The Girlfriends Come to Visit

Rothenburg

I am a couple of days late this week, but I was way too busy having a fun time with my girlfriends to take a couple hours out on Sunday and get to blogging.   I know you understand!


It was a fun, full and busy week!   With some stress and drama thrown in for good measure.  
Let's just get to it.....


My sister in law, Donna and two of my dearest friends, Cindy and Gigi arrived on Wednesday morning.  I picked them up at the Frankfurt Main airport.  They looked fabulous for having just arrived at 5:45 a.m. after a long, long flight.  The first thing they wanted to do was to 'freshen up' a bit, but guess what??   No hot water!   That's right...it was out again, so  they had to use cold water only.


We spent Wednesday touring Ramstein AFB and the surrounding villages.  They really tried to stay awake but I did hear some snoring coming from the back seat a few times.  Then we went home and they napped for an hour or so.  Horst and the heating guy came by and got some temporary hot water going and the heating guy promised to be back first thing in the morning to do the permanent fix.   Off we went to the Landgasthoff in Hütschenhausen for Schnitzel Abend. Okay...I 'll remind you...that means "Schnitzel Night".

We saw my friends Larry and Karma there.  They had also just had company arrive and were enjoying dinner there too.  It's such a warm, cozy, typical German place to eat.  I love it!

The next morning, we waited for the heating guy who was an hour late, but Hooray!  Hot Water!   Then we jumped in the BMW and drove over to Bingen and caught the car ferry across to Rüdesheim.  It was not my plan, but the GPS took us there and the girls were all for just going on the ferry.  If you know me, you know I can be a nervous nelly sometimes about new and unknown things, but since I had the girlfriends there egging me on, it was no sweat and actually kind of fun!  It was a cold windy day to be on the river, though!

Once off the ferry, we parked and went exploring in the town of Rüdesheim.
Remember, you can click on the pictures to make them bigger...and it's worth it :)

  It wasn't long before we were all hungry and cold and ready for somewhere warm to have lunch.  We looked at all the menus and ended up at a very nice restaurant right along the main tourist street called the Drosselgasse.

Goulash with dumplings

Potato soup with a roll

We started our feast with a round of Heisse Shokoladen (hot chocolates)  and then had a wonderful lunch.  

Späetzle

Gigi, Cindy and Donna with their new furry scarves

After lunch we did a bit more shopping and then headed for the boat dock to catch the boat that would take us down the most scenic portion of the Rhine River.  

Bacharach

We spent about an hour and a half on the boat and passed many castles and quaint little towns.  It was so cold and windy, we spent most of the time inside, but the boat had a very nice area to sit and large windows to look out.  

We got off the boat in St. Goarhausen which wasn't a very interesting town. St Goar across the river looked much more interesting but oh well...   Anyway we walked to the train station and caught the next train back to Rüdesheim.  It took us about thirty minutes to get back to the car.

After we got back to the car, we drove up to the Niederwald monument  for a great view of the Rhine River and then drove back home.  It was a great day!

On Friday, we went to the base again and got the girls base passes, got some euros, did a little shopping in the BX and then drove about an hour up to Idar Oberstein.  I have been here a few times and it's in the blog, but I love it every time I go and it's a new experience for me each time seeing it through someone else's eyes.

We wandered through the village and then hiked up to the Felsenkirche or Church in the Rock.   They were getting ready to have a wedding there, so we couldn't spend but a few minutes looking around. 

 

Next we hiked up to the Burg Oberstein.  Every time I have been here it has been closed.  This time we could actually get in to part of it and took some fun pictures. 

Me and Donna

 Then we stopped at a little souvenir shop and hiked back to the turret and then back to the village.  We had some ice cream at the Eis Cafe and did a little shopping before heading back toward home.

Our "grocery store dinner"

Filling the cart at Kaufland

On our way back, we stopped at Kaufland in Landstuhl and did a little grocery shopping.  The girls bought all kinds of fun stuff for dinner and to take home to the states.  They just couldn't get enough Kinder Eggs or Happy Hippos!

The next day was Saturday and I had a big "four countries in one day" tour planned including some World War ll battlefields and cemeteries.  First stop was St. Avold, France.  It was about an hour and a half from my house.  We drove into the town and parked the car so we could walk around and do a little shopping and eating...because that's what you do when you're in France!  Oui! Oui!

St. Avold, France

Donna with her eclair

Yummo!

It was a cute little city and of course we found a couple of amazing little Boulangeries and Patisseries.  We bought tarts, eclairs, baguettes and more... 

After an hour or so in the town, we drove to the Lorraine American Cemetery and Memorial.  It is the largest American Military Cemetery in Europe.  It is the resting place of 10,487 our brave military most whom died when the U.S. 80th Infantry Division liberated the surrounding area on November 27, 1944, on it's way from the Moselle to the Rhine.

Then we pressed on down the road thru part of Luxembourg to Belgium.  We stopped at two chocolate factories in a beautiful area near Bastogne.   We were able to get to the Battle of the Bulge museum and memorial right before it closed but it was raining pretty hard and cold, so we didn't stay too long and it was getting dark.  

We were about twenty minutes out of Bastogne, which by the way is a very cute town that I really want to go back to when I have more time and it's not raining and dark, when I noticed a light on the dash.  This is when the stress and drama began...I hope you didn't think it was stress and drama between us girls!  

We tried to figure out what the light meant but since the owner's manual was in German, all I could get was that it needed to go to a BMW dealer as soon as possible.  Meantime the windshield wipers started to go really, really slow.  Then the gauges went out, then the heater didn't work.  It was blowing hot air and we couldn't turn it down and soon after that the windows no longer would go down.....did I mention hot air was blowing? 

Tired, cold, hungry....stranded!

Dinner at the truck stop

We had the worst smoker's room ever!

Just waiting for a ride home

  Well things went from bad to worse,  we ended up at an IKEA on the Belgium-Luxembourg border and then at truckstop in the middle of nowhere.  It's a long story, too long for this blog, but we ended up stranded at the truck stop/hotel unitl about 2 p.m. the next day and then we were finally rescued by the McGraths.  The poor car is still stranded in the IKEA parking lot!   

I am so glad that if the car was going to have a major malfunction, that it was when I was with my girlfriends who have been with me through thick and thin for over 20 years!  They were real troopers and never complained. They were also cool, calm and collected and tried to keep me the same.   I love those gals!

I am also so grateful for those who were so understanding and helpful when I was freaking out...Josh's dad,Darren, Marie from IKEA, of course my girls and the McGraths, who not only came to our rescue, but had a homemade dinner waiting for us as well.  I am soooo blessed to have good friends.

Well that brings us to our last day together.  SInce we lost out on one day of our planned acitviies, they had to decide whether to go to Burg Eltz or Rothenburg.   They made the wise choice and off we went to Rothenburg.  We got there about noon, parked and then went to look for a great place to eat lunch.  By now you realize that eating is really what it's all about...chuckle, chuckle!

We went to a place about a block from the square and had another fabulous meal.  We had salads, pumpkin seed soup, späetzle, flammekuchen and Cindy was the brave one and ordered a sausage trio with sauerkraut.  It was all sooooo good!

Then we spent the day shopping and shopping and taking pictures and shopping some more.

Donna must miss Pat

Cindy's new friend.

that's a lot of sausage!

Schneeballen...a famous Rothenburg pastry.

We finished up the day walking around the ramparts of this medieval city and then having some more hot chocolate, apple strudel and a warm waffle with ice cream.  Then we drove the two and half hour drive back home.

They just left this morning and I am missing them a ton already.  It was such a treat to have them here, to have pajama parties every night, watch chick flicks, eat too much, catch up on all of each other's kids and grandkids and just enjoy being together.  Thank you girls....for everything!


love and miss you all,
-corri


"I'd like to be the sort of friend that you have been to me. I'd like to be the help that you've been always glad to be; I'd like to mean as much to you each minute of the day, as you have meant, old friend of mine, to me along the way."
- Edgar A. Guest