German Fare

When we finished up the Chocolate Museum, the sun was beginning to set. We decided it was time to grab some dinner and then head back to the hotel for some shut eye.

I think we were delirious/tired/confused so finding a restaurant turned into another adventure. We referred to our Rick Steve's guidebook and ended up walking to a plaza with several restaurants. Most of the restaurants were pretty full and there was patio seating everywhere. Perfect.

Or so we thought. We quickly learned that in Germany, you seat yourself and the waiter will come to your table when they are ready. After awkwardly standing around for a while, we asked the waiter for a menu. He looked at us like we were crazy and hesitatingly gave us menus. We stood around a while with our menus and pestered the waiter about the difference between sitting inside or outside. Nobody was sitting inside.. and it turns out it was cheaper to sit outside. One of the waiters gestured that we sit down at an open table. We ordered beers all around and sat around for a while. Kolsh is their specialty. It's a light, fresh beer. We impatiently flagged down our waiter to place our order and he came over reluctantly.

Of course, we had several questions about the menu. For example, "what is a scallopine?" He was more annoyed with us, couldn't describe it, and told us he would come back when we were ready. We decided to just go down the specials and order one of each. 

Finally, the food came out and we were pretty satisfied. It turns out a "scallopine" is a fried veal cutlet. It ended up being one of my favorite!

We quickly learned that Germans are no-nonsense. We should know what we want to eat. We should know what kind of beer we want. We should be decisive. HA.  

Chocolate > Sleep

Our first stop on our European adventure was Koln - aka Cologne. We arrived a few days before our official Rick Steve's tour began so that we could adjust to the time difference and explore Germany on our own for a few days.

Even though we were really jet-lagged, we dragged each other away from the comfortable beds in our hotel to wander around the city. Of course, even on day one, we had an itinerary. Our main destination - the chocolate factory (and Hard Rock).

I never knew Germany was famous for it's chocolate...until we walked up to the Lindt Chocolate museum. I love Lindt so it was fun to tour the factory. We whizzed through the history portion of the museum (how they make chocolate..blah blah blah) and went for the chocolate machines, chocolate molds, and chocolate fountain!!

If this wasn't at the beginning of our tour, I would have definitely picked some up to take home.

 

We did pick up one souvenir.... Chocolate Beer! (I had to do it). It was tasty and it reminded me of a good porter. 

Beer and Castles!

In September, we headed to the land of beer and castles! I've always heard a lot of great things about Germany and I persuaded my family it would be fun to make our way to back to Europe. We got a little taste of everything - Germany, Austria, Switzerland, and the Czech Republic.

I think the beer was exceptionally tasty because it was Oktoberfest! Who knew that they actually celebrate that in September...

Short and sweet

My trip to the Virgin Islands was short and sweet.

We snorkeled a little bit, but it was hard to be excited by the fish because the current was pretty strong so we had to pay attention and make sure we could find where our stuff was.

I did go scuba diving and went for my first professional massage. Both were amazing... :)

I was pretty scared while scuba diving because my mask was filled with some water and our instructor didn't  give us very detailed instructions. In fact, our intro to scuba was about 10 minutes long and didn't involve getting in the water... Unusual, I think. Even though I was a swimmer, the sensation of breathing underwater was a little unnerving. We didn't see that much stuff, but we were able to get a lot closer to the coral and we could see small sea-eels at the bottom of the ocean. I would try it again in the Bahamas or Australia for sure.

The massage was heavenly. I think I fell asleep for a few minutes because I was so relaxed... We got complimentary tea, fuzzy robes, and cushy shoes.

I would definitely make it back to the Virgin Islands one day. Wedding destination?

Where I want my wedding pictures taken

So ideally, sometime in the future, I would have so much money that I could fly my entire wedding party to the Virgin Islands and pay for their transportation to Devil's Bay to take professional pictures.

I think it's beautiful. I was so camera happy that we almost didn't make it back to our boat on time!

Getaway

Our living arrangement made St. John's even better. It felt like a villa! With 7 people, we all fit very comfortably. We even had our own private pool and grill. Oh yeah, and we definitely put our blender to good use. We made Pina Coladas whenever we could. I'd say that during the week we polished off 2 bottles of rum and 1 bottle of mixer...between the 3 1/2 drinkers.

1. me
2. my partner in crime, Brittany
3. my dad
3.5. my mom only counts for 1/2.

We pretty much spent our entire vacation lounging around. The only food nearby was the hotel restaurant, so we utilized our kitchen and grill to cook for most of the week - mostly salad and BBQ. There was even a window from the kitchen to the patio. The boys liked the quick service!

typical dinner. NOM.

Virgin Islands

I never thought I would find a beach with softer sand than Hawaii....

The sand is heavenly, the ocean is the perfect temperature, and there's almost no one around. If it's time for a relaxing vacation, St. John's is definitely high on my list.

We arrived to St. John's by ferry and it was well worth the wait. I would stray away from St. Thomas. It has beautiful beaches too, but also a lot more tourists. After all, St. Thomas is a popular port for cruise ships.