The Day has Finally Come...Ryan is Here!

Greetings! I'm Ryan Davis, who some of you know as Lizzie's boyfriend, and as I'm visiting Germany for 2 weeks, I've been given the job of blogging this week. Really, I think this is all a ploy on Lizzie's part to pin some of the work on me while I'm here, but I'm probably more entertaining anyway, so lets go.

I arrived in Frankfurt early Tuesday morning and caught a train to Heidelberg. I enjoyed my first German train ride in the first class of one of the nicest trains here, apparently because my clerk at the airport gave me a first class ticket for the price of what usually amounts to riding in the cattle cars. Upon my arrival in Heidelberg, I was greeted by torrential rains, a bus full of screaming schoolchildren, and an angry German man trying to break down the doors of the bus when he was not allowed in. He unleashed a few Deutsch vulgarities I didn't understand, but I got the message when he gave the entire bus the international sign of the middle finger. Welcome to Germany, I guess?

Heidelberg is pretty much as Lizzie has previously described it: quaint, cute, precious, etc...so I'll spare repeating some of those details. Everything here is amazingly beautiful. One half of the city is fairly modern, but the Old City has a total 16th century European village feel that's hard to replicate. The architecture, as you've probably seen in pictures already posted, is pretty stunning. Buildings hundreds of years old on each side, with cobblestone paths in between, a beer garden every 50 feet, and a castle constantly in the background....yea, pretty cool stuff.

My first assignment, a mere 4 hours after arriving, was climbing the Philosophenweg (The Philosopher's Path)--a mountain trail on the south side of Heidelberg that overlooks the city. Despite no sleep in 24 hours and severe jet lag, I soldiered through and was treated to stunning views of the city and Lizzie playing on children's playground equipment while giggling like an idiot.

Day 2 was Heidelberg Castle, which sadly involved another long uphill climb (378 steps, I counted). While it's largely in ruins now, the castle still has a lot of interesting German architecture, especially in the statues. German art from that period seems to really accentuate masculine features to a point of hilarity: enormous beards, broad shoulders, and you know...other dude things. The castle was also home to a pharmacy museum and the world's largest beer keg (or perhaps wine...we never cleared that one up. Regardless, it seems to be about 3 stories tall.)

Day 3 was a bit more relaxed as I took in more of the city. I enjoyed my first beer-on-tap, ate at the Schnitzelhaus (101 varieties of schnitzel), ventured into many of the small shops around town, and ended the night trying to find shelter from the 27th rainstorm since I arrived.

Day 4 was a trip to Stuttgart, the capital of Baden-Württemberg. Stuttgart is a fairly stark contrast to Heidelberg. Although we only saw the main area of the city, it's much more modern than the majority of Heidelberg. The city has an enormous shopping district stepping out of the train station that never seems to end, but it all surrounds a collection of really extravagant 19th century Gothic architecture. I was actually fairly surprised to learn the number of companies that have their main offices in Stuttgart: Daimler AG, Porsche, Bosch, Hewlett Packard, and IBM all have homes in Stuttgart.

Speaking of Porsche, Stuttgart is home to Porsche and the Porsche museum, which, through a surprisingly small amount of begging, I talked Lizzie into visiting. See, the thing is, Lizzie doesn't know a lot about cars. Nothing, in fact. Across the street from the museum is a Porsche dealership, which she mistook for the museum and began taking pictures of cars on the lot for sale. But, once we got into the museum (which was a work of art in itself), I educated her on Porsche motors from the early 1900's until today.

Tomorrow morning we leave for Prague, so until then, I leave you with these pictures (taken by Lizzie):

Heidelberg: Picturesque, breathtaking, full of large churches and people on bicycles.

The two of us atop the Philosopher's Path. I am running on no sleep and semi-conscious at this point.

At Heidelberg castle. To our side you see what used to be a large moat. The new stream at the bottom likely does a poor job of keeping the knights at bay.

The largest wine keg in the world and me. I'm very excited!

The mean witch coming to cook Hansel and Gretel.

This is the Porsche I liked, because it had over 600 HP.

The Porsche Lizzie liked, because it was "bright and shiny"...

The Neue Schloss (New Castle) in Stuttgart. Originally the palace for the kings of Württemberg, it was largely destroyed in World War II, reconstructed in the 50's, and now serves as the home of the state parliament.

An enormous church in the center of Stuttgart. Sadly, we arrived just after they closed the doors, so we didn't get to go inside and learn anything about it. But doesn't it look pretty with the storm clouds in the background?

Lizzie found some families of ducks in Stuttgart and took about a dozen pictures. So yeah, here are some ducks.

She's cold, wet, and tired.

Hopefully my guest spot on this blog has given you loads of laughter and entertainment. You'll hear from one of us again sometime next week when we return from the Czech Republic. See you soon!

-Ryan