Causeys Take Europe - Final Posts

Day 8,9,10 - Monday-Wednesday, July 7-9: Leipzig

Well, I have to group all the Leipzig days together, because we really didn't do much. Again, our hotel was in an industrial part of town. The guys at work told Matt that I should be careful walking around, because there were some not-too-nice neighborhoods not far away. So, I found my way to the train station/mall and walked there every day. The trains came in on the upper-most floor, and the mall was built in to the 2 floors beneath. It was pretty large, and gave me a place to walk and easily find lunch - especially since it rained a bit while we were there. Not very historic or informational, though.
This hotel also had a pool and jacuzzi, and I swam laps a few times to make up for the excersise I was missing. I also got to use the hot tub!! Now, before everyone starts lecturing me, let me explain. The water in this hot tub was about the temperature of my average bath water - WHEN I DECIDE TO GET OUT!! I estimate it was maybe 10 degrees warmer than the swimming pool. In fact, it actually felt slightly cool to my hands, and didn't even hurt my Berlin Sunburn. So, the good news is that I got to have a nice soak with the bubble jets. The bad news is that it wasn't at all hot. Oh well, at this point, I can't have both!
Unfortunately, we don't have any pictures from Leipzig! It didn't seem important to take a picture of the station, and we forgot to take a picture of our hotel, though I'll try to find a photo online just so you can see where we were. We were planning to stop at a museum on our way out of Leipzig on Wednesday, but our rental car ended up with a flat tire. Matt had to change it, and we ran out of time for the museum.

Since these 3 days are condensed into one, I'll add some random notes on items of interest in the UK/EU. Let's see if I can come up with anything interesting:

1. Hotels do not provide you with a washcloth.
It seems very strange to me. You get bath towels, hand towels, shampoo, soap, lotion, shower caps, sometimes even bath salts (France!). We've stayed in hotels in Scotland also, and no washcloth there either. We asked our local friends about it, and they didn't seem to find anything strange about it - they said that washcloths are more "personal". I guess that's true, but I am not one who wants to pack up a wet washcloth in my luggage and take it with me! For anyone traveling in Europe - Bring a washcloth or a poof, or you'll be soaping-up with your bare hands!
2. Refills are NEVER free, and the concept of customer service is a bit different.
If you order a drink anywhere in the UK/EU you will get a bottled drink and a glass of ice. Therefore, refills are not free. At fast-food places (McDonalds, Burger King) you'll get a fountain drink, but the refills still won't be free. Neither will they be 25 cents. If you want another drink, you'll pay full price for it. And, water isn't placed on the table either. If you ask for water, you have to specify "tap water" or you'll get a bottle of Evian with a glass of ice, and pay more than for a soda. And they won't find it necessary to check to see if you want more water, if you do manage to get a glass. Because you shouldn't need anything after your food arives, you'll be lucky to see your waiter even once during your meal. My thoughts are these: The meal is a family/personal time. People don't want to be bothered. So, the waiter stays away. (I must say that I've had US waiters who were really annoying - coming up every 5 minutes to see if we needed anything!) Also, in the US, you will usually get your bill even before your meal is over - or at least, as soon as your dishes are cleared away. Here, you have to flag your waiter down to ask for the bill. Even if they offer dessert and coffee, and you decline - they don't bring the bill automatically. You must ask for it. I guess in the states, they want you in-and-out ASAP to make room for other guests. Here, they let you stay as long as you like to enjoy the atmosphere, the company, and let your food settle. So, when travelling in Europe, don't be offended if you can never find someone to help you - just be patient and don't expect to be in and out in 30 min.
3. Tips are un-necessary
We tip in the US because those poor, overworked waiters are making about $3.00/hr. They work hard, and give us great service, so we make up the rest of their income. In the UK/EU waiters make at least the minimum wage, if not more. They do not depend on tips to pay the rent. You only 'need' to tip if you feel the service was exceptionally good. Like if someone checks on how you're doing... say... twice? That's great service ;-)

Day 11,12,13 - Wednesday-Saturday, July 9-12: Bad Hersfeld and Home

We spent the last 3 days of our trip in the city of Bad Hersfeld, Germany. The German word "bad" means bath - alluding to the natural springs that are in the city. Bad Hersfeld is not a tourist town. It is located almost in the exact center of Germany, and several hours away (even on the autobahn!) from Berlin, Munich & Frankfurt. It's much smaller and cozier than Berlin and Leipzig. Our hotel was on a quiet street which overlooked a large park. There are lots of photos of the park which will be in the photo gallery. Because of the natural springs here, water was everywhere!! As they might say back home, "you can't sling a cat" without hitting a water fountain! There was a large pond with a fountain in the middle and an area of tiny fountains for children to play in at the park. In town, there was some form of flowing water about every 4 or 5 blocks! Sculptures with water flowing down or around, random 'modern art' zig-zag carvings with a path for the water - it was everywhere! Quite beautiful and soothing - with the sound of flowing water everywhere you went. And, amazingly, no grafitti. In Berlin & Leipzig, there was the 'usual' big city grafitti - spray paint on bridges, windows, monuments, etc. This town was picturesque and very clean.
A short walk away from our hotel was a pedestrian mall. Old fashioned cobble-stone streets radiating out from a large central area (with a fountain, you may be sure). Each street was lined with shops on teh street level, with apartments above. Of course, the shops are modern - clothes, food and the like. But the walking along narrow streets with people all around was really fun. I found several really good ice-cream shops, which was nice, because it got pretty warm in the afternoons.
On one of these small streets, I happened upon a yarn shop - what fun! At some point in our trip, I had thought to myself that it might be nice to bring home some yarn from Europe, but had no ideas about actually trying to find a yarn store. The woman inside didn't speak much English, but I managed to tell her that I was just looking. I found some nice sock yarn - I decided that since we didn't have any souvenirs I would make us each a pair of house socks to commemorate our trip. I've gotten pretty good at socks since I've been practicing on baby socks during our whole trip! But alas! She didn't take a credit card, and I only had enough euros for 1 ball of yarn! Well, I thought (rightly) that Matt really couldn't care less about having his own pair of home-made-out-of-wool-straight-from-Germany socks, so I bought a color for me. But, Matt came home from work early enough for me to grab some money and run back to the shop for a ball of wool for his socks too! I had to convince him that he needed home-made socks, and that getting wool in Germany was fun. I had to use the, "we haven't spent any money on any souvenirs yet... " argument, but I finally won. Besides, the price of the wool was nearly the same as what I can get here in Scotland. I'll put photos of my baby socks along with my partially-completed house socks with the last set of photos in the gallery.

Our flight home was to leave on Saturday morning at around noon from Berlin. Check in at 10, 3-4 hour drive, had to stop for gas... we decided to leave at 5:30. Well, the alarm was mis-set, and went off at 5:30. You've never seen 2 people get ready to go so quickly! We were up, dressed and packed in less than 15 minutes. While Matt was checking out, I snuck over to the breakfast buffet to see if the bread was out yet. Breakfast wasn't supposed to start until 7, but they had to be in there setting up, right? Well, the cold meats and cheeses were on ice, but the breads were no where to be seen... darn. I'm sure I could have explained that we were leaving early, and gotten some rolls, but it wasn't that important.

We got on the road, then found a petrol station and a McDonalds side-by-side. Yes, we ate American Food in Germany. I am proud to say that this is the first American Food we've eaten since we moved - In February! We checked inside the petrol station for something more German, but all he had was coffee. Oh well - Bacon, Egg and Cheese McMuffins with Minute Maid OJ and coffee - tasted just like home! (although the coffee here is ground fresh from beans - even at McDonalds, and I got a latte - tasted as good as any Starbucks we've had!)

Matt took his last drive on the Autobahn (we took a photo of the spedometer at 170km/hr - I told him to enjoy it while it lasted!) And we got to Berlin about 30 minutes prior to check in, where we ate our second American Fast Food Meal - the only restaurant at the airport was Burger King. However, this did not taste like home. The burger was massively thick, and tasted like a hand made burger you'd cook on your grill at home! Yum! We got checked-in (we didn't make the 'A' group this time) then hung around waiting to board. Funny thing - we got on board after, oh, maybe 75 other people. But it seems that everyone wanted a window seat. We got 2 seats together on the 3rd row!! We decided that maybe it's not so important to be the first in line and do all that extra standing - there's a chance you might get a good seat anyway! And just for the record, no one ever asked if I had Doctor's permission to fly.

When we landed in Glasgow, we got to go in the short line through customs, since we have American Passports. There's one line for "UK/EU residents" and one line for "all other passports". There aren't too many non-EU passport holders flying from Berlin to Glasgow - too cool! We got our baggage, caught a bus to our train line, and were home by 5pm.

Before we left, we cleaned out every perishable food from the fridge, so when we got home we found mustard, individually-wrapped cheese slices, ketchup and 2 jars of jam. Not that I would have had the energy to cook anyway... So we ate our third American Fast Food - a pizza delivered from Dominoes. We went to bed early, and slept in late the next day, then spent the rest of the weekend doing nothing. Except I started Matt's socks... ;-)

Well, that's our trip! It was exciting, exhausting and so much fun. There are exactly 7 weeks left until my due date. I don't know if we'll be doing anything blog-worthy until then, so you may not hear from us for a while. But rest assured we'll be busy trying to think of all those last minute preparations that must be made before the big day! Thanks to you all for your comments, and for hanging on through this extremely long narrative. Hopefully, I'll have the last set of photos up very soon, and then your inbox won't be overflowing with any more emails from me. Please leave any further comments in the 'comments' section at the end of this post - if you just email them to me, no one else gets to read them. Ta ta for now!!