It has been too long since I have posted anything on my blog. Sorry about that. Life has been running at 160.93kmp (100mph). Last week we celebrated Michael's birthday in Schloß Wernigerode where I spent the time taking advantage of the really long magic hour lighting. For awesome reasons, since we are so far north, magic hour lasts for a long time. This is fantastic for me.
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This weekend we decided to tour Southern Germany, see castles and go to Liechtenstein, a country none of us had been to. Every day, we encountered trials that made our quest to get to Liechtenstein something I will not soon forget. We spent many hours in train stations, we slept in a parking garage, and we missed a train in Austria. All on our way to Liechtenstein.
Our journey had the promise of being epic. Castles, Kingdoms (okay Principality) and giant mountains we just some of the things we had planned. But we got more adventure than we planned. The first day we were supposed to be in Rothenburg, a fun Renaissance Era town on the first day of break. Only problem is that we forgot which day we considered the first day of break. We ended up missing out on that day, but all's well that ends well. One of the students at Friedensau was driving his car down in the region of Heidelberg, where we were intending to go next. Since we essentially just skipped a day, it was either ride the train to Heidelberg or get a ride in the car. Of course we took the car. We got to hang out more, see different parts of the country and we got there loads faster. This was only the beginning of our adventure, but the miscalculation of Rothenburg was a foreshadowing of things to come.
We went into this trip with only limited plans. We wanted to decide most of what we were going to do when we got to a location. This was both the best way and the worst way to go. We have a lot more life experiences learned, and we also have a way better story than if we had just planned it the regular way.
In Heidelberg we walked around the city that night. We had planned a night and a day in this awesome city so the first night there was our night time exploration through the city. We knew that Heidelberg had a cool castle so of course we went to look for it. As it turns out it is a massive compound on the mountain ominously imposing its presence on the city below. This made it no puzzle to find. We explored this expansive estate for quite some time before heading back. The next morning we were in no hurry to leave the hostel so we slept in. We had only a guess of how little sleep we were going to get the next night. That day we explored the mountain opposite the castle. On said mountain, there is a giant park to wander in for hours. This alluded to the many hours spent taking pictures and having a grand time. We discovered the ruins to an old monastery, a giant Nazi Propaganda amphitheater (and when I mean giant, it was expansive. Those guys never did anything unimposing), and many trails to just walk through. Since even Heidelberg, in one of the southern states, is still fairly far north compared to where I have been before, the sun goes down early. So while it was afternoon, we still had time to explore Heidelberg at night. We had several hours to kill so after walking around we hung out in a coffee shop, where in addition to having yummy coffee, I had my first waffle of my European adventure. I was beside myself. On a side note: I ordered this all in German, but when they asked me something I responded using the word "just". They then replied to everything else in English. So demoralizing.
Eventually it was time for us to head to the Hauptbahnhof (Main train station) and wait for our train. We thought we were only going to wait about twenty to thirty minutes, but because we didn't officially plan anything, we didn't know. Our quest for Liechtenstein officially began here. At the information desk we asked what the best way to get to Liechtenstein was. No help at all. The lady didn't know what Liechtenstein was. We later became 0-2 in that department. Come on guys, it's not that small of a country. It's even the richest in the world per capita. But we were not to be discouraged. Our quest was going to continue regardless. We must make it to Liechtenstein.
We spent a lot of time just hanging out in the train station, and eventually headed to Mannheim, a city north of Hamburg. We decided it was a better choice because it was bigger and would probably have a way to get to Stuttgart, where there undoubtedly was a train to the small country no information desk employee knows of. On the platform we saw a man that looked like he had nefarious intentions, and some Germany college students warned us that he was a pick pocketer. Before we could fall victim to the malefactor's dastardly deeds we departed for the other end of the platform to stay awake and with our belongings intact. The train didn't offer much respite, there were many loud individuals who spent their night inebriated in celebration of the day's holiday. Finally we made it to a town that said their was a train to Stuttgart. The town was Neckeralz. Good luck finding it on a map. If the Bahnhof is any indication, it isn''t a very big city. We had been sleeping in shifts so that one person was not stuck with watching the stuff and making sure we made our connections. When we got to Neckeralz it was my turn to stay awake. We had all decided to sleep in the ground level of a parking garage, well they did, I decided to stay awake. This became a very good life choice as it rained for most of our stay there. While it didn't keep us any warmer, it did keep us dry. If the temperature was over 40 degrees Fahrenheit I will be a monkey's uncle. And speaking of the animal kingdom, we ended up spending a small portion of our night with a weasel. After the longest and potentially coldest 3 hour watch period I have ever done, the train came. 6:15 AM. We had braved the night. Naturally I got on the train and fell asleep. Until Stuttgart.
Our crazy night was an indication of just how far we were willing to go to get to this small country. We didn't know what lay ahead. But we knew what was behind us, and what was ahead couldn't be as dramatic. Or so we thought. All we had to do was get to Stuttgart. Surely they had a direct train to where we wanted to go.
For more on this story read The Quest of Liechtenstein: Part 2 - 14 Hours later and we are in…Switzerland.
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