A Surprise Visitor!

"If I don't come now, I'm not going to make it before you leave..."

We booked a flight the next day, arriving in Cologne and leaving 10 days later from Copenhagen. 

It took her three grueling days to finally arrive, beyond exhausted but ready for adventure.

And oh, what a week it was, from Heidelburg, Prague to Berlin, and finally relaxing in Copenhagen.

I made Ashley try a raw meat sandwich, street hotdogs in sideways buns, and fried fish that made her puke in a cemetery an hour later.  There wasn't anything she wouldn't try, even if only once. 

Our whirlwind trip began in Prague, which has always been a dream of Ashley's to visit. A few of my favorites:

If you get a chance to go, visit the Jewish cemetery and the small museum-- it contains hundreds of artwork done by children in a neighboring concentration camp. Utterly heart breaking. 

This guy was able to meet us in Berlin for the weekend-- 

It's such a joy to be able to share life with the people that mean the most to you!

So glad she was able to come-- we had a fabulous time :) 

Do you want to go to Bamberg?

(Sung to the tune of "Do you wanna build a snowman?")

Do you wanna go to Bamberg?

We can drink a lot of beeeeeeer!

That's as far as I got, but if you've ever spent any time around me then you know I was singing those lines on repeat the entire weekend. 

So, Bamberg! The beer capital of the world! Or something like that.

A couple weeks ago, those of us who are left in Frankfurt all happened to be around for the weekend, so a spontaneous weekend in Bamberg was called for. The town and its surrounding areas has an insane amount of breweries, even some tucked away into the forrest that date back to when the monks brewed beer in cellars dug into the side of mountains because it was cooler there.

Because it was a holiday weekend, we had to book a place about 8 km outside of town, so we brought our bikes. Little did we realize that the 8 km meant it was all uphill to get there! 

This was after having to walk our bikes up a massive hill. 

The ride was quite beautiful, though, in the midst of wheat fields and air tinged with hops. 

You pay 22 euros for a sweet backpack, a mug, and vouchers for 6 beers at the different breweries. Over the course of two days, you can imagine how much fun we had! My kind of holiday... find a brewery, drink a delicious beer, eat a snack, bike to the next brewery, repeat. 

And for those of you wondering... no, we weren't hammered off delicious smoked rauchbier and hoppy pilsners that I'd take over Frankfurt beer any day. 

The joy of consuming mass quantities of delicious German food won that day-- a pretzel here, sausages there, or meals like this:

Meat-stuffed onion topped with bacon and beer gravy? Yes, please! How have I not gained 100 pounds while living in this country?!

Seriously, if you live in Frankfurt or stumbled across this post while planning a trip to Germany, just do it. Bamberg delivered on every aspect of 'quant-German-town.'

Nope, that 3-D addition to the town hall isn't creepy at all.

PS- all of these beautiful German small-town pictures have pretty much been of the same building at different angles...

photobomb

 This is Erhan! He'll be showing us around his hometown of Istanbul next week! I used him to take a picture of the guy behind him, who was mumbling incoherently at the top of his lungs and dancing with his invisible partner.

More of these kinds of weekends in my life, please. Dan and Martha, ya'll just need to come back. 

And if you're thinking about going and wondering which ones to visit, go to all of them of course, but our favorites were Spezial (the food! the smoked beer!) and Ambraüsianum (the ambiance and small flights of beer to sample.)

Simply the best.

"What's been your favorite?"-- the question most frequently asked on my recent trip home, one that left me without an answer every time. 

"It's all my favorite," I'd respond without much more detail to offer, knowing I left it a bit anticlimactic as we move on to other topics. 

 After an impromptu trip this past holiday weekend, I think it's safe to say that Switzerland is my favorite. Maybe not for the exorbitant prices or food, or even the random mishmash of cultures (what are you really? German? French? Italian? What language is coming out of your mouth?) 

Everything that is right with the world, everything that the Lord created and said, "This is so GOOD" must have started with the Alps. 

Switzerland is unreal. I can't even find the words to describe its infinite beauty. Much of the weekend was spent lying in grass and just staring off into our surroundings. Doesn't this picture look like Mike was photoshopped into a painting? 

Anyways, we left on Friday from Frankfurt on the train to Zürich, which took about 4 hours. The summers provide lengthy days of sunlight, so we had sufficient time to explore the town well into the night. We found it to be very pretty, and better than the reputation it's received as a banking city. 

Didn't do much, just walked around the lake as the rest of the city was out on its banks enjoying picnic dinners and street music. Summer has officially made its arrival known with extreme temperatures (95 degrees!) and there's nothing to do other than park yourself outside in the shade, hopefully close to a body of water. 

Silly us, thinking we needed our puffy coats because surely Switzerland is a cold place to be.

Saturday we leisurely started our day, walked around the city a bit more and then hopped on a train 45 minutes to Lucerne. We'd heard great things about the city, which is a bit more south and closer to the mountains. It surely did not disappoint!

The focal point is a wooden bridge that, while not the original structure, has been used as a pathway and fortification for the city since the medieval age. Oh, and the swans- they're everywhere looking for handouts from tourists dining on the edge of the lake. Silly things, those swans!

(I forget to take pictures of the two of us. So here's one.)

There's really nothing to do in Lucerne that doesn't take a mere half day to see; we had a very relaxing picnic dinner down at the lake and people watched for hours with fabulous cheese and Italian wine. It was nice to get out of the town itself and walk a bit to where the locals were spending their Saturday night, as the town was packed to the brim with Asian tourists streaming off buses and heading directly to the fancy watch shops. It was outrageous. But I digress. 

Pacific Northwest?

Sunday we made the 'trek' up to the top of Mt. Pitalus via the "steepest cog rail in the world!" In the late 1800s someone said, hey, let's build this thing and plop a hotel on the top for tourists. I'm just glad we didn't have to hike it, because those whom were hiking looked miserable. 

As soon as we got off there were these guys playing their alpine horns (don't know what they're called?) They'd pay a bit of the song, then the others on the opposite side of the hill would answer back. I was hyperventilating and holding back tears I was so excited, but sadly we came too late as the were finishing their performance.

 This view, though!

 I was a bit sad knowing we've closed the door on Switzerland and probably won't be returning for a good, long while. Until we meet in another lifetime, so long, farewell, auf wiedersehen for now!

Oh home.

I'm so behind on all the things I want to document from these past couple of months.... a fabulous trip with Paul and Amy, spring which is on the cusp of transitioning into summer, life changes approaching. Once I fall behind it's challenging to pick it back up and write about the now, because I feel guilty for skipping over other major life events. I'll focus on the now and hopefully find time to backtrack :)

Oh home. Not enough adjectives to describe this past trip. It was a time to bask in love, to relax and not think about anything, really. A time to consume mass quantities of coffee on my parents' squishy couches while we discuss life, to cruise Melbourne for glimpses of manatees and cherish childhood memories. I'm beyond grateful for both of my parents' dedication to our upbringing, for their grace and love that shaped who we are today. I'm also incredibly thankful that Mike's parents live in the same town. What a joy to be able to connect with them and to essentially have a second set of parents! I'm a lucky girl.

Latest obsession (alongside manatees, of course...) Sandy Hill Cranes!  

 Most common question I receive from non-Americans... "Have you ever seen an alligator?!" Why yes, yes I have. 

 Always have a kite handy in the back of your car- Grayson family rule

 Hot date night for a proper Bloody Mary 

Yep, still kickin'

A reoccurring theme that I mulled over in my mind was the concept of 'home.' It was like all these places that we've planted roots comprise a sense of 'home' to me. Is that even possible? Home is Melbourne, where I was raised, but it's also not the same and ever evolving. And then, I felt like I was returning 'home' to St. Auggie where we spent the past 6 years and developed community that I'll carry in my heart forever. I drove by our house and parked outside like a creeper, with someone else's mini-van in the driveway and tomatoes that weren't mine growing in the garden box that we labored over and I just cried for the life that we had in that town that we simultaneously loved and drove us crazy. That life was grand, but it'll never be like that again, a life without kids in a house that we own in Florida.

I'm getting all weird, I know, but it was trip that gave me the chance to reflect on what makes me me... the wonderful people in my life and experiences that will forever shape who I am.

Anyways, back to the joys of seeing everyone! Sadly I barely took any pictures, and if I did they're mostly on Instagram already. Babies galore, catching up on the past school year and picking up right where we left off. Lifelong connections, for sure; I'm grateful that my friends are sweet enough to keep me in the loop, letting me know when major events occur and watching their littles grow!

So much more could be said, but I think I'll leave it here because quite frankly this post has been sitting unfinished on my desktop for a week now; I'm tired of seeing it. More thoughts later, maybe.