More Garmisch weekend

We did some other things on our birthday trip to Garmisch! Completely on opposite spectrums from each other, but equally as memorable.

First, we stopped at the Dachau Concentration Camp on our way down. We had been there years before and things had changed so much we got a little turned around when we were going there. Instead of parking in the big gravel lot where all the prisoners once gathered, there is a separate parking lot across the street. There is a Visitor's Center now and an audio tour you can take. Because we walked from the lot across the street, we ended up entering the camp through the gate so many innocent people entered when they were off-loaded from the trains 70+ years ago...

I don't have much to say about Dachau. When you are there it steals your words. Incomprehensible.

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One other fun thing we did on the weekend was to explore Schloss Linderhof, another of King Ludwig's castles.  We visited there once before with the big kids but were only able to tour the grounds, as the castle itself was closed for renovations. Also, one of us (ahem) had to stay outside the Grotto with the baby who wasn't quiet enough to enter (cough cough...)

Now the "baby" is big and we all got to enter. And the castle renovations were finished so we got to tour it as well!

The colors were absolutely spectacular the day we were there!

Inside the Grotto. We did feel a little ripped off. We "listened" to a lengthy description and narration of the grotto and its history in German, with the promise of an english translation coming afterwards. The fifteen minute German narration was reduced to a 3-minute brief by the time it made it to us in English... but it was still neat.

We had lunch in the nearby town of Ettal, near the famous monastery. Oh, German food, how we love you... 

We also had some fun recreating pictures we had taken 12 years ago! Things haven't changed too much, but the people sure have!

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On the other end of our trip, we decided to stop off at Legoland one last time. The Soldier had never been there! We had a great time on all the rides, eating yummy food, and exploring the shops and Lego factory. A fun end to a great weekend.

Couldn't resist stopping to capture this beautiful view on our way north...

Not too crowded in October!

We helped assemble a giant pumpkin made out of Lego blocks...

I went, too, but not this ride. :)

And then it was home....

Birthday weekend

It's so nice that our Soldier's birthday is always on a long weekend. Especially where we live. There's no reason not to celebrate BIG!

This year we decided to take it up a notch. Like about 2900 meters up.

 We went to the Zugspitze and to say the view was spectacular doesn't do it justice. Incredible, gorgeous, stunning, and breathtaking get a little closer.
Getting to the Zugspitze takes a little bit of work. Unless you plan on making the difficult hike all the way up by yourself (we did talk to a couple of climbers who had done it in about 5 hours--which was pretty much a record. It involves climbing equipment for the last part!) you have to consider a couple different methods of transportation.
We chose to drive to the Eibsee and take the cable car straight up to the top. Then we took a combination of cable car and train on our way back down.
The cable car holds about 35 people and takes you to a lookout about 2000 meters up. It has changed significantly since we were there 11 years ago. They have built new restaurants and shops and are in the process of building a system which will carry a new cable car that holds 100 people!

The last time we were up on the Zugspitze I stayed at the lookout with the baby boy while the Soldier took the other three kids out of the safety zone and made the hike over to the summit. It was dangerous and I was slightlly nervous about my little elementary kids making that climb, but they made it and were so proud of themselves!
Now that the baby boy is bigger he wanted to make it to the summit himself.

There was one problem.

Because of the new cable car construction, the entrance to the climbing area was closed. Gesperrt. Chiuso. Barre.
We decided to take a break (with coffee and cake, of course) to consider our options. We got to talking to the lady in the cafe and she said, "of course!" we could still make the climb! I'm not entirely sure there wasn't a bit of disconnect between our languages, but we decided to roll with it. We ducked under the sign, shimmied around the crane, climbed down some stairs, and set out.

The climb was slippery and treacherous, made even more difficult by the fact that several of the guide ropes were not attached to the rock anymore because of the construction.

made it to the summit!

Here's a fun story. There were two guys in their late 20's who had decided to break the rules and try the climb, too. They were just ahead of us and we caught up to one of them when we reached the ladder. He was just standing there, holding on. We asked him if he was going up and he said no, and let us pass. After we made it to the top we saw him coming up! He told us that he was too scared to continue but when he saw Joshua making the climb he figured he couldn't turn back so he summoned some courage and made it himself! He's actually the one who took the photo above.

We were pretty proud of ourselves! 

We explored a bit, went over to the glacier where the guys did some sledding and had a snowball fight and we got a quick bite to eat before heading back. 

Happy birthday, my love!

 We did some shopping around Garmisch-Partenkirchen before heading back to the hotel. The hot tub and sauna were a welcome relief for all of us! Dinner was at a new and wonderful Italian restaurant. We may have eaten there again before the weekend was over.... :)

*I'm so frustrated at the photo quality on here. It's one of the reasons I haven't been posting as much lately. I edit my photos to post on IG and Facebook, but when they upload to the Mac the edits are mostly lost. And even if I edit the photo on the Mac (Like increasing the brightness and exposure on that summit picture above) the edit doesn't transfer when I upload the photo to blogger. Hopefully I'll figure this problem out soon...

Schloss Ludwigsburg

A couple weeks ago a sweet friend of mine from Fort Bragg came to Germany with her husband, who was on TDY. She had time to kill during the day while he was working so Joshua and I decided to drive over to Stuttgart to meet her.
Now, you may have heard me lament over driving to, near, around, in the vicinity of Stuttgart before. The TRAFFIC. It's just terrible. Every. Single. Time. And honestly, this time was no different. I lamented the whole way there and back. ;)
Let's just take a minute and thank the Lord and the Army that the Soldier was not stationed in Stuttgart.....
ok.

But once we (finally) got there we had a great time! And it was actually such a great time the extremely slow and long drive home didn't overshadow the fun. :)

We went to Ludwigsburg castle, a beautiful baroque palace just north of Stuttgart. The foundations were layed in the early 18th century and the palace was gradually added to, redecorated,  and completed over the next 40 or 50 years. as different rulers assumed title.
Surprisingly, the castle was not destroyed during WWII and it remains in beautiful condition today. The centrepiece of the grounds are the gardens. As we visited during one of the driest summers on record, they were not as spectacular as some of the photos we saw of them, but they were still lovely.
In addition, there is a children's fairy tale garden on the grounds--and that was an absolute delight to explore.

In the courtyard

from inside the courtyard-looking back at the first building of the complex

beautiful old carousel

This was the only photo I was able to snap inside the palace before we were informed that no photography was allowed...

taken from inside the castle

Lost in the hedge maze. Good thing we had just filled up on coffee and cake!

fun in the fairy tale garden. 

On the boat, just before floating through the big whale...