I'm a travelin' woman

Don and I've been traveling most of September on our first trip together to Europe.  Returned on the 25th but only now have I been able to organize some of the photos.  

Don and I flew to Sophia, Bulgaria on the 10th and were met by Jo, our Peace Corps daughter, at the airport.  I didn't realize how much I'd missed her until I saw her there and then the tears came and I couldn't stop hugging  her.  Wow!  I never expected that kind of reaction from me!   We spent 6 days in Bulgaria--a very beautiful country, BTW, with lots of mountains.  We met a lot of the Bulgarian people she knows and works with, even spending 2 nights in the rural village with the host family she lived with while she was in training.  Such warm and welcoming people to open their homes to us.  

Then the 3 of us flew to Munich to begin an adventure that had been arranged for us by ToEurope.  They arranged our transportation while in Germany as well as hotels for every night of the 6 or 7 days we spent in that country.  I could write a book about the trip, but I'll spare you and refrain.  I'll let these few pix serve the purpose, okay?

This is one of several medieval villages we stayed in--very charming.  I believe our hotel in this village was built as a home in 1536.  Everything in Europe is so much older than in the Midwest of the US--amazing!

 This is a pix of the Rila Monastery outside of Sophia, Bulgaria, one of 3 UNESCO World Heritage Sites that we were fortunate to visit.  Amazing murals covering every inch of surface.

This fantastic building is in Wurzburg Germany.  All of that "frosting" is stucco applied by hand three to four hundred years ago. Now it's a public library.

Everywhere in both Bulgaria and Germany were beautiful flowers in the window boxes as well as the gardens.  This building is in Munich.

Had to take a pix of the vineyards along the middle Rhein River, another UNESCO site.  And one of many castles along that stretch of the river.

We developed a very good habit on our trip--a daily coffee and cake stop!  I can't tell you how delectable the cakes and pastries were.  Melt in you mouth, truly!  I usually just sampled the cakes that Don and Jo bought and it was really hard to not scarf up the entire piece!  But I held myself back.  :-)

And of course, Don and I had to sample German beer.  Soooo good.  Lots of flavor but not so much alcohol as here in the States so we could drink the entire stein and not get wasted.  The German wine, however, is a different story!  Again, very flavorful but a higher alcohol content than I'm used to, so half a glass pretty much put me under the table. Yikes!

In this pix I look like I've drank more than my share of the beer and Don looks like he's fed up with this picture taking and wants to get back to drinking!

I had a wonderful time on the trip and what made it so good, I think, was that we were with our daughter after 18 months separation.  She'll be home in another 6 months and we'll all be happy to have her back. 

The trip was especially good since we never took the wrong train and got lost, had great hotels and found wonderful restaurants, and didn't lose any of our luggage on the flights!  Pretty good for the first time, huh?   Best of all, Don (the reluctant traveler) wants to go back in a couple of years.  Yea!