Shelly and Scott Abroad

That's right folks, Shelly and Scott made the long journey to Germany for a visit!! The world travelers stopped over in Paris for a few days before arriving in Germany. I was so excited for them to get here, I tried calling their hotel room in Paris the evening their flight landed, but those crazy kids were out on the town until late so I had to wait to talk to them until they made their way over to Deutschland.

After a whirlwind self-guided tour of Paris, they arrived at the Frankfurt airport ahead of schedule. Tom and I were barely on time to meet them at the gate! Hugs were exchanged all around and then we drove back to our place so that Shelly and Scott could get settled into their 'guest suite' aka office with futon and folding luggage racks. For dinner we went to the Waldgeist which is a German restaurant that serves gianormous portions of schnitzel and other traditional German fare.

The next day, we drove over to Legoland . . . DEUTSCHLAND! It was on Scott and Shelly's list of things they wanted to do so we rode some rides, saw a lot of cool Lego things, and had tons of fun! The only hitch in our day was when a wasp flew into Scott's slurpee straw and then bit him on the inside of his lip when he went to take a sip! Poor Scott's lip swelled up and it looked painful but he was a trooper and luckily it healed up by the next day.

On Monday it was raining but Michelle, Scott, and I braved the weather and headed out on the train to Rudesheim. In Rudesheim, we caught a boat that took us up the Rhine River to St. Goar, all the way pointing out castles and interesting sights. We bought some fun souvenirs, including cool hooded sweatshirt sweatshirts for Shelly and Scott and a fun knitted hat for me, plus some other odds and ends. We had a great lunch of soup, sandwiches and hot chocolate at a little bakery and then got back on the boat to go home. On the way back we decided to ride on the top open air part of the boat and had a great view! When it started getting colder and darker, we went back inside to thaw.

Tuesday morning me, Shelly and Scott packed up and drove to Amsterdam! First order of business was to visit the Heineken Experience. Shelly's favorite part of the tour was, of course, the draft horses and Scott's favorite part was the 3 beers that are included :) After the tour we went to the Hardrock Cafe for diner and got a great table with a view of one of the canals. Then we hopped on a tram back to the Dam Square and walked through the Redlight District before calling it a night and taking the bus back to our hotel. In the hotel lobby, they had a bowl full of marshmallow candies that Scott tried and said were really good! Shelly and I were skeptical and didn't try them but then Scott spotted a whole box full of packages of the candies in the hotel office. He asked the receptionist if he could buy a bag of the candies and the guy looked at Scott, grabbed a bag, and very sneakily slide it across the counter to us. We munched on delicious marshmallow candies in our room as we watched some Dutch TV.
The next day we started out with a tour of the Anne Frank museum and a walk through one of the historic neighborhoods. Then we grabbed some lunch from one of the many shops that sell pizza, hotdogs and waffles (food for people with the munchies maybe? I don't know!). On our way back to the bus station we snapped some photos of more historic sites. Back at the hotel, we walked around the neighboring town of Monnickendam a little bit to stretch our legs before the long car ride back to Wiesbaden.

Thursday was a 'day off' from traveling. We stayed close to home. Shelly and I did some errands and Scott hung out at the gym for a while. We had lunch at the food court on Post and then when Tom got off of work we all went golfing, which was on Scott and Shelly's list of things they wanted to do while on vacation. Afterwards, we grilled out for diner. It was a very relaxing day.

On Friday morning we headed out for our big Bavarian adventure . . . and another 4 hours in the car! On our way down to Munchen (Munich) we stopped at a concentration camp memorial. After visiting the Anne Frank museum in Amsterdam it was especially depressing, but such a big part of our history. After Dachau, we were on our way to the hotel. We snagged an awesome free parking spot on the street right in front of the hotel! After we checked in and dumped our bags in the room, we jumped on the Metro over to the main square to see what we could see and get some dinner. We planned on going to the Hofbrauhaus for dinner but when we got there we were greeted by a massive crowd of people waiting to get in, so we re-routed to a different brauhaus across the street and it ended up being a great meal! So great, in fact that we went back again the next day with Tom :) Full and happy after dinner, we made our way back to our hotel room to wait for Tom to get there. Poor Tom ended up having to work on Friday but he drove down after work and ran into a lot of traffic but made it to the hotel around midnight, ready for Oktoberfestivities on Saturday, opening day of the fest!

In the morning we all woke up and went straight to Oktoberfest. The boys were eager for their first beer of the day but we found out that they don't start serving beer on opening day until noon - after the parade ceremonies and the tapping of the first barrel of Oktoberfest brew. So, we found a good spot to watch the parade. The parade consisted mostly of excessively decorated draft horses pulling carts and wagons full of either beer barrels or people in traditional Bavarian costume drinking beer. There was also the occasional marching band playing Bavarian music. After the parade it was a free-for-all to get a seat in one of the huge beer tents so that you could be served a liter of beer. We wandered through several tents before finding a table with a few open seats that we could squeeze into. We were actually at two different tables next to each other. Shelly and Scott sat next to a nice couple from Frankfurt who spoke perfect English and Tom and I were with a group of rowdy Spaniards from Madrid. It was great fun, we all 'Prosted' and did our best to communicate in 3 different languages, which becomes increasingly difficult with the more beer you drink :) Eventually we left our table and wandered around the fest. Tom and Scott wanted to ride one of the rides and then we got something to eat. After all day at the Fest we went back to the hotel to relax a little. We went to the pool and then changed before dinner back at our favorite downtown Munich restaurant.

Since Munich is in southern Germany it is close to many other countries. We decided to expand Scott and Shelly's list of countries they have visited by driving to a few of them. We decided to drive through Austrian and Italy. In Austria we stopped at Innsbruck for lunch. The town was hosting a huge parade so we had to battle the crowds to see some of the city and find a place to eat for lunch. Luckily we had a lot of practice with crowds the previous day at Oktoberfest! In Italy we went to a nice little town called Bolzano. Scott did some reading up about the town on our way there and found a cool museum for us to visit while there. We went to a Mummy Museum! It was a little creepy but kinda neat. We got back to Munich with plenty of time for a quick trip back to Oktoberfest for more beer and bratwursts for dinner!

On Monday we had to pack up and check out of the hotel, but not to worry, that doesn't mean the fun is over! We checked out, loaded our bags into the car and drove to Neuschwanstein Castle! We all enjoyed the tour of the castle and the scenery. By now, Shelly and Scott were well acquainted with my travel buddy, the TomTom GPS Navigator. On our way home from the castle TomTom navigated us through some very rural roads - for a while we weren't even sure if we were on a road at all and maybe just driving on some German farmer's driveway! But, eventually these tiny little roads in the middle of cow pastures led to the autobahn and we sped off toward home!

Tuesday was Shelly and Scott's last full day in Deutschland. Unfortunately, I had to go back to work but they made the most of their time and explored Wiesbaden on their own. We had dinner at home and Shelly and Scott packed their bags and prepared for the long journey back home the next morning. It was so sad to drop them off at the airport, but it helped that I would be seeing them again soon when Tom and I come home for a few weeks!!! I am so glad that they were able to come and visit and I hope they had as much fun as I did!!