Fun in Frankfurt

This past weekend Maria and I took the train to visit Julia Heizinger, a foreign exchange student that stayed with my family when I was in the third grade.  We left Schledorf about 4:00 p.m. and arrived in Frankfurt about 9:00 p.m. on Friday evening.  Julia picked us up at the train station and asked if we were up to seeing some of Frankfurt's night life.  Of course we were up for doing some exploring around Frankfurt after sitting for about five hours.  We were given two options:  we could look around at a carnival that was going around or we could go to a more traditional place.  I decided it would be nice to see a more traditional place, so we went to an outdoor café called the Painted House.  Julia helped us to decided what to order, so we tried a traditional drink called Apfelwein (apple wine) and we ate a green herb sauce with potatoes.  Both were very good and we enjoyed the beautiful weather outside.  After finishing our traditional meal, we headed back to Julia's parent's house where we would spend the next day and a half.  We were able to meet Julia's mother and sister before we called it a night.

On Saturday, we made our way to Mainz, the town in which Julia is currently living.  We walked through the old town and were able to see a couple churches, but my favorite part of Mainz was the open market.  I guess I must love the idea of going to a market outdoors on Saturday morning to buy fresh fruits, vegetables, and cheeses for the week.  I truly wish this was a bigger concept in the United States.  After spending some time in Mainz, we sat down for a nice lunch at a café and took a short break from walking around.  Once we had our fill, we made our way to Frankfurt which was about 20 minute drive from Mainz.  In Frankfurt, we explored a portion of the pedestrian area and walked through part of the carnival we had seen going on the last night. There were so many people in Frankfurt today!  It was almost difficult to get through the crowds.  In Frankfurt we visited another church, a bridge where many married couples attach a lock and throw the key into the river, and the opera house.  There is so much to see in Frankfurt even though it is mainly known for its many banks.  I wish we would have more time here than one weekend.  After seeing a few of the many sites, we returned to Julia's house to prepare for a BBQ her family was having that night in celebration that her sister is home from the USA.  Julia's sister invited a few friends and and her parents had a couple co-works over.  We ate so much delicious food and one of Julia's sister's friends stopped to pick up ice cream at a local ice cream parlor before stopping over.  It was probably the best ice cream I have ever had in my life.  I had three different flavors: pistachio, snickers, and my favorite one a was a cherry flavored ice cream.  We had so much fun sitting around and chatting over the food.  It was a great night that went into the early hours of the morning.

After getting two and a half hours of sleep it was time to wake up and get ready to take the train back to Maria's home town.  It was of course sad to say good bye to Julia, but it had been a great weekend where many wonderful memories were created.  A big thank you goes out to Julia and her family for making this weekend to memorable.