Castle Hoppin' and Rhine Stompin'

Today we had the nicest day, a very special one to always remember. Actually, for Matthew and I it began at about 2:30 AM when we both were wide awake due to jet lag. We both sat there playing an "I Spy" computer game wrapped up in a blanket together in the dark so we didn't wake up Joshie or Dominick. We giggled and had fun, and finally went back to bed around 4;30 Am and got a couple more hours sleep. Poor Joshie slept 12 hours plus a 3 hour nap yesterday! But he was raring to go this morning when he got up.

Dominick scored with a brand new Mercedes as our rental car, and you would have thought he had died and gone to heaven! It had a talking GPS system in it which made us far less intimidated to hit the countryside. We drove about an hour and a half to Braubach to visit Marksburg Castle. I have some great pictures but for some reason Blogger is not letting me upload from here tonight. I'll try later and see if it comes through. We wandered the streets of the tinz little village of Braubach, got an ice cream cone and then enjoyed the castle tour. The boys loved it, especially the torture room. We ate a lunch of bratwurst and french fries while overlooking the Rhine and felt very touristy.

We went back to the hotel and visited with some new friends we made who are from Illinois. Gene and Dee had dinner with us the last couple of nights and we really enjoyed their company and will miss them when we all part ways tomorrow.

This evening we drove into Frankfurt and walked along the Rhine, people watching and boat watching...it was a beautiful warm evening with the city lights reflecting off the river.

We actually really love Germany and feel so lucky we got to see a little piece of it today. It really is as green as they say it is, and Matthew asked from the backseat "Mommy, why don't they call Germany 'Greenland'?" I sure wish I could successfully post some of the photos I took so you could see it. This is a place I could see coming back to visit someday, like in my next lifetime when we have money!! Hahahaha!

Everyone is in bed now, anticipating our flight tomorrow to Kazakhstan. One of the nicest things about this trip is simply spending time together as a family with no interruptions, no cell phones, no paperwork. It isn't often that you get time like this to be alone together, and we are taking full advantage of it!

Well, I had better head off to bed myself as it is 1 AM here, guess the jetlag still has hold of me! We'll try and post more sometime tomorrow or the next day, depending upon where we have internet access. Nitey nite!