freiburg

find more photos here: Flickr Album

We just got back from a quick trip to Freiburg, Germany. My (Mexican) friend Rocio used to live there, and her husband’s family still has an apartment there. She invited us to go with her and stay at her place for the weekend (gracias Rocio).

Freiburg is a small city, very lively and friendly and eco and multicultural (all of it due mostly to the university). We left on Friday night (aug 8) and although we could have saved a bit of money and gone with a “carpool-carsharing” system that is very popular around here, we opted to travel by train. It just made me feel safer than going on a car with a driver i don’t know, and who drives god know how fast, and… what if I get nauseus? Or I have to go the toilette?… so we ended up getting direct train tickets from Zurich to Freiburg, which in the end were not direct, as there was some problem with the train and we still had to change trains in Basel. But we made it in under 2 hours still.

We arrived Friday night and walked around a bit. Rocio showed us around the neighborhood and told is stories about her life as a student there). The next day we woke up early and headed for the Cathedral. There’s a market on the cathedral square every day, except Sundays, so this was our only chance to go. The market was lively, and with lots of local produce and flowers! Not to mention food… mmm. We had some wurst (susages) and spätzle (some traditional german pasta). Then, after going in the cathedral, we headed for a walk of the old town. There are little channels filled with water from the river that run on the streets of the old town called bächle They have been there since medieval times, supposedly to keep the city cool, as a water source for the animals and as a way to put out fires. Now they are mostly to keep the city cool, for kids to play in, for tourists to soak their feet in, and for the occasional foot-in-the-water accident (it is said that if you accidentally fall into a Bächle you will marry a local).

As usual, we walked a lot. This is what you do when you travel: you get on the train, sit for an hour or two, get to your destination and walk for hours! Walk around town, around a lake, around a forest, around a garden… Then you get back on the train and go home. We took it slow this time, since the pace was dictated by my belly and my aching feet. We visited a couple of museums, and a couple of churches (also typical day-trip itinerary). Then we met with Rocio for dinner at a beer garden/brewery. Afterwards we walked some more! (to see the spots we missed and that only a local could show us). Then we spent a bit of time at the Winekost, the wine tasting mini-fest on the cathedral square. After that, we were ready to go to bed, around midnight.

On Sunday we walked to the Schlossberg, a little mountain on the edge of town, where you can get an awesome view of the city and actually experience the back forest beauty. It was a long walk, with lots of stairs and hills. We had to stop several times for me to rest and catch my breath, but we eventually made it (45 minutes, some hills and almost 300 steps to get to the tower PLUS a more steps to get to the top of the 30 m high platform).

The view was amazing an the walk was quite an appetite building workout, so from there we headed to a kebab place, highly recommended by Rocio. Turns out the kebabs were closed, and although we waited for 30 minutes for them to open, we were just too hungry and ended up having lunch down the street. Gera and I were glad we did, because we got to try “Flammkuchen”, a pizza-like dish traditional in the area. It is like a very thin-crust pizza, with a cream sause (instead of tomato) and varied toppings, the classic being bacon and onions. Very tasty!

From there we headed to Titisee, a very picturesque (and touristy) lake, with lots of cuckoo clocks chops, lost of people and a nice place to swim (but we didn’t). After laying down for about 30 mins and walking a bit around the lake for a while, it was time to go back to freiburg, where we would meet with Rocio again for dinner and then head back to Zurich. This time we did experience the famous kebabs, which were good, but I guess our expectations were high after so much build up.

Later we said goodbye to Rocio and Freiburg, and after patching up some postcards with stamps trying to make sure they made it to their destination, we boarded our train back to Zurich. (we initially placed a .45 euro stamp on the postcards, and they needed 1 euro, so we bought several other smaller stamps to cover the missing postage, and ended up covering parts of the text in the postcard and some having about 40 cents too much postage).

I know I promised baby and belly pics, but since my next appointment is next week, I’ll just wait ‘til after it so I can have one more sonogram to add to the post. Unitl next time, don’t forget to comment!

constance & Gera's Birthday

photos HERE

Last weekend was Gera's birthday, and to celebrate we went to the city of Konstanz in Germany (almost on the border with Switzerland). We have been wanting to go there for a while because we knew it would make a nice day trip, so this was the perfect occasion.

I must start by saying that this was probably the worst trip we've had in all our time of Europe sightseeing. It started badly and only went downhill from there. Dont get me wrong, Konstanz was a very nice place, and the Island of Mainau nearby was very pretty too, and we couldn't have asked for better weather... but... it was just a bad trip.

(9am) It all started when we arrived to the tram station only to see our tram leaving... ok. we'll just wait for the next one.
10 minutes later we're leaving on the "new" tram, when Gera asks "did you pack our passports?"..... "no".
We get off the tram at the next stop and WALK home to get the passports (and our stash of Euros, which we had also forgotten). By now we missed the direct train we wanted to catch, but we could make another one that left 30 minutes later but it was not direct. (9:37) Since we still had to buy the tickets, we BARELY made it to the train... (on hindsight it could have been worse).

We finally arrived to Konstanz (11am) and started walking. Kosntanz is the type of town where there isn't much else to do but walk, so we walked for a couple of hours, until we were tired and hungry. We stopped to eat at a restaurant we found on our way (which turned out to be very good, so there again, things could have been worse).

So with our bellies full and our bladders empty, we headed north towards the island of Mainau (a green paradise). According to the guide I had printed, you could walk there. so we walked and walked. And since we had crossed a bridge at one point, we thought we were ALREADY on the Island.... but something was off, and the map of the island did not make sense... weird. But we kept walking along the shore line and came across a couple of bathing areas. Nice. Kept walking. At one point we came to the conclusion we were NOT on Mainau yet, and somehow we were lost.

We walked some more trying to get to a bus station, or a ferry port. We eventually got to a ferry port, where they had a map and there we realized how much we'd walked and how more we still had to go. We boarded a ferry (after buying a one-way ticket) thinking it would take us to Mainau (or to Konstanz where we could catch a ferry to Mainau). We just wanted to stop walking... Turns out the ferry took us across the lake to another town... so we quickly got off the boat, bought another ticket and got back on. Then we ended up again in the same place. Then we took a bus and after changing buses once, we were finally in Mainau. (5pm) Only 3 hours after setting out on foot).

Mainau was a very nice place, but after going through so much just to get there, it was nothing more than a glorified city garden. We were charged 1/2 price for the entrance because it was so late (another good thing). Once there, the map we had made perfect sense! We saw some plants, tulips, fountains and butterflies. It was all very pretty but we were so very tired... and then we were looking for an ice cream place and found none... Another thing that happened here was that Gera lost his return train ticket (he had it in his pocket, and then he didnt). Finally we left Mainau and took a bus back to Konstanz's main station, but since we werent sure the bus went all the way to the city center, we got off at a point were we recognized the area and could walk. Then we saw the bus keep going in the same direction as us... oh well...

So we ended up doing some more walking, but that gave us a chance to find an ice cream place. (7:40pm) We got to the train station and after Gera bought another ticket we found out that the last direct train to Zurich had left like 45 minutes ago. There were no more trains to Zurich for the day (!!), only as far as Wintherthur (about 20+ minutes away). (8:00pm) Oh well... by now we just laughed at all the misfortunes... We arrived in Wintherthur and the direct train to Zurich was delayed!! OMG! will it not stop?! so we took a "regional" train that stops at every single town... so it took forever to get to zurich....
We arrived home at around 10pm. We were tired and hungry, but as I write this i i am grateful that we had good weather, good food and good sights, because things could have been a lot worse!


(the red line is what we walked, the green is the bus we took, the blue is the ferry)

On Gera's Birthday we just stayed home, resting and eating. I made him pancakes for breakfast, and a very yummy General Tso's chicken for dinner. And of course, the 3-milk cake he requested, that was the best!

Fussen Germany

Fussen Germany
Hohenschwangau & Neuschwanstein castles.

find photos HERE

Last weekend we took an impromptu trip to Germany (gotta love living in Europe!). We went to a town called Fussen (4.5 hrs by train), to visit the (very famous) nearby castles of Hohenschwangau & Neuschwanstein. Prince Ludwig II (prince of Bavaria) had a “thing” for castles, and he built a few. Then he was later declared crazy, and a day or two later was found dead (along with his psychiatrist, go figure). Neuschwanstein caslte was never finished, but it was opened to the public only a few months after he died (can you say “ka-ching!”?). It is grand and majestic, and was the inspiration for the Cinderella castle at Disney World! The other (less grand) castle of Hohenschwangau was a sort of summer residence, and that is where the prince grew up and lived.
The day we arrived was snowy and rainy, and we almost regretted going. But the second day was great and sunny, and everything looked so much prettier with all the fresh snow, we were happy we made the trip.
We took a trail up to a bridge where (according to the guidebooks) you could get a very nice view of the castle. Everythingwas white and beautiful, it looked like Narnia. We had to ignore a few warning signs and closed paths to get to the bridge. Because of all the snow the day before, some paths were closed, but people were just going through (under the fence), and so did we!. It was totally worth it!