Schwarzwald and Fireworks (and lack of a witty title)

Yesterday we took a program study trip to the Schwarzwald (Black Forest.) When you imagine a location for all the old German fairy tales like Hansel and Gretel and the like, you're probably picturing the black forest. It's located in the southwest of the country, all in the southern part of Baden-Wuertemburg. Met at the train station bright and early at 8:30, boarded the bus, and made the two hour trip down on the autobahn. We always travel via train, so this was only the second time since being in Germany that I had ridden on a big charter bus on the highway. We were all pretty tired, but had an enjoyable bus ride. There was a clear division between our program all sitting in the back of the bus, and the summer students all in the front of the bus... yes, apparently we are still in middle school.

Arrived at the Schwarzwald Museum or whatever it was called... it was strange because Herr Doerr did our tour in English, the first time anyone in AJY has spoken English to us in over three months. Almost all the summer students know at least a good bit of German, so they went with their instructor on the German tour, but five of the kids don't know any German, so they came with us and Herr Doerr, which is why he did the tour in English. Not gonna lie, it was SO WEIRD listening to him speak English, and I can honestly understand him better when he speaks German. My spoken German has definitely improved just by me being here, but it's not something I've really been practicing... my written German is probably honestly at the same level because I haven't been writing a lot of German except a few notes in class that we usually copy off the powerpoint, but my comprehension has definitely improved. It's still not that great, but I definitely noticed during Herr Doerr's tour, when he would slip into German anyways and I wasn't even realizing that he was speaking another language because I was still comprehending it all.

So we saw the giant farms and farmhouses and huts of the old people that used to inhabit the Black Forest...they were all much smaller than people today so the ceilings and doorways were very small! The straw roofs were built to as low as possible in order to better insulate the house during the very cold winters.





After our little tour, we were free to walk around the premises. Will and I split a piece of freshly baked bread-- baked in the outdoor oven mmmmm.


Got bored with walking around, so we stopped at the little cafe/biergarten with Krista and Monika and ordered a piece of the famous black forest cake-- made with cherry filling, because cherries grow really well in the region.


Back on the bus and drove for another hour or so-- this time we were all wide awake and laughing our heads off at random stuff in the back of the bus. Yeah, we were the cool kids in the back of the bus. Those kids.

Finally arrived at our picnic site-- a SPECTACULAR view, but just random really tall grass to sit in while eating. We found a rock to sit on and eat, and I surprisingly enjoyed my weird curry spicy pasta salad I had made to eat, as well as some nice carrot sticks and cookies and an apple!



Back on the bus and drove to an area of the forest where the kloster ruins and waterfall are. All of that was pretty cool-- the waterfall was very pretty and it was a gorgeous day to walk all around nature, though we were all sweaty and gross on the bus ride home. As I've said, I got a new camera and this one has a "vivid colors" setting, which captures photos in...VIVID COLORS! Seriously, it makes the photos so beautiful and bright, and I don't think I'll be able to switch back to the normal setting again...

Just check out the colors:





Left the waterfall, back on the bus, and I think every one of us fell asleep and were really groggy and sweaty when we got back to HD. We all stopped at Kaufland afterwards to pick up some beer, went home to shower, and met on the Wiese for pincincing and snacking and drinking for a couple hours waiting for the fireworks! On a few summer nights, Heidelberg puts on summer fireworks right next to the castle, so the Wiese and bridges were packed with people eagerly awaiting. Jolly and buzzed with some cups of cheer, we were all just enjoying the night (except for the GIANT beetles that were attacking us...) and the company of one another.



After relocating to escape the plague of beetles and forever losing a beloved shoe in the process, we awaited the fireworks. It doesn't get completely dark in HD until about 10pm so they didn't start until 10:15. Gotta say...unimpressive. And I think it's because we're all Americans and were expecting something along the lines of July 4th fireworks (especially me having seen them in DC so many times...) They were still cool, but very unimpressive. Stayed out on the Wiese for another hour or so...I think at some point we broke into choruses of Disney songs.

Made our way to the bridge and crossed the river into the Altstadt which was a SHIT SHOW. A combination of a Saturday at midnight and the fireworks shortly before had created a madhouse on Unterestrasse and Hauptstrasse, all along every bar. And here I am with only one shoe. Luckily I was careful though and avoided any broken glass! All of our usual bars were PACKED (I rarely go into the Altstadt on Saturday nights specifically because it is just too crowded to be fun unless you get there early enough to snag a table) so we made our way farther down Hauptstrasse and visited teh Dubliner--one of two Irish pubs in HD. I've always wanted to go, and it was only comfortably crowded-- we ordered a liter of beer:


It got really late and we called it a night. Borrowed a pair of Krista's shoes so I was able to successfully make it home. It was a pretty lazy Sunday today-- made some actual progress on my work and had a good, long run. I just had a four day weekend, but with two full-day trips, it went by so quickly and I am exhausted! Leaving for Lyon on Thursday, so soon before YAYA in Europe!!

FINALLY GOT A NEW CAMERA!!

I will admit that part of the reason contributing to my lack of blogging was the fact that I had gone more than two weeks without my camera. It ended up being only 15 euro more to buy a completely new one, so I just decided to do that. I finally bought it two days ago, and have since been taking photos galore, after going through a basic withdrawal. I LOVE taking pictures and just documenting life, because I'm one of those people that loves going through old photos and just remembering great memories with great people :)

Yesterday was a Catholic holiday-- Feast of the Ascension or something... so this being Europe, EVERYTHING was closed, and EVERYONE was out and about. With no class, a group of us took a day trip to Würzburg, a city maybe a little bigger than Heidelberg, but in Bavaria, about a two-three hour train ride away. We've been wanting to take a trip here for a while because it's free to take the train there with our semester passes, so this random holiday seemed a perfect day to do so!

Boarded the train with snacks (and beer...) galore at 8:55am. I love the fact that I get up earlier on holidays than I would on a normal school day... The previous day being Wednesday, our Stammtisch day, I was a bit hungover, so did not participate in the train drinking until the way back to Heidelberg, but we've got some champs in AJY, and they were going strong when we boarded that first train. Sometimes it's really nice to have your buddy doing his internship at a brewery where he can get all the free beer he can carry!


Of course these being regional trains and this being a holiday, our second train came really late, and then kept breaking down (German trains are not always so punctual as everyone believes...) and it was very crowded and we all got stuck sitting in the section between the compartments next to the bathroom for two hours... it wasn't too terrible though. Finally arrived in the city! None of us had looked up anything about it really-- Becca and I met a girl in our hostel in Istanbul actually from there, so she had told us some things to do, but other than that, we were just winging it.

Will, Krista, and Monika decided to do some city exploring and went off to see the fortress and Residenz and such. We were left with...wait for it...BANANA CLUB. That's what we refer to our group that went to Amsterdam: Brock, Dan, Matt, Becca, and me. I'm always trying to get us to hang out more, and here we were in a new city without us even realizing! So we started walking around and such, I was taking photos galore, just happy to have a way to document my life again!

We decided that Wuerzburg is basically the Heidelberg of Bavaria. It had the old fortress up on the hill, the old bridge with statues, a main river separating the Altstadt and the more residential areas, with the train station randomly at the edge of the city.

Banana Club together again!


Of course I needed a picture in front of the river and fortress


And what's a day without some statue imitation??


Walked and walked and walked, until we finally found our destination-- the Stadtstrand! Our friend Steffi had told us about this when we told her wanted to go to Wuerzburg. It's a little strand along the river set up like a beach-- beach chairs and sand and tables and a bar and umbrellas. All of us except Dan are going to Portugal in a few weeks, so we knew we had to start on our tans ;) We got into our swimsuits, and were ready to soak in the rays for a couple hours with some drinks... little did we know though, that the cocktail of the week was non-alcoholic, but boy was it DELICIOUS! We felt pretty dumb about that one, though haha




After a couple hours and a few drinks and few sunburns (Becca and I are in the champs league of tanning so we came out unharmed I'd like to note) we said goodbye to the Stadtstrand and went on a quest for food. Came upon a playground though, and us being members of AJY, we had to explore it! We coined the Krampus of Wuerzburg-- a merry-go-round ride that made me so dizzy I thought I was going to die.


After that little detour, kept searching for food-- harder than you'd think because everything was closed due to the Feiertag. Made our way to the Altstadt and found some churches (what's a trip to a European city without seeing some churches?!) I don't know what the first was called but it was very pretty on the inside, and the second was the Wuerzburger Dom, much more impressive on the outside than the inside.



Still starving... we continued our quest. Matt and Dan resorted to McDonalds and I was about to resort to Pizza Hut until we came across a wine festival! Becca, Brock, and I got our Bavarian wurst und kartoffeln specialties, and when Becca tried to order a beer and was told they didn't have beer, we learned that we were at the Wuersburg wine festival! So, when in Rome... I ordered a nice glass, and it was delicious! Honestly, all wine that is not 2 or 3 euro from the grocery store is delicious-- but really, it was a very good halbtrocken weiswein. Also managed to steal the glass for my collection!


It was approaching 6 and we called up the others and decided to take the 6:36 train to get back to Heidelberg around 9 (of course all the trains were late though, so we didn't get back until 10... and Becca not until midnight which is a whole other story on its own hahah) so we started making our way to the train station but had some time to kill, so we stopped at a Biergarten and had some afternoon holiday beers before our long journey back home...


Met up with the others at the station, grabbed some sustinents (aka beer and chocolate) and did a long journey home. Got back to my room and watched a movie, skyped with Mollie while she was doing last minute preparations before YAYA in Europe in Italy, and then went to sleep!

Today was BEAUTIFUL. I had planned to spend the day getting some work done (it's legit all starting to creep up on me and I don't like it at all!)...got a little done, but then I had to go grocery shopping for the picnic tomorrow, and by the time I got home after biking, I was sooo sweaty. I called up Becca and we went to the Schwimmbad which is a 10 minute walk from our house. It's 2,60 euro to go for as long as you want during the day-- they've got a biergarten inside, and a snackbar, and volleyball courts, and two GIANT pools, with a giant slide, and giant diving boards, and students galore. Definitely worth the price. We sun a lot on the Neckar, but the great thing about the pool is that when you get too hot, you can go swim around a bit and cool off!

I'm realizing that this being-in-school-until-July thing is going to be very hard because I set out days to do work...but if it's a beautiful sunny hot day, all I want to do is be outside soaking in those rays and Vitamin D! Hmmmm....

Went for a run after the pool, and then prepared some kind of weird concoction for the picnic tomorrow, who knows how it'll taste, and then preceded to do some more work. I think all of AJY was doing work tonight, despite the fact that it's a Friday night. We've got a program trip to the Schwarzwald tomorrow and gotta catch the bus at 8:30am, so no one was up for going out. We'll be traveling with all the students in the summer program, and we're all wary to meet them, because we all feel as if HD is our turf...and they're encroaching. We'll see what happens though.