Rothenburg is such a pretty town. We spent today touring the town and enjoying the local delicacy - Schneeballs. Our tour guide was a retired teacher whose family can trace its history in the town back to the 1200s. It was also nice to meet up with some fellow Americans on our English speaking tour. Amazing that we ran into someone from Iowa City today as well. Thank goodness the Cyclone fan from several days ago was not in town. We took a lot of pictures, and they look just like the postcards and pictures everyone has seen. But our guide debunked several of the Rothenburg myths 1- the town was saved during the 30 years war, not because the old mayor could drink a liter of beer in a single gulp, but because the wealthy ... read more

Today was Nuremberg - an interesting day. We toured the museum there and walked around the main market square. At the end of the day we drove over to Furth - almost like a sister city. Furth is also very pretty, but truth be told, we went there because Dave's brother-in-law's family name is Furth .... And who knows, they may be from there. After that, we had found a huge rose garden that we wanted to visit in Hagenhausen. It was supposed to be closed, but we spent some time walking along the front part of the garden admiring the roses. And good news for all of you who were concerned with our navigation situation ... After preparing to navigate from a map ... We figured out how to work the system in our van. ... read more

Thursday Another great weather day. We went to Ahrweiler today. Originally to see the West German Atomic Bomb Shelter - which was closed - and ended up spending the afternoon in the walled city instead. What a cute little town .. Lots of shops and restaurants ..and the weather was perfect for strolling. Once we were done there, we went off to the Bridge at Remagen, and toured the site and museum there. The Meuse, is the Peace Museum, and it had some interesting artifacts and exhibits. We decided on an early day and then fought with Garmin all the way home. Tomorrow we change locations and will be just east of Frankfurt. Dave continued to make sure we got where we were going, and were almost legally parked. The walled town was a pleasant surprise. ... read more

We have been having technical difficulties for the past couple of days .. So here is what you have misse Monday Wow .. We are having quite a thunderstorm tonight. We were sitting on the patio, but the wind and rain drove us inside So today we explored the castle we stayed at last night ... We had a good time. We have decided the people that lived back then were related to billy goats. Lots of steep stairs and climbing in those castle walls. And it seems the siege was a very effective type of warfare - and castles everywhere spent most of their waking time either preparing to be sieged or being sieged. This seemed to be common theme for castles on the Rhein. Lots of great photos from today - and some Dave ... read more

Well, there was no skiing today. When we got up this morning, we couldn't see the mountains from our room, and a quick look at the weather forecast and the webcam at the top of the mountain boded for a cloudy, foggy day with no sunshine insight. Having skied in these conditions before, and not liked them, we decided to hang out in Garmisch-Partenkirchen instead today. We did accomplish a couple of things though. 1) we had coffee and pastry in several coffee shops and erased my caffeine deficiency of the past few days. 2) as we browsed around town, we found some candidates for next year's Christmas stockings 3) we took a quick tour of the Olympic Stadium and their exhibition "the Dark Side of the Games" We did walk through town, and you will ... read more