The Last Week or So

Well, I know it's been a while since I've updated. It's hard to get online sometimes, but I'm on now!

Last week a few of us went to Karlsruhe. We were going to a museum, but they closed 30 minutes before we got there. So we just walked around the town, through the botanicle gardens and around the castle there. We ate dinner at a Greek restaurant owned by Germans. It was soooo yummy. All of the food here is amazing.


Friday night, one of the people on my shift that is here permanently had a bunch of people over to his house for dinner. The moms of two of the people deployed here came to visit and they cooked dinner for us. It was incredible food. It's amazing how so many people can come together and hang out so quickly after meeting each other for the first time. It truly is like having a second family here. (I'll upload those pictures another day, the others took forever.)


So, I went to Rudesheim am Rhein yesterday. It was so very pretty. There's a huge statue in the mountain there. You can walk, drive or take a cable car up the mountain. Guess what I did? The person afraid of heights took the cable car. It was so beautiful. It was a very foggy, but sunny day. We rode over some vineyards and it was really cool.

Wikepedia has this description of the statue: The Niederwalddenkmal is in the Niederwald Landscape park. High up above town, the Niederwalddenkmal is a statue of Germania, built to commemorate the unification of Germany in 1871 under the leadership of Kaiser Wilhelm I and the first German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, both of whom are depicted on the monument. The monument was constructed in order to remember the foundation of the Second Reich after the end of the Franco-Prussian War. The first stone was laid on September 16, 1877 by Wilhelm I. The sculptors selected for the creation of the monument were Johannes Schilling and Karl Weisbach. The monument was inaugurated on September 28, 1883, six years after the start of the construction.

Underneath the monument makes reference to "Die Wacht am Rhein", a patriotic German song with roots as early as the Franco-Prussian war. The central figure is the 12,5 m tall Germania.

This immense monument can be reached either by an hour's walk from the town or by means of a gondola over the vineyards. It is also possible to walk a little way further to reach the chairlift down to Assmannshausen. Whichever route is used, the monument provides a wonderful view of both Ruedesheim and Bingen across the river, as well as the junction of the Rhine and the Nahe.

Afterwards, we went to this really, really yummy restaurant. The baked chicken and pommes frites are to die for! I couldn't eat the whole thing, but I stuffed myself full. When Steven comes to visit, we'll be going back for sure!


Well, I'm signing off since it's getting late and I have to work in the morning! Love you all!