Germany--Days 9-12

We woke up a little late and had yogurt for breakfast again. I tried out the hazelnut yogurt--kinda weird. We headed back out to the old part of town again...but not before Lance shaved a fu-man-chu. Better than the ugly mustache he planned, but still not good.

This is the Nuremberg Easter Festival

We hung out in old town for a bit, and the took the train to the Nuremberg Nazi rally site. This was really interesting--it's a huge stadium that the Nazi's created to intimidate others and perpetuate their propaganda. The buildings were never 100% completed, and it's now a museum.

After that we stopped off at another beer garden and had some asparagus soup. The beer gardens are great--there are hundreds all over, and you can just saddle up and grab a Diet Coke or water. Plus, they have a small menu of snacks to nosh on.

After that, we took a nap, ate some chocolate, and then went to this amazing dinner. Lancer had beef and pig medallions, spaetzle, and veggies. I got a rumpsteak topped with bacon and a fried egg (another German treat--strange), fried potatoes, and a huge pile of homemade German horseradish. It was so tasty.

After dinner, wandered around for a few more hours, and Lancer got in some night shots. I helped out as the faithful Photographer's Assistant, lured in with the promise of delicious hazelnut ice-cream.


The next day we packed up and shipped off to Munich, and checked into the Marriott right by the train station. Our non-stop walking was finally catching up to us. It was the first day we were finally feeling tired, and ready to head back home.

Lance was also emboldened by his Asian-inspired mustache, and was doing "karate" moves in the mirror...until he slammed his elbow into a cupboard, and then contritely went to lunch with me.

We spent the better part of the day at Dachau, which was unbelievably sad and moving. After that, we went back, took a nap, ate some chocolate (see a theme??), and then headed out to the Munich shopping district to check things out.

At dinner that night, Lance got yet *another* compliment on his great German speaking skills. It goes something like this:

Lance: "Hi, can I get one scoop of chocolate ice-cream?
Storeperson: **Blank Face**
Lance: "Guten tag, eine Kugel schoko eis? Bitte."
Storeperson--in German: "Oh my...you have such great speaking skills. You're amazing! You speak it so well! Are you German??"

He pretended he didn't love it, but that's a fib. That night, we fell asleep watching horrible programs courtesy of Dubai. Some dude on a unicycle, same dude on gigantic unicycle, same dude on small unicycle...and the crowd was eating it up. Remind me to go to Dubai if I ever need a career with no skills.

The next day, we decided to do a "touristy" thing and head up to the famous castles in Hohenschwangau. Lancer had arranged for a horse and buggy to take us up to the smaller catsle first. It was a fun Bavarian treat.

The horse and buggy guy

This is the first of the two castles--this one is the smaller, lesser known one. It was still amazing.

Then we headed up to the other castle--it's unbelievable. Disneyland is modeled after it--that should tell you something.

Across from this castle is this rickety old bridge. It's a great viewpoint, so we decided to go across it after the castle.

View from bridge

Heading home, Lancer and I were laughing about how much the Germans love Heidi Klum. I asked why this is, and he explained that for the longest time, they only had Boris Becker and Stefi Graff to talk about. Now, they have 3 people. This is the front page of a real newspaper.

Sure enough, on the back page, Boris Becker!!

And we left the next day. The sign of a truly great vacation is when you are ready to go home, and we were there. It was fun having Lancer as both a tour guide and a translator, though I was able to hold my own...you know, with my amazing skills gleaned from 2 years of German in HS. A lot of the words and phrases came back. I couldn't really speak well, but I understood what people were saying most of the time.

We had a fun, wonderful, adventurous time. I hope to return again someday. Goodbye Germany!