European Adventures: Week 2

The view of Stuttgart from the TV tower.

What a crazy week it has been! Since arriving in Europe I have spent time in 5 countries and sat on a train for about 25 hours (13 of them yesterday, that to come later). I have heard French, German, English, Italian, Luxembourgish (yes, it is a language), Spanish, Russian, Turkish, and Polish. I have eaten ice cream all but 2 days, enjoyed fresh baked breads, swiss chocolate, and choked down sparkling water. Instead of posting about everything I have done, I am going to sum up most of the week in one post.

Saturday I met up with Carolin, one of my German friends from my foreign exchange group, in Stuttgart. She showed me around, we went into the TV tower and looked out over the city. Little tidbit, the tower in Stuttgart is the oldest in the world. That evening we met up with some of her friends and went to a Simple Plan concert. I know, I went to Germany and saw an American band. ya, ya, ya.

Sunday Carolin and I took off. We visited a beautiful city, Tuebingen, Germany. There, we enjoyed the Neckar River in pedal boats (I think that is what they are called in English). We then headed for Switzerland.  Just over the Swiss border is a beautiful waterfall called Rheinfall. After visiting there, we went to Caro's apartment in Loerrach. Loerrach is a border city in the extreme southwest corner of Germany, with Switzerland and France only minutes away.We stayed here and made day trips.

Monday was spent in France. We went to Colmar France, aka Little Venice. I have never been to Venice, but if it is anything like Colmar, it is surely beautiful. We also visited the town of Mullhouse, also cool. We visited a castle that reminded me quite a bit on the outside of Old Main. Coincidence? Probably. I will let you decide, but it was so beautiful!

Tuesday we went to Basel Switzerland. Basel was really interesting. It is a big city, but within the big city, is the old city. Old towns are present in most European cities, often with buildings and churches dating back hundreds, sometimes nearly a thousand years. Some cities are a lot of fun to visit and experience this phenomenon, Basel being one of them. On Tuesday night, Carolin's friend/roommate cooked us dinner. It was amazing! For any of you who know southern Germany, we had a Maultaschen casserole. The three of us then went into Loerrach and had ice cream. (Ice cream became a daily tradition for Carolin and I :-) )  

On Wednesday, I enjoyed the drive back to Stuttgart as we stopped in Freiburg and Titisee. Freiburg is a cool old cities with some excellent shopping. Titisee is a beautiful, absolutely beautiful mountain lake in the black forest. WOW! I reminded me a lot of Bear Lake. The lake itself (though much smaller), the touristy town, the old feel; everything really was a lot like Bear Lake. Wednesday, being that we were in the black forest, there were mountains. It was so great, like clockwork, I had my sense of direction back. Without the mountains, it is nearly impossible to tell directions.

I had such a fun time traveling with Carolin! She is so amazing and so good for taking some time off of work to travel with me! It was great to have a travel buddy, especially one who speaks but German and French. She and I are studying the same thing, so I enjoyed discussing our studies and such. We also had some interesting talks about culture. It is so fun to learn about life in another place.

Sorry for the long post, next up, my crazy journey to, and time in Berlin.