SwAG (Switzerland, Austria, and Germany)

[WARNING: this post is long. i hope you will stick with me til the end though! it's been a neat couple of days.]

hello from germany!

it's crazy how small europe is... well, compared to canada, at least. over the last 2 days, brady, jonas and i went on a "small" road trip through 3 countries. it is kind of astounding that that is even possible. 

yesterday we left around noon to head out to our first stop, switzerland! after driving through a very scenic 2 hours of countryside and a swiss border crossing, we made it to rheinfalls, which is on the outskirts of schaffhausen, switzerland. rheinfalls is a gorgeous, teal-blue waterfall that has become a huge tourist attraction, naturally. the weather was super hot and it definitely would have been nice to jump in to those waterfalls (funny, me saying that!). we walked around the entire waterfall and over it via a bridge that people are trying to turn into a replica of lover's bridge in paris. the views were breathtaking and it was amazing to see another part of God's creation that was so beautiful.

rheinfalls!

from another angle

from there, we drove a short distance to a grocery store - and CHEESE IS SO CHEAP! i am jealous. i would like to live here. i think there was a block of brie cheese on for 4$ that would normally cost 8-10$ in canada. 
okay sorry, aside over. 
we picked up some groceries and then drove to stein am rhein, another small and unbelievably fairy-tale-ish town right on the border of switzerland. looking over the rhein river, jonas, brady and i ate our simple but tasty picnic and thoroughly enjoyed the sights. kids jumped off the 5- or 7-meter-high bridge and boats drove by while we ate and talked about how this town was so unlike any other we'd seen before. definitely a favourite moment thus far for me.  it was so peaceful and beautiful there - i really enjoyed that!

the river we gazed at during our picnic

after our picnic, we walked around stein am rhein and took a good number of pictures. one building was built in 1423, if i remember correctly; another, 1448.  europe certainly has a richness in its history that canada unfortunately cannot share. can you imagine life back then? i tried, which was interesting! i'm not often inspired to think of the "old days" when i'm at home, as there isn't anything 500+ years old to remind me of days gone by. here, though, it was much easier, because you can so easily picture horse-drawn carriages rolling down the street while women throw wash-buckets of water out the widows and kids run around barefoot as soon as you close your eyes! wow. also reflecting on how God saw ALL of that AND remembers it. that's astounding. that's a lot of love for His creation. i can barely remember last week, it seems, yet He knows every man, woman, and child from every moment of history. we serve a great God. 

what a beautiful town!

part of our trek team, reunited!

then it was off to bregenz, austria! 3rd country of the day and we'd only been gone for 6 hours at this time!! we spent a lovely evening there walking around and talking, seeing the sights. we also tried an austrian and german specialty, currywurst! this dish is a sausage with curry powder in a sweet-and-sour sauce, kind of. it's served with a bun and i really enjoyed it!

austria!

then we stayed at the cutest little hotel (more like an amped-up bed&breakfast, but still awesome) for the night. it was right in the mountains in germany and the scenery was amazing!

our bed and breakfast :)

this morning we headed off to a few more places - a castle, neuschwanstein, and a town, rothenberg ob der tauber! super neat, both of them. 

neuschwanstein was the vacation home of king ludwig II - imagine having a literal CASTLE as your vacation home!! wow. it was huge and really very impressive. apparently the castle didn't get finished before his death but is very extravagant. we didn't go inside (not cheap!) but we did take pictures outside for a while and enjoyed the german mountains in the background. there was even a couple having their wedding pictures taken there! 

i'd like this as a summer home; what about you?

i was probably a bit more excited about seeing rothenberg ob der tauber for one simple - but very classic - reason: parts of harry potter and the deathly hallows (I & II) were filmed there!!! and you could tell that, too, right away. the town was very old and also very story-book-like. i could immediately envision scenes from harry potter being filmed there, maybe hogsmeade. i wasn't actually able to pick out a specific spot that i thought was in the movies, but it definitely was no stretch of the imagination to see why the movie team chose that spot. the town was quaint and very - if i may be so stereotypical - european. cobblestone streets, buildings wedged together, narrow alleys, small stores with their doors open, and a wall with walkway running around the entire outside of the old part of town. super cool! i also managed to pick up my first pair of birkenstocks there :) i am a happy camper!

rothenberg ob der tauber

me with my new birkenstocks! a check off the bucket list :)

so, it has been a busy 2 days, but a great 2 days. what a blessing to see all these new sights with such good friends! i have enjoyed having an "inside look", sort of, at the places we've seen, since jonas is german and knows these places in a different way than a tour guide would show us. and it's more fun this way!

tomorrow we are off to berlin! as always, prayers for safety and wisdom are appreciated.

soon, 
tejal :)