July 31

Ben and I were able to sleep in relatively late, but we knew we must leave the apartment shortly after 11:00 am to ensure that we meet Tiff. We weren’t sure what train she would be on, but she told us check out from her hotel was 11:00 am and she planned on getting her money’s worth. Once we arrived at the train station after another twenty-five minute walk from the apartment, we found the first train that would be arriving from Stuttgart. We still had another half hour to wait before that train arrived, and we didn’t even know if Tiff was going to be on it. Luckily, as Ben and I split up to sift through all the people getting off both sides of the train, we found Tiff. However, we didn’t find her in very good shape. Apparently, she had tripped while boarding the train because her many bags had blocked her view of the gap between the train and the platform. She had a good sized scrape on her leg and a pretty decent limp. Unfortunately, we still had to walk all the way back to our apartment to drop off Tiff’s stuff before coming back to the train station. We dispersed Tiff’s load among the three of us and got back to the apartment about a half hour later. From there we dropped everything on the floor and walked back to the train station. On our way, we passed the Doner Kabob place to which we had eaten with Mark. We wanted to show Tiff how awesome the Yufka Doner (#3 on the menu) was and we were all hungry. I walked in like a pro ready to order. I pointed to the board and said the German word for “three.” Unfortunately, he thought I wanted three #1’s. The end result was that we all got a small Kabob Doner instead of the good one. Needless to say, they were still tasty and held us over until we got to Tubingen.

Tubingen was a nice little tourist town which is highly regarded by the locals. When we arrived, the first thing we did was find a park and take a nap. About an hour later, refreshed, we started walking around to see the sights. Of course, there was the town cathedral and a castle to check out, but the main attraction may have been the cheap ice cream. As we walked down the main street, we recognized that nearly every other person held an ice cone. Tiff and I were both thinking the same thing. Once we found the ice cream store, we struggled to order due to our lack of German and a huge selection. We were ecstatic to find that the large cone only cost 0.80 Euro. As soon as we had finished our first cone, we had already planned the ice cream shop into our return trip. Tubingen was a nice town, but it wasn’t anything that you could really spend an entire day at unless you wanted to go to all the museums and shops along the way. We stayed from about 2:00 pm until 8:00 pm. Our next step was to catch the next train to Stuttgart to try our hand at meeting Sarah even though we didn’t have a cell phone. We had told her the day before to meet us at the same bar that we had started at the previous night. We told her that we would be there around 10:00 pm and would just wait for her. Once we got to the bar, we found a nice place to sit on the concrete and began to wait. The nights attendance had increased by fivefold since it was now Friday night instead of Wednesday. This made our search a little more difficult. After waiting for Sarah for over an hour and a half, we decided to call it quits for the night and head home. By the time we arrived back in Reutlingen, it had already been after 1:00 am. As we were walking to the apartment, I couldn’t help but think how delicious a Yufka Doner would taste at that moment. Although I was certain they would be closed that late into the night, we did have to walk right by the place to get back. Imagine my delight when the restaurant’s Kabob stick was still turning as we walked by. I order one, and this time, ordered correctly. I’m sure eating two Doners in one day is completely unhealthy, but I think I can work it off over the next couple days.

August 1

I woke up at around 8:00 am and began doing some preparations for the next few days on the computer. I let Ben and Tiff sleep until 10:30 am, yet they still complained having to wake up. We had decided the night before that we would go to Nuremburg in the morning. However, the morning quickly gave way to afternoon before we had finally boarded the train. We didn’t end up arriving until after 2:00 pm. We arrived in Nuremburg with no idea of what to expect or to do. We were pleasantly surprised to learn that the city had a festival going on at the time, so the entire city was crawling with people. You couldn’t walk anywhere without seeing street musicians, food booths, or attractions. We picked up a map from the information booth and immediately began to plan a tour around the city. There were many museums, cathedrals, and, of course, a castle. Along with all the events from the festival, there was no shortage of things to do; only a shortage of time. The last train to Stuttgart left at 8:30, so we would have to hurry. The castle was on the opposite corner of town, so it looked as though we wouldn’t be missing much on our way there and back. Among the highlights from our short stay in Nuremburg was the statue of Ludwig von Beethoven, the castle, and watching Tiff try to run down the hill by the castle. We had taken a path around the castle that seemed seldom use. When it ended, there was a steep hill down to the main path. Ben and I made it just fine in our tennis shoes, but Tiff struggled in her flip flops. Fortunately, there was a tree half way down that broke her fall. Then, at the bottom of the hill, there was a fence guarding a two story drop that broke her descent.

We ended up making our way back to the train station a bit early and found an earlier train back to Stuttgart. When we arrived in Stuttgart, we had about twenty minutes until our train to Reutlingen. We had told Sarah via email that we wanted to hang out with her again and that we would be in Stuttgart that night. Since we hadn’t heard from her, I decided to try my luck with the payphone. It was good to hear her voice, but I was disappointed that she had invited us to her house and we didn’t get the message in time. I ran out of change before our conversation had completed, but I told her I would email her again when I got back to the apartment. I did send the email, and then went directly to bed. We had another long day ahead of us and it seemed that we had started a vicious cycle of coming home late and waking up with most of the morning expired. We were going to try to get up early to go to Munich in the morning.

August 2

(11:30) I woke up at 6:30 am. I told the other two that I was waking up at 7:00 am to go to Munich, and if they weren’t ready, I would just go by myself. Since I had another half hour to sleep, I rolled over and fell asleep. Five minutes later, I woke up at 8:45 am. I got up quickly and checked the train schedule with the computer to find the quickest way to Munich. I found out that we could make it by 12:30 pm if we hurried to the train station by 9:43 am. I got everyone up and told them when we needed to be walking out the door in order to make it on time. We ended up leaving about five minutes late, and when we walked outside, we realized that it was raining. Ben and Tiff ran back into the apartment to get their raincoats, and I my umbrella. However, by the time we had reached the road, the rain had almost completely stopped already. I led the way, keeping a pace that occasionally caused Tiff to run to keep up. It was a good thing we did go quickly, because we got to the train station at 9:44 am, but the train was still loading. I got to the train about fifty yards ahead of Ben and a hundred ahead of Tiff. The whistle had already blown which meant the door would be closing in mere seconds. I stood in a doorway to hopefully get the train to delay a few more seconds. It was at that point that I began to wonder what Munich would be like by myself. However, Tiff kicked it into another gear and was able to sprint to the train in time. We had a detailed train itinerary to follow in order to get to Munich, which included two five-minute changeovers. We made it to the first one only after another sprint to the finish line, but the second was completely stress free. We are now on the hour and a half long train to Munich. If all goes as planned, we will arrive in Munich at 12:30 pm.

(7:50) We arrived in Munich as scheduled. The day was filled with most of the usual things; cathedrals, impressive buildings, statues and art, etc. The highlight was probably our stop at the Haufbrauhaus brewery. There, in typical Bavarian form, many of the workers (and the live music) were wearing lederhosen. They served beer there by the liter. I was too cheap to afford one, but Ben and Tiff both tried a glass. During the hour or so that it took Ben to finish his liter, we managed to spark up conversation with two American, middle-aged ladies. One was from San Diego and the other from Washington D.C. I believe I heard them say that they were sisters. Their interesting story was that they were partaking in a special type of trip where the members of their group turned over all their planning to a special trip advisor that only tells them where they are going a day or two in advance. In fact, they didn’t even find out where their original destination would be until three days before their flight. At each new destination, they were required to do certain tasks in a type of scavenger hunt. Each task required a thirty second video as proof. This was a pretty interesting concept which seemed like an exciting way to tour Europe.

Another highlight seemed to be the food. We stumbled upon a small area that was like a mini Chinatown. Ben had asked the information booth of a Chinese restaurant nearby and was directed to a nice Chinese restaurant. We got there at the heart of lunch time but found it odd that there was no one in the entire restaurant. When we sat down in our window seats, we knew why. The prices were quite ridiculous. Ben actually tried to order something, but was then told that that price was only valid on a certain day. He seemed a little relieved because he was already kicking himself for paying that much for a meal. I didn’t plan on eating anyway since I had already had a pretzel and an ice cream cone during our walk through the massive train station. I then spotted a China Express restaurant across the street, so we got up and left the table without ordering. When we got across the street, it was a thrill to see the sign that read “All you can eat!” This was the first all-you-can-eat buffet we have seen thus far, and, unfortunately, I was too full to get my money’s worth. I let them order and then went to McDonald’s to get something off the Euro menu. I met them back at the restaurant, allowed them to finish, and then we started walking around the city. We made our rounds and got back to the train station around 5:00 pm. We were all willing to head home a little early to get caught up with everything. We need to update pictures and our parents, clean up a little, do laundry, plan our next couple days, and somehow get to bed early enough to wake up on time for once.

(22:30) We made it to the apartment after stopping for another Yufka Doner and battling the rain for the entire walk. I was happy that it was raining when we walked out the door that morning otherwise I would never have brought the umbrella along. I’m also glad that I kept that umbrella I had found in Switzerland. I guess I learned that lesson after the first time I threw away an umbrella I had found in London. When we got back to the apartment, I simply uploaded all the pictures that Tiff had taken on my camera during the day, talked to my parents on Skype, and took a shower. I guess the nap I took on the train earlier didn’t last long enough because I am ready for bed already.