Germany

We have several friends who are living in Europe at the moment, and DC has access to an awesome Space-A flight that goes from Baltimore to Italy. Space-A, for those who are not military, is a system were military members can travel for free on empty seats of military flights. Our friends Greg and Andrea have been living in Munich for the past year. We decided last minute that we needed to head to Munich before they left and also see our friends Riann and Carly (husbands deployed) in Italy. Dave's mom was nice enough to come watch the kids so we could go kid free.
I learned a lot about Space-A this go around including that in early January, everyone is trying to get home from pending Christmas in the US. We weren't able to get on the flight we wanted going out, so I just bought tickets to leave the next day (but we did make is Space-A back home with no problems).
Germany was amazing!! Greg and Andrea were the best tour guides we could have asked for :).
First stop was Neuschwanstein Castle which is the castle that the Disney castle is modeled after. It even snowed the night before so we had a breath taking powder of snow over everything.

beautiful view on the walk to the castle

The castle King Ludwig lived in while Neuschwanstein was being built

The snow had caused the grounds keepers to close the pathway over to the bridge that you take pictures from. Well, Dave talked us into hopping the fence and going anyway. It was like exploring a fairy tale because of the beautiful snowy path and no other tourists.

path to the bridge

view from bridge

my favorite picture

 Greg drove us around on the Autobahn ... exciting for Amy :)

We went to the charming town of Rothenburg. It is surronded by a stone wall and inside has many cute shops - mostly Christmas shops.

Kathe Wohlfahrt was the crazy three story shop we spent way too much money in

On the way back from Rothenburg, we stopped in the cute town of Nurenberg. We ate at the oldest sausage house in Germany which had AMAZING nurenberg sausages.

  


If you see the cup in Dave's hand, it has gluhwein in it. It's this warm, prune tasting wine that they sell in the winter. Dave had a good time getting it every night :)

Then we have Munich. Munich is shockingly nice and clean, it is the Beverly Hills of Germany.

One of the monk statues

Marienplatz

Beautiful church we had mass in

Odeonsplatz

People rub the lion's shield for luck

pretzels every where

Grilling sausages

We also went to the town of oberammergau, but forgot to take any pictures ... oops. It had amazing little wood work shops.
Coming soon ... the Italy post.