Part 1 of Europe Adventures with Momola!!!

 Our day trip to Heidelberg, Germany!

 We started out our adventure with a sweaty sprint to the train station down the street from my flat.  Yes, as usual, things were running slightly late when in connection with Brooke ;-p.  We missed the first train by a mere 30 seconds, it pulling away as we raced breathless onto the platform.  So we took the next 10 minutes to catch our breaths before boarding the following train.  Luckily there was a 12:30pm to Heidelberg in lieu of us having missed the 12:06, so this worked out perfectly bringing us into Heidelberg about 1:30pm!

  Upon our arrival, we meandered down different streets checking out building facades and little shops.  Mom snagged a pretzel to snack on as I snapped loads of photos.  We strolled along the river with a picturesque view of the rolling mountains, the lazily snaking river and all the gargantuan mansions nestled into the hill on the opposite side of the river.  More photos were taken, we played the game "which house would you take, if given the choice of one freebie" (which resulted in much laughter and fun back and forth discussion) until we came to the Old Town area of the city.

Pretzel time!

As you can see from all of the photos above, we wandered through the older part of town for quite some time, pausing to gaze at the colorful, charming facades and snap more photos up until we stopped for lunch.  The restaurant we settled on caught our eye from outside, as we looked into the window, the appearance evoking something like a forest of birth trees.  How cool!  We both remarked to one another about the eye-catching appearance, their ambiance/marketing strategy complete as we found ourselves drawn inside.

It ended up being an ultra-trendy burger joint.  We each ordered a veggie burger, my own was spicy and my Moms choice a more mild olive burger topped with three cheeses.  Both of us could not get over how delicious they were!  In fact, my Mom said it was the best veggie burger she has ever had.  How bout that!

Over lunch we walked about romantic relationships, more things we hoped to do in each of our lives, our travel plans to come in the next week with one another, and more.

Afterwards, we stopped over in a quaint little cafe for a slice of Bienenstich cake which we walked with in hand to the square just next door.  We sat momentarily and devoured the light, moist vanilla cake sandwiched with a layer of rich pastry cream and topped with honeyed almonds.  So delicious.  She loved it.  Success!

Then, we made our way up to the CASTLE!!!!

How cool is the inside of this restaurant!?

We had an awesome view of a bustling square in Old Town as we ate.

BOMB veggie burger.

Mom enjoying a German beer :-D

She was having a grand ole time!  Making our way up to the castle.

Such stellar views from Heidelberg Castle!!

Check out that stained glass.  Gorgeous.

One of the games Mom and I came up with during our travels was: describing each of our destinations (after the fact of course) using JUST three words.  This was super tough.  Boiling down the essence of our own experience and feelings within that city to just three words.  How do you describe a place in just three?  You cant, of course.  But we still had fun with this.

So, each of our three words for Heidelberg:

Mom: Moorish, Quaint, Versatile
Brooke: Picturesque, Historical, Natural.