Bordeaux, France

We spent a recent weekend in Bordeaux, France surrounded by its 287,000 acres of vineyards! We left late on a Friday after Jon's workday was complete and caught a plane to Bordeaux. We rented a car and drove through the windy country roads to our Bed and Breakfast outside of the city. The Bordeaux region is the world's major wine industry capital and the vineyards as far as the eye could see were proof! Upon arrival at the Chateau de Crecy, we met our hosts Martine and Bruno who were absolutely lovely. They didn't speak much English, I don't speak any French and Jon hasn't used his French skills in about 14 years. We were able to communicate enough to find a place to go to dinner, Le Caffe Cuisine in a nearby little town. We plugged the address into our GPS and set off. We found the little town easily enough and drove to where the GPS said the restaurant was and it looked like an abandoned street...no lights in the windows, no signs, no hint of a restaurant. We drove around the 4 or 5 blocks that consist of this small town and we could not find this restaurant...or any other restaurant as a back-up. After driving in several circles and on the verge of giving up on this quest we come around a new corner and saw lights and lots of them!!! We found it...we think. We decided if it's not the restaurant we're supposed to be at, we're going there anyway. We found a spot to park, walked back to the lights, up to the door that says "Entre" with an arrow pointing around the corner. We followed the path around the building to a small narrow alley way with another door that is closed and obviously not the entrance to the restaurant. We came upon another door that said something in French but we translated it to say "for deliveries" mainly because you can hear the kitchen clearly and we think it's the back door. We continued making a complete loop around the building without finding the proper entrance and end up back at the delivery door. I decided what the heck; the kitchen will at least be able to tell us how to get into this place! I knocked on the door...no answer, so I opened the door and see the bathrooms and the kitchen with the dining room around the corner. It turns out this was the front door to the restaurant! The restaurant is very small with beautiful decorations of white and silver with very soft lighting of mostly candles...this combination made it really intimate and cozy. Our server didn't speak English so she brought over another server who knew a few words and we went through the menu in a series of points, mimes, gestures and random words. The only trouble to this technique is that when we pointed to something on the menu to ask about it, they thought we were ordering it. After a few minutes, I realized we had just ordered about half the menu! We sufficiently canceled our previous "orders" and ended up with a delicious scallop entree and yummy beef entree. They were both great and we knew we were in for a treat when it came to the food and wine in Bordeaux!

After dinner, we headed back to our B&B, which is also a winery, to sit by the fire and play some cards. Our B&B also serves dinner, but you have to let them know if advance so we were planning to eat with them on Saturday night. When we returned Martin and Bruno were at the table with three other guests finishing dinner. We came in and sat by the fire with a glass of the Chateau de Crecy Red and played our favorite card game gin (Grandma will be glad to read this and know that her gin teaching skills have made it all the way to France!). When Martine brought dessert out she kindly invited us to the table to enjoy her homemade French apple dessert dish. I know, very technical, but I don't know the name of it...all I know is that it was wonderful and I've never had anything like it! The three other guests were three buddies from Italy on a guy’s trip for the weekend. As we all sat trying to communicate again with mimes, gestures and broken language Jon's French starts to come back slightly and makes things a bit easier. This first night was great fun, but still a bit difficult to fully get across what we were all saying.



Saturday morning we were greeted with an amazing breakfast of homemade croissants, chocolate croissants, fresh fruit, cured meats, French cheese and farm fresh eggs...We could get used to this! We fueled up for our day of exploring the Bordeaux country side. Martine gave us great suggestions on how to fill up our day! We headed to the small town of St. Emilion first and checked in with the tourist center to get an overview of the city. I must say here that we have been thoroughly impressed in all of our travels with the tourist centers; they have all been very helpful! January is the regions "off-season" so many of the wineries were closed, but there was still plenty to do and see. St. Emillion's history goes back to prehistoric times and the Romans planted vineyards here as early as the 2nd century, so you can imagine the history here. We went to two wine caves that were in the town, took a tour of each and walked around the various sites of the town. We continued our day through the endless hills and valleys of vineyards driving through the small towns and countryside. We did happen to see a winery that was open and stopped in for a visit. We had a small tasting of their red and purchased a bottle to take home. We stopped at a few more that looked like they might be open, but could not find anyone. We stopped in Creon to find a place for lunch and settled at a small creperie. The creperie was playing country oldies on the stereo and Jon loved it! The menu was in French and we asked the waitress a few questions and ordered what we thought was a small meat and cheese tray and a salad (we were saving room for a dessert crepe!). It turns out our pointing and asking questions method needs to not be used again because we got the three things we pointed to instead of the two we thought we ordered. Don't get me wrong they were good, but didn't leave any room for a dessert crepe...C'est la vie:)





We continued our drive through the Bordeaux countryside stopping off at a few more small towns. Around 5pm we start heading back to our B&B to freshen up and relax by the fire before dinner. Dinner was just the four of us, me, Jon, Martine and Bruno. Martine and Bruno made an amazing meal...celery soup (it doesn't sound like much, but I think it's the best soup I've ever tasted), scallops and fish with noodles, fresh baked bread (of course!), salad, cheese and another amazing dessert she called apple cake. Everything was spectacular and I can't wait to try out some French cooking at home! By this time Jon's French has really come back to him so we are able to communicate much better over dinner. Around dessert, our three Italian friends (Pino, Fancesco and Nico)returned from their dinner and joined us at the table. I started picking up on the Italian because it's so similar to Spanish and they were able to understand my Spanish. It was such a great evening making new friends. We thought it was really amazing we were all able to communicate speaking English, French, Italian and Spanish! It was truly a night to remember!



Sunday morning we woke to the same amazing breakfast! We drove to the city of Bordeaux and walked around to get a feel for that area. It was really a beautiful city with great history, architecture and views. We know we didn't give the city its proper time, but we really wanted to see the northern wine country of Bordeaux. We thought we'd squeeze it in before our plane left. We drove north of the city and toured around on our own, again all the wineries we closed being off season and a Sunday. However, we had a wonderful time in Bordeaux and the surrounding areas! The scenery was fantastic, the food and wine was amazing and the people were kind and helpful.

Here's a link to our pictures(you need to copy and paste the link to your browser):

http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=8054604007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

South Wales

We got up early on a Saturday, took the tube to Heathrow Airport and rented a car for our drive to South Wales. It was about a 3 1/2 hour drive to the seaside town of Tenby, Wales that was filled with beautiful scenes of mountains, the ocean and lots of sheep. We arrived in Tenby around lunch time. Tenby is a very popular resort town in the summer months and January is considered the off season. It was fairly quiet and most of the people around were locals. We found a parking spot along the beach and walked into town to find a place to eat. All we had to do was follow the people and we found a great little cafe filled with locals and figured it had to be good...and it was! After lunch we wandered around the town a bit and stopped in the tourist center to get some assistance on planning the rest of our day and the next. We got some great ideas and headed towards Pembroke Castle for our afternoon activity.




On our way to Pembroke Castle we happened to drive by Carew Castle which has a history over 2,000 years old! We stopped for a quick look around. It was closed so we did not go inside, but we did walk around the grounds.




Pembroke Castle dates back to 1093 and was the birthplace of Henry VII. It is truly a castle of movies and storybooks. This is exactly what I was picturing when being told of all the amazing castles in Europe. There are parts in fairly good condition and parts falling down. It's all stone with no glitz or glam like some of the castles we've toured. Don't get me wrong, those were very cool too...just different. The best part about this castle was that you could go everywhere...nothing was off limits. Jon and I ran around like little kids, going up to the top of every tower, down into the dungeon and the cave where boats used to come in. This castle even had a moat, just like the castles we build on the beach! I can't not express in words how much fun we had exploring this castle. It is an experience with Jon I'll cherish forever.




After touring the castle the sun was starting to set and we headed to our Bed and Breakfast to check in. St. Lawrence is a picturesque B&B on a hill in the country with views of the valley and the ocean in the distance. We were greeted at the door by one of our hosts, Yvonne. We were their only guests that weekend and we couldn't have felt more at home. The sun wasn't quite down yet so we took a walk to the top of the hill to take in the last specs of daylight as the sun was setting over this beautiful landscape. On our way back to the house we met Russell, Yvonne's husband, who was as warm and welcoming as anyone could ask for. We sat by the fire in the living room and chatted with Russell before leaving for dinner. We went to a restaurant they recommended called The Mulberry. The inside had a fire in the center and exposed brick and beams throughout the restaurant. It made for a wonderful atmosphere and the food was delicious too! It was a great choice!




After dinner we settled back into the living room by the fire with a glass of wine and Skyped with Garret and the Stegmann's to send our Happy Birthday wishes to our growing nephew and niece! It was such a relaxing end to a wonderful day.

On Sunday, we woke up in time to take in the sunrise from the top of the hill (about 8:15am). It was pretty cold, windy and cloudy, but that didn't stop us from taking it all in and really enjoying the moment. Right next to the house is the ancient Gumfreston Church dating back to the 12th century. Before breakfast we walked over to this historic site. It was really incredible as you could feel all the history of the grounds. Back at the house we were greeted with a traditional Welsh breakfast that included: fresh fruit, home baked bread, farm fresh eggs (from their own chickens), Welsh sausage, black pudding, bacon, mushrooms, beans and tomatoes...I feel full just typing all of this! It was an incredible breakfast and we didn't leave hungry!



We left for our day of exploring the Pembrokeshire Coast and drove about 15 minutes to the start of a walking path Yvonne and Russell recommended. The path started out along a river, that turn into a lake that was full of ducks and geese. As we came around a bend the lake opened into the Atlantic Ocean...oh, what a sight! By this time the clouds were long gone and it was a bright sunshiny day and the view was amazing. We had no idea the views we were about to see on our walk. We headed up a hill so we were on top of the cliffs that dropped straight down into the ocean. It was spectacular! We walked along these cliffs for several hours taking in the jaw dropping panoramic views. We even saw wild ponies and a ton of sheep everywhere! We could not believe what a beautiful spot we were in and were so grateful to have found it.



After our walk we started out journey back to London. Our trip to South Wales was such a great experience and so much more than we ever could have expected!


Here is the link to our pictures:

http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=8019013007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Oxford, England

We took a trip to Oxford for our first weekend back to London in 2012. We made a day trip out of it and took an early train (about an hour) to Oxford on Saturday morning. Oxford is a wonderful city with more history than we could even imagine! We took a 2 hour walking tour around the city and colleges. The name Oxford literally comes from oxen fording the river and dates back to 900 A.D.! The University of Oxford is the oldest university in the English-speaking world. It is actually a combination of many different individual colleges (with their own campus, admissions, programs etc) that operate under the name of Oxford University. We had no idea this is how it worked, very intriguing idea. Although, we didn't see any oxen during our tour we did see some cows!





After our walking tour we went to the oldest pub in Oxford and arguably the oldest pub in England (depending on who you speak to). It's called The Bear because they actually used to have a pit outside the pub where they would tie up a bear and unleash dogs on it. This was considered a form of entertainment back then. Thankfully, I was not alive during this time because I could barely stomach just hearing about it, let alone witnessing it! We decided to not hold their past activities against them and take in the history of the place. It's a tiny little pub with 5 tables, a small bar and very low ceilings and doorways. We had to wait about 15 minutes for a table, but we were able to enjoy a pint as we waited and took in the interesting decor. The walls and ceiling we covered in frames containing hundreds of ties, but just the bottom 1/4 or so of each tie. Each one was labeled with a name and year, we saw some over 100 years old. The story goes that the owner would clip the ties of his customers to remember them and then a tradition was born! We got a table just in time as several groups came in and it's first come first serve...yourself. We grabbed the table quickly as it opened up. We ordered a fish and chips and shepherd’s pie; we wanted to go with traditional British food being in the oldest pub and all.






After lunch we picked up a few souvenirs and headed towards St. Mary's college to take a tour. We picked this one because several scenes from Harry Potter were filmed here and I LOVE those books and the movies. At St. Mary's we were told that that part of the tour was closed that day for a private event. We decided to hold off on the tour and try to come back later.



We walked around a bit more on our own and decided to call it a day and head back to the train station. I'm so glad we got a chance to visit this city; it was so much more than I was expecting!




Here's the link to pictures:
http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=7983421007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Munich, Germany

Our Alps Adventure concluded in Munich, Germany where we rang in the New Year. We got into Munich late and tired on the 30th, so we rested up for Silvester. We learned this is what they call New Year's Eve. We woke up to HUGE snowflakes pouring down! A great way to see the city! We went off exploring the great city of Munich anyway. It was extremely busy and crowded with tourists and locals alike. We found an open air market that was selling all sorts of food. It was really busy as everyone was stocking up for the festivities. A few blocks from the open air market we happened to walk into an open square in front of St. Peter's Church. This church is incredible! It's not only enormous (the tallest point is 301 feet!) and full of history, but when the clock tower chimes a whole production goes on in the steeple. The best way to describe it is similar to a cuckoo clock. There are different figures of people, animals and things moving and dancing about as the bell chimes. It was unlike anything I've ever seen. The church was originally built in the 8th century, but due to a fire was rebuilt in 1368 and the steeple was added in the 17th century. Being from the states we have such a different view of old something is and this trip has definitely changed my perspective! After walking around the city we decided to grab some lunch. Many places were closed for the holidays, but we were lucky enough to pass a little Turkish restaurant (our new fav!) and picked up our lunch and took it back to the hotel to eat and regroup.



After a late lunch we decide to head back downtown to the Hofbrauhaus to be sure we get good seats for the night. We get there about 3pm and it's PACKED!! This was also unlike anything I've ever experienced! There were rooms full of long tables all full of people. We begin our search for two seats, I didn't think this would be that difficult since there were only two of us and people usually shared tables. So after much wandering around Jon saw a table asks for the bill and I went over and stalked the table until they left. As soon as they got up hoards of people came rushing over to claim the spot, but I was there first to stake our claim! We let two other groups sit with us as it was a table big enough for 10 or so. A server finally came over and let's just say customer service isn't their strong suit, but carry 10 liters of beer at one time is!! So, we order our first beer and take in the atmosphere and the great live music. We were glad when the two other groups left because they were real duds. As they leave a large group of 8 asks to sit with us and we say sure. They were all great! They were locals from the area. They were very nice and so much fun to spend the evening with. A few of them were just starting here and then going back to their house where they were having a big Silvester Party and they invited us to come along. We thought it was very kind of them to invite complete strangers to their home, but we figured being in a strange city we should probably stick with what we knew. Jon even made friends with our server because he gave him a tip! The server who was pretty gruff and cold turned to Jon and said "why are you so good to me?" and then he chatted with us for a few minutes. After that, we got great service! The band played lots of German music and some good old American tunes as well. They crowd went CRAZY over the American songs, especially Country Roads by John Denver; everyone was up on the tables dancing! After lots of laughs, fun, food and beer we decided to head back to our hotel. Yes, it was only 10pm, but it was starting to get pretty crazy in there and I'm sure it would have been a blast...but we had more touring to do the next day and wanted to avoid the unpleasantness of a hangover on vacation. We had a great time and had so much fun at the Hofbrauhaus!



On New Year's Day almost everything was closed. We walked through the quite city and through the English Garten, a huge park in the middle of the city. There was a New Year's Day race going on while we were in the park. As we were walking a guy in a wetsuit and surf board walks by us. This peaked our interest. We followed him to a point in the river right behind some type of dam that creates a permanent wave in the river. There were two guys in full wetsuits and surfboards surfing in the river! That was something we'd never seen before! We ended up walking by the US Consulate and we saw a piece of The Berlin Wall. We walked around the city some more and went in a search of a place for lunch. This was surprisingly difficult as EVERYTHING was closed. We finally discovered our trusty Turkish restaurant was open and went back there for a bite to eat. We checked out of our hotel and headed to our hotel by the airport to make our final travel day easier. We settled in for a quite night with a take-out pizza and watched The Karate Kid I & II in German! We had a wonderful trip through Switzerland, Austria and German and feel so blessed to be having all of these wonderful experiences.

Here's the link for Munich pictures:
http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=7974734007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Stay tuned for our trip to Oxford, England!

Oberammergau, Germany

We drove from Salzburg, Austria to Oberammergau, Germany on Dec. 29th. We arrived at our B&B in the beautiful little town of Oberammergau in the early afternoon. Our B&B was out in the country with views of the mountains right outside our window. We checked in and figured out our plan for the rest of the day. They left packages of gummy bears on our pillows instead of chocolate! We had planned to go to the top of Zugspitze, the tallest peak in Germany, but it was a very cloudy day and we wouldn't have been able to see anything from the top. We decided to drive into Garmisch-Partenkirchen anyway and check out Partnach Gorge, a deep gorge that has been formed by a mountain stream. We were told to park at the Olympic Stadium in Garmisch and we'd see signs. Thanks again to GPS, we found the stadium easily and parked. We put money in the meter and were on our way...except there were no signs to follow. I spotted a security guard and asked him where to go, he directed us to go through the stadium and just keep going straight and we'll run into it. Let me take a minute here to describe the stadium. The Olympics were held in Garmisch in 1936, but a new ski jump was put up in 2008 and is used for ski jump competitions including a New Year's competition that they were preparing for while we were there. It's a fairly small stadium, but the ski jump is huge! Ok, now we found out that if you walk through the stadium, out the opposite side and keep going straight you would walk into a river...we could go either right or left. We chose right and we were wrong, after about 15 minutes walking in the wrong direction we realized that this couldn't be the right way. We asked some locals walking on the same path where the Partnach Gorge was and they looked at us like we were crazy, since they don't speak any English. I start miming here to try and describe a gorge...try that once just for fun! Finally, the guy was able to figure out what I was talking about and pointed us in the right direction...we should have gone left:) A half hour later we were on our way to the gorge. As we start our wintery trek to the gorge we find that our choice in footwear (tennis shoes) is not the greatest for this walk. We walk about 20 more minutes through the woods and along a river to the base of the gorge where you would take a cable car to the top and walk down. After slipping frequently and several near butt splitting experiences we decided that we should skip this outing...for now. We fully intend on coming back to this area of the world at some point in our life and will take it on then with the appropriate shoes!



We decided it would be fun to go to a ski lodge for a hot tottie by the fire and watch the skiers coming down the hill. We searched for one in our trusty Garmin and there was one a mile away. We arrived to the ski hill around 3pm and as many of the skiers are leaving. We park and start walking towards the hill only to realize their lodge is slightly different than what we were expecting...it's outside. Jon made his way to the bar and ordered a couple of drinks and we found a spot out in the freezing cold to drink our ice cold beer! We drank them very quickly so we could get out of that cold as fast as possible. It was pretty fun to watch all the kids coming down the hill. There were some really tiny kids just zipping down the hill!



We headed back to Oberammergau to find a place for dinner. Oberammergau is a picture perfect, little German mountain town nestled among the mountains. We went to a restaurant recommended by our B&B (it was also the only restaurant with people in it and we figured this was a good sign). We had a great meal and headed back to our B&B to rest up for the adventures of the next day.



We woke up in the morning to a snow covered world with snow still pouring down. It was so beautiful and made the morning perfect. We walked to a monument near our B&B that was given to the town of Oberammergau by King Lewis in 1871 for dedicating the Passion Play to him. It is a really beautiful monument and walking to it with large snowflakes falling down around us made it even better.



After breakfast, we loaded up the car and set off for the day of touring castles or schloss's as they refer to them. Our first stop was supposed to be about 15 minutes away, but with the snow it was closer to 30 was Linderhof Palace. It's the smallest of three castles built by King Ludwig II. We toured the snow covered grounds here, but did not go into the castle as we thought the next two would be enough castle touring for one day. It was much smaller than I expected, but for my first true castle it was a good initiation. Then we drove about 2 hours on windy, snow covered roads to reach Hohenschwangau Schloss and Neuschwanstein Schloss. These were also built by King Ludwig II, but he died before Neuschwanstein was completed and so to this day it remains the way it was when he died. The castles were beautiful, interesting, full of history and surprisingly different from each other. They both had spectacular views. Neuschwanstein in the castle that Disney's Magic Kingdom is modeled after.





We left the castles and made our way to Munich where we finish our Alps adventure by ringing in the New Year.

Here's the link for more pictures:(if you click to sort them alphabetically they will be in order)

http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=7947160007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Salzburg, Austria

The day after Christmas we took the train to Munich, Germany. The train ride was absolutely beautiful and so much fun going through the mountains and countryside. We really enjoyed it. Upon arriving at the Munich train station we rented a car for our drive to Salzburg, Austria. We thought we'd pick up a few sandwiches for the road since we weren't sure what to expect once we were on the road. At the sandwich shop (that was packed), everything was in German so we went by looks pointed to a few sandwiches, handed them our credit card only to be told they don't take credit cards...ok, we look at each other and the line behind us...we don't have any euro's yet. She points us in the direction of an ATM, I stand to the side to wait and Jon runs to get some money out. After a fairly intense sandwich ordering experience and an easy car rental (we got a Blue Chevy automatic) we were on our way to Salzburg! Thanks to our GPS we made it there without any detours. The scenery on the way was beautiful; we could honestly look at those mountains for hours and not get bored. We drove on the Autobahn, but didn't really know we were on it for sure until a few days later. It is a little strange because there are points where there was no speed limits and points where is slows down to 40...Jon just kept up with traffic and I was glad to be able to just sit back and enjoy the scenery.



We arrived in Salzburg in the afternoon and after settling in we ventured to "Old Town" (the historic district). We walked around the city that was beautifully decorated for Christmas and found an ice skating rink and Christmas Market. This happened to be the last day of the market that had been going on for 40 days! There were a few little stands selling beer and food and we enjoyed a pint of the local brew Die Wessie Beer while watching the people slip and slide on the ice rink. We decided to walk around some more and start looking for a place for dinner. As we were walking and looking at different menus we suddenly smelled something so good we had to go in search of the source. We found a tiny little Turkish food stand and we were sold on the aromas alone! We had our first Doner Kebab and Doner Durum...YUM! We headed back to our hotel and started planning the rest of our stay in Salzburg.



The next day Jon graciously obliged me by going on The Sound of Music Tour with me. I loved it! It wasn't just all about the movie; the tour gave us a great overview of the history of Salzburg and Austria. We went to the lake from the boat scene where they all fall overboard, the Abbey, the gazebo, the church where they got married, the outside of the manor they used in the movie and a few more sites. We went to the little town of Mondsee to see the church where the wedding ceremony was filmed. We were able to walk around here and explore. The only disappointment of this was on our way to the area where she's singing on the hill, it got so foggy in the valley's we couldn't see anything. Our tour guide and driver we're both great and very funny. They sold beer and soda's on the bus and when we were getting back on the bus after lunch Jon ordered a couple of beers and the bus driver asks if he wants "insert some German/English here"...we look at each other and have no idea what he's said and our guide says "just say yes"...so we do. The driver proceeds to get a bottle of clear alcohol looking stuff out and two shot glasses and now we're realizing what we've committed to. Ok, it looks like Schnapps...it can't be that bad, right? Wrong! It was likely drinking rubbing alcohol and Jon and I had to drink it and look happy about it as to not offend our driver! We realize this is probably his fun little inside joke he plays on all the Americans and loves to watch our reaction to the taste of this blazing liquid in a bottle.



After the tour we walked around Salzburg some more, being sure to stop by the place where Mozart was born and gathering our souvenirs, postcards and such. Then we walked up to the top of the hill overlooking the city where the Fortress is. We had tickets to have dinner and see a Mozart concert in the castle that night. We went up early to be able to see the views before the sun went down and to watch the sunset. It was a great view and watching the sun set behind the snow capped mountains from a Fortress was an experience I will never forget. The concert was great! It was really small and intimate and the music was fantastic! An interesting fact about the Fortress...certain areas of it have been converted into apartments and the government pays artists to live there, could you imagine!



On Wednesday, we left in the morning and headed to a little town of Hallein to tour the largest Salt Mine. This was such a great time! When you get there they hand you a pair of white pants and a white coat to protect your clothing from the salt. It is pretty hilarious though to see all these people in these oversized white uniforms...some might call it a fashion statement, I would not:) It was all part of the fun though because there is something about dressing up in weird clothes that makes everything more entertaining! Throughout the tour we learned about the history of the mine and what a major money maker it was. We also got to take a little train, the main way in and out of the mine and we got to go down two slides! Yes, you heard me two slides!!! These slides were used for the workers to get to the lower portions of the mine quickly and safely. This was probably my favorite part and would have liked to go down them again and again! I have to give props to our tour guide here as I was very impressed...he spoke at least three languages VERY well (German, English and Italian) and did the tour in all three! He probably spoke more since they do offer the tour in a few more languages.



After our Salt Mine Tour, we went to the little town of Oberndorf (right next to Hallein) for lunch. This was our first major language barrier experience. Since we like to go to places off the beaten path...I don't think the restaurant we picked got a lot of Americans. They did have pizza on the menu and since we know what Margarita Pizza is...we went with that:) We then headed to the birth place of Stille Nacht (Silent Night). We toured the little museum, which I'm sure was extremely interesting and fascinating, but I'm afraid I can't give much detail since it was ALL in German!



We headed back to Salzburg for some more exploring. We heard through our tour guide the day before about the largest beer hall in Austria and we couldn't pass that up! We walked fairly far from the main section of town and the touristy areas and after much looking around finally found the very poorly marked beer hall. After seeing the loads of people inside, I understand why they don't need to mark it very well...all the locals know about it all ready. We were again some of the only tourists in the place, but we forged ahead because we love seeing where the locals hang out. Here's where it gets intense again...we see a line, so we get in it, but we don't see a menu or any choices of beer, so we wait a minute or two for our turn. The cashier is an older gentleman kind gruff, well who's kidding who...really gruff. When reading this be sure to use an irritated, stern, gruff, curt voice for the role of cashier. Cashier: "something in German" (probably, what do you want) Us: two beers Cashier: "what size" Us: "what are our options" Cashier:"look behind me" (extra irritated here) Us: quickly glancing over his shoulder and quickly say "large" (we figure we'll need it to unwind from this encounter!) He takes our money, hands us two coupons and we get in the next line...here we realize everyone else has large steins already in hand, after a quick glance around we see a large case with steins in them along the wall. Jon grabs two steins, while I hold our place in line. We get to the front and the guys fills our mugs and we're on our way to...find a seat, which we accomplish with a lot more ease than purchasing the beer. After settling in, we see how this really is the local hang out and lots of groups of families or friends are gathered here. Oh, in case you we're wondering after a liter of beer you completely forget about how intense it was getting the beer in the first place:) We had a great time!



On our way back to the hotel, we stopped by another hotel that had a roof top bar and took in the great views of the city one last time. We love Salzburg and would highly recommend it!



Stay tuned for our adventures in Oberammergau, Germany!

Click here for pictures:

http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=7939287007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Christmas in Switzerland!

We took the tube to Heathrow Airport by train around 1pm on Friday December 23rd...slightly crazy, but we managed an 1 1/2 later to make it to the airport. The airport was surprisingly calm and easy to get to our gate. We stopped off at the duty free shop for some spirits for our vacation and got a couple of sandwiches for dinner. After going through several long, curvy hallways and staircases we finally made it to our gate...40 minutes before departure, not a soul in sight. Literally, not even an employee! This made us worried that our gate had changed, so we walked all the way back through the curvy and empty hallways to find out in fact our gate hadn't changed, there just must not be anyone there yet...back to the gate we went. We enjoyed a cocktail as we waited for our plane and about 20mins before we boarded the gate was packed! It was a nice easy flight to Basel, Switzerland (right on the boarder of Switzerland, Germany and France. We took the city bus to our hotel by the train station. We checked into our BRIGHT lime green hotel room for the night (they love their bright colors over here!). We had read on the internet that while in Basel you should check out the Bar at the top of the Ramada for great views of the city, so off we went. We got back on the city bus...believe me, I impressed myself with this one too:) and took it to the closest stop to the Ramada. After walking a fairly sketchy poorly lit block we made it safely to the bar...only to find at night in a city you don't know, a bar overlooking the fairly small city isn't all that great. We had our drinks and made our way back to the "lime green inn".

On Christmas Eve we went to the train station (across the street) to take the train to Lucerne, Switzerland. We got to the station and found out the platform we needed (which is kind of intense your first time out of the gate) and realized we had some time, so Jon went in search of coffee and breakfast. Upon return and minutes before our train is to leave he says "Do you have my water bottle?" Me: "No" Jon: "Oh, I set it down when I was taking pictures!" and off he ran to fetch his water bottle, leaving me in a complete panic that we were going to miss our train (those of you who know me well, know I HATE being late and get quite a bit of anxiety about if I think we might be late). Whew! We made the train just in the nick of time! We got all settled in for our hour journey to Lucerne. This is my first time on a train (not subway) so I thought it was the bee’s knees! We loved watching all the scenery go by.



We got off the train in Lucerne and realized we knew our hotel was close, but we didn't have a map or internet...but thanks to the AWESOME travel center in the train station we were all covered. They not only gave us a map with directions to our hotel, but great advice on things to do and when AND Christmas cookies!! Also, since we were there for the 24th & 25th a lot of restaurants were closed and they gave us a list of what was open those days. We knew we had upgraded hotels when upon check-in there was a basket of Toblerone’s! I had planned for us to go to the top of Mt. Pilatus this day, but it was rainy and cloudy and we wouldn't have been able to see anything so we changed gears and walked around the beautiful town of Lucerne. It was really picture perfect! Everyone we had talked to so far in Switzerland said we had to try the Fondue while we were here...so we found a restaurant on the river for lunch that was serving Fondue and basically, we had beer, cheese, bread and potatoes for lunch...yes, take that in for a moment. We were glad we had the rest of the day to walk at least some of it off! The Fondue was delicious and way better than any American version of it that I have tried. However, we were a little surprised when we got the bill (a common theme in Switzerland), the menu said "Fondue for two- 33 CHF" (Swiss Francs), what they fail to mention here on the menu that it is 33 CHF per person! We decided we were glad we did it anyway:)



We spent the rest of the afternoon walking around the Old Town and taking it all in. It's a beautiful town on a lake with a river running through the center surrounded by mountains. We went to a great little wine bar and restaurant for dinner called OPUS. We had some extra time before Christmas Eve service started at 11pm so we walked around some more and stumbled upon another church that was about to start their service and listed to the choir singing Christmas Carols (in German) for about 15 mins. Then we headed to the church we planned to go to. It was so beautiful, the service was in German which made it interesting, but we thoroughly enjoyed it! Back at the hotel we Skyped with some of our family and friends to wish them all a Merry Christmas!



On Christmas Day we woke up to a clear blue sunny sky! This was our day to go to the top of Mt. Pilatus and the weather couldn't have been more beautiful. We took the city bus to the closest stop by the mountain. (Let me just say here, with all of the city buses we took on our trip we were never asked for a ticket or proof of purchase, we found this a little strange.)Once off the bus we walked 7 or 8 blocks to the start of the cable car ride. We took a cable car 3/4 of the way up the mountain and then got into a gondola (about 1/2 hour total). The views of this ride we incredible, we had such a great time looking at everything! At the top of the mountain we were left breathless with the panoramic views of snow capped mountains and lakes. What an amazing way to spend Christmas Day! There was a little restaurant where we had lunch and tried Elchhof beer while looking out over the mountains. While we were up there a guy proposed to his girlfriend! We decided he should get a free pass a lot over the coming years...all he has to say is "remember the day we got engaged" and she's sure to forget why she might have been upset! On our way back to town while waiting for the bus we found a Swiss vending machine (see pictures on link)...hilarious!!!



The rest of the day was pretty low key as we were pretty tired with our late night Skyping! We still needed to get our postcards...but the cheapest we could find were 1.20 CHF per card, geez! We only bought a few. We walked around town some more and decided to pop into a little pub for a beer before we went for dinner. We ordered two pints of the local beer, we got our beer and our bill and it was 18CHF for 2 beers...this about gave Jon a heart attack, especially when we've had this same beer several times since we've been here for 3CHF apiece. As we all know Jon loves a deal and hates being ripped off...this just really ruined his beer drinking experience:( So we went off to find a place for dinner and cheer Jon up! We found a cute little Italian place (our options were very limited being Christmas Day) and shared a salad and pizza, it was just was we wanted. We went back to our hotel to Skype some more and go to bed early as we had an early train to catch in the morning.

Wir hoffen, dass Sie alle hatten ein sehr lustig Christfest! Auf Wiedersehen fur jetzt...


Click here for pictures: Sorry, some are out of order...I spent a very long time putting them in the correct order and when I logged back in to snapfish they were all messed up again!

http://www2.snapfish.com/snapfish/thumbnailshare/AlbumID=7920029007/a=53561785_53561785/otsc=SHR/otsi=SALBlink/COBRAND_NAME=snapfish/

Next blog...Salzburg, Austria!