Our Trip Home

The trip home wasn't nearly as bad as the trip to Germany. Security was not nearly as tight and customs was a breeze. It even seemed that the plane ride was shorter, I guess its because we were not as excited, it always takes longer to get somewhere if you are excited about it. The only bad the about the trip home, was the fact that we were going home. We had such a great time in Germany and learned so much about the country and each other. There were lots of memorable moments on this trip and I wish it never would have ended, I hope we come back some time, with more money for even more indulgence.

Panzermuseum

Today we went to the Panzer Museum in Munster, Germany.  It was huge and filled with German Tanks from World War II.  There were about 100 tanks from Germany, United States, Great Britian, and the Red Army.  The Museum is trying to restore them to working order so they can do demonstrations and re-enactments.  They had the German Panzer IV which is one of their medium tanks.  There were a little under 9,000 built and where run by a 5 man crew.  It has a V12 Maybach engine with only 296 hp. It fired a 7.5 cm exploding shell through a rotating turret.  The Tiger II was their heavy tank.  It had a 12 Maybach as well with 690 hp.  It also had a 5 man crew but an 8.8 cm "Porsche" turret.  It was interesting to see the tanks and when they let us go inside one of them it was really unbelievable the they were able to fit 5 men in them.  They told us that the tanks had such heavy armor that they could take a direct hit from an American tank from the front and keep on going.  The only way to destroy the tank was to shoot it from behind or throw a grenade inside.  These tanks contributed a lot to todays battle tanks because the design is the same and they just added modern technology and the best of todays weapons.

Nurburgring Track

Today was the best day ever! We took the RV to Germany's famous Nurburgring tracks and rented a 2010 Audi R8 with a powerful V8 engine and 420 HP.  The track is famous for letting people drive on it when there is not a race going on.  We rented the R8 outside of Dachau after we visited the concentration camp memorial.  We were all feeling pretty bad about what happened there so we got the car to help lift our spirits.  It was Nico's idea to get it and there couldn't have been a better time.  We got a sleek red one with a black interior.  It had a dual exhaust and a turbocharger.  An idea was presented by Elliot for us to take it to the Nurbergring track.  We took turns driving it there along with the RV.  We took it on the Autobahn in some places and were constantly racing other cars.  We passed Porsche 911s, Corvettes, Lamborhinis, and a Viper.  There were a few close calls but when you are driving a supercharged sports car on a road without a speed limit, you need to get creative to say the least.  Corey decided to push it to 190 mph and we were only in fourth gear.  The real trouble came when we got to the track.  Everybody wanted to drive it but unfortunately we only had one.  We had to register with the track officials and got 5 track sessions.  What they do is give you a card with a time on it.  At the time on your card you drove up to entrance. You give them your card and they drop down the barricade and let you through.  You pull up to the starting line and there are three lights in front of you.  When you see green you take off.  It was a ten mile loop and that took about 8 minutes for the best driver (Nico of course) and for Jason who wanted to take it slow finished after 15 minutes.  He decided to drag it out and take advantage of the maximum amount of time.  We all got a chance and finished around five p.m.  The car did not have to be back until ten (the agency had a location at the track) p.m. so we took it on the autobahn over and over again until we completely ran out of gas. Since we are cheap we returned the vehicle that was the source of all our happiness to a person with white gloves, and no gas.  Good bye Audi R8, we will miss you.

BMW Headquarters

While we were in Munich we decided to go to the BMW Headquarters and Museum.  It is a historic building that was designed as the 4-cylinder tower that is supposed to symbolize the 4 cylinders of a car engine.It is incredibly unique because none of the 4 towers actually touch the ground, but they are connected to a strong central tower and are suspended in the air.  There is an elevator on the inside that is used to transport cars all around the building.  There is a museum of BMW history that holds a model of almost all of their famous designs such as the original Z3 which was featured in the movie 007 Golden Eye. The museum shows the history of BMW from their start making aircraft engines , moving on to motorcycles, and now today the production of cars.  Germany is famous for making many of today's best luxury cars including Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Porsche, and of course BMW.  We were lucky enough to experience the history and culture of the auto making industry in Germany first hand and it is not an experience I will soon forget.

Skiing!

Today was probably the best we have had in Germany so far.  We drove into a mountian lodge and are spending the next 2 days here and there are snow-mobiles, skiing trails, snowboarding parks,  huge outdoor heated pools, a zipline we can go on, and almost nobody here!  The whole time we have been here, besides the people who run the place we have seen maybe 10 other skiiers so we pretty much get it to ourselves.  We all fell a bunch of times, except Jason, he is a ninja on a snowboard.  Dylan tried to do a backflip, that did not end too well.  We are going to rent the snow-mobiles tommorrow and take them on a side trail that goes to some ramps that somebody built.  We are not supposed to jump the snow-mobiles but I think we are going to try anyway.  We payed for the insurance so if they break we will be fine.  No one really wants to sleep right now, I think we are planning to go on a midnight pool run.  The RVs heat is working thank God.  I did not realize how cold it was here because of all the excitement.  There was a small problem because we stopped doing laundry for a while and we kind of ran out so we all wore the lodges robes while our clothes were being cleaned.  Next time we are going to think ahead a little better.  We all kind of lose track of time on vacation.  We just do what we want, when we want and try to have a good time.  There is a lot to do in Germany and two weeks could not possibly cover it.  Ok, yes we are going to the pool.  I have to go now, more later!

After Oktoberfest

Yesterday was Oktoberfest and as you can imagine, today was pretty miserable.  We slept until noon and woke up feeling pretty bad.  After the fact, we started thinking that it probably wasn't the best idea to go to a drinking festival while we were on vacation and we lost almost two days just recovering.  We closed all the windows and the blinds and tried to keep the noise levels down.  There was a lot of activity outside but the inside of the RV was pretty quite.  We really only ate drank and slept.  The RV needed gas and none of us felt good enough to go get some.  Turns out the fuel gauge broke so there was no way for us to know how much gas we have.  I owe my 8th grade math teacher an apology, I said there was never going to be a time when we would need to use math in the world.  Now we need to calculate how much we put in and how much we have used so we don't run out again.  The generator was starting to get low so if we didn't do something soon we would lose power.  We drew straws again and Nico lost.  He had to take a few pills, drink some water and go out to find a gas station.  If we were thinking we would have realized 1). We could have just googled it and 2). There was a spare tank full of gas in the storage compartment underneath.  We could have used that to drive the RV to a gas station.  Too bad there is no German AAA.  I think we are going to drive to the mountains and go skiing soon.  Hopefully we are able to recover well enough for that.  The headache is starting to subside so I am going to get some sleep now. Tomorrow, the real fun begins.

Oktoberfest

Today we arrived in Munich to take part in Oktoberfest which oddly is in November.  We got in really early around 3 a.m. and the festivities were already beginning.  There was music playing on every corner, people where already drinking.  There were drinks from all over the world here.  There were some stands that featured a different country such as Japan or locations in the Middle East.  The beer was golden and not brown.  The lighting in one of the bars made it look like it was glowing.  We made many new friends because at Oktoberfest everyone is a friend.  There were hundreds of different drinks you could try from hard liqueur to foreign beers.  The atmosphere was so light and exciting and everyone was having a great time.  We stumbled back to the RV multiple times to refresh and get more money.  The day was a little fuzzy for me, but I remember it was a good time. The German police were patrolling constantly arresting anybody who got to rowdy.  They used tasers and batons to restrain the crowds and nobody thought about disobeying him.  We are going to need a few days to recover from this.  I will write more later.

Traveling to Munich

Today we don't have very much planned.  We are traveling to Munich to go to Oktoberfest.  We are all really excited about it but we needed to go a little over 300 miles.  We stopped at Super Target (yes they do have Target in Germany) to get food because we didn't bring any food from the United States.  We went inside with $250 and completly stocked the RV with all the food you could imagine.  We go canned soup for lunch, pringles, pretzals, sodas, and some drinks for Oktoberfest.  We got 20 HungryMan dinners.  We hope that will last for at least 5 days.  We also purchased multiple DVDs for entertainment because we are not allowed to drive the RV on the Autobahn.  We were forced to take some side roads and back roads where the speed limit was between 30mph and 50mph.  With traffic it is going to take about 8 hours to get there.  Luckily the company gives us 150 miles of gas per day included in our price.  After that they charged us $1.50 per mile.  To travel the whole way it only cost us $475 and we are going to be set for a couple of days.  We decided to switch off driving every hour.  When we were on uncrowded stretches of road we all stood up and whoever was  driving would rapidly slow down and try to knock us over.  It was not very intelligent or responsible but it sure passed the time well.  We also tried to do handstands while the RV was moving and the first one to fall had to sleep on the roof. Elliot lost so he is getting kicked out as soon as we stop. Its freezing outside but we will give him a sleeping bag don't worry.  I will tell you how this goes tommorrow.

Berlin Zoo

Today we went to one of the largest zoos in the entire world. The Berlin Zoo. It was so cool. We didnt even manage to see all of the animals there, there were too many. There were 1400 animals and we only had three hours to see them. We got to see the pandas, but when we got there, they werent doing anything. It was exciting seeing the sheer power of their jaws ripping the bamboo apart. The rest of the animals got fed at about 12:00, and that was pretty interesting. Most of the habitats where inside because it was too cold for them outside.  There was a reptile house that had a 23 foot anaconda inside.  When it moved you could see his muscles rippling throughout his body.  Maybe we can come back soon and see them again if we have time.

The Flight

Today is the first day of our long and hopefully very exciting vacation. Unfortunately we did not start on a good note, and I would rather catch the flu, than go through it again. For starters, the tickets are $818 a person, just to get there! I hardly believe this charge was worth the excessive security measures. It seamed like almost every 100 yards there was a security checkpoint. Now with the new full body scanners it takes about twice as long just to make it through the terminal. It is fine now though, we made it through the airport, and we are sitting on the plane on the way to germany. I hope that all of this hassle pays off in the end. The plane is quite comfortable and roomy.  Luckily there was almost no one on the plane and the flight attendant was nice enough to let us sit in first class. We were on a Boieng 767 that had maybe 15 people on board.  The seats where wide and offset so there was more leg room.  It was probably the longest flight I have ever been on.  We got 3 meals and watched movies on a flat screeen on the wall.  The flight attendant let us pick and we chose Snakes on a Plane just to make the flight more interesting.  4395 miles seemed like a lot less when we were planning this trip last year.  There was a monitor on the wall that was displaying flight information for the passenger.  We were flying at 480 mph and the flight lasted roughly 10 hours.  We have reclining seats so most of us are going to sleep now.  I will try to write more when we land.

Touring Berlin

Today I got stuck with driving the RV around Berlin.  We all got up around 9 a.m. as we are not yet acclimated to the time here.  While they were in the back chilling I got to sit in the drivers seat for a little over an hour.  You would be surprised how hard it is to get a 42 foot bus through the clogged and crowded streets of Berlin and even better: the parking.  There is no-where to park the huge beast in this city.  I finally found an empty parking garage and took up 7 spaces in the back.  We walked about a block and a half to Museum Island.  This is kind of like the National Mall in DC.  There are a lot of Museums and buildings around a large square.  The outside of the Museum was beautiful.  It had manicured lawns that where starting to turn a golden yellow because of the cold and there were huge columns with armed security guards outside.  It was mainly a sculpture museum with hundreds of sculptures in many different materials.  There were some that were simply made out of hardened clay that were of people and animals that were truly brilliant.  There were some made out of blown glass that where made into the shape of letters and one was in the shape of a person.  When we got into the depths of the halls we got to the more modern arts.  Here we found steel beams that were bolted together in totally random ways that forced us to find things it might signify. We really couldn't think of anything.  As we were leaving after about 4 hours wandering that halls we made it to the exit.  Great news.  We got selected for a random search to make sure we didn't steal anything.  Four security guards approached us at the exit and asked us to follow them.  We did and they made us stand in an X-Ray machine that scanned us completely from head to toe.  I guess they don't have he same laws that we do in America.  When they were done looking us over we were kicked to the curb and we had to trudge back to the RV. We were not allowed to park anywhere overnight so we were once again forced to endure the terrible traffic back to the outskirts of the city where we were able to lock up for the night and go to sleep.  It was overall a great day and I am looking forward to tomorrow.

Our First Full Day in Germany

We just landed in Berlin after a very long flight.  The security was not too bad but we had a little trouble at customs.  The Customs agent there did not speak English and none of us speak German.  It took us about 5 minutes for him to realize that we could not understand I thing he was saying.  He started out talking incredibly fast in German and eventually looked up and saw our blank faces.  He began to slow down assuming he was just speaking too fast for a couple of Germans who had just gotten off a long flight.  After about 2 minutes of him talking to us like we were six he called for an interpreter and we finally got through.  We made arrangements for the RV to be dropped off at the airport.  One thing we did not anticipate was the airport being so big and we had no idea where it would be.  We walked around for roughly ten minutes before we finally got the great idea to call the company and ask them where it was.  We got them on one of our cell phones, which we had hoped not to use, and they told us that they had a car waiting to take us to the parking garage where it was left.  When we got to it I we were in awe.  The thing was massive! The pictures did not even come close to capturing the essence of the sheer size of the vehicle.  When the door opened there was a very Star Trek like whoosh and three steps folded out.  When we walked in there was mood lighting lit dimly and a person from the company waiting for us to arrive and check our IDs.  He looked at our passports and gave us a quick tour.  It looked a lot bigger from the outside.  Unfortunately there was only sleeping for 4 so we needed to make someone sleep on the floor.  We would alternate so it wouldn't be bad.  After our long flight and the time change we were all pretty tired.  Elliot was lucky and got the fold out couch after doing rock paper scissors with Corey.  Corey got the queen in the back and I got the couch in the same room.  Jason got the convertible table and Dylan got stuck with the sleeping bag on the floor.  This is where I sign off.  Hopefully more tomorrow.