The Whole Trip

Here is a map of the whole group trip, about 1,200 miles in all. We traveled clockwise, if you will.

Each color represents a different country:
Yellow - The Netherlands
Blue - Germany
Pink - Austria
Light Blue - Liechtenstein
Green - Switzerland
Red - France
Light Green - Luxembourg
Brown - Belgium

August 27

Today we were almost late getting on the bus because of two of the boys. We were congratulating the girl who had the foresight to go wake the pair up when one of the boys discovered that he’d lost his passport, rail pass, camera, computer charger, etc.. As it turned out, he had left his bag at a discotheque after having way too many drinks. We ended up dropping him off in Strasbourg, whence he took a train back to Colmar to look for his bag. He ultimately found it and returned to Maastricht just in time to leave for Barcelona with his group, but we wouldn’t know that till later.

Having dumped off the problem child, we continued to Metz, where we took a guided tour of the city. The highlight of our stop in Metz was definitely the Cathedrale St. Etienne, one of the most beautiful churches in the world. The cathedral is currently undergoing exterior cleaning. We also saw the backside of the oldest church in France, dating from the third century! Unfortunately, we did not have time to visit. We ended our tour with an uninspiring fast food lunch at a bad panini shop. Erik had gnocchi, and I had a chicken panino smothered in nacho cheese. How un-Italian!

Cathedrale St. Etienne

This portal had been recently cleaned.

One of the highest naves in the world.

The stained glass has been painstakingly treated so that it can't be shattered by a storm or a stone.

The length of the cathedral.

After Metz, we made our last stop of the trip in Bastogne, where we saw the Battle of the Bulge memorial. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.

See Oklahoma there on the left wing?

Looking across the battlefield towards the memorial.

August 26

This morning, everyone got to sleep in a bit before a ten minute trip in the bus to Chillon castle, formerly one of the summer castles of the royal family of Savoy. Our guide gave us a rousing and biased version of Swiss history along with the tour. He was great.

Chillon - say shee-yon

The view from the dungeon/cellar.

After the castle, we herded the group down to the pier where we caught a ferry to Vevey, Switzerland, just a half-hour away. Our boat was steam-powered! You wouldn’t believe the speed with which that thing could take off from the dock.

The bow of our steamship.

After the bus picked us all back up, we drove back north and into France, stopping in Colmar. Our hotel was a short walk from the city center, so after we dropped off our belongings, the four of us walked into the old town. Colmar is a pretty town with a few nice squares, lots of shopping and restaurants, and a beautiful cathedral. As chance would have it, the cathedral had a Mass at 6:00 in the evening, so we were able to make Mass. We thought that we would miss for the weekend but were pleasantly surprised. It was a beautiful service in a beautiful church, and we were quite pleased.

St. Matthieu in Colmar

Click the picture for a better view.

After Mass, we met Dr. Rust and Séverine for dinner at one of the cafés in the same square as the cathedral. Erik and I both had choucroute garnie, a regional specialty. Séverine says that it wasn’t as good as her mom’s!

Colmar street scene

August 25

From Erik: After checking out of our hotel, the group headed west towards central Switzerland. On the way, we made a pit stop in Liechtenstein, everyone’s favorite sovereign principality! It was very pretty and surprisingly small. Apparently, their economy is based on selling postage stamps and souvenir passport visas. We thought we could find a better way to spend 4 Euro. It was very interesting to be there. I thought it was about as close as one could get to feudalism in this day and age, with the prince on the mountain and his subjects down below. It gave us an appreciation of what the Greek and Italian city states must have been like. Long live the prince!

The prince's castle, high above the city.

From Becky: Our next stop was Vitznau on Lake Lucerne. Once there, we took a chain-driven train up the Rigi mountain to Rigi Kaltbad, where we ate lunch at the Hotel Alpina. The weather was beautiful, so we had spectacular views of the lake, the Alps, and the countryside. On the way back down, we took the little steam-powered train!

Lake Lucerne from the train.

Alpine Erik. See the steam-powered train chugging up the mountain?

We spent the rest of the day in the bus. It was supposed to have been a scenic drive, but I missed most of it because I was carsick and had my eyes closed. Well, I was bus-sick, I guess. Late afternoon we arrived at Montreux, a resort town on the Swiss side of Lake Geneva. Séverine grew up on the French side of the lake and was truly moved by being home. The four of us took a long walk up and down the lakeside and watched the sunset and then the moon over the lake.

Freddy Mercury in Montreux. Not sure why...

Lake Geneva at sunset.

August 24

After checking out of the hotel and loading our junk on the bus, we walked the whole group down to the Rothernburg Criminal Museum. It’s a pretty intense place, chock full of devices of torture, shaming, and execution. Kind of hard on the freshly pastry/meat/cheese laden stomach. I tried out real life Japanese for the first time. A bunch of Japanese tourists were crowded around a sign that I wanted to read, so I said “Excuse me” in Japanese. Amazing, huh? That was the extent of our conversation.

"Come and get your lollipops! All free today!"

"But I don't wanna go in the iron maiden."

Next we drove on to Neuschwanstein Castle, Mad King Ludwig’s craziest creation and the model for the Disney castle. Don’t be deceived – this castle was built in the late 19th century! This was a horrible stop, really, because we were running late and the students were not moving.

Neuschwanstein

After finally herding everyone back onto the bus, we drove another hour and a half or so to Ettal to the Kloster Ettal, a Benedictine monastery. The monastery itself is a beautiful building, in its own very Baroque way, as is the church. Dr. Rust and Erik went off on a small adventure to have Erik’s St. Benedict medal blessed while we were there. Erik was able to practice his German both with the priest and later with the cashier at the attached shop where Erik bought a variety pack of the monastery’s beer.

Kloster Ettal

Fr. Timothy's idea of a confessional. (Ha)

After the monastery, we made our way into Austria to stay for the night at a ski resort hotel in St. Anton. The hotel was amazing and 4 stars, but the rooms were reasonably priced since it’s the off-season. Séverine and Dr. Rust had dinner with us in the hotel restaurant. Erik made the best choice – Variations on Alpine Pork. Yum.

The view from our hotel window in St. Anton.

August 23

Today found us on a bus bright and early, heading out for our group trip! Erik and I secured seats on the second row, and I wore my sea bands the entire time, so we did pretty well. Our first stop was in Germany at the Deutsches Eck, the point at which the Rhine and the Moselle rivers flow together. It’s a pretty spot. There is a hulking shrine to German Unification there crowned by an equestrian statue of Kaiser Wilhelm I attended by Germania. It’s kind of a weird monument and very Teutonic. Germany is apparently not as litigious as America, because one can climb all the way to the top of the monument, where there are no railings. The climb up was worth the effort, because the view of the Eck (“corner”) was very nice.

William "The Great"

The Eck with the state flags of Germany flying in the breeze.

We then hopped back on the bus for another brief jaunt (not) of about three hours and made our way to Boppard, Germany, where we boarded the “Pegasus” for a cruise down the Rhine to St. Goar. The weather was beautiful, and so was the scenery, ancient vineyards and mediaeval castles lining both sides of the Rhine valley. We were a little skeptical about the on-board restaurant, but our bratwursts, fries, and Altbiere were great. Erik successfully ordered and paid in German, but this didn’t seem to improve the friendliness of the cashier, who seems to hate tourists. I think she picked the wrong profession. The climax of the cruise was to be the sight of the statue of Loreley, a legendary siren who lured ships onto the shallows. The experience was marred a bit by sailors of the German navy performing maneuvers in black rubber rafts, apparently deaf to Loreley’s siren call.

Great bratwurst on the boat.

Cute Erik on the boat.

After another three hours or so of bus ride, we arrived at Wurzburg, where we saw the Residenz, the former palace of the Prince-Bishop of Franconia. The palace has an impressive façade and an even more impressive interior. Unfortunately, photography was not allowed inside, so we have no interior pictures. Just imagine a entrance hall large enough to admit horse-drawn carriages, a vast frescoed vault with allegories of all the continents of the world, and a room lined with painted mirrors. Most of the palace was destroyed by bombing during World War II, but the vault with its frescoes survived. The mirrored room had to be meticulously recreated from detailed photographs taken at the beginning of the war. Fortunately, many of the furnishings and wall hangings were stored in the palace’s cellar during the war and have been restored to their former places. Most of the palace remains an empty shell.

Severine and I at the Residenz.

Beautiful gardens at the Residenz.

The Residenz from the gardens.

After the palace, we drove down to Rothenburg, Germany, a mediaeval town that has been kept frozen in the 15th century by law. Everything within the ancient town walls has retained its timber and plaster construction. There are electricity and indoor plumbing, though! It’s a really neat place, and we had a great dinner there with Dr. Rust and Séverine. We all had goulash with spätzle – only Dr. Rust was too wimpy to have the venison. Séverine and I tried to go into the wrong hotel on the way back, but that’s a story for another time.

Monkey Island, anyone?
I think the voodoo shop is just on the right.

August 22

Today was scheduled to be another grueling day, but Dr. Rust got one of the events canceled, and Erik and I skipped out on another part. We needed some rest! We did go up to CES for some sessions on Dutch language and culture in the morning, but we spent the afternoon shopping for some things for the room and taking a nap! One of the kids showed himself to be a problem child starting today. More on him later.

August 21

Today was our first breakfast at the cafeteria. It could have been worse. Afterwards, we walked down to UM’s law school. There is no “campus” here; rather, the university’s buildings are spread across the city center. The buildings are all really old and pretty, too. Representatives of different student groups made brief presentations and then served us vlaai, a kind of Dutch cake, with tea and coffee. After that, we had a tour with the Erasmus Student Network. It was kind of a pointless affair, with us running all over town and not really seeing much besides the train station. But, there it is.

You know, just your typical train station.

Afterwards, we walked down to Mensa, UM’s cafeteria located in the city center. It was, on the whole, better food than we enjoy in the guesthouse. Next, we went for the first time to CES, the Center for European Studies, where Séverine works. From there, we went almost directly to dinner. As you may be able to tell, we didn’t have a moment’s rest in these first few days.

The students rushed the computers when we arrived at CES.

August 20

After pretty much no sleep on the plane on my part and with Erik having gotten just enough to be loopy, we arrived at Amsterdam at 1:00 PM local time. All the students and luggage made it, so we passed right out of the airport and into a waiting bus for our three hour drive to Maastricht. When we arrived at the dorm, it was raining. Séverine Dufour, the trip coordinator from U. Maastricht, came onto the bus to greet us all and then helped us get situated with the Guesthouse people. After dumping our belongings in our room, we went down to dinner in the cafeteria. Just to make sure we hit the ground running, a group of representatives from the Erasmus Student Network met our group at 6:30 in the lobby and took us over to the Brusselsepoort (shopping mall) to show us around.

Everything but the grocery stores was closed, so we picked up some fruit and yoghurt and some shaving soap for Erik’s precious straight razor. The variety and inexpensiveness of the produce here really surprised us. The variety of cheeses and meats, especially different types of sausage, is great, too. Grandpa John will be happy to know that all of the grocery stores here run on the Aldi model in that the shopping bags are reusable and cost money and that the shopping carts are only released by a 1 Euro coin. There is an Aldi in town, but we have not shopped there.

August 19

Got up at five to leave Tulsa on a 9:00 flight to Dallas. Dad dropped us off at the airport. We ate a good wrap and chips with salsa from Camille’s. That was the last good airport food we were to see this trip. We spent an uneventful but long time at the Dallas airport. The bus driver from the American terminal to the Continental terminal was really nice. He prophesied that we will have our first child soon. We’ll see how it goes. The agent at the counter was worried about bad weather coming in and keeping our group from making our Houston connection to Amsterdam and wanted us to get everyone on an earlier flight. We had no way of calling the students, so there was nothing we could do. One student did end up on the earlier flight, but the others all came with us on the later one with no difficulty.

The Continental terminal had really bad food. Erik had bad Chinese, and I had bad Burger King. How can you mess up a chicken nugget? We left Dallas for Houston at around 4:30 with all the students in tow. When we arrived at Dallas, our plane’s gate wasn’t free, so we were taxied to another gate and terminal and ended up one gate away from our flight to Amsterdam. Dr. Rust was surprised to see all of us pop up right next to him. He had gathered most of the other group, but one of the students had accidentally flown into Houston Hobby instead of Houston International. She was taking a taxi from one to the other, and we weren’t sure she would make it. But, crisis averted, she wasn’t even the last one to show up. After rounding up the stragglers from the various food courts, we were on our way to Holland.