Tuesday, July 09, 2013

Arrivederche--Planes, Trains, Automobiles and Boats.

The morning started EARLY as we had to catch a 6:45 boat to take us to the airport for our flight to Munich so we could drive to Salzberg with a stop at Lake Chiemsee to take a boat to Herrenchiemsee castle.

As I write this I'm sitting in a laundromat waiting for our wash to finish. We timed it perfectly... except our sweaty clothes are taking more time to get clean than the washer timer originally anticipated. And the laundromat closes 30 minutes earlier than we had been told. I'd tell my family that I won't be back soon but my phone was almost dead so I brought Courtney's. But I forgot to get her password so can't make any calls. And my iPad wasn't set up with roaming service.

We may be taking a weeks worth of laundry for six people home to our hotel and hanging it out to dry!!

But you wouldn't believe the view from the laundry window! It's really not fair to call it a laundromat because that conjures visions of a place you're not happy to be. Where I am is breathtaking. In fact, I might move here someday and sit in this same spot typing on my iPad, writing a book. It's that inspiring. And the bonus is our clothes are getting clean at the same time!

Landing in Munich was a little bit like landing back in the United States. The cars were a more familiar size. (We are not saying "weird" or "strange" on this trip. Only, "that's different than I'm used to" or "I find it interesting that...") The airport and surrounding buildings were also very modern. For the week we were in Italy, Valeria, would call anything built after the 1800's "mo-deRn."

K. It's 8:30. All but one load is in the drier. Lets hope they don't come to close it for a bit. Sign on door says it closes at 8:30--actually says 20:30--but Internet said 9:00. I think 30 minutes might be all I need in these large driers. And I know "bitte" means "please" so I have one word to work with. Thing that's disturbing me most is I only have 8% battery left on my iPad!

We picked up our 9-passenger Mercedes minivan (think FedEx truck) and headed out on the Autobahn towards Salzburg. Actually we weren't sure if it was the Autobahn or not. Is it a name for just one road? And, are there rules on the Autobahn we should be aware of? As cars zipped past us going at least 90, we decided we had to be on the Autobahn. Wikipedia gave us all the answers and we figured out its the whole freeway system in Germany. Dan so wished he was in his car and not the FedEx van.

But With Chris and Nick both saying, "Faster, Dad, Please!" He got our rental up to 100 (160 km)!

The countryside we drove through is beautiful. Green rolling hills with steep, jagged mountains in back. It looks like the grass runs up the mountains until the pines take over. Very "Heidi" and "Sound of music."

Lake Chiemsee was clearly a destination resort. Lots of sailboats out on the lake and bikers of all ages out riding.

Herrenchiemsee was built by King Edward II and patterned after Versailles. Nearly exactly. Except that he ran out of money and couldn't finish it. The neat thing about the tour was it wasn't crowded at all so it was like seeing Versailles without the hoardes of people.

The kids had pretzels but were wanting more food. And Marty had seen a Burger King on the way into town. So yes, we stopped. And to be honest it was a little bit of a treat. Sad, but true. Mostly because we've had so much pizza, pasta and mozzarella cheese, it was nice to have something different.

Our hotel is in Berchtesgaden, as I said earlier, in the mountains. A little but like Snowbird. The air is crisp and clear. Wildflowers are everywhere. I'm sure edelweiss is there too. The kids all swam when we got here in the big indoor/outdoor pool.

At dinner, Dan tried Schnitzel and Courtney had sausage and pretzels. Marty and Nick had rib eyes. Chris and I had ober€pul (or something like that)--giant hamburgers.

I ended up going going to do the laundry but everyone said the whole restaurant was staring at them. Like blatant staring. We're not quite sure why. Four kids? English-speaking? A family sitting in a biergarten? Not sure.

We ended the evening (after getting all the laundry replaced and put away) watching The Regular Show and Psych. Dan was able to hook up the iPods to the TV with the HDMI converter. One of the many reasons the kids love their Dad. Tech genius.

 

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I did laundry today. In your laundry room. Really? Did you get the van up to 100 mph? Beautiful pics!