Advertising for the next Ladies Night: Water for Elephants (This was during Easter break though, so I was not around for it sadly)
So for our Easter break, we had nine days off. I was very excited for this, especially because I knew I would be spending Easter with the Lebers, and then the other half in the Black Forest. Before I left though, some of us girls decided to dye Easter eggs :)
And then Tuesday night after class, I hopped on the train, and Aline picked me up in Mainz. When I got there, we went to a cook-out on the Rhine River with some of her co-workers from the Hilton Hotel. I ate Wurst and Brot (sausage and bread), very typical German food :)
Wednesday we went to Mainz again to meet up with Heike, Marleen, and Marie, Aline's aunt and her two cousins. We went shopping and ate delicious lunch. I had a Caesar wrap, yum. Then that night, there was a big birthday party for two of Aline's guy friends. She had to work the night shift, 10 PM to 7 AM, but I got to stay and hang out with some of her girlfriends, Leah and Umi. It was very nice to just hang out and relax.
Thursday we decided to go to the Rhine again and lounge on the beach. The whole time I was in Dienheim, it was in the seventies, completely beautiful outside. I absolutely loved it. The beach was only rocks, no sand, so it hurt a little to walk, but still worth it. Unfortunately Aline's friend Keira lost her watch in the river though.
Friday we went Mini-golfing, and I will just say that it was quite a different experience than Mini-golf in the states. The court was very basic, and all the holes were packed together. First, it didn't matter if you went in order when you golfed. You could just go to which ever hole was open because there were so many people there. So we started at hole 17, then 18, 1, 2, 16, 15, 4, and so on. Second, you couldn't step on the green at all because they were afraid it wasn't stable enough, so you had to golf from the side. Third, the holes were a little ridiculous. Half of them were designed to only be able to make the shot in one hole. Fourth, if you didn't make it past the obstacle of a particular hole, you had to start over (we didn't always follow this rule). Fifth, if you make it up to 7 hits, which is very likely, then you're done with that hole even if you didn't make it in the hole, and that's what you get. We didn't end up finishing because we were all pretty bored, but I did end up winning :)
Saturday we lounged outside in the sun. Aline and I both ended up falling asleep, and I got burnt. But it went away quickly, and now I've got a little color in my face, so I'll definitely take it. Then that night we went out for drinks on the Rhine. We would have gone to the Disko (club), but dancing is forbidden on Easter, and since the Germans don't go out until eleven or midnight, it would have been pointless to go. But the drinks were nice, and once it got dark we went to a different cocktail bar where I got a strawberry daiquiri, yum.
And the next morning was Easter. Aline's aunt, uncles, and cousins, came for Easter brunch at the Lebers. It was absolutely amazing. There were so many types of bread, cheese, spreads, meat, fruit, sweets, and more. They really love asparagus here too. They had it wrapped up in ham on Easter. It was actually pretty tasty. I've also never gotten so much chocolate in my life. I was definitely loving my life that day :)
I just want to mention all the delicious food I ate while I was at the Lebers this last weekend. The Thursday before Easter, it is traditional to eat spinach, potatoes, and eggs for lunch. (Lunch is their biggest meal of the day.) So this is what we ate of course, and it was absolutely delicious. I didn't know I liked spinach so much. Then Friday, we had fish of course, and I also didn't know I liked fish so much. But it was very tasty fried up and with the sauce Corinna, Aline's mom, had to go with it. On Saturday we had cooked asparagus wrapped up in ham on toast, with a special cheesy sauce over the top of it. It was also absolutely amazing. I wish I had taken pictures of all the meals because they all looked just as fabulous as they tasted.
But then Monday morning, I was off to den Schwarzwald (the Black Forest). I was going to meet Lori, Mike, Emily, and Margaret. Lori and Mike were staying one night, and then Tuesday Kyle and Noelle were meeting us. Margaret was staying until Wednesday, and Emily and I were staying Monday until Thursday. It was a little confusing for the B&B owner, but it all worked out. We stayed at the Gasthaus Finken.
View from our room
We all met up in the tiny town of Oppenau. It's right in the middle of the Black Forest, and it really is extremely tiny. We only saw two other guests at our B&B while we were there.
When we got there, it was just Lori, Mike, and me, so we decided to just hang out until Margaret and Emily got there. We ate and drank outside our B&B. It was so beautiful outside; we didn't mind waiting one bit. We also went on a walk around the tiny town, and we ended up finding a park with a sweet slide. It was amazing, but also a little scary. I may or may not have screamed on the ride down the slide.
After the girls got there, we just relaxed some more because we decided we wanted to go to the Allerheiligen Water Falls the next day. During tourist season, there is a bus that takes you right there, but tourist season doesn't start until May 1 of course, five days away. So we decided to walk the 9 km instead, 5.6 miles.
We got up early, ate the delicious complimentary breakfast, which consisted of rolls, bread, various spreads, fruit, cereal, milk, tea, coffee, hot chocolate, yogurt (and more), and then we were off to explore the Black Forest. We didn't mind walking so far because it was absolutely gorgeous. There was a path that took us the entire way there. We just needed to follow the Blue Diamond signs.
Cool picture taken by Emily
Let me just tell you about this blue diamond though. We were confused because we thought the blue diamond just stood for the water falls, but it actually just stood for the path that took you to and beyond the water falls. So at one point, we ended up turning around because we got confused about these blue diamond signs. This made us walk about an extra hour more than we needed to. None of us were too pleased to find out we were mistaken.
Stupid blue diamond.
Three hours and many, many hills later we finally arrived at the Wasserfälle Allerheiligen. They weren't absolutely spectacular or anything, but they were still pretty nonetheless. After many steps, we reached the top of them and decided to rest our poor feet and eat a little.
To the Waterfalls
Convent Ruins at the top of the Falls
Since Lori and Mike had to get back early to catch their train, they decided to call a taxi to take them back to the B&B, and since my junky 13 euro sneakers weren't designed for hiking and it felt like my feet were about to fall off, it did not take any convincing for me to take the taxi back as well. Margaret and Emily, being the runners they are, walked the entire way back though.
That night Mike and Lori left, and Kyle and Noelle showed up. We just lounged around, and the next morning we took the train for an hour and half to Freudenstadt, known for having one of the biggest squares in Germany, with tons of fountains. And Margaret headed back to Marburg.
It was a little gloomy outside and a bit chilly, so we didn't enjoy it as much as we could of, but it was still a pretty town. I don't think we got to see the entire square, but what we did see we really enjoyed. We just walked around for the day, went into some shops, but mostly we just wanted to try some traditional Black Forest cake. It's chocolate cake with cherries, and some type of cream filling between layers. The cake part was pretty delicious, but we didn't enjoy the cream filling too much because it was made with alcohol, and according to Emily, "we aren't alcoholics, so it didn't really gefällt uns." Bahaha!
We speak a lot of Denglish here in Germany, Deutsch (German) and English mixed together. This sentence especially cracked us up though because Emily had written it in her journal when she was giggly/crazy from sleepiness, and when she read it out loud we couldn't stop laughing. I think we may have all been a little sleepy crazy though.
You are the salt of the earth, you are the light of the world.
And then the next day, Thursday, we were back to Marburg, but only for one night because Friday after class, Emily and I are headed to Landshut, which is about an hour away from Munich. Emily and Kelsey have friends there from their exchange program in high school though, so we're headed there until Monday to hang out. And then next Thursday, PARIS!
