Life as a Country Girl

While life on a small Army post is rather dull, life in the German countryside is awesome! We are within walking distance of miles and miles of trails through the most enchanting forests and country I have ever experienced. For the last day of Justin's time off we decided to take Riley on a long hike. The weather was perfect, the sun was shining (a miracle in Baumholder) and we woke up early to get a good start. We hiked an hour and half up the side of a mountain to be greeted with a gorgeous panoramic view of the area. 

My Boys!

It's hard to imagine life getting any better than this! Especially because the trail that led down the backside of the mountain was steep, icy and essentially a death trap. Luckily the three of us made it safely down despite the ringing artillery fire in the back ground and drastic drop in temperature... Life has been more of an adventure than I could ever imagine and I can't wait to see what is in store for us next! 

K-Town Adventure

I found my camera! Which means y'all will finally get to see our adventure in Kaiserslautern. Day two of Justin's three days off we took a little drive to K-town. Kaiserslautern is a city where another army/air force base is located and its also where the USO headquarters for the area are so we were able to sign up for another trip! Kaiserslautern is about as close to an actual city as I have been in over the past month and I have been missing the hustle and bustle of city life. After signing up for the trip we headed down town where we of course got lost! Luckily we found a park and the train station so we were pleasantly busy exploring. At least until it starting snowing yet again... 

Fanciest Tapas restaurant I have ever seen! 

Cute street of colorful houses

Nothing like a strip club in the middle of town...

Train Station, we can not wait to make our first train trip!

We tried to shop but quit early when it the snow started coming down, personally I think it was Justin's excuse to not shop but either way I was cold and ready to head home. We needed to rest up for our big hike on Day 3 of vacation! 

Sneaking into castles and restricted military training grounds...

The past three days have been Justin's so called "vacation" that he earned by working on his days off (as always)! Usually this would warrant us to take some sort of extreme trip but I sort of dropped the ball on planning. I'm blaming the fact that we are still recovering from our Fasching celebration... It is just so hard getting old. Even though we had nothing previously planned I was determined not to let this time go to waste, despite sleeping in and getting late starts almost every day. My main request during our time off was to see another castle. Luckily there just so happens to be one only 10 minutes away!

After a sketchy drive on tank roads and through military (german and american) training areas we arrived at the trail head only to find the main pathway leading up to the castle was closed. Do you think that stopped us, of course not! Being the adventurous, resourceful couple that we are we found an alternative route that led us up the backside of the ruins.

There were multiple trails stemming from the ruins and we found the most interesting one to take exploring. The hike was beautiful, I felt as if we were walking through an enchanted forest in the middle of s fairy tale. I can understand how the Grimm brothers were able to draw inspiration for their stories from this gorgeous countryside.  The trail came to an end suddenly and were left with the decision to turn around or else make our own trail. We of course decided to make our own and Justin figured the best way to do that would be to clamber straight up to the top of the mountain. Which we somehow managed to do without dying only to realize we had ended up on military training land where "firearms" would be used on trespassers. Awesome. Using our limited survival training  aka follow the river downstream, we were able to get back on original trail unharmed.  By this time I had had just about enough adventure for one day and we carefully made our way back to the car.

On the way back from the castle Justin took me through the town of Reichen and past the house of "sign guy", you may remember me mentioning him from an early post as the guy who wears army gear, thanks all of the soldiers and loves the United States. Him and his family were loaded onto trains bound for a concentration camp during WWII when American troops intervened, saving everyone on the trains. He has now made his house a shrine for peace and love.

It was the perfect ending to the perfect day. Don't worry there will plenty of more adventure to come!

My sweet Valentine

Happy late Valentines Day! My wonderful husband had to work late but he when he got off shift he surprised me with a rose and chocolate. He then proceeded to make me the most delicious steak dinner, complete with his own homemade marinade, sautéed spinach, beans, rolls and finished off with a fantastic german wine. I am quite spoiled!

I spent the day working on my latest project, figuring out to make/use cake fondant. It is not as easy as all of the cake shows on TV make it seem! But I found a semi-easy marshmallow fondant recipe that actually turned out quite tasty, husband approved.

We stayed in the rest of the day relaxing with our puppy. It was the perfect day!

Mainz Fasching Celebration

Fasching is the German term for Mardi Gras. Germany has three cities known for their huge celebrations and this year Justin and I decided to go to the party in Mainz. The USO in Kaislerslautern (army/air force base about 40 minutes away) was hosting a trip which meant we wouldn't even have to drive! After about an hour on the bus, "listening" to the history lesson the tour guide decided we needed to have at 7:30 in the morning we arrived in Mainz. The parade started at 11:11am so we had plenty of time to explore and figure out the best place to watch the parade. After much debate, mainly about where we would be closest to food and drinks, we picked the drink tent right next to the grandstand. Perfect place to keep refilling our gluhwein cups, the only thing keeping us warm in the below freezing weather!

Thousands of people flooded the city and everyone was dressed up, it was like halloween with even crazier costumes! The parade lasted four hours... There were political floats, horses, marching bands, costumes and even a giant polar bear. Everyone was throwing out candy, toys, confetti shot out of canons and I'm pretty sure I even caught a sham-wow. The street carnival was a blast, complete with delicious food. There is no better carnival food than bratwurst cooked on an open fire in a warm bun. Yum, I am getting hungry just thinking about it.  We took a break from the festivities in an attempt to warm up and found a little hole in the wall diner called Bugerlanden, the only decent burger I have in had in Germany.

After the parade we went out on our own to explore the city. Mainz is most famous for being the home town of Gutenberg. We found the ruins from the church he was baptized in as well as the remains of the building where Gutenberg printed the first bible. Unfortunately most of the cities famous attractions were closed off to the public to save them from possible destruction in the four day fasching celebration. The police were out in full force and the EMT were well prepared, for good reason because the celebration gets out of control crazy!

The memorial ruins of the church where Gutenberg was baptized.  

What is left of the building where Gutenberg printed the first bible. 

EMT preparation

We slept the entire way back to Kaiserslautern, it was an exhausting but amazing experience and we can not wait till next year!