Blog 5 Free Day

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This was our free day today. I decided to sleep in today and it was great!! After eating breakfast, I got dressed and Catherine, Nate, and I went walking around. We walked along the river that runs through the city. It was really interesting because we saw lots of snails and slugs around the trail. They were huge! We haven't seen anything like this in Texas. After wondering around town, we got hungry and stopped at this restaurant called "Rosti-Hauseinwaldli". This seems like a nice local place to eat dinner. We walked in there was this big dog sitting there in the doorway. That was really weird. The lady did not speak any English so that made everything really difficult. She passed out some menus that had some English on it. Me and Catherine decided to try the special which we thought was chicken because that is what she said. Nate ordered some kinda of dish. After that, we told her we wanted some water, and she asked if we wanted salad. The way she phrased it made it seems like the salad came with the meal. When me and Catherine received our food, it was chicken wings, fries, and 2 sauces in a wagon basket; Nate had breaded pork chops. Me and Catherine were shocked at the food that we received. We started eating and the food was really good! After we finished eating we got our bill and it was $100 for 3 people!!! We were completely in shock!! We finally got the billed figured out and we left. The chicken wings were $19, the water was $4.60, and the salad was $8.50. That was expensive lunch! After that, I went to a dairy shop and had some dessert that had some alcohol in it. This was filled with liquor and very strong!! I had no idea it would be like this. We walked back to the hotel and took a nap.

After our nap, Catherine and I went to some shops. We stopped by the ATM to get some cash. She went first and everything was okay. I put my card in and went through the process, and I never got my card back. The ATM kept my card so I went to get help from the bank clerk. She informs me that my account or card is blocked so I need to contact my bank to figure what the problem is. To keep a long story short, the bank permanently blocked my debit card because of the international use. Instead of my verifying the information, they decided to just block the card and they sent me a new one yesterday. They still did this even though in the system it says I am traveling out of the country. I am HIGHLY UPSET!! Basically I am not able to access my account while here! I don't think I will be able to go to Paris which really makes me upset! Not only did I have bank problems, but I spent a long time on the phone with them, so I know my phone bill will be ridiculous! I will have them compensate me for those errors on there behalf.

Now I am sitting around and probably going to go to bed because I am angry. Tomorrow we leave to go to Strasbourg, France. I really hope I can enjoy the rest of my trip.

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