HISTORY 101

I love Canada, I really do...but come on!! Do we have a wall that was built in 373??!! Well now I have a picture of one that was.

The town that we are in is called Wiesbaden and the reason that they have so many old buildings is because in WWII, the American soldiers liked it here so much they made it their headquarters and didn't bomb it as much as the surrounding towns. So many of the houses and churches are still standing from when they were first built.

Mark and I toured around Wiesbaden and Mainz yesterday and I was completely blown away with what I saw. The amazing care and craftsmanship that these buildings were assembled with is something that I have never seen. We were lucky enough to be walking through a large church yesterday just as a wedding ceremony started. The organ began playing and the choir stared singing and I got goosebumps. It was unreal.

Today we toured the Rhine river on a boat for 3 hours taking way too many pictures of about 20 castles that stand along the banks. We hopped off in a town called St. Goar and were able to walk through the Burg Rheinfels. (castle Reinfels). Again way too many pictures.

The people we are staying with are as amazing as their country-

Sabine- a wonderful hostess who can't do enough for you.

Franz- the best and most knowledgeable tour guide I've ever had.

Melanie-So easy going and even if she's seen it a thousand times before, will show you again without a word of complaint.

Ava-a sweet 82 year old lady that starts to cry when she thinks about Canada because she loves it so much and.....

Heinz- the perfect host who makes sure that your glass is never empty. doesn't actually drink very much himself, but loves to watch the Canadians try to do their best with peach schnapps, cherry schnapps, asbach schnapps, schlein schnapps.....all in the same night. You could ask Mark how he did but I'm not sure he remembers.

I'm still trying to figure out how to post pictures directly to the blog and not have to load them on the computer first, but alas everything is in German...

Have to run-we are on are way to Heidi and Bernd's for the next 3 nights and then off to Italy!!

Aufwiedersehen!!