Next morning was an early wake up because a group of us decided to take an hour and a half drive to
Photo credit goes to Alyssa and Christine |
Photo credit goes to Alyssa and Christine |
Photo credit goes to Dorthea Knudsen |
Photo Credit goes to Louise Bertram |
Photo credit goes to Dorthea Knudsen |
Photo Credit goes to Louise Bertram |
A few weeks ago my family arrived in Berlin. I had the opportunity to show them around my home for the past 5 months and introduce them to my coworkers. After my last day at MODOMOTO and moving out of my apartment, we set off on our tour of Germany. Instead of my normal way of traveling by planes, trains, and buses, we chose to ride in style. My dad of course wanted to rent an Audi and drive at high speeds on the Autobahn.
After leaving Berlin, we visited Wittenberg where Martin Luther lived and nailed the 95 Theses. Then, we traveled to the former capital of Saxony Dresden and took a tour of VW’s Transparent Factory. Next, we visited Nürnberg for an overview of Nazi history and to have lunch with my friend Alex Göldner and her mom. Then, we drove to Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a beautifully well-preserved medieval town. The city’s gates and wall were so well in tact that you could walk around the perimeter of the city on them. Afterwards, we drove down the Romantic Road to Füssen for the stunning Schloss Neuschwanstein. Our trip concluded in Munich. Here, we toured Dachau Concentration Camp, which American forces liberated at the end of WWII. We also visited Allianz Arena where the Bayern München soccer club plays and ate at the Hofbräuhaus with a couple of my friends from Elon. The next day we flew back to Cleveland.
So that’s a wrap! I’m back and grateful for all of the wonderful memories I made during my year in Germany. But, I am also grateful for the challenges, too. It taught me about independence and perseverance and gave me a greater appreciation for the German culture. In addition to the many German cities I visited, I had the opportunity to travel to 10 other European countries. Although I won’t be finishing the dual-degree program at ESB Reutlingen next year, I am looking forward to returning to Elon in the fall to complete my bachelors. Though this adventure has come to an end, I know that I still have many more to come. Thank you all for sharing this year with me.
Unfortunately, I have exceeded my storage limit for uploading photos on this blog so I couldn’t upload all of the pictures from our trip. I will post the pictures on Facebook instead. (Just my luck on my last post!)
After arriving in Bratislava and finding our hostel, we set off to explore the city and to make the most of our 24 hours there. We started off right with a delicious traditional Slovakian meal before heading out to take a free walking tour of the city…that we ended up missing by a few minutes. We ended up walking around ourselves to see the old town part of the city and took a little train tour up to the Bratislava castle, where we were greeted with fantastic views.
Afterwards we wandered around trying to get to the cathedral in the center of town, only to find that it was closing for the day. So, we decided to head back to our hostel to drop off some bags and figure out what we wanted to do that evening. Our wanderings took us right by the Grand Cru Wine Club. We were debating going inside when a Scotsman who was sitting outside started talking to us, convincing us that it was worth the stop. We were definitely not disappointed. The shop only serves local wines and owner, Martin, gave us great recommendation.
Next, we went back to the hostel to drop off our things and befriended a Brazilian guy who was staying the room next to us. After a delicious pizza dinner, we headed back to Martin’s for another glass of wine, before calling it a night. The following morning, we grabbed breakfast and wandered around a bit more before it was time to catch our next train, destination Budapest.
Budapest was the city that we had the most time in, giving us time to rest and relax partway through our world wind trip. And rest and relax we did. The first afternoon there, we got a map and headed to the river…and ended up sitting and talking outside the Parlement building for 1.5 hours. Unknowingly to us, they take the flag outside the Parlement down everyday at 6:30pm, which was an interesting event to watch.
The next day, we thought that we should see a bit more of the city than what’s right by the riverside, so we visited the castle on the island, the Vajdahunyad Castle, that looks like it’s straight out of a fairytale. Next up was a free walking tour of the city which helped us learn more about the history of Budapest and how the cities Buda and Pest merged to create the city we know today. A delicious ice cream, dinner, a spilled beer, and a taste of pálinka later, we called our day a success and turned in for the night.
Our last full day in the city started with a trip to Starbucks and another walking tour, this time one of the Jewish quarter. A trip to Budapest cannot be complete without visiting the traditional Turkish baths, so we spent an afternoon in the city relaxing in the one of the largest bath houses in the city. We finished off our full day with an evening river cruise along the Danube River, which gave us an new perspective of the city.
With a few hours to kill in the morning before our “direct” train to Zagreb, we grabbed coffee at The Little Melbourne coffee shop. Our hostel recommended this coffee shop and I have to say, the recommendation was spot on. It was the best coffee I’ve ever had. Coffee was followed by a visit to the Roman Catholic church and another amazing view of the city from the church towers. After stopping for a quick bit to eat, it was time to say goodbye to Budapest and the European Union and make our way to Croatia.