runs through town. Bern translates into Bear and they take great pride in using the Bear as their symbol. The kids had a lot of fun in the water fountains.






Bern also has a glockenspiel but instead of a cuckoo bird coming out and “cuck- cuckooing”, a rooster comes out and says “kee-kee-ree-kee” (instead of cock a doodle do) it was fun to watch.

We also got in an excellent tour of the Einstein Museum. Einstein lived in Bern when he did much of his work on the theory of relativity.

Lyss Switzerland via France

We traveled from Koblenz Germany to Lyss Switzerland via France and ate at a wonderful French café in Obernai France. The next day we spent quite a bit of time in Avenches Switzerland, a site with many Roman ruins.






We headed to Gruyeres Switzerland and ate at a restaurant with some wonderful... you guessed it .... Gruyeres cheese fondue. Who knew you could use pickles and pickled onions as dippers in fondue?

We topped the day off at the Cottlier chocolate factory and were able to sample a very large variety of chocolate, yum. I definitely ate more chocolate than I should have.

Amsterdam in a day!

We planned a day trip to Amsterdam by taking the train. Once in Amsterdam, our first stop we made was at the Anne Frank Huis. I thought this was important since Annaliese studied part of the story last year. It makes you pause.



Of course what is a day trip without a little food?




We had a wonderful visit to the Rijksmuseum where all the great masterpieces were carefully selected and shrunk down to a couple of rooms due to major renovations. That was great for us; we got a taste of Dutch artists with some great Rembrandt pieces.
The lighter side of our day we took a canal trip and hopped a few trams through the city. We made it back in plenty of time for our return train.




On the trip back we had to switch trains in Köln and had a 40 minute layover where we got the most amazing views of the Köln Cathedral. The Cathedral was breathtaking.

Koblenz

On to Koblenz a a great boat ride down the Rhine river, getting off and exploring Boppard a short while and completing a round trip. So many castles to view and what great weather we had for the cruise.



The remaining part of the day was spent at Eltz Castle not too far from the Rhine. It's been in the same family for over 33 generations.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber

a German medieval walled city.






We walked the wall around the city, climbed the tower, took a horse carriage ride, experienced a Christmas museum, visited St. Jacobs church,
explored the shops and topped it off with the night watch man’s tour.
The next evening we watched the World Cup at the puppet theatre in town, accompanied by a bier. Go figure, bier in a puppet theatre….wish we would have made the earlier puppet show.

The hills are alive!

Salzburg: the birthplace of Mozart and the backdrop for the Sound of Music. We enjoyed the Sound of Music tour, which included the city. Some of the kids cooled off with help from the Residenzplatz Fountain.
I think I could have stayed another day with all the shopping.

Neuschwanstein, Glockenspiel und Hofbräuhaus

Big Bavarian day! We began at Neuschwanstein Castle, another castle by “Mad” Ludwig.

The castle’s interior is about 1/3 complete and the king lived it in for a total of 3 months before he mysteriously died. The view of the castle is spectacular.

Off to München to see the Glockenspiel;
we made it just in time for the third daily chiming and dance.

Following the 15ish minute spiel, we walked over to the Hofbräuhaus for some great food, bier and oompah music.
I tried the local favorite – Crisp roast knuckle of pork and … ja bier!

Linderhof und Mittenwald

Today was a day trip to Linderhof Castle, the summer home of “Mad” King Ludwig. The castle is relatively small and the tour reasonably short.
We hiked up to see the grotto which is cave-like and man made. It’s kinda creepy in a Liberace’ sort of way. This king had way too much time on his hands and spent much of it building castles.

We detoured into Mittenwald, a small town with cute shops and the kids got ice cream shaped like spaghetti. There’s a small bit of canal running through the main street, it serves primarily as a tourist attraction these days and for us… a contest to see who could jump over it with the most style.
The town is most famous for violin making.

We finished off the day with a self cooked (Mark) meal of white asparagus, ham and potatoes. Our whole family revolves around meals and what we’re going to eat next. Hmmm … I wonder what’s for breakfast?

First Day

Breakfast, what a treat, we’re staying in Murnau at the Sporerhof. If I were to eat only one meal it would be breakfast. Typically a German breakfast is bread, butter (of course), soft boiled eggs and an assortment of meats and cheeses. I think my favorite was the homemade liverwurst, yummy!

Off to the daytrip to Dachau. What a somber, sad and very moving experience. It’s hard to comprehend what happened and why but it’s a good lesson for all of us to remember just how lucky we truly are.

Dinner was at a local restaurant by the lake where I had the fish plate and the rest of my family sampled local favorites including the bier and Apfelstrudel.

Arrival!

We made it! After an 11 ½ hour very long flight from LAX to München… our bags made it, but mom did not make her flight connections. The majority of the family (and a bus) will not arrive until Monday but a few of us decided to start early. Great, I wasn’t counting on driving but I’m up for an adventure. Besides, my brother-in-law speaks fluent German so he was the designated navigator.
It’s been a long time since I’ve driven on the AutoBahn and let’s just say I received a couple of flashing lights, a signal for me to move over, and a couple of hand gestures when I didn’t move fast enough.
Prost

Packing!

Get on that Bus! Wow… I am so excited. We are traveling to Germany for our summer vacation… all courtesy of my mother… Grandma! She‘s rented a bus and a driver with a full itinerary and invited the whole family. We start and end in Munich.

Stay tuned!

The Sound of Music

Gretch, thanks for getting this up and running.

Even though it's lame, I really would like to go to Salzburg and see all the Sound of Music sites. I'd also want to see Roman ruins, or some stuff that's just as old as it can get (old germanic stuff would be equally good). And some hot springs, or other geothermal features.

Thank you Gretchen!

This should be awesome. I'd like to propose a map and a polling tool (we could use doodle). Mom suggested (I think) 5 cities, staying roughly 3 days in each city. A map will help us figure out what cities and in what order. The poll will allow us to vote on choices--activities, or cities, possibly dates of the trip, or even how we want to handle things.

Here are a couple of cities:
Trier (or some other old city with Roman ruins)
Dresden (or some city in the old East Germany)

Europe Blog

Welcome! This is the first post of the Stierholz Europe Travel Blog!