Germany

The family was up at 3 am on August 3rd to go the Budapest so that the kids and I could fly to Cologne Germany to visit Claudia and Kilian Hopf. The flight was uneventful except for the cattle car loading ( yuck). We spent the rest of Saturday relaxing and going for a walk. Except for Chris and Kilian who decided to go on the bus to get an Ice Cream but didn't notice that the bus didn't return for three hours. We got "the phone call' and went and got them:-)

Sunday was fun, we drove to the River Rhine and took a boat tour which was awesome! We then drove down the river to look at the different landscape. The landscape around Cluadia's house is rolling farmland with trees, around the river it is valley walls and grape vines. We stopped at a place called Lorelei, that is named after a woman who sat on the cliffs combing her hair and lead a few ships to crash into the rocks below. On the way home we hit a traffic jam on the autobahn and so we took the back way home.

Monday was swim and go to the book store day. Nicole also picked up some shoes and a dress.
I also learned that in Germany on the three lane freeway you can't pass on the right. Interesting fact I thought!

Tuesday, we went to the Modern Germany Museum, which covers Germany from the end of WWII to the present. Even though it was all in German it was very interesting and enlightening. We then went and visited some more friends that were home for the summer from Kosice.

Wednesday was Zoo day. We took about 4 hours and wondered around Colognes very nice zoo. Then we took the gondola across the River Rhine and back. Claudia wasn't happy but she went along for the ride!

Thursday we went to the Big Catholic church in the middle of downtown Cologne. The church was building the 1500's and was the only building to survive the WWII bombings. We took the 509 steps up the tower. The only thing that was annoying was the fact that it was raining!! The inside of the Church is amazing, huge and very interesting to see. We then went to Subway for lunch and then shopped!!! The boys went to the Electronics store and the girls went shoe and clothes shopping. We met up with the boys later and on the way back to the car we picked up some Starbucks ( yummy)

Friday was another pool day but this was an inside outside pool. Claudia managed to get Nicole to really swim. The boys had a great time and the hot bubble pool was great. By the end of the 4 hours we were all wrinkles!! We went out that night for some good German food.

Saturday was return home day. I would go back to Germany to visit with Claudia and Kilian again!