Family, Part Won

I get the feeling that, in the USA, wheat beer is looked upon as a not very manly beer choice. I said as much to a fellow ICP student and he said “yea i suppose so. but thats because most americans are stupid, uncultured, and dont appreciate anything different other than the normal watery beer they drink called pee.” Here in Germany, manly men order wheat beers whenever they darn well feel like it. That’s the way it should be.

The last week in July, the excitement was building towards Friday, for when Mom Dad and Karin were coming to visit! They rented a car, but had no way to contact me once they were here, so we agreed to meet up on my way home from work. As in, I leave work at 4, walk down the street, and they intercept me before I get to my apartment. It worked pretty well! I could see mom’s face peering out through the window of the car from 50 yards away, and I had to chuckle. MY FAMILY’S IN TOWN!!!! (Though it’s pretty much only half of my family, I’m still pumped that they’re here.)

Salzburg!

Very first thing we did? Bakery. After a visit to my apartment to finish packing and whatnot, and sending emails to myself with a google map picture of our route to Salzburg, and copy-pasting the written directions into a note on the iPod, we ate our baked goods, and then set off. I was navigator! Since it was my iPod which had our directions. I must say, the car ride down was uneventful. After a missed exit, we didn’t have to go too far out of our way; since Salzburg is a pretty big city, there are several exits. Using my handy-dandy map app, I helped us cross the city and get to that B&B mom was looking at. WELL, the lights were off and the sign said Full Up, so no dice. We checked another cute little place, but much closer to the city center, and nobody answered the door. So we circle around to the Holiday Inn we passed on the way in. Full. Check across the street, in the Mercure. Full. BUT, there’s ANOTHER Mercure around the corner, and they have rooms available! Sweet! At this point, it was probably around 10:45 PM. Mom’s Rick Steve’s Germany book had a couple food places listed, which were open late. There was one a block-and-a-half away! YAAAY! We walk there through a light rain. This place was adorable. I wanted to take it home with me! We need cool little pubs like this back home. To heck with the sports bars. I want brick walls and wooden framing EVERYWHERE!! The tables had all been re-surfaced, but you could tell how ancient they were because the table legs looked pretty beat-up by generations of Austrians continually failing at scooting their chairs in. Their kitchen was closed. Rats! So we ordered beers. They were Lecker.

Prosting like 'muricans. Note in the background the awesome Bar decor...

Like mother, like daughter. Cursed with red cheeks.

The next day, we were going on a Sound of Music tour, and we learned that they would pick us up from the hotel if we asked them. Well, getting mom’s email account on my iPod was not working, so we sent an email through mine, thinking that if we didn’t hear back before 8 AM Saturday, that we would just go ahead and try to find parking around where the tour office is.

Gazebo!!!!!! THE Gazebo!

Saturday. Breakfast was fun. Pointing out all the german-ities about it all to the rents and the seeeester was also fun. Check out. Drive over to city center. We miss the office the first time, so we had to drive through the suuuuper skinny windy street of the altstadt to loop back around, to actually see it, then we loop around AGAIN, then dad drops us off, and goes to park somewheres. The Sound of Music Tour thing was 5 hours long and very fun! It was a super small tour, and we took it with one other couple (Jim and Tonya) who lives in Arizona. So the vehicle we used was a yellow van that screamed “BOB’S TOURS!!!” Our tour guide was a british lady named Sandra. She was very fun to listen to! We learned a ton about The Sound of Music, including the real story, fun facts about the movie (the real Maria appears in the background of one shot!), interesting things about the actors and actresses and directors and whatnot, all the while driving around and visiting recognizable spots from the movie. One stop was the lake that was behind the house in the movie (the real house did NOT have a lake!), the gravel path where the bus dropped Maria/Julie Andrews off, a field where we could spin if we wanted to, a luge track (? FUN!!), a stop to get soup (where the view would have been amazing, if it hadn’t been rainy cold and cloudy and misty everywhere in the mountains), the church in the movie where they got hitched (but not in real life… that place is off-limits to tourists), and a dirndl and lederhosen shop! Karin bought her dirndl there, but I didn’t because there was a gorgeous one in Nürnberg that I saw when the boys were getting their L-hosen, and I want THAT one. We had a marvelous time! Though we did run late, almost too late; Sandra had to apologize over and over to somebody squawking (By the way, that might be the first time in my entire life that I have typed or written the word squawk. Funny word.) at her over the phone. We walked through some sort of garden, and over the river and up the street towards the car.

THE REASON FOR THIS PICTURE: Lederhosen man in the background.
Awesome.

So, Saturday afternoon, we set off towards Füssen and the castles! We find the highway, and start going west. The road maps were no help at all. At an exit, we try to raid an information booth, but it was barren of helpful infos. Luckily it was next to a burger king. LUNCH! We make a pit stop further on, and kauf (buy) this super sweet road map of Germany. Altogether, we decide to drive through Munich over to route 17, which is the Romantic Road. I was reading my book all through Munich, and it sounded very harrowing, navigating only using the maps. By this point, mom was lamenting that she had turned down the chance for a gps. Oh man, could we have certainly used that!!! But anyways, we finally get to Füssen, and their informational booth has information on local lodging and a telephone so you could call them and ask about rooms. WELL. A bunch were full up, and a couple had only ONE double room, and FINALLY, we found a place that had a room for four peeps. “Would you like to make a reservation?” “YES PLEASE!” Since I had no map in my iPod for Füssen (there exists no such map for this app), I took a picture of the map that the booth provided, and tried to use that to navigate over to the hotel. Well, this map doesn’t denote which roads are only walking paths, and roads aren’t prominently marked with their names, so after turning around twice (or was it three times? Can’t remember..), we finally pull up and check in and relax. Earlier, looking for a car-tastic path to this hotel, we drove by the restaurant that Tonya and Jim had recommended, so we decided to walk there and eat, make merry, and then go to sleep.