Germany - The Land of Castles, Vineyards, & Oktoberfest

We arrived in Bonn, Germany last Thursday (sorry it has been so long since an update, we were without Internet the last few days). We stayed with the Capps family for the weekend and also were able to spend lots of time with John. Kelly and Erin are close family friends and also youth leaders from Egypt. Since seeing them last, they have had two wonderful kids - Maren and Elias (4 & almost 2). It was so great to catch up with them, hear about life in the German culture, their work in the international church, and as parents of two energetic kids! It was so fun to play with the kids...Maren dominates at Crazy Eights and Elias loves to line things up (reminding us of Cason always parking his cars). John was a good friend from high school in Egypt and I lived with his family for awhile, so it was good to catch up with him as well.

During our time there, we were able to meet a mix of their friends. It was interesting to be back in an international group of friends, where everyone relates a bit different because everyone is from a different culture. You don't always know if you are offending someone and you don't always understand the sense of humor - but it still manages to work well and can generate some very deep, lifelong friends.

We spent one afternoon biking on the Rhine and playing on the playground. Again, it felt great to just hang out and play! We saw hot air balloons fill up and lift off in the park, fed fish, and stuffed the kids pockets with all the chestnuts that were beginning to fall. One day we went for a walk through the vineyards and saw a different side of Germany, filled with little towns nestled in the valleys. It was remote, but very beautiful. The rest of our time was spent playing games, sipping coffee, and sharing about our life!


From Bonn, we took a train to Moselkern, Germany. We knew the train station was an unmanned station, but we didn't realize just how secluded we would feel! We hiked a beautiful trail from the town, along a stream and surrounded by trees with their leaves starting to turn colors. After about 5k, we arrived at Burg Eltz, the castle pictured above. It is one of the largest and best preserved castles, I think from the 1200s. We toured the castle, heard about the families who built it, saw tons of armor and weaponry, and learned that staircases were built to wind counter-clockwise so that knights protecting the castle would always have an advantage on those attacking the castle, as all knights at this time were right-handed.

We hiked another 5k down and caught a train to St. Goar - a small town on the Rhine. We stayed in a beautiful hotel, right on the river. To walk from one end of the town to the other, only took about ten minutes! We really enjoyed being in a tiny place, it was a nice break from the big, overwhelming cities we have been in the last few weeks. We saw the world's biggest beer stein, beer steins worth over $2,000, giant cuckoo clocks, and Rheinfels Castle.

Then we took an hour boat ride down the Rhine River to another town called Bacharach. On our boat ride, we saw tons of castles built up around the river, where rulers used to demand taxes from merchant ships before letting them pass. We arrived in Bacharach and I instantly loved the town! It is known for its wine, so all of the hillsides around it are covered in vineyards, and the town itself is full of wine gardens...basically gardens covered in vines, where you can sample the local wines.

We stayed in our first and last youth hostel in this town, but it wasn't just any hostel - because it was a hostel in the town's castle! It was so cool to get to walk around the castle, stay in it, appreciate the beautiful views from every angle! The only downside - we had to climb the mountain (over 350 steps and steep hills) with our backpacks. We pretty much spent the whole hike laughing at ourselves, trying to balance going up steep hills while our backpacks were pulling us backward. It was definitely worth the hike, but probably not something we will do again.

After a few relaxing days in the seclusion of wine country, we flipped the switch and went to Oktoberfest...quite the opposite experience in every imaginable way. Think about a state fair, the SC State Fair comes to my mind, and multiply it by 10 in terms of people, rides, vendors, and more people! Then, add in 14 massive (and I mean massive) tents, filled with thousands of people...and you will have a pretty good picture of what Oktoberfest is like. You sit at long tables, squished on either side and then sitting back-to-back with someone you don't know. Everyone wants to share food, talk, sing, dance, and then "prost" (or toast) each other. So needless to say, we met some interesting people...some wanting to talk US politics, which we strategically avoided, and others just wanting us to partake in all of their traditional fun!

Now we are on the train to Switzerland, going through the Alps...so we are going to get off here and enjoy the scenery! Love to everyone!