SONNTAG

Some of you may not know it, but Germany, in my opinion, has some silly rules.  I was aware of a few of them, but others I have only found out recently.  

A couple examples of rules ... 

During the week quiet hours begin at 10pm - country wide.  Quiet hours last until something like 7am.  This means no night flying for Todd (or at least in Germany).  To me it seems like it might be a hard law to enforce, but whatever.   Another rule is every day during the work week (I think) has quiet hours from something like 12p - 2p.  I think the purpose of this law is so kids don't get woken up during naptime.  I'm sure if I had a child I'd probably appreciate that law alot more than I currently do.  

Another big one is in Germany, Sonntag (Sunday) is a day of rest.  You shouldn't be doing any hard labor and shouldn't really be making any noise either (i.e., mowing the lawn).   This part we were aware of, but apparently there's more to it.   A couple of Sundays ago, in the evening before the sun had even began to set, Todd and I decided we needed to get ride of some glass bottles.  Molschbach has at least 2 separate spots that has large (taller than me) bins to thrown brown, clear, and green glass.   Once we got there we started throwing bottles in.  We had only gotten a few bottles in when a German woman who lives across the street from the bins walks around the corner of her house & stares at us.   Todd says "Hallo" & proceeded to get rid of more bottles.   Next thing we know she is yelling "SONNTAG" at us (and it doesn't sound very friendly!), more than once.   At first Todd nor I had a stinkin' clue what she was yelling "SONNTAG" at us for.  Todd finally figured it out, it seems as though we can't recycle on Sonntag.  We still don't know if its due to the noise or because no work on Sundays.   Either way we've been making fun of her yelling SONNTAG ever since!!!!  We now randomly yell it at each other!!

Side story:  A few days later Todd went back to recycle the rest of the bottles.  He decides to do this about 7:30/7:45pm.  He luckily finds a sign that tells you when you are allowed to recycle bottles .... No Later than 7pm.  Who knows what that woman would have yelled at him this time!!

Our Home Part 2

Here are some more pictures of our home.  

Master bedroom:  I think we just need to add a few pictures to finish it off. 

Extra Room in the Basement:  We still don't really know what to do with this room.  It also doesn't help that we don't have enough furniture.  We plan on putting a sofa bed along with maybe another couch or chair.  Who really knows at this point.  We also have to do something with the walls.  

Utility Room:  We don't have any plans with this.  I think its about as good as its going to get.  We are just using it as a laundry room and storage for all of our stuff that we can't use (110 voltage) or whatever.

 

We also have a small storage room that we keep tools, the cat litter, and some other random stuff in.  

Mini Castle Tour

A couple of weekends ago Todd and I went on our own little castle along the Rhine tour.  Well, I guess you could call it a tour, although we only saw two different castles.  But, anyways, it was a nice day for a drive so we took advantage.   

A view we passed on our drive - The Rhine River

The first castle we went to was Burg Eltz.   Todd had flown over it and thought it was a great looking castle.  He has named it one of his favorite castles by looks alone.   Unfortunately for us, its under construction or rather restoration.  2011 Burg Eltz has a big campaign called Restoration 2011 (or something like) to try to restore and maintain the castle.  Whether its really restoration or construction, it has a couple ugly eye sores - the huge crane & the side scaffolding. We didn't even bother going inside this castle because we've agreed that we want to come back when they are done restoring it.  Hopefully next summer.   The cool thing about Burg Eltz is that its completely surrounded by woods (the reason why Todd likes it so much I think) and the same family has been living in it since the 13th century or something like that.  I'm not sure how much of the castle they open up for viewing, but apparently the family lives in just one of the wings while (maybe) the rest is open for viewing.

I took a picture of a picture of what its supposed to look like.  

On our way back up to the car we came across this GIANT slug.  I know you can't really tell how big it is, but its the absolute biggest slug I've ever seen!!!

Trying to show the size comparison using Todd's hand

Our second castle for the day was Reischburg Cochem.  This castle is on a hilltop in the town of Cochem.  Its right along the Rhine River with multitudes of vineyards around town.   We actually did the tour for this one.  It was nice, but I must make a little complaint - it was about 5 Euro each and we only got to see about 10 rooms.  It would have really been nice to go up in the tower.  Oh well.  Reischburg Cochem is now owned by the town itself making it just a tourist attraction (as far as I'm concerned).   We did see a bridal party taking pictures there, I'm unsure if they actually got married there or not.

Here's some pictures from the tour ....

This some sort of man-mermaid-antler thing.  I believe its supposed to protect

When this boar was alive it was over 400 lbs.!!!  That sucker was huge!!

Back in the day the king (I think) would make sure to drink wine from this container.  These things would be filled to the top and he would drink that whole amount everyday.

Our guide made sure to point out that these aren't frogs - they are lions with helmets on them

Suit of Armor the castle owned - handmade for some guy over 7 ft. tall 

The wedding party

Just wanted to share a bit of information I just learned.   In German .... Burg = Castle while Berg = mountains.  Now you know too!