Europe 2016 – Part 2

The drive should have taken about 5.5 hours, but since I forgotten that my GPS app was in “avoid tolls” mode, it took closer to 7. (Incidentally, little known tip: the “Here Maps” app, originally from Nokia, allows you to download detailed, turn-by-turn full country maps for offline use, so you can navigate with your phone without paying data roaming charges.) We got to Kandern late in the day on Monday, approaching from the north, and stopping immediately at the grocery store at the edge of town to buy German chocolate. Then we crossed the street to my old house, Herman Burte Strasse 1a — which looked exactly as I remembered it.
IMG_1769 IMG_1834
As we walked through town, some changes became evident, which impacted my planned tour for Nicole (which consisted largely of food stops!) The Turkish owned pub that made the unparalleled pommes frites was now apparently under Scottish ownership, and did not have fries; the hundred-year old bakery that sold amazing little brotchen was now a woman’s fashion store; the toy store in town where we wanted to souvenir shop for the kids was gone. But the Eis Cafe remained, and we had gelato and later “spaghetti ice.” My old school was right where I left it, although bigger now that the long-planned addition was complete.
Some changes were good. When we lived there, a small group of refugees lived in a building across the street from the school. Despite being a school full of missionaries and missionary kids, at the time, there was apparently no ministry to those refugees, and we’d look awkwardly across the road at each other, neither group quite belonging but despite our shared displacement, having no involvement with each other. It turns out the Turkish pub moved to a proper restaurant on the other end of town, and while we were ordering up our pommes and shawarma, we heard English being spoken by other guests, and struck up a conversation — assuming they were associated with the school. In fact, they were part of a group of believers now ministering full time to the refugees. Germany has committed to housing a million refugees from the most recent crisis, and the region around Kandern had signed up to receive 40,000 of them. New temporary housing was built on the edge of town, and the school has donated some of their dorm houses surrounding the town to the effort.
Its easy to think of the German people as being somewhat cold. I warned Nicole that we would have to communicate in German (another language I used to have some command over, but is now quite rusty) — but not for long: most Germans in town actually speak some English, but will rarely use it until you first make an attempt to speak their language. Though they may seem somewhat brusque at first, the people of this little region have long hosted the annual plague-like arrival of hundreds foreign missionary kids, and then signed up to house 40,000 refugees.
In fact, the town without the missionary kids felt a little like a movie set without the actors: dream-like and empty. With school out its just a typical little German town — that happens to be nestled on the edge of the Black Forest. Nicole and I drove up to Hochblauen, although it was too foggy to see anything, and hiked to the ruined Sausenberg Castle, where the view was considerably better. Our little Gasthaus in Schlingen was adorable, and afforded us some nice evenings quietly sipping wine and catching up on our reading. We even got in a swim at Schwimmbad before leaving town on Wednesday.
From there we wound our way to Zurich, getting a quick look around, before heading up a mountain to try to find the train to a look-out above the city. We found the train, with a great view of the Alps, but then went the wrong way, and saw some different parts of the city than we had planned! We flew out the next day, managing a few more meals based on French bread, and paying a small ransom to return the rental car in a location different from where we’d picked it up!
It was a near perfect trip, for the limited amount of time we had. We do intend to bring the kids to Europe some day — but when they’re older and can appreciate it more. For just the two of us, it was quite affordable… with 5, not so much. There’s lots more of Europe we’d like to see, but it’ll have to wait for the next trip. Hopefully that’ll be in less than 19 years!

Europe 2016 – Part 1

Nicole and I met shortly after I returned from a month-long stay in France, in 1997. Two friends, who I’d known since kindergarten, and I were part of a choir that toured France, and we arranged to head over about a week early so I could show them Kandern, Germany — the little village my family lived in when we spent a year in Germany. I was 14 when we lived there; my 9th grade year was spent at Black Forest Academy, a boarding school for missionary kids, where my parents worked for the year.
Of course I regaled Nic with stories of life there, and of the more recent trip, and as we grew closer, I promised her that one day I would take her to Europe.
I also promised her that I’d take her to Asia, and warned her that I fully expected my career to move me to the States at least once. We were 17, but she seemed interested in my big plans, and apparently decided she could put up with me for awhile…
19 years, two trips to Asia, and 3 jobs in 3 different States later, we finally pulled off the Europe trip part of that plan! The week prior, I had to participate in a conference in Orlando, so Nic took the opportunity to head to Ontario to get the kids settled in with Nana and Papa and visit her family. At the end of the week, temporarily free of kids and work responsibilities, we each made our way to the Detroit airport, meeting up just a couple hours before our direct flight to Paris. We took advantage of a status perk and spent those hours in relative luxury in the Delta Skyclub, sipping free wine and making sure our gadgets were all charged.
We landed in Paris early in the morning on Saturday. We were told we couldn’t check into our hotel until 2, but when we arrived mid-morning in our tiny rental car at our little lodging just outside the touristy part of town, our room was ready. By 2, we’d had a nap, unpacked a little, and were ready to explore. We had taken a bit of a gamble and pre-paid for a parking spot somewhere near Notre Dame (the directions weren’t super clear!) The spot turned out to be a small parking garage directly underneath the square in front of Notre Dame. After overcoming some communication challenges due to my rusted-beyond-repair French language skills, we secured our place with in/out privileges, and were well positioned to spend 2 days seeing the city.
20160618_122402699_iOS 20160618_134928926_iOS
We saw Notre Dame and the Louvre on day 1, and on day 2 walked across town to the Arc de Triomphe, stopping at a street side cafe to rest our feet and sip tea, then to the Eiffel Tower, stopping at a little bakery to carb-up. Despite being obvious tourist traps, prices were reasonable everywhere we went. We saw the Louvre for 15 euros each, went to the very top of the Eiffel Tower for 17 each. Food was, of course, great and also reasonably priced. We even took a bike rickshaw back from the Eiffel Tower for around 12 Euro. Paris isn’t the world’s cleanest city, but there’s amazing architecture and history, mixed in with the modern. Traffic was nuts, but crowds and lines were only a problem at the Eiffel Tower. Also security was elevated due to the Euro Cup, with armed soldiers posted at strategic spots throughout the city, or attentively strolling through courtyards looking for suspicious activity. None of these things were enough to detract from our stay — it was really quite beautiful and peaceful.
20160619_072917408_iOS 20160619_093053461_iOS
And 2 days was all we needed. On day 3, we drove our tiny, manual-transmission Peugot through rush-hour traffic, into the French country-side, and off toward Kandern…