Edelweiss Edelweiss

7/09/08

Munich, Germany

Today we spent the day right back where we started three weeks and a lifetime ago: Munich. How do you say goodbye? How do you end a trip that was so long in the making and whose memories will be with us forever?

Firstly, I can’t believe that its over. Secondly, I can’t believe that it even happened.

The trip had a variety of paces, and it all seemed surreal. Like the 10 p.m. sunsets we've been enjoying.

Today, we frolicked in the place where we felt most at home: Germany. The Germans were the people we felt most comfortable with. Them and the Austrians.

We enjoyed the Marian Platz which soundly put to shame the platz in Brussels (poor Brussels!) We strolled by the area near the Hofbrauhaus. Memories of 12% alcohol danced in my head. I’ll never forget trying to park the Beast with Rick that first Saturday night. There was just no room at the inn. Here she was chugging along in a city that didn’t realize that big girls need love too. We ended up parking 10 blocks away that night and walked to the Platz area.

Today, Zack was able to finally buy the backpack he had desperately been searching for as a souvenir. He was very patient, and a real trooper.

Laura and I finally found something we liked for our house: a Nutcracker. But this handmade “Cracker”, dressed in laderhosen, will be able to stay out year round and join the rest of Laura’s collection at Christmas.

What a jambalaya experience we all had on this trip: different languages, rich culture, subtle and grand differences; the people warm and some cool. (Some too cool: see Hasselhoff blog.) Travel is a most exciting teacher.

As we took our last family portrait, I wondered: are the Europeans really much different than we Americans? We all share the same nature, but have different nurture. In the end, I gained a respect for much of the European lifestyle: the long lunches where conversation is savored as much as the food. A slower pace of life. Art in the public square. The united commitment by a city for conservation. The commitment to use rapid transit or a BIKE. And a willingness to embrace and trust strangers in a strange land like us.

I gained a new level of appreciation for what I have in the U.S. While there is much I would love to see changed, it is still home, and I love America. She is still the greatest country in the world to me.

I have a few people I’d like to thank. I want to thank my sister-in-law Heather for setting up this blog which I at first shunned, and ultimately embraced. I want to thank Rick for driving the Beast and being a great tour guide in Bavaria. I want to thank YOU the fans. I have really enjoyed this time we’ve shared in cyberspace. I will never forget the frenzied pace of plugging in somewhere just to post a blog. And I want to recognize God’s protection over us this past 21 days. We have had more than a few close calls on the road that I know without Divine intervention we would not have made it through.

And so as I say goodbye, three families having lived through “Survivor: Europe", we walk into the next phase of our adventure: life after Europe and the return HOME. We return home a little wiser, a little more cultured, and the world seems a little smaller.

God bless you, God bless America, and God bless Europe. Those Euros aren’t so bad after all.

Signing off.


Gabe