HAPPY NEW YEAR (Ein Gutes Frohe Neues Yahr) to everyone! I'm back from Germany after two weeks of Christmas and New Year's and celebrating my husband's birthday. We had a wonderful time together taking several day trips and doing a bit of sightseeing. I wanted to visit some of the Christmas markets (especially the one in Nuremberg), but arrived too late. They usually close early on Christmas Eve and I arrived the day after. Generally, Frankfurt was not as cold as I had expected, although there were days that were very cold. 
I arrived in Germany on Christmas day (very early in the morning). The airport was fairly empty. My husband was already there waiting and anxious to see me. We left the airport and headed to the apartment and for the first time I travelled on the autobahn. What an experience! Generally there is no speed limit, but in certain areas there are signs posted. These are usually when you are approaching a city or a populated area, or construction site, etc. We were driving along and cars were just swooshing by when I noticed that our car started to pick up the pace. Although I won't reveal the KPH at which we were driving, I had to ask my husband to slow down. Yikes! I needed to be warmed up to such high speeds, especially since I did not sleep or each much on the flight. He obliged and headed for the far right lane. (: We finally arrived at the apartment, which he had decorated with Christmas ornaments. I was very pleased and he was proud of his accomplishment. We spent the rest of Christmas day together unpacking and exchanging gifts (which is generally done on Christmas Eve in Germany), and went out to dinner that evening. We ate at an Italian restaurant and the food was really good. After dinner we had good intentions of going Christmas sightseeing, but after we ate, I got very tired and just wanted to get some rest.
Heidelberg
The next day, we took a day trip to Heidelberg. I love this charming city with a beautiful old castle. The view from the castle is breathtaking. After we explored the castle, which also has a winehouse, coffee/pastry bar and a pharmaceutical museum, we left and walked around the city. It was a cold day, but the city is not very big and we really enjoyed the scenery. Later that evening, we had dinner reservations at a very nice German restaurant. We had been there before and really liked the ambiance and the food was good too. After dinner we wanted to have drinks, but it was really tough to find any bars open right after Christmas. Also, the city we were in (Gernsheim) is a small one, which, doubled with the fact that it was Christmas time, made it even more difficult to find an open bar. We were dressed to the nines and finally ended up in a smoke-filled pub with a fireplace, listening to Karaoke sung by Germans in English. Some of the patrons stared at us when we walked in like we had come in our hands instead of our feet. We clearly looked out of place. Soon everyone went back to their business, we had drinks and listened to Karaoke. Believe it or not, this was one of our most memorable evenings! As we were leaving the pub, a very kind but sorely intoxicated gentleman held the door open for us and after we exited, we turned around to find that he was being scraped off the ground by his companion. Ooops!!
Mainz
We took a day trip to the city of Mainz. We spent the afternoon there just enjoying the city. There are lots of restaurants, winehouses and shopping in Mainz. A river runs along Mainz's downtown and there is a beautiful old church in the city center. We went inside to explore but there was a service going on at the time. It was just as beautiful and old on the inside as well. We could not walk around while the service was in session, so we lit two candles for us and watched the flames for a few minutes.
My husband wanted to visit the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz (since he studied printing in school). When we arrived at the museum, however, they were just closing so we could see only what was in view through the windows. Gutenberg is famous for inventing the first "movable letters" for use on a printing press and was a genius in his time.
On this day, I had such a craving for Thai food. It was all I talked about while we were sightseeing and I wanted it for dinner. Mainz was the last place I would have expected to find a Thai restaurant. We kept walking and when we turned one corner, lo and behold, Thai Express had made its presence known (bright red awning and all) and was calling my name. I stood in place for a few seconds just laughing in disbelief. One serving of food easily can feed two and one-half people, but we each ate all of our food and could not eat anything for the rest of the day or night. All in all, for us our trip to Mainz was very romantic and we had a great day there.
Mannheim
We visited the city of Mannheim. We got there late in the afternoon and most of the stores were already beginning to close. Mannheim was bustling with activity and there is a lot of shopping (both high and low end) there. We mostly did a lot of window shopping and checked out the city which was packed with people. Many of the Christmas decorations were still up in the city, so when the lights came on they were very pretty to see. You have to be very careful in downtown Mannheim because in certain areas pedestrians and trams use the same space with no stop/go lights. If you want to cross from one side of the street to the other, you simply have to look both ways to make sure that no tram is coming.
New Year's Eve 
We decided to stay in Frankfurt for NYE and booked a package at the Frankfurt Marriott, which included room and admission to a NYE gala and ball. During the day we went downtown Frankfurt, which was packed with people of all nationalities, who where mostly shopping trying to get some after Christmas bargains. We checked out the Main river which runs through downtown Frankfurt, but the cruises were closed because most of the boats were booked for NYE celebrations and were getting ready. It was cold that day but the atmosphere was very festive. We went back to the hotel to relax and get ready for the gala. After we got dressed, we went down to the ballroom which was nicely decorated and many people were already there. Dinner, which was served buffet style, and all the drinks you wanted, were included in the cost of the tickets. When we arrived at our table (10 per table), the other guests were already there. Everyone looked great with the ladies wearing cocktail dresses and the men dressed in suits. The food was good and after several glasses of champagne I was ready to dance. There was a live band and a DJ and my husband and I danced and danced.
We walked around the hotel to the other rooms and ended up in a room playing 70s and 80s music, where we danced to S&P's "Push It," the Village People's "YMCA" and Prince's "Little Red Corvet." We had a blast! That room soon became too hot so we decided to go back to our table in the ballroom to cool off. We (well mostly my husband) talked to the others guests at our table and we found out that one of the couples have been married for 53 years and they were still going strong. They were so cute together. One of the male guests at our table asked me to dance and after getting "approval," I danced with him. I was a little nervous, because I could tell he was a little intoxicated, but he turned out to be a great dancer. At midnight, the countdown (done in German), gave me a chance to practice saying the numbers.(: Everyone toasted and offered good cheer for the new year, then headed outside for fireworks. There were only small displays of fireworks in the area where we were. We would have had to head to the Main river to see the bigger displays, but we chose to stay at the hotel and continue celebrating. By this time it's around 1:00am and my husband and I had been at the gala for about 5 hours. We were both very tired and headed to our room. What a great evening we had and a fabulous way to ring in the New Year!
Darmstadt
My husband works in Darmstadt and so he was happy to show me around the city. Darmstadt is a fairly big city and not as diverse as Frankfurt, but more diverse than many of the other cities we had visited. There is a US Army based in Darmstadt so a lot of Americans frequent the area. Darmstadt also has a lot of shopping and many boutique stores.
Birthday celebration
We celebrated my husband's birthday on January 4. We made reservations at a Croatian restaurant and had a really nice time although neither one of us sampled any Croatian fare. The restaurant had a very mysterious feel with dark wood vaulted ceilings, deep red drapes hanging from ceiling to floor, white tablecloths with dark wooden furniture and candles everywhere. During one of our conversations at dinner I stopped and listened more closely to hear Katy Perry coming through the speakers in the restaurant singing "Kissed a Girl." Took some of the mystery away. LOL! But, we had a great dinner and a happy birthday.
Bird, the bird 
My husband has a bird, which is over 17 years old. This bird is still going strong except for the fact that he sometimes falls off the rope in his cage. The rope of course is hung close to the top of the cage and when I say he falls, I mean he falls. He doesn't event try to recover on the way down. He lands on the bottom, is stunned for a few seconds, then starts his trek right back to his favorite rope near the top. (His cage is over 5 feet tall.) Also, no jokes, this birds "lays down" on the rope when he's sleeping. I've seen it with my own eyes. At night he literally lays on his side, still clinging to the cage with his claws, and falls asleep sideways. LOL!! (Disclaimer: the bird is well taken care of and is not hurt when he falls! LOL)
My trip to Germany was a good one but I'm not finished with Germany yet though, because there's still Oktoberfest, wine festivals and a soccer game in Bavaria to experience. I really enjoyed the Holiday season and have many memories to treasure. I'm already looking forward to Christmas 2009 because my husband wants to spend it in Trinidad & Tobago. How ya feelin'? HOT! HOT! HOT!
NEXT STOP. . .Las Vegas for bachelorette party. Check back later for recap, but definitely no pictures. LOL!
In the meantime, make this a travel year and tell me "what's your next stop?" I want to hear about it!
All photos are were taken by and are personal property of screen name TriniDiva (Dec 2008/Jan2009).
