Europe Recap and Pictures

You know when you are so totally behind on blogging that you don't want to even start to try to catch up? Yeah, well that's me. Here is the Europe recap. We had a wonderful time!!

On our 8 hour flight from New York City to Frankfurt Germany the flight attendant asks if we would like the bassinet for the baby. Um...I didn't know there was one but YES! We happened to have been seated directly behind the bulkhead which is the only spot on the plane that has the attachments for this awesome bassinet. Audrey slept like...well, a baby.

This was our day in Luxembourg. We drove there and first stop was the National Museum of Military History. It was a wonderful museum! Audrey enjoyed snuggling up in her little carrier. Good thing too because she spent the vast majority of the two weeks in it!

We also visited the Clervaux Castle which was built in the 1100's! We learned that Luxembourg is called the land of the castles because there are 22 castles in that tiny Duchy. Inside the castle there was an exhibit with scale models of each of the castles.

This was on a darling little residential street in Clervaux Luxembourg. We realized that we had several pictures of Mitchell and myself but not many of Audrey. Doesn't she look thrilled?

There isn't a picture of this but another highlight of the trip to Luxembourg was lunch! We ate at a little French cafe in the main part of downtown. I had the absolute best fillet I have ever had! It was pricey but what a delicious steak!

A highlight of our whole trip was the several days we spent in Munich. We could have stayed there for months and not seen everything! This building is called the New Town Hall. It isnt very new though. It was built in 1867. The large clock tower is the famous Glockenspiel. Every day at 11:00am, 12:00pm and 5:00pm it opens up and music plays and the dancers dance.

In Munich we took an extended walking tour of the city. It was called the Third Reich Tour and our guide talked about Hitler's rise to power and about the Nazi Party. We learned that Hitler spent a lot of time in Munich as he was growing the Nazi Party. Hitler gave several famous speeches in this beer hall.

Near Munich is the Dachau Concentration Camp. We toured the site one day and it was fascinating. It's hard to really find the right words to describe the experience of being there. We didn't take very many pictures there because it didn't seem very appropriate considering the spirit that was there. The air was definitely very heavy at Dachau. Above are 2 of the crematoriums that were used and below is the gate at the entrance of the camp. One of the many cruel elements of the camp is that the gate has the words "Arbeit Macht Frei," "Work Makes You Free." The prisoners there were forced to work but for most of them they were only set free when they died.

This was an adorable little town called Rothenburg. Most of it went undamaged in WWII so the buildings are all in medieval style. The gate to the city was built in the 900's AD and most of the buildings within the city were built before the 1600's.

We stayed the night in an inn. It was complete with the restaurant downstairs and crooked walls and floors! Seriously, there wasn't a square corner in the whole building! I guess if it has been standing for 500 years already it must be sturdier than it would seem. The floor in our room was so slanted that I thought I would fall out of bed!

This is the tower above the gate to the city. The entire city used to have a wall around it for protection. This tower is several hundred years old!

In Rothenburg we visited the Medieval Museum of Crime and Torture. Some of the torture devices were really awful! They did say though, that many of the devices were intended to be more for intimidation and fear than for actually using. Most of the torture devices were, fittingly, down in the dungeon/basement. Upstairs there was a huge exhibit about medieval law. It was somewhat hilarious! There seemed to have been legislation against everything!! And their punishments were pretty funny too! Our favorite was the neck violin (basically like a human-sized wooden yoke), it was used to attach "quarrelsome women" together until they could get along.

When we came back from Rothenburg we spent the next couple of days sightseeing closer to the Roach home. We went twice to the best amusement park ever! Eifel Park! Mitchell and I enjoyed it just as much as the kids!

One afternoon we went to the Manderscheid Castle ruins to look around. It was neat to be able to explore the entire castle! What a gorgeous view!

Thanks again Roach Family!!!