Residenz Hotel Bensheim

So today we are departing Heidelberg. Last night we had our last Heidelberg beer at the Roten Oksen (The Red Ox), which in its day was Mark Twain's favorite bar. I always marvel that places like that survive the centuries- in America, we'd have knocked it down decades ago, put up a condo, and named it The Mark Twain in memoriam.

I liked Heidelberg- it's hard not to, with its stunning castle ruins hanging ...

sorry it has been so long since we have been on and updated. Payton is doing GREAT. had an unhealthy 2 weeks but all better. She had thrush which is so hard to get rid of, then another cold and ear aches. but she is all better. she weighs about 16 to 17 lbs now and is about 23 1/2 to 24 inches long. she is really starting to coo now and its so cute. she is trying to sit up on her own. we almost have a sleep pattern down :) which im super excited abou

... morning. Oh Weather.com, how you taunt me with your wildly inaccurate predictions...me and my light fall fleece thank you...

We left Bad Wimpfen this morning at 8am, and drove north up the Burgenstrasse to Heildelberg. Literally, there was a hilltop castle hanging over every town en route. It got repetitive after a while. But color me pleased with the German tourist board: when you call something the "Castle Road," you MEAN it. I do not feel cheated. Cold, maybe, but not ...

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I arrived in Basel (in Switzerland) and saw the "official" there. He then sent me to the baggage claim. They sent me back to the "official", who then informed me that since I was in Basel, Switzerland and my bags were with the German railroad, that I'd have to go to Basel, Germany (the city is split) and speak with their rail officials. So, I caught a bus back to Germany and saw the officials there. Note I said officials ...

... Christus Kirche, an old red sandstone church. Further on I reached Schlooss Johannisburg, a magnificent red sandstone castle we had seen from the river. I walked back to the ship through a nice city park along the river.
Had duck for dinner tonight. Makes you wonder about all the ducks you see swimming by the ship.

We arrived at Miltenberg and I took another walking tour. This town has a lot of the half-timbered buildings and was not damaged in WWII. It has one of the oldest operating hotels in Germany and Elvis Presley stayed there once when he was stationed in Heidelberg. This area of Germany is ...

... lastminute...managed to do it all over the phone...just the printing of the info was a bit more tricky,,,,drove around Zwingenberg and neighboring towns to find an internet caffe with a working printer! Just as we were giving up, once came to view! Phew...so got our airline details for Monday too! TG!
Also packed another box to send MORE stuff back to NZ! Sheeesh....naturally we found a few more things later on that should have ...

We had to stop in Frankfurt for a day to connect to Egypt. It seemed funny to us that in order to get from southern Africa to northern Africa we had to fly to Europe, but we made the most of it!
It was strange to be back in the cold northern hemisphere, and even stranger to see them preparing for Christmas! We were in one of the cute squares as they delivered and put up a giant Christmas tree. We sat outside at a long ...

This morning I went to see the Alte Oper- old opera house. It is built in renasainnce style and was destroyed in the second wold war, but rebuilt. The outside is as orignal as possible. but modeern on the inside. I then walked to the river and crossed over the bridge. All the museums line the other bank of the river. The first one I visited was Stadelsches Kunstinstitut- Stadel Art Institute.

... airport is big and flashy inside, with lots of security checks and business travellers. Frankfurt the city has lots of concrete and buildings. It's a "metropolitan" of sorts. Very different from Delhi. Cool, crisp, clean air. White faces and familiar accents. Tall people. A bit of a culture shock! I took a bus tour through some of the hills of Germany, past the vineyards on the mountains. We stopped at a few landmarks, and had some dinner (a big, white chicken breast ...