Germany

Today was a great day!

We woke up and had a "Typical Bavarian Breakfast". It consisted of white sausages which are eaten for breakfast here in Bavaria with a type of sweet mustard, pretzel bread with butter and chives, and a Weisbeier (a thick beer that is traditionally served at breakfast) I KNOW...beer for breakfast, but this is the German way!

After breakfast, we went to a town (that I cant spell so I'll leave it out) that Elise's brother was born in and her parents lived near for six years. It was really neat to walk around and see her take pictures and get to see the place where her brother was born. We hung around for a while and got some gelato, lunch, and coffee, and then headed back to Evelyn's village.

After a short break, we headed to another local village to hike to the top of a mountain/hill that had a 14th century castle on top of it. The weather was very overcast and it started raining while we were hiking, but it was great to cool down and we had an amazing view of the surrounding villages from the top.

On the way home, outside a small village called Nuermburg, Evelyn took us to a Jewish memorial site. Several year ago, a mass grave was uncovered from the "Death Marches" that the Jews were forced to take to avoid American liberators and others from finding out the conditions of certain camps. Many Jews died or were killed on these journeys. A Jewish foundation has set up a very nice memorial cemetary, and we got to walk around and read about it. I think it was something that "tourists" such as myself, don't get to do often.

For dinner, Evelyn's mom cooked an amazing dinner of pork, potato cakes, and cucumber salad. I don't think I have ever eaten so well!

Because yesterday was midsummer's day, all the little villages in Bavaria have a midsummer's day festival. We went to one just now in a neighbooring village, and got to watch villagers dress up as monsters and witches and dance around a huge bonfire. Evelyn explained to us that they were re-enacting the beliefs of villagers in olden times. How neat to be able to see something like this!

The picture above is of Me, Evelyn, Alex, and Mattias, (her boyfriend) at the top of the hill after our hike!

Kate