April 17, 2007 - page 2



We ate bretzels (pretzels) and mustard, kalter braten, and drank dark, rich, delicious beer for lunch. We threw our bikes down next to a lake and ran around in the sun, nearly singing “the hills are alive.” (Okay, we did do that…I mean, Catherine and Lillian did.) Lillian and I got to watch Catherine crash her bike over a curb and roll down a hill. Our backyard view from the hostel balcony was the Alps, so that’s the first thing we saw each morning waking with the sunrise. We found the greatest restaurant in Europe- Le Pearle- where we ate two nights in a row and befriended the owner who brought us free drinks.

There’s so much more, but you’d rather hear about our trip’s horrible, non-Disney ending.

We had train reservations for Sunday night, which would get us back to Strasbourg Monday morning in time for classes. Theoretically, this works great.

There was a train switch in Munich at 11:45 p.m. We’d been on layover for an hour, sitting on the cold cement. As we were leaning on our bikes on the platform our ride finally rolled to a steaming halt. Folks rushed on the train. I lifted my bike and started to climb the stairs, when a conductor put his hand out said “Oh, no. No bike!” with a stern, thick German accent.

“Um, excuse me?” I said more than asked, sure that this guy was just messing with me. I laughed nervously, saying, “Oh, well, yes but we have reservations for this train with our bikes.” “No,” he said. “There are no bikes on this train.”

“Are you sure?” asked Catherine. “Our reservation says we can transport bikes.”

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