Day One of our European adventure:
On July 22nd, Shay and I left for Europe!
Our trip started with my dad taking Shay and me to the airport where we were able to catch a flight to Denver to make our international flight to Frankfort, Germany.
Shay had never been to Europe before so he was super excited.
Some highlights from our flight:
1. When the flight attendant invited us to find the movie and T.V. options in the back of the flight magazine. Wow:
2. When I realized the castle on the front cover was one of the stops we were going to go see!
3. When the flight attendants offered free alcohol for the fourth time during our flight:
4. When the lady across the aisle from me started to struggle with her little boy. The little boy didn't speak any English but definitely was getting upset. The passengers in the plane were all trying to sleep and were not happy about the child's behavior. I quickly pulled out my I-mini and put on a game. He looked across at it and quickly went quiet. I handed my mini to the lady and she quickly thanked me profusely. Later, after the lady had returned my mini, the little boy started to act up again. I pulled out a few distractions from my purse to help him silent down, since the other travelers were getting upset (someone actually shushed the little boy...like that is going to help). He was so cute. As I was trying to play with him across the aisle he quickly slipped from his mother's arms and crawled up into my lap. The mother apologies in her broken English and I told her that he was fine. We had a good time playing a few games before his attention changed to the breakfast being served. Unfortunately, the lady said she had another 8 hour flight ahead of her. Wow! It was a wonderful opportunity to give some service to this mother who looked so tired as well as play with this cute little boy!
When we finally landed we walked around the Frankfort Airport looking for our traveling companions. We were a party of 8 for one week and downsized to 7 the second week.
When we finally were able to rent the cars, cram what luggage came across the sea with us (yes, 2 girls had their luggages lost on the flight over), we were off.
I was speechless when we drove through Germany. I couldn't have imagined the beauty that one encounters in Germany:
This was a park we stopped at when trying to find our way to Mike's cousin's home:
It was a beautiful park, but when we saw it for the fourth time we were ready not so see it again! ;-)
I thought this gate was so cool that I took a picture of it to remember it:
The cute ladies that worked in this bakery allowed Mike to call his cousins to get directions:
When Mike was finally able to get a hold of his cousins, we stopped at a grocery store and ran in to check out the chocolate (European chocolate it SO GOOD!).
Here is Sonya. We met Sonya last October when we went down to Cancun with Mike.
This is Bradley. We hadn't met Bradley prior to our trip. It was great to meet new friends on our trip!
This was the first time we had seen Lindt's new packaging:
It made us smile to realize they had a whole aisle dedicated to chocolate:
Then his cousin showed up to have us follow them back to their elusive home. On the way I took some pictures. It was SO pretty!
Mike's cousins were so nice! We really enjoyed the opportunity to go with them for dinner:
One of his cousins, Arna, is a chef and I asked him to order my dinner for me. This is a picture of what he ordered for me.
IT WAS TO DIE FOR!!!
We then returned home, chatted in the back with Mike's cousins, and then hit the hay. It was a wonderful first day in Europe! We feel so blessed to have had the opportunity to go and see all we were able to see!
