Ok, I have let this blog go unentered for too long. I thought about sitting down and catching up on the last couple months before adding the most recent things but if I waited until that happened we'd be on a plane back to the US and nothing would be written. So, I'm just going to start with this week and from time to time I will have to fill in the past couple months. Apologies in advance for things being so out of order.
Yesterday, July 8th, we took our first bike rides through the forest that our neighborhood backs up to. Our German friends have some favorite spots to ride bikes to and our good friend Christian arranged for us to use his parents bikes and to go on a ride with him to have lunch at a charming Inn about 8 kilometers (about 5 miles?) away from our house. We don't have our bikes yet because, well, they are expensive. There are a few that you can get for cheap at the local Toom Markt (a mini version of a Wal-Mart so to say) but it is nothing like going to a Wal-Mart and being able to get a bike for average riding for about $100. The "cheap" bikes here are like $250-$300. So anyways, we started first with getting the kids taken care of and picked up one of those little kid bike chariots. Still $150 but those are actually much cheaper than the ones in the US.
So the whole process for going to get the chariot and then getting the two bikes from Christian's parents house and then attaching the chariot to the bike and then getting the kids loaded up and then over to Christian's parents house again to inflat the very flat chariot tires only took about 3 hours. (Starting at 10:30am). Poor Christian was hoping to enjoy some lunch at the Inn and it felt as if we weren't going to get there until dinner. By 1:30pm we were finally ready to go on the 5 mile bike ride to get lunch. Above is a picture of the boys in tow.
It was a beautiful ride through the forest and with the temps being in the mid 80s for the past couple weeks, riding through a shaded forest was quite nice, especially with the breeze riding along provided. Its pretty cool how many different trails there are to go riding through the forest and not just little trails for a single bike at a time being hit by tree branches, these were like dirt roads that a small car could easily travel on so while the entire path wasn't always even, it was at least wide enough for the cart to find a relatively steady path for the little chariot.
Once we got to the Inn we couldn't wait for some cold drinks and lunch. We found a nice shady table right next to the entrance to the playground so that we could sit and watch Mason play at his leisure in the park. Mind you, this Inn/train station/restaurant is 130 years old. Christian also told us that the last Emperor of Germany, Wilhelm II, had visited this Inn during his reign. So the playground was quite old as well, though not 130 years old :) For lunch Andy had some piece of meat covered in a sauce with mushrooms and some french fries, Christian had the ever so popular Curry Wurst with french fries and I had one of my favorite things, a Salad. Now, you say, "A salad! How German is that?" Well, salads in Germany are a lot different than salads in the US. I mean, I guess you can get a salad similar to these in the US, but they are specialty meal salads that you usually pay like $15 dollars for. At most restaurants, you can get a pretty good German salad for like $10 or less and this was the case here and my salad included: Lettuce of course, kidney beans, corn, yellow beans, green beans, tomatoes, ham, sliced eggs, and very yummy cheese in slices rolled and placed to decorate as well :) Then of course, the signature yogurt and herb dressing. For drinks I had a Coke and some bottled water that wasn't supposed to be sparkling so that meant it has just a very tad bit of carbination. Christian had a popular summer drink, a Coke and Koelsch (Coca cola poured into a Koelsch beer) and Andy just had a Koelsch. The popular children's drink is Apfel Schole which is apple juice mixed with sparkling water.
We had a very enjoyable time and got to practice our restaurant German some more which was once again complimented by our waitress who was also happy to show off some of her English and also told us (in German first which we did actually understand) that her daughter was an au pair for an American family in Conneticut. We only switched over to English for the rest of the discussion to explain to Christian where in the US that was. What was a little surprising, and now maybe a little disappointing is that in this remote place, just out side of a not so populated area as it is, there was an American girl eating lunch with a German girl speaking English. It just reminded me that summer study abroad and summer vacation tours of Europe was upon us and we were going to be once again grouped into the class of American tourist and it would be a little harder to disguise ourselves as locals. Better keep learning that German!
I was kinda dreading the ride back because I was so relaxed and new that we still had a ways to go and it was also much warmer than the ride over. Other than our week of riding bikes in Hilton Head, South Carolina last month, neither of us have done much riding the past couple years so our bums were already a little sore.
None the less we returned home, at 6:30pm and it turned out to be a very satisfying way to spend the day. Pictures of the Inn and lunch are attached.
No comments:
Post a Comment