Road trip ... down memory lane

What a week we've had. My mom arrived for her much anticipated visit a week ago. I got a rental car and picked her up from the airport in Frankfurt and we've had fun ever since.

After two days of getting acclimatized and getting ourselves together, we headed out for 6 days of traveling clear across the country, meeting friends and family along the way. The day before we left, my mom and I had spent part of the afternoon sitting in the sun on one of the main squares in Heidelberg drinking a coffee and enjoying spring. The following day, we re-entered winter. Our first stop on our trip was Hamburg, which is fairly far north. As we were driving north, we could see the temperature dropping on the car thermometer. The car trip took us about 5 hours, but we spent a leisurely hour in between enjoying the offerings of one of the roadside rest stops. These are no longer the yucky, marginal gas stations of my youth, but full-service restaurants, cafes, etc. Here my mom and Alex are enjoying the surroundings.

By the time we got to Hamburg in the late afternoon it was well below freezing, snowing, and there were several inches of snow on the ground. It was perfect to come in from the cold and spend a cozy evening with an old family friend.

The next morning, the whole city was a winter wonderland, but we headed out to explore some of the sights. Our first stop was an enormous statue of Bismarck. For those of you who have read this blog since the beginning, you may remember Alex's fascination with the Lincoln memorial. Well, when he found out about this gigantic sculpture, he just had to see it. Bismarck, unfortunately, stands at a somewhat inconvenient spot, on top of a hill covered in deep snow, but we managed to get ourselves up there. You can see how large the monument is by how small Alex looks next to the big man.

Alex was completely undeterred by the rather large amounts of snow (possibly because he was in rubber boots), but here you can see him trying to climb to the top of the stairs - with the steeple of the beautiful Baroque St. Michael's church (affectionately called "Michel" by the locals) in the background.

After his ascent to see Bismarck, he and my mom got into a rather serious snow-ball fight.

After these wintry (and freezing cold) adventures, we were looking for some place to warm up and took the car down the hill towards the port to an area that houses a large and famous fish market every Sunday morning. We were a little too late for most of the fish (I think they start at 7 am and we got there around 10), but a live Sunday classic rock concert was still going on in the old market building. For a while we warmed up and rocked out to cover versions of classic rock classics in a great setting. 

Since we were already at the port, we decided to look around to see some of the wonderful museum ships they have here. This is a famous sailing ship permanently anchored in the Hamburg's port called the "Rickmer Rickmers." 

Before we could figure out how to get on board, I overheard some folks talking about a harbor cruise and my ears perked up. I remember going on those with my grandparents and just loved them. We quickly bought our tickets and hurried on board. 

The little ship (Barkasse) took us on an hour-long trip through the harbor. It was fantastic! We saw the old Speicherstadt, where 19th century merchants stored their treasures ranging from spices to rugs to tea and coffee. These brick buildings emerge from the canals and are beautiful. Here's a picture I took through the windows of our ship.

We also saw the enormous modern container ships. Here's one from China. Our guide said that it can hold 10,000 containers!

At one point, we also had a great view of the main harbor buildings, the Landungsbrücken. If you look carefully, you can see the Bismarck in the distance.

The tour was great! Alex and I my mom enjoyed the ride as well.

After all this, it was only 1pm! We spent the rest of the day with old family friends and all 3 generations had a great time.

The next morning, we continued our exploration of Hamburg, though the weather didn't play along very well. First we stopped by my grandmother's old place. It looked just the same as it did when I was a kid.

We went on to Poppenbüttel to check out our old neighborhood, but at that point it was snowing so hard that I could not stop to take pictures and we took refuge in a shopping center. In the afternoon, we went to my mom's god-daugher's house and spent a lovely afternoon. The kids played for hours and even had a long romp in the snow.

The following morning we left Hamburg and drove to my aunt's house in Hannover. I had not seen her in years and it was wonderful to check in. My cousin also took some time off from work and joined us for a little while. Neither of them had met Alex and they had a great time getting to know each other a little bit. After lunch, we headed on to Bonn where we finally arrived in the early evening. My mom's friend with whom we stayed had dug out a big box of Legos and it was almost impossible to pry Alex away and into bed.

After a luscious breakfast,we headed into the city which looked remarkably unchanged since our days here in the 1980s. We enjoyed exploring the shops and had lunch in a rooftop restaurant.

Afterwards, I bought Alex a pair of sandals (European size 31 for those of you keeping count!) in the hopes that spring will come some day. The shoe store had a cool carrousel for kids - one I remember from my childhood!

After shopping for a while, we left my mom downtown and headed into the suburbs to visit one of my friends from school. I hadn't seen her since 2006 and we had the best time catching up and talking. It's amazing how easy it can be to reconnect with old friends. Alex and her younger son Christian also bonded really quickly and built an amazing Lego castle.

Once both her boys were home from school and had finished their homework, we headed out into the woods and the kids went sledding! We were literally in the woods and the kids sledded down a hill between trees and stubs. It was terrifying - but apparently incredibly fun. We were literally frozen by the time we got back to the house. 

Finally, on Thursday, we visited our old neighbors and took a look at the house where I lived between the ages of 7 and 17. It looked just the same. It seemed weird to me that it was still there looking the same.

Then, we got back in the car and drove back to our current home, Heidelberg. I'm still trying to make sense of all those memories that got stirred up. We may have to go back to some of these places before our time Germany is up.