Another Long Day

We started the day at a bakery.  We had croissants that were quite excellent.  Since we didn’t see much of Erfurt the night before we decided to walk around and do a bit of shopping in the morning.  We walked over the Krämerbrücke.  It is one of the city‘s most interesting structures.  It has shops and houses that line it and the bridge dates from 1325.  From there, we walked to Dom.  It is a huge church on a big square.  On our way up to the church we walked through a market selling everything from flowers to fresh meat.  We did a bit of shopping and then hiked up the stairs to the Dom.  It was quite impressive but the main church was closed until noon so we didn’t get to see the inside.  We then walked around through town and into the Anger district for a bit of shopping.  We even saw statues of die Maus and die Elefant.  By that time it was time to hurry back to the hotel to check out and be on our way.

Today we drove through the Thüringer Wald (Thuringian Forest).  It was similar to the Harz but with different kinds of trees.  We first stopped at Oberhof a ski resort and summer hiking destination.  We stopped for lunch at an Italian place where the owner seemed to know all of the guests.  They were very nice and had excellent food.  After that, we continued on our way through the forest.  Once again, it was very scenic. 



On our way down the mountain, we saw a big ruined building with a guard tower next to it.  As we drove by, Patrick figured out that it was a remnant of the East German border defense.  A few meters later, we saw the sign about the wall falling.  Shortly thereafter, Patrick pulled off to see if we could hike to see the tower.  We did but we also found a small remnant of the West German border controls as well as a hike to a sculpture garden commemorating the fall of the wall.  We talked with Anna about how her Opa used to guard the border on the Western side and how Papa’s Opa fought in the Second World War and what happened to Papa’s Oma and Opa at the end of the war.  She was really interested in figuring it all out.



Finally, we were on the last leg of our journey to Aschaffenburg.  By now it was 5PM and we saw lots of people heading to church in a couple of the towns we passed through.  By now, the girls were done riding in the car but they did great.  We did make one detour outside of Schweinfurt to see the place where Patrick used to live.  Anna was interested to see the field where Patrick cut his arm as a boy.  She knows the story well. 

We finally got to our hotel right at 7PM.  Our room is on the 3^rd floor and there isn’t an elevator so we had to lug all of our stuff up to our room.  On the plus side, the room is huge and has plenty of room for all of us.  We are excited about that since we are staying here tomorrow night too.

Once we got settled, we went wandering about to find dinner.  We walked toward downtown and the Schloß.  It is HUGE.  We walked a bit and found a Bavarian restaurant for dinner.  The food was excellent.  While we were eating, we heard an organ grinder and saw girls handing out leaflets.  Anna went to get one and we found out that tonight is the night of open churches – for Pfingsten.  We were going to check it out but Sabine was done so we walked a bit instead.

Finally, it was time to go back to the hotel.  The girls wanted to write in their journals and we were all tired.  We are looking forward to checking out the city tomorrow and having a slow day with no driving.