Spending My Days: Familie Besucht Deutschland

Our second set of visitors have come and gone. We had a great time showing my in-laws around Germany this past week. We were able to fit in a few day trips & enjoy lots of quality time playing Apples to Apples, spoiling our puppy (who has been by my side, none-stop for the last 48 hours) and binge-watching Netflix together.

Forcing them to adjust to the time-zone, we woke up first thing Saturday morning and headed to Bad Dürkheim, a quick stop on our way to Heidelberg. We stopped on our way out of town and introduced them to the wonders that are German baked goods. To say it was love at first taste would, I believe, be a very accurate statement. My brother-in-law asked us if they shipped to the States.

Exploring the beautiful town of Bad Dürkheim.

We hit the ground running. We took my in-laws to a small traditional German restaurant for lunch. This particular restaurant offered menus only in German. Daniel and I worked to translate what we could & helped everyone decide what they wanted to order, including reminding them that you needed to ask for STILL water if you didn't want bubbles in your water. We proceeded to use our developing German vocabulary to place everyone's orders.

Not even 45 minutes past Bad Dürkheim. The flea market was huge and boasted a wide variety of items at low price points, just the way I like them rkheim, we arrived in Heidelberg, Germany. We carefully parked our barrowed mini-van (side note: driving a mini-van around Germany - an adventure in and of itself) in a packing garage and trekked up to the castle.

Selfie-stick for the win

The girls in front of Heidelberg Castle.

Brothers.

Siblings. Brothers will be brothers.

"Castle Illumination"

Since the illumination couldn't start until it was dark & it doesn't get dark here till after 10:00 PM, you can imagine how ready to get home we all were - especially those who had traveled across an ocean and a time zone change the day before.

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On our way to Luxembourg we detoured through Trier - "The Oldest City in Germany"

Porta Nigra

Introducing the in-laws to our favorite tour guide & good friend, Rick Steeves.

Exploring the Roman Baths.

Just outside the city walls is the Roman Amphitheater.

You can't even imagine just how many "Gladiator" quotes made it into the day.

The Cathedral

Driving another 30ish minutes we crossed the border into Luxembourg. We didn't take time to explore the city, but instead headed straight for the American Military Cemetery & Memorial.