La Dolce Vita di Kierea: Boats, Castles, Thai People and More!

I do not even know where to begin—we packed a ton into today and met so many cool people! I honestly feel that more than 16 hours have passed since waking up at 5am. I'm still feeling sick (sore throat/stuffed), but I 'drugged up' this morning and have felt pretty great as a result. :)

I took my first train ride ever this morning and got to enjoy some beautiful scenery, and some pretty legit graffiti. We had a little layover between trains and decided to check out a little town called Manheim—loved it! One of my favorite things about Germany is that all the little towns are so quaint beautiful. We saw some really cool street art and picturesque gardens and fountains.

We founds this place during a layover at one of our train stops!

Street art: "If you don't harvest their thoughts, they'll go bad"

Street art: "If you give me the chance to shine, I'll be the best sun ever!"

Rhine River Tour at Bingen

We went on a boat tour today to see German castles along the water, and although we ended up having to run to catch the boat, it was well worth it! There was a huge group of tourists from Thailand on the boat with us. One, bright-pink-lipstick-wearing, woman walked over to the side of the boat, near where we were sitting, and started smiling. She smiled, looked at me, then pointed at the camera; I turned to look at the man taking a picture of her, then back at her. I thought she was trying to communicate to me that she was taking a picture and to let me know that she was not smiling at me, so I shouldn't feel awkward. I was wrong. Apparently she was actually trying to take a picture with me! It was unexpected and hilarious, but I went with it. Then, suddenly, all of her friends came over and took turns taking pictures with me. Even after they walked away, a couple of them kept taking pictures of me, and would randomly come and lean down by me to get another picture! I was so caught off guard—either they got confused and thought I was some celebrity or the just really like blonde hair. Either way, if I get treated like that from Thai people, I think Thailand will have to be my next travel destination! ;)

Apparently the Thai tourists on the boat thought I was someone famous
or just really liked my blonde hair and asked to take pictures with me

Rheinfels Castle, St. Goar
We got to explore two castles in depth today, this one was definitely my favorite. Not necessarily because it was cooler or prettier than the other one, but just because the staff was super liberal and let us explore whatever we wanted. Rheinfels was completely in ruins, and we just hiked through the little passage ways and up to every room we could find. We started heading up this pitch black staircase, into goodness knows what; Shawn was leading the way and all of a sudden he screamed--like something had grabbed him! I, being the protective travel buddy that I am, screamed and booked it down the stairs and out of the castle in about 2 seconds; then realized that nothing had actually grabbed him and that he was just screaming for my benefit...Brat.

Stolzenfels Castle, Kapellen

We had to take an extra train and a bus to get to Stolzenfels castle, then walked through the town, and hiked up a huge windy hill to get to the castle, only to find that it was closed. We decided not to let that stop us because, after all, it's not like we could go there next week. Plus, the fences didn't really seem equipped to actually keep people out—if they really didn't want us in there, they'd make it less accessible, right? So, being our rebellious selves, we snuck in and saw some girl in 12th century clothing speaking all dramatically. Had we just snuck into a movie set!? Well, that would have definitely been a cool story, but no. Turns out the castle wasn't even closed in the first place, we just had gone around to the wrong side, and the girl in the 12th century clothes was just a random tourist (this is who gives tourist a bad name, says the girl who 'snuck' in...). Anyhow, the castle itself was amazing! I've never seen anything so intricate in my life. I am completely obsessed with the castles, especially their gothic windows. I feel like I’m in a humanities class on steroids. Seriously, there is nothing like this in the States!

Just inside the castle :)

I love Gothic windows!

View from the castle

It rained most of the day, but it was still pretty warm outside :)

No words, it was gorgeous!

While the boats, castles, food, and scenery in Germany are amazing, I'd have to say that my favorite aspect of this trip has been the people. I don't know why I had this idea in my mind that Germans weren't very nice. Besides that fact that they are falsely modest (every time you ask someone if they speak English, they say, "A little." which actually means that they are fluent and can carry on a conversation with you for as long as you're interested), the Germans we have met are all extremely warm and fun to talk to (thankfully they speak English—I have experience with Italian and Shawn & Hayden are fluent in Russian and Spanish, but that doesn't get us very far in Germany...shocker, eh?). But, like I said, the people are wonderful.

Exhibit #1: Schmidt

After we got done at Rheinfels, we took a bus to Koblenz, a random, small town in Germany, and met a super chill—and kind of out there—guy named Schmidt. He wore all black, which contrasted nicely with his bleach blonde dread locks. Shawn started up a conversation with him. He told us where he was from and then asked us about ourselves.

Schmidt: Where are you from?
Shawn: Utah.
Schmidt: Utah? ... Utah?
Shawn: Yes.
Schmidt: Well why the he** are you in Koblenz?

Shawn didn't really know how to answer that; everyone just ended up laughing, and Schmidt shared some cheese with us (individually wrapped, I ate it and am still alive and not hallucinating, so I think we're good). It was random, but we ended up having a good conversation with him, and it turns out he’s a really nice guy. I like going to the smaller, less touristy parts of town. I feel like the people are more open and excited to talk. I really can't wait until I'm in Italy where I actually get to build stronger friendships, rather than just make passing acquaintances (which I still do very much enjoy).

Exhibit #2 The 4 Ladies at Stolzenfels Castle, Kapellen

I didn't mention this before, but the second castle we went to had a guided tour which I'm sure would have been interesting, if we could have understood ANYTHING that the tour guide was saying. Unfortunately, although most people in Germany speak English, the tour guide was not one of them. The only thing I actually understood was his firm step in front of us, which halted our progress towards a self-directed tour, and assured our continued presence in the small tour group, ourselves and four women. One of the women tried to translate a little bit of the tour for us, but ended up ranting about random things. Afterwards, we had a nice little chat with the women—they were pretty sassy, if I do say so myself. I loved it! Shawn told them about his and Hayden's world tour trip and they seemed less than impressed. "How long are you staying in Germany?" one asked. Shawn, smiling widely, told them "3 more days." "Typical Americans." another one said shaking her head. They at least seemed happy that I was staying put in one country for the majority of my trip. Besides that comment (which I thought was extremely funny), the women were friendly, took pictures and talked with us for a good 20 minutes.

These are three of the four women we met during the Stolzenfels Castle tour,
the lady on the right tried to translate for us
We tried to get them to smile for the picture, but they just kept talking :)

Exhibit #3 Susan the Story Teller

We met Susan on one of our longer train rides, somehow we started chatting and she told me that I should not be on the train, but up on the top of the hill, like Lorelai. When we all looked at her, befuddled, she told us that Germany has many traditional stories, and then continued to explain the story of Lorelai. She had a bit of a hard time translating it into English, but told us that Lorelai was a beautiful, blonde haired woman that would sit on the top of the hill, brush her hair, and sing. All of the sailors would get so distracted as they sailed by that they would run into the side of the hill and die. Susan shook her head as she told the story, "Very sad...very sad." Obviously some of the emotional connection/meaning was lost in translation, and I'm not sure how I feel being compared to a woman who kills sailors, but I appreciated her sharing some of the history of Germany with us.

We met Susan on a train and she told us some 'historical' stories about Germany

We also met some cool university students on our last train rides. We talked a long time to a couple locals named Steffen and Jenny—they were sitting across from us and started speaking loudly in English to get our attention. Sometimes I feel hesitant to start a conversation with the people around us, but I've found that it is a completely illogical fear because it seems like everyone is as eager to talk to us as we are to talk to them. Seriously, I love Germany!

And some more pictures from the rest of the day