On the Road Again

Europe seems to have whet my appetite for travel, so I'm excited to announce my latest plans: a road trip across the United States! Join me on my journey here: http://thetravelbugbitesagain.blogspot.com

Oregon again

After 10 uneventful hours on a plane, I heaved my pack onto my back for the last time. My family and two of my favorite country bumpkins greeted me at the gate, waving mini American flags and holding a "Wellcum home too Mollalla Bethy-Lou" sign (tastefully constructed from a vacuum cleaner box - Oregonians are good recyclers). My flight had been delayed and U.S. customs took forever, so Amy and Maggie had to hang out in the airport wearing their Molalla hick costumes for a bit longer than they'd anticipated. They got plenty of odd looks, I'm told. I must say, I've missed those crazy gals.


Now that my feet are back on Oregon soil (and yes, it does feel good), I'm afraid it's time to retire this Europe blog. Thanks for following me along in my travels! Ciao!

P.S. You're welcome to visit me at my personal blog, http://www.bethanymonroe.blogspot.com/ anytime!

Last night in Europe

I'm staying in a hostel in Frankfurt tonight(with free wireless, hence the frenzy of new posts) so that I can catch my plane destined for Portland tomorrow morning. A "Corporate Challenge" of some sort drew thousands of walkers/runners to downtown Frankfurt this evening, turning the streets into a garbage dump with their piles of banana peels and empty bottles. Thankfully, I've already visited Frankfurt and wasn't planning to do any site-seeing today. The banana peels kind of ruin my chances at getting any postcard-perfect images of the city.

Berliner Mauer

Before catching a train out of Berlin today, I took a walk along the East Berlin Gallery - a mile-long portion of the Berlin Wall painted by artists (and many unnamed graffiti taggers)from around the world. The wall was torn down rapidly in 1989 and very little of it remains throughout the city, but a cobblestone line marks where it once stood.

East Berlin has been under major construction ever since the wall came down and now bears little resemblance to its days occupied by the Soviets. One of the few East Berlin symbols remaining are the pedestrian traffic lights. Named "Ampfelmann," the cheery little walk/don't walk character has a little more personality than the typical stick man version.

Smart Cars

I've been seeing these tiny transports all over Europe and finally got to ride in one a couple days ago when I caught a ride home with Anna in her new Smart Car after work (I'd been site-seeing and shopping in the city). They're not really as cramped as they look.

Like heaven on earth

This travel blog just wouldn't be complete without a post dedicated to Nutella - a lovely chocolate-hazelnut spread that Europeans eat like peanut butter. So, I'm digging back into my Europe photo archives for a visual. Between Katie, Mark and myself, I believe we polished off six jars of Nutella in our six weeks of traveling together. It was a bit of an addiction - especially for Katie, although I have little room to talk. Our favorite way to eat it was dipping stick pretzels straight into the jar. Katie even tried Nutella on broccoli and potato chips. My Nutella consumption has tapered off drastically since those first six weeks, but I do enjoy some on my morning toast when the opportunity arises. If you hadn't had the pleasure of eating Nutella yet, I highly recommend it - it's easy to find in U.S. grocery stores.

Other favorite European foods and beverages (some not so easy to find in the U.S.): gelatto, yogurt-filled Milka chocolate bars, durum kebabs (a Turkish fast-food sandwich wrap sold in stands all over Europe), Radler (half lemon-lime soda, half beer. A godsend in Bavaria - it's much less daunting than the liters of straight beer that the locals guzzle), apfelschorle (apple juice and mineral water), Mezzo Mix (cola w/orange) and Fanta (their Fanta is different - it actually tastes like fruit).

Back in Berlin

Audrey and I arrived in Berlin yesterday afternoon and parted ways for the first time in weeks – she is staying with her relatives in east Berlin and I am back with the Kasten family. On our way to Berlin, we had planned to spend a night in Hamburg but discovered that all of the hostels were booked solid. We spent a couple hours in the Hamburg train station trying to figure out where we could find a bed, thinking we might have to ride trains all night or sleep in the station. Instead, we caught a train to Lubeck and found a hostel with space, to our delight.

I’m staying with Dirk, Anna and Dirk’s two children – Sophie and Maxi. They took me to see the castles in Potsdam today. The weather is extremely hot, so we’ve spent the afternoon in the garden soaking in the sunshine and swimming in Werner and Hannelore Kastens’ (Dirk’s parents) pool next door.

Dirk and Anna both speak English (and better than they give themselves credit, I must add!), but the kids have been putting my German comprehension to the test (I’m afraid I’m doing quite poorly, but they’re patient). It’s been fun picking up words from them – and I’m a tad braver trying out my German with kids. Three-year-olds don’t notice if your grammar is horrid! And it really doesn’t take a lot of speaking skills to toss a ball, spin a top or give a high-five. I think kids have a talent for finding commonalities and breaking down cultural barriers.

She's big in Sweden . . .

Audrey has been missing her guitar during our travels, so she was happy to find that our last hostel in Sweden had one available for use in the lounge. The night we returned from the opera, she sat down and started strumming and singing. A few people drifted in and began dishing compliments, begging for more (including one of the opera singers). Soon, an audience of about 10 had gathered to hear her impromptu concert (and all from memory, I might add - she didn't bring her music). Some wanted their picture with her and some of the opera singers asked if she wrote the songs herself. When she answered no, they insisted on co-writing a song. We thought they might actually know a thing or two about songwriting since they were professional opera singers, but no such luck. After about an hour of "composing" they had come up with one verse to a song titled "Yesterday." The lyrics were pretty pathetic, but to their credit, English isn't their first language. Audrey managed to put it to music and the South Africans insist it will be a hit, but I won't be holding my breath. Still, how many Americans can say they composed a song with South African opera singers in Sweden?

A photo sampling from Sweden

I wasn't able to post photos when I had Internet access in Sweden, so here are some from the past few days. We took the bus back over the bridge into Copenhagen today and will catch a train to Germany in the morning. It's hard to believe, but I'm now entering the last week of my travels. It's gone by quickly, but at the same time it feels like forever ago that I flew out of PDX. I'm looking forward to seeing family and friends, sleeping in the same bed for more than a few nights, having a closet and clean clothes and re-introducing vegetables into my diet, to name a few. Of course, there are plenty of things I'll miss about Europe, though. But more on that later . . . here's the photo captions:

1) Picnicking in one of Malmo, Sweden's many, many parks. Audrey is shown here taking a bite out of her hefty portion of Gouda. We tried to order 50 grams of cheese from the lady at the grocery store deli, hoping that she would slice it for sandwiches. Instead, she grumpily cut us off a 150 gram block. That's a lot of cheese for two people's lunches, but we managed! The Swedes were all very friendly and helpful - with the cheese lady being the one exception.

2) The Swedish flag - isn't the blue and yellow combo striking? Yesterday was the Swede's National Day, so we saw a lot of flags around town.

3) This is actually a photo from Copenhagen last week. After the soccer game, someone dumped soap into one of the city fountains, filling it with suds. (Can you see the bubbles in the background?)

4) A family of geese swim in a castle moat in Malmo. Malmo's parks are inundated with geese.

5) Malmo's beach. The tall building you see is called the "Twisted Torso" and is Sweden's tallest building, if I remember correctly.

A night at the opera

We just got back from an incredible performance of Gershwin's American folk opera "Porgy and Bess." ("Summertime, and the livin´is ea----sy...") We happened to notice that it was playing at the opera house here in Malmo when we were walking around yesterday and inquired about tickets. We held off on buying them until we could secure a hostel for tonight and almost missed our chance. We did find a hostel with room (and just a block from the opera house!), but there was a crowd of people at the ticket booth when we got there this afternoon and we were sure it would be sold out. I´m so glad that it wasn´t, because the show was amazing. It was performed by the Cape Town Opera from South Africa and it just so happens that the cast is staying at our hostel, so we´ve been hearing little outbursts of opera singing ringing in the halls.

Soccer and Sweden

"Skandale!" was the headline emblazoned across Sunday's Danish newspapers, after the hotly controversial Danes vs. Swedes soccer game from the night before. We're not big on soccer, but after seeing all the excited fans congregating in Copenhagen, we decided we´d better go ahead and at least watch the second half on TV at our hostel. The Swedes led 3-1 going into the second half, but the Danes made a comeback and the game was tied 3-3. With only a few minutes left, the ref gave a Danish player a red card, infuriating a Danish fan who dashed onto the field and tried to punch the ref. Several of the Danish players came to the ref's rescue and the fan was escorted away. After much deliberation, the officials decided to end the game right there and give it to Sweden, 3-0. I think it will be a long time before that fan will dare show his face in public! Of course, they replayed it on TV over and over again, so we all got a good look at the culprit.

Audrey and I checked out of our hostel in Copenhagen Sunday and caught a bus to Malmo, Sweden. We hadn´t planned on coming here, but there´s a huge bridge that connects the two cities and it only takes about an hour by bus. Ahhh, the advantages of a flexible itinerary! I'm so glad we came! It's been like a vacation from our vacation, if that makes any sense. Our hostel is in a nicely-kept old house within walking distance of both the beach and downtown. It's a beautiful city full of parks and great pedestrian and bike paths. Sometimes it's nice to get out of the major cities for a few days and just relax - although we're not exactly kicking back. I think we've done even more walking here than in Copenhagen. You sure don't see many fat people here. Yesterday we even saw a giant Jazzercise-style aearobics class in the middle of a park. We're hoping to stay here one more night, but will have to find a different hostel as our current place is booked solid.

A taste of Copenhagen

Despite the prevalence of Swedish flags in my photos, I'm still in Denmark. Copenhagen's streets have been crowded with red & white-clad Danes and blue & yellow-clad Swedes all day. There's a big soccer game between Sweden and Denmark tonight. The fans drape their country's flag across their backs like capes and break into their team's fight songs and chants any chance they get. As you can see in the photos, the Swedes have taken up residence in one of Copenhagen's city squares, claiming it as their own. It's a festive atmosphere, to say the least.

Audrey and I had to check out of our hostel at 9 this morning, ditching our backpacks at a train station locker since we were homeless (beds are hard to come by due to the soccer game). Thankfully, a different hostel still had space available and allowed us to check in this afternoon, so we do have a place to lay our heads tonight. We'll be glad for a bed after all the walking we've done today.

We spent a couple hours in the Museum of Danish Resistance, an excellent exhibit about the Nazi's occupation of Denmark and the efforts of some brave Danes to thwart them. After lunch at a Turkish buffet, we walked to Christiania - a city within the city. Years ago, some homeless people moved into some abandoned naval barracks and created their own community. Christiania governs itself, independent of the city of Copenhagen (although not officially, if I understand correctly). No cars are allowed in the city and the inhabitants decide together who will be allowed to move in when others vacate. It's basically a little community of hippies (and lots of dogs running loose) complete with a few restaurants, shops, an overgrown park - and not-so-legal drugs. It's an interesting area to walk through, but not a place I'd care to stay.

Copenhagen, Denmark

Audrey and I arrived in Copenhagen yesterday after spending a night in Hamburg. Copenhagen is on the part of Denmark not attached to Europe's mainland. I fell asleep on the train and when I woke up, we were on the water - I didn't realize that ferries could carry entire trains! Copenhagen is a pleasant city with lots of bicycles and pedestrians, but it´s the most expensive place I´ve been on this entire trip. Finding affordable eateries is a challenge, so last night we settled on ordering off of the appetizer menu at a Mexican restaurant. We waited an hour and a half for our food and our waiter was less than apologetic. Audrey and I kept annalyzing what we possibly could have done wrong and we couldn't pinpoint anything. To top it off, when the waiter brought the bill he refused to let us pay separately (normally not an issue in European restaurants), insisting that he didn´t have enough change to break the 100 kroner bill I tried to give him. In American dollars, that might have been reasonable - but 100 kroner is the equivalent of about 18 U.S. dollars and he would have owed me less than half of that back.

It's a small world afterall

While approaching the entrance to Rheinfels Castle today, I spotted a blonde woman who looked strangely familiar. "No, it can't be," I tried to convince myself as I walked by, but I took a peek over my shoulder just to be certain. Sure enough: she was none other than my cousin Ruth Ann from Seattle, Washington! Ruth works for Rick Steves and is helping guide a tour group. What are the odds of us being at a castle in a tiny village along the Rhine River at the same time?!?

Rheinfels Castle, St. Goar

Oregon's scenery bears a strong resemblance to Germany's Rhine Valley, minus the centuries-old castles and villages dotting the hills along the Rhine River. Audrey and I are spending a couple nights with my friend Maggie's sister, Mandi, who lives in a small village near the Rhine. (Her husband is in the Air Force.) Today, we took a train to St. Goar and visited Rheinfels Castle, first built in the 13th century. We had fun exploring the ruins of the huge fortress - complete with dungeons, narrow underground passageways, a slaughterhouse and other not-so-Disney-Princess-friendly accommodations. One of the highlights was navigating the 3-foot-high, pitch-black tunnels beneath the castle. Surprisingly, visitors are allowed to explore without a guide. As we ducked into the passageway equipped only with my cell phone to light the way, I couldn't help but wonder how long it would take someone to notice if we were to get lost inside. Obviously, we lived to tell about it.

A Bavarian Breakfast

As much as we love the Bavarians and their culture, there are some traditions we don't mind leaving behind. Before catching a train out of Osterhofen, we were told we had to eat a traditional Bavarian breakfast served at the festival: weisswurst (white sausage), a soft pretzel and wheat beer. It wasn’t horrible, but it definitely threw off our body clocks for the rest of the day.

If there was ever any doubt, this morning proved that Bavarians are truly crazy. Hundreds of people showed up around 9 a.m. for breakfast – in spite of the festivities (and hangovers for some, I’m sure) from the night before. Audrey and I were expecting a mellower, pancake-feed-style atmosphere rather than the loud, energetic nighttime beer hall scene, but we were dead wrong. If anything, people seemed even more festive this morning – dancing on the benches as the band played traditional German beer-drinking songs along with classic rock (like “We Will Rock You” and “Sweet Home Alabama”). We’re told it’s just like Oktoberfest, only on a smaller scale. It's an experience I'd highly recommend, if you ever get the chance. (American Oktoberfests don't count - it's all too steeped in Bavarian tradition for Americans to ever come close to replicating!)

Goodbye, Osterhofen! It's been fun . . .

We said sad goodbyes to our new friends in Osterhofen today and are spending tonight in Munich. We’re heading toward the Rhine River tomorrow where we’ll stay a couple days before traveling on to Denmark. Right now I'm sitting in the lounge area of our youth hostel and the only language I hear in the background is English - and American English at that. It's a strange sound after spending a week hearing nothing but German accents. We were truly a novelty in Osterhofen - Hadde told us we were the first Americans he had ever met. Our week in Osterhofen was a trip highlight thanks to Regina and her wonderful friends and family. Here’s a few more photos of our time there . . .

#1) Picnicking along the Danube River with Regina and Melodie.

#2) Taking a boat tour on the Danube River through Regensburg, a town near Osterhofen with a history dating back to the ancient Romans.

#3) Audrey, me and Regina's dad, Wolfgang (the sun was bright - pardon the squinting). We hiked to the top of a steep hill and rode sleds on a concrete shoot to get back down (like Mt. Hood's Alpine Slide).



#4) An evening at the beer garden where Hadde works. Pictured: Regina, Audrey, Gecko, Me and Stephanie


#5) Gecko (who works as a brewer) giving us a mini brewery tour at the beer garden. Here, he's showing us the bags of malt used in the brew.


#6) Hadde, Audrey and me - listening intently (or so it appears) during Gecko's brewery tour.


#7) Willy, Audrey, me and Andreas at the top of Munich's Olympic Tower. Willy lives in Munich and is a friend of Regina, so he joined us for the evening as our "tour guide."

Loving Bavarian life

Lederhosen, dirndl dresses, oom-pa-pa music, beer maids laden with giant frothy mugs: until last night I thought it was all nothing but old-time German tradition re-enacted for tourists. But the local folk festival (one of the year's highlights, according to Regina and her friends) proved that Bavarian tradition is more than a thing of the past - it's still alive and kicking, even amongst the young, American-music-and-movie-fed generation of Bavarians. We spent last night eating roasted chicken and giant pretzels, drinking beer and linking arms with young Bavarians as they stood on benches and belted out songs. (The lederhosen-clad band even donned sombreros at one point and sang Feliz Navidad!) And we never ran into another American (or Japanese) tourist the whole night. There's nothing quite like hanging out with locals to make you feel like you're truly experiencing a culture.

Regina and her family have been wonderful hosts and she's introduced us to lots of her friends who remind each other "In English, please" when we're around so that we feel included. We're planning to catch a train heading north tomorrow, but it will be hard to leave Regina and all our new Bavarian friends.

PHOTO CAPTIONS:

1) Audrey and Stephanie (a friend of Regina) at the festival

2) Regina (doesn't she look like Snow White?) and her friend Gecko (coolest guy ever)

3) Traditionally-dressed Bavarians standing on benches and clapping along to the live band music

4) A photo from earlier this week at a fair in a nearby town.

5) Hadde, Stephanie, Andreas (Regina's boyfriend), Regina and Audrey at a bistro after an evening of bowling on Tuesday.

Surfing in the middle of a landlocked city

The sign reads "Surf-ing and bathing forbidden," but as you can see, it's not strictly enforced. We visited Englischen Garten (a huge park in Munich) yesterday, where a fast-moving river creates constant waves in a small area under the bridge. It's nothing compared to the ocean (the surfers have to go one at a time because there's not much room), but I guess you can't be too picky when you live in southern Germany.

A glimpse of Berlin

Audrey and I had our first Eurail experience yesterday taking the train from Berlin to Osterhofen (a Bavarian town), where we are staying for about a week with Regina and her family (Audrey's relatives). Regina is our age and took the week off from work so that she could show us around. But before I start posting about Osterhofen, here are a few photos from our time in Berlin . . .

First, some zoo pictures . . . (all of which are from Audrey's camera because my batteries were dead that day)


Here is Knut, the zoo's current main attraction, with his zookeeper. His twin died and Knut was rejected by his mother, so the zookeeper has become his surrogate mother/father. It's hard to get a decent photo Knut due to his constant movement and the throngs of people.


Look closely at the next photo - there's a baby clinging to this mama baboon. It was fun to watch them interact.



















This poor creature is quite possibly the zoo's ugliest inhabitant:

The next photo was taken from the top of the Berliner Dom - an old cathedral downtown. After that, we have the Reichstag = Germany's Parliament building. We took an elevator to the roof and then walked to the top of the glass dome - there's a walkway that wraps around the inside perimeter. From inside the dome, you can look out for a great view of the city or look down through the glass ceiling and see where Parliament meets (so that the people can always keep an eye on their government, they say).

Finally, we have two pictures from the Checkpoint Charlie museum. The museum sits on what was once the border between the Russian and American-occupied sections of Berlin (east and west). Before the Berlin Wall was torn down in 1989, people went to great lengths to escape from the Soviet-ruled east to the free west. Hiding inside the hood of a VW Bug was one of the many methods people used to sneak past the guards.