Christmas in Germany - Traveling with Margaret, Part I

I'd make this all one post, but with all the pictures it would be ridiculously long and nobody would read the whole thing.

On December 26th, my entire family checked out of our hostel in Frankfurt and took the train to the Frankfurt airport, where my mom and dad hopped on a plane for a short ride across the ocean back to the Pacific Northwest. However, Margaret and I bought ourselves our first train tickets to start our own adventure - an unbelievable two weeks running around Germany. First stop: Worms.

Margaret in front of the Martin Luther
statue in Worms, where he was basically put
on trial at the "Diet of Worms." Ask Margaret
for the real details.

We saw several interesting places, including the first of many churches, some cool old city walls, and CAKE.

Next stop, same day: Mannheim!

We stopped next to a statue to see how heavy our packs were. Here, apparently, they didn't feel too heavy yet.

A nifty palace in Mannheim, supposedly the largest Baroque-style
palace in Germany.

Next and final stop, same day: Heidelberg! By the time we arrived in Heidelberg, we were tired. Our packs were heavy, and I got confused by the directions I copied to get from the train station to our hostel. Instead of a short jaunt, it turned into a 3km trudge through what turned out to be most of the main street of Heidelberg. But when we arrived, the place was super cool. The hostel is part of a bar and restaurant called the Sudpfanne Hostel. It's a bit difficult to translate, but basically a Sudpfanne is the copper top of a giant vat for brewing beer. It looks like a giant hat, which I discovered because the ceiling of the bar is made out of one. We ended up chatting with the bartender/receptionist both nights we stayed there, so we got the inside scoop on what to see and do.

Most of the city is located along the banks of the Neckar River, which flows through a valley here. However, if you want to see some cool stuff, you have to do some uphill walking. Up one side of the valley is an old castle.

That's me! The hostel is a bit closer than the tall steeple on the right.

On the other wall of the valley is a trail called the "Philosophenweg." Ask Margaret how to pronounce that; she managed to get it after several tries. It's a nice walk of varying lengths and steepness, depending on where you enter or exit the trail, and it's where great poets and authors walked or sat and gained inspiration looking across the valley at the castle and the city below.

The way up to the Philosophenweg begins with a short walk
up a narrow road.

Heidelberg also has a set of locks, and we spent several minutes fascinated by this process of lowering or raising giant barges.

This guy was super friendly. He saw us staring and smiled and
waved, and even let me take his picture!

After two days, we headed off to Freiburg, a town on the southern end of the famed Schwarzwald, or Black Forest.

If you can climb a church tower, it's usually worth it. Just be prepared to climb hundreds of steps up a sketchy spiral staircase that's really only wide enough for one person. The best part is coming down when someone is coming up. Spiral staircases have normal-sized steps on the outside, and nearly non-existent steps on the inside. It's impossible to get your foot on it on the way down, which people coming up the stairs don't seem to understand. The trick to it is that the person coming up should hug the inside of the staircase and turn sideways so the people climbing down can actually step on something. 

The view from the top of the Münster tower.

For our full day in Freiburg, we started with a hike into the forest just outside of the city, up to a viewpoint on the top of a hill. After something like 200 steps to climb up the side of the hill, we came up to the tower.

Just when you thought you'd finished climbing stairs,
you've got a ton more. Only this time it's a spiral staircase!

Totally worth it.

It was windy, so a picture with normal hair wasn't really possible.

We needed a break from all the walking on the way back down, so we found a place to sit for a few minutes. 

Human cannonballing: it's gonna be a thing.

The place was missing a couple of gargoyles,
so we thought we'd help out.

Second half of the day: a train ride into the Schwarzwald. Destination: Triberg. We wanted to get a taste of the Black Forest, and look at some handmade woodworking. Triberg was supposed to be the place. Touristy, yet charming. Home to the highest waterfall in Germany, the "House of 1000 (cuckoo) Clocks," and Black Forest Cake. Unfortunately, we spent too much time hiking in the morning to be able to see all of those things, but we tried to make the most of our time.

We were looking for any random little shop that made things by hand. We happened upon a place where the store was also the workshop. As it turned out, the owner of the shop was two days away from retiring and closing his shop after 50 years. We were able to spend over an hour chatting with him and his wife, as well as his grandson who was visiting to help him close up the shop.

Pictures of the owner from the early '80s.

The owner and his wife today. What a great guy!

Next stop: Ulm, home of the world's tallest church steeple.

Ulm is also the birthplace of Albert Einstein.

A fountain near the place he was born.

A monument to Einstein, only more of a pun.
Ein Stein = "one stone." Get it?

The world's most crooked hotel.

Just another Einstein statue. And some mad hops in the snow.

The hostel in Ulm was pretty cool. They had free tea, and the most comfortable beds I've ever slept in. Too bad we only stayed one night. But we had Berlin to visit, and New Years to celebrate!

Coming soon...Part II: Berlin and New Years, Luther's 95 Theses, Bach's grave, and more.