The first place we decided to explore in Germany was the downtown of the town we live in, Bad Windsheim.
The architecture is absolutely gorgeous! I think the first thing I fell in love with was the use of color all around the town, and the overall historic feel. It is very obvious that some of these building date back centuries upon centuries, possibly even a millennium. That thought was so mind boggling to me at first, considering anything in the States is lucky to be a century or two old. But once you get passed the ancient buildings, the stores themselves are pretty basic. Clothing stores, shoe stores, restaurants, furniture stores, and even tanning salons! But the thing that stood out the most to me was how many cafe's they have here! And their cafe's are essentially a place where you can get any kind of dessert or pastry under the sun! They have them almost as much as the States has Starbucks.
Meet my favorite spot downtown! Its this little ice cream shop, Sola Luna. It sells the best Eis (which is actually more like gelato) in town, and for the cheapest price! You could get one scoop in a cup (which is plenty) for 0.60. Needless to say Jake and I visit there quite frequently :)
Shortly after our trip of exploring Bad Windsheim, we heard about a legitimate Renaissance Fair going on in a town about 45 minutes away from us. So we thought we'd check it out! It was definitely a site to see! (Sadly I didn't really take pictures of the fair itself, because we were getting stared at enough as it was) It was on the grounds of this extremely old building that we got to walk through. The stairs never seemed like they were going to stop!
The people there were so into it! Almost EVERYONE was dressed up, and they even had a little show. The food was great too! We didn't really know what to order, because everything was in German, and my 2 years of classes weren't really coming back to me, so we actually ended up ordering their version of a kids meal haha. We got a nice size sausage that was coiled into a spiraled circle, two big rolls, and a little shield! We couldn't help but just laugh it off, because the only other people with those shields were like 12 years or younger.
The next town we got to explore was a town called Rotenberg, the walled city. It's called the walled city because the city itself is actually completely surrounded by this huge wall! It even had a moat. We actually went there twice within a week. Once with Duke (who was still pretty brand new to us at the time) just to play with him outside the wall, and then another time with a group of soldiers going through this class that you have to do as a soldier when you get to a new duty station.
So in these series of pictures, we were trying to get a picture of Duke running, because his face flops SO much when he runs, but Jake would get him going, and then Duke would just face plant! hahaha It was extremely hilarious (at this time we called him our Duke of Hazard.. because he was so clumsy!) Luckily, we finally got a pretty good shot of him running so all of you can see what we see.
Here is a little better idea of the wall that I'm talking about. There were stairways all around the wall to be able to get on top of it. We were able to walk on the wall for quite a way, and see the town from a very different angle.
I've started to get a little obsession for the doors here! There are so many different styles, shapes, sizes, etc. And it just makes you wonder.. Where do they all go?!
Rotenberg is actually a beautiful city to walk through, except for when it starts to rain cats and dogs! The day we were site seeing there it was extremely overcast with light showers.. But those showers turned into buckets. We had gotten separated from most of the group, with a few people falling back to find us, only to find out we had to find our own way back to the train station by a certain time. Once we found out, we had not time to lose. We ran across what seemed like the entire town, in the pouring rain! Well with duke still being a puppy, we decided to just throw him in the backpack to get him out of the rain and so that we could move quickly. We made it to the train station with only a few minutes to spare. It was definitely and adventure!
Finally, the last noteworthy place that we have visited thus far is the Hohenzollernburg Castle! One of the main things I wanted to do once I got to Germany was visit Castle's. And although we haven't been able to visit too many, this one was still a great experience.
The cool thing about this Castle is that they have actually made it into a hotel. What a fun thing to be able to say! "Oh yeah, I stayed in a Castle this weekend" We haven't yet, but I'm sure we will sometime while we're here. They had a restaurant that we had lunch at. The food was absolutely amazing! I can't wait to visit more castles!
And there you have it! All the notable things we've done so far :) I will definitely be keeping up on the blog way more now! We will be getting our stuff finally in about a week, and then I'll have a desk to type at :)
Prayer Requests:
-Duke is still having problems potty training, especially within the past couple of days, because he is having some kind of stomach problems - please pray for his health and his obedience.
-Jake just left for the field this morning for another 2 1/2 weeks. - please pray for his time out there, and that it be successful in learning new things.
-All of our personal goods are going to arrive while Jake is away, so he wont be around to help - Please pray that I don't feel overwhelmed, and that I don't overexert my body to try and get everything done before he gets home.
Praises:
-Duke is starting to listen to commands a lot more. He knows sit, stay, get in your bed, and lay down.
-Jake has overcome the problem he was dealing with, and our communication is better than ever.
- I was having problems with depression, but I now feel like I have overcome and conquered most of those feelings.
Thanks for hanging in there. I will post again soon!
Love,
Bethany
