A Few Days in BK (That's Bad Kreuznach, Not Burger King)

Honestly, for the last week before I returned to my aunt's house, I was kind of counting down the days until I would be there. I had been traveling solo for almost a month at that point, moving to a new city (and often, a new country) every few days, and I was ready to be someplace familiar, with family rather than a new batch of strangers.

I was ready for a little break, a few days when I wouldn't feel obligated to wake up early, get out, and go do stuff every single day. A few days when I wouldn't have to decide whether to go out to dinner or figure out what to cook or to just skip eating altogether because it was just too expensive/too much effort.

I was tired of the same clothes that I'd been wearing for a month straight (most of which were black, chosen for ease of matching and so as not to show wear).

And I was ready to dump all of the heavy souvenirs that I'd been hauling around for the last few weeks.

It was strange, coming back to my aunt's house, though; when I'd left in September, it had still been summer. Now, it was most decidedly fall. No more leisurely evenings out on the balcony; we'd traded warmth for gorgeous colors on the trees and in the vineyards.

Aside from the seasonal changes, everything was comfortingly unchanged. It was nice to climb into a familiar bed and to pet familiar dogs and to use the same full-sized bottles of shampoo and conditioner as I had a month earlier.

It was nice to have a couple of lazy days, during which the most eventful thing that happened was scoring a pair of sneakers for less than €13.

And it was WONDERFUL to run again.

When packing my backpack for my month away from my aunt's house, I'd realized how little space 40 liters really is. At the last minute, I'd rashly decided to ditch my running shoes--they were so bulky, and I'd get exercise walking everywhere anyway--a decision that I came to seriously regret. I MISSED running.

Even though I've never been much of a city runner, every time I saw someone running through town, I'd get mad jealous. Or I'd e walking through a really nice park, like the English Gardens in Munich, and just want to go for a run.

So the first morning back at my aunt's house, I got up and went for a run. And man, I could not wipe the smile off of my face. Even after a month off, running felt GOOD. Apparently I'd walked enough to counterbalance the junk food and maintain some level of fitness.

On Monday, my plan was to work on my blog most of the day, and get all caught up before Evan arrived the next morning. Well, I did manage to get a bit of blogging done, but that all went out the window early that afternoon when there was a knock at the door and there Evan was!

There have been very few times in my life that I have felt as surprised as I did in that moment, so major props to Evan and my aunt for scheming behind my back for three weeks and managing to pull that off!

We love the bridge houses!

Suddenly, I got to reprise my role as tour guide (which you all know I have sorely missed) and show Evan around Bad Kreuznach in the rain. To escape the downpour, I also introduced him to that wonderful German tradition of afternoon coffee and cake.

YUM.

One of the things that Evan was most excited to see in Germany was castles, so the next day, we took a train along the Rhine to my favorite castle, Rheinfels.

We bought our tickets at the gate, from a guy who was just as excited about he fact that we got a student discount as we were. We spent hours exploring the ruins and being adventurous. 

Even though I'd been to the castle only a month earlier, Evan and I still managed to find parts of the ruins that I hadn't seen the last time, including several mining tunnels. I'm generally not a big fan of tunnels--something about enclosed underground spaces tends make me hyperventilate--but I was feeling brave that day. I was even game to try a very narrow tunnel--one that involved simultaneously ducking and climbing--until I came face-to-face with a big ol' spider. I was out of that tunnel so fast I practically bowled Evan over. 

We did a bit more exploring in the castle, now out in the more open bits, before wandering down through the town of St. Goar below the castle. There, Evan had his first real bratwurst.

One of my hobbies is taking unflattering pictures of people while they eat.

We enjoyed more authentic German food at dinner that night; my aunt had made Speisbraten, a roasted pork loin stuffed with onions, served with leeks and potatoes.

In the interest of stuffing Evan full of as much German food as possible, we had Zwiebelküchen (onion cake) and Federweißer (new wine) for lunch on Wednesday, in between bouts of packing. My aunt packed us some leftover-Speisbraten sandwiches for dinner, and Evan and I were off to Frankfurt, where we spent the night in a hostel before catching our bus to Brussels at 7:00am Thursday morning.

Even though I was "home" for almost a week, those days flew by...I couldn't believe that I was already leaving again! But at the same time, I was really excited to get to Brussels. 

After all, Belgium is where waffles come from.