We're back! And we have been back for 10 days now. Sorry for not posting anything about our trip until now. It was crazy busy the last 2 weeks there, and super fun. We left Bremen, Germany and headed to Berlin. Unfortunately we were only able to stay one full day, but we had a sweet place to stay, thanks to my friend in Krefeld. His brother lives in an appartment complex (the whole building) and they still have a few units that were not remodeled into part of his house. So we had our own appartment to stay in for two nights. It was great! European hospitaltiy is the bomb.


This is the family we stayed with in Bremen, Germany. So good to see them!

Berlin is a pretty cool city. I liked the vibe there and there is a lot to see. The friend we stayed with showed us around a little bit in his two collectors cars. One is a Yellow 60's Chevy truck and the other is a brand new Land Rover Defender. Its strange for europeans to have such big cars, but this guy loves it and it was fun to ride around in them there cuz you definitely get some funny looks. We got to see parts of the Old Berlin wall, the famous Brandenburg Gate, a Holocaust museum, and much more. Its amazing just how much history lies in this city...you could spend weeks there and never get to see it all. Hopefully one day we will be back.


Brandenburg Gate, Berlin

From Berlin we went to Opole, Poland where we met up with some of my Dad's friends. He has known them for some years now and we have met them a few times in The States. They were so amazingly generous and took us out for traditional Polish perogies (sp?) the first night in town. Yummy!!! Let me just say that out of everywhere we went in Europe, Polish food was by far our favorite. Now, don't get me wrong. Italy holds a close second with all the pizza, pasta, and gelato. But Poland wins with its fried potato pancakes, cabage soups, stews, and salads, hearty meats, fried fish, perogies, cabbage rolls filled with pork, crouchettes, i mean seriously..the list just keeps going on. And all the restraunts we went to were buffet style with the most food I have ever seen. It was better than a wedding. OMG sooooooooo good.


First night in Opole, Poland with our friends who introduced us to perogies!

Enough about food. Poland was very different than the parts of Western Europe we had been in. I have heard that there is a huge difference in Western and Eastern Europe, and that we should visit both. I am glad we did as it was a great learning experience. The first thing I noticed was that not as many people speak english there, and the language is WEIRD! In the other languages you could attemp to pronounce them and sometimes get it right. But in Polish, a handful of the letters sound nothing like what they do in english. For example, a letter Z sounds like a J, and a letter W sounds like a V, and there are many more like this. So good luck trying to communicate and prounounce Polish words with someone who speaks no enlish and you don't know how to say the words of their language correctly. It just doesnt work. I am thankful we were with friends most of the time! Some of the hardest times we had were on the trains because they do not announce where you are when the train comes to the stations! On all other trains we had been on throughout Europe a nice little voice comes over the intercom and tells you where you will be and which side of the train to exit on. Not the case with Poland. They expect you to know, or you better make sure you watch where you are. Don't fall asleep or you will miss it!

It seemed less stuffy in eastern Europe, and a little bit more laid back. There were a lot of advertisements on the roads and it wasn't quite as clean and crisp as the other countries. But it was still beautiful...the old buildings and architechture. And it got even more beautiful when our friends took us down to Zakopane for the weekend, which is a little mountain town on the Czech border. They set up an incredible weekend for us by finding the cutest bed and breakfast for all of us to stay in, and two tiny dogs greeted us as we drove in. It was fun to have little dogs running around, and two sheep in the yard next door, oh and horses pulling carriages down the streets out front...oh and the mountains all around. It was like a fairy tale! We spent three nights there and ate the best food we have ever had, and hiked off all the calories during the daytime with 2 epic 6 hour hikes to the tops of tall mountains with views unlike anything I have ever seen, and I have seen some pretty amazing things this year.

We left Zakopane and st0pped through to see Krakow (pronounced Krakauff), went home, and the next day went for a visit to Auschwitz conentration camp. Auschwitz is the last and largest concentration camp built, and was the place where approximately 1.5 million people were killed during the Holocaust. As hard as it was, we are both glad we had an opportunity to see that. I think that one cannot grasp the severity and size of the operation until you have actually been there and felt what the energy is like in that place. We were overwhelemed with how huge the camps were, but that is just a small piece of it all considering the stories of inhumanity told and hearing personal accounts of people who actually spent time living in that place. Its inconceivable, just totally impossible to actually beleive that inhumanity like that could actually happen. But I beleive it could happen again, and perhaps is still happening and we don't know about it. Looking back, both of us feel that we were so overwhelemed with everything that we had no choice but to shut overselves off emotionally. I think you have to, or you would not be able to make it through the tour. Even today its something that I cannot quite wrap my head around. I would recommend a visit there if you ever have the chance. It will change your life forever.


Hiking in Zakopane

After Auschwitz we headed up to Wroclaw (pronounced Vrautswauff, strange, huh?) where we met up with some more friends of my dad who we had actually just met in the States about a month before! We had a great time with them as they showed us around town and one of the most beautiful downtown squares I had seen in Europe. We did lots of cool historic sightseeing and more eating of delicious food. And I must add in that we also drank the best vodka I have ever tasted. It can only be found in Poland, and its called Zubrowka bison grass vodka (pronounced Jabroufka). I'm not a huge vodka fan, but this stuff is amazing! You mix it with apple juice, which is strange, but it ends up tasting kind of like delicious tea. I have great memories now my favorite mixed drink in the world. Too bad that I will just have to go back to Poland to get more! But we had great talks and fun times with our friends who thankfully took us to the train station to help us get on our train to Prague (thank goodness because otherwise we would not have found the right platform...argh...Polish train stations...).
Sweet little David in Wroclaw riding the little bronze statues of a memorial for animals that Polish people eat everyday.



And later I will write about how amazing Prague was. But for now I must go and this time I will leave some pictures of Poland and Germany!! :)