Help! We’re far behind on the blog and need to catch up! We’ve spent the last week and a half or so in Nuertingen and then our final stop in Western Europe, Berlin.
Nuertingen is definitely not somewhere that most people visit, but it was such a cute little town and we have friends there. Kersten and Michael Haussman are friends that we met in Koh Phanang, Thailand over three years ago. We kept in touch over Facebook and when we told them that we were going to be in Germany they put us up for a few days and it was so good to see them.
When we got there, they had a great little note on the pillow welcoming us to Bed and Breakfast Haussman and encouraging us to ask for any help that we needed at reception.
Neurtingen is outside of Stuttgart, so we spent some time exploring there when the Haussman’s went to a wedding, but our favorite day had to be the “subben”.
Nuertingen is landlocked, but believe it or not, they have a local surf shop… on the river. “Subben” is German for paddle-boarding, and the Haussman’s friend Rolf rented five boards for the group of friends. There was probably 10 of us sharing and splitting time with the boards, but we had a lot of fun.
There were other people on the river skulling. You might recognize it from the Olympics. They have long, thin boats with many people rowing. As you might imagine, they don’t exactly like that they’re now sharing the river with the paddle-boarders. Kerstin and Semi actually collided with one of them!
We stayed in the Friedrichshain neighborhood of Berlin, which was on the eastern side of the Wall. Berlin oozes history. The recently completed Holocaust Memorial is really well done and the city is mending itself back together post reconciliation. The Branderburger Gate was impressive, and while I’ll never forget seeing the place Hitler died, it wasn’t all that much to look at. Hitler’s Bunker is now a parking lot.
The people of Berlin are quite interesting though. It’s very much an alternative city with lots of art, organic food and hipsters.
If we can get this blog posted soon, we will actually be caught up, as we left Berlin this morning with the intention of getting to Krakow, Poland.
Instead, we got kicked off the train when we learned the Eurail doesn’t work in Poland, even though it’s mapped on our “Eurail Map”. Grr…
Right now, we’re doubling back, on a train to Dresden, Germany and likely to go to Prague tomorrow. Krakow will have to wait. (They’re sooooo disappointed).
Also, Bryan wrote a new feature for the blog….click view all for pictures.
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