Sunday in Berlin. Best part of the trip!!!

(I still have no idea what this sign is trying to tell me not to do...)

This is the last part of my trip?? I feel so accomplished! I haven't even been back a week yet! Paris took me like a month to write! This was my favorite day though. This is my Sunday in Berlin. In my other blog I mentioned my Grandpa's cousin and his story in Berlin. In his book he mentions the name of the ward where he was married. While doing my research I discovered that there is still a ward by that name. Could it really be the same one or the same place? Only one way to find out. So putting on my new shoes I bought in Berlin (How could I not buy them? They were the last pair, my size, and on an insanely great sale.), and dodging past the drunks who were still out partying. The clubs were still blaring music, and I was on my way to church :) I kinda stuck out, but I am getting more and more use to it.

I managed to find my way to the stop I wanted no issues. I was pretty sure I was walking the right way, but wasn't sure. Then I saw it. It was like my first Sunday in Frankfurt all over again. I was so happy to see the church. Before I walked in I took a deep breath ready to brace myself. I didn't want to get my hopes up too high in case it wasn't the same church. I made it to the chapel and was about ready to cry. It was the exact church. Same light fixture, same everything. No doubt in my mind, this was the church Herbert married his sweetheart in on September 28th,1951. That moment right there, made my whole trip. That was my highlight. I got a picture of the chapel and tried to take a picture of the original I have. I know it is hard to make out, but look and you can see it.

Amazing. Relief Society was first, and somehow I managed to sit in the section with other English speakers. I had no idea, then I realized I could understand them and was amazed. After that I go to the single adults class, and my world gets smaller. I am introduced to Christina. She is an au pair from the US too! Imagine that. This is how the conversation went.

"Hey were are you from?"

"I am from Utah, where are you from?"

"Washington."

"Oh really what part?"
"Seattle area."

"Hey I lived there for a while too, which part?"

"Widbey Island."

Now, for those of you who don't know, when I was living in Provo I adopted me a little brother. He is from a little island in Washington called Widbey Island. The conversation continues with me asking "Do you know Sam Parker?"

She stares at me in disbelief and just responds with a "You are kidding me!? He is like a brother to me!!" So there I was, standing in a church where in 1951 someone in my family history was married, talking to a girl that knew one of my favorite people ever! Small little Mormon world. I LOVE IT!

Her and I had a lot of fun talking and being shocked. I really wish she lived closer to me, what is with me and making friends who don't live by me?! Oh well, I figure I will run into her again somewhere random. Seattle, Provo, Barcelona, who knows?

After that I went to the Rathaus Schoeneberg, which was the other place that Herbert might have been married. The picture I have of their wedding day is hard to make out, but without a doubt this is the wrong place. It was still worth the shop. There was a swap meet going on and they had massive amounts of books! I was looking for an old copy of Grimm Fairytales, since I have now started a collection of them. While I was looking the guy selling them just kept repeating "one euro, books are one euro" In German to all of us looking through the books. I didn't see any Grimms books, so I decided to ask him. I had no idea how to even start that one so I asked in English. He said he didn't think they did so I then just told him that I wanted the two books in my hand. "Five euro" was what he said to me.

Hearing that load of crap come out of his mouth, I put on my nanny face. The face I use when a kid lies to me and I know it. And by my face they know they screwed up as well. "Didn't you just say that all of these books are one euro?" You little twerp! Just because I can't speak German doesn't mean I can't understand it! A little flustered he comes up with an excuse fast. "Oh, uh, um that is the old price I am sorry, we just changed the prices I must have forgotten." Uh huh. Right. Two seconds ago I thought the only thing you knew how to say in German was "one Euro". I gave him another nanny look, this one being the 'Lie to me again and we will have issues'. I gave him two euro and walked off. Yeah I probably should have told him to give me both of them for one euro for him being a butt face, but I didn't want to deal with it. At least I didn't pay what he asked. Honestly people!

After that I headed back to Annette's place and we headed out to the train station. I honestly had such a blast with her! Talking over breakfast about what it was like growing up on the East side of Berlin, and a lot of the history in Berlin. We also had some fun chats about music and how much she liked American music because she didn't understand the words. She always made sure I was fed and even spoiled me with strawberries with Italian whipped topping. YUM! She was great and I loved it! My train was just about to come and I wanted to get some food, and then I realized that all I had was my cards, no cash. Crap. Oh well. I can survive, no worries Annette I am fine. She wouldn't stand for that. My train was just about to pull into the station, and she races off and buys me a delish little sandwich and gets there right as my train pulls in. It was so sweet and I feel so blessed to have met her and become her friend!

That is about where my adventure ends. I rode the train home, got stuck waiting 45 minutes for the train in Frankfurt to take me home. I watched How I Met Your Mother, which made me look totally insane. I can't help but laugh a lot at that show, and since my headphones were on listening to it everyone else around me had no idea why I was laugh. Oh well. Laughed a lot anyways :) Let them laugh at the crazy American. Seems to be the theme of my life!

The nerd in me comes out even more...

Now I realize you don't know this, but all of the stories here are very jumbled. My mind has been jumping all over this trip, so there are a lot of things that happened the first day that will get told here, and a lot of things that happened Saturday that I made it look like happened on Friday. Best part about this? I am the only one who knows what happened when! MWAHAHAHA!!! Back to Berlin.... Saturday was a really fun day. I had seen just about everything I had planned on seeing. It is amazing how much faster the scooter is apposed to walking :)

The first place I wanted to see was the Jewish Museum. I was sort of expecting something like the Holocaust Museum in D.C. (which is amazing by the way). Instead what I got was a history of the Jewish people with a tiny bit dedicated to the ones killed in the Holocaust. I was really kinda disappointed by this actually. I think I would have found it interesting if I didn't go in with the expectations I had. About the only exciting thing that happened here is that they found the knife in my bag... ooops... forgot about it. They took it and I picked it up when I was done. Wooo.... excitement.

At this point I was a little annoyed, I was so looking forward to this! Oh well. I decided to go and find some lunch, but apparently nothing really opens until 4. Really?? Do people in Berlin not eat lunch? Finally I found a little bakery that had food. I decided I was going to try and use my German and not try to rely so much on my English. I was doing decent until I got flustered and the girl didn't want to deal with it. She wasn't rude, but you could tell that she didn't want to be the one that this little American girl used her awful German on. So it became more of a point and say thank you conversation. Suck. I then went to this lovely bench and ate my food

Now I know to most of you this just seems like just another bench. And well... I guess it is. There is a little more to it for me though. Before I came to Germany my Grandpa Ludwig sent me a copy of his first cousins life story. His name was Herbert Kurt Ludwig, and while I don't think I ever met him, because of reading his story I felt extremely close to him. The first girl he kissed ended up being the last one he kissed as well. He kissed her and then later proposed to her on a bench in a park in Berlin. In the book there is a picture of the bench, but try as I might, I couldn't find the actual original bench. It is a very bad picture and it was also taken over 50 years ago. Luckily for me, I have an amazing imagination. This bench fit all the criteria he talked about. It is in Berlin, just down the way from a train station, and it kinda looks like the same place. I know I might sound crazy, but I really enjoyed pretending that this was their bench.

This is the Rotes Rathaus, which I am almost confident was where Herbert was married. The church didn't have the authority to marry them in Germany at this point, and so they were married in the town hall and then had a ceremony in the LDS chapel. The picture of their wedding day is really hard to make out, but I am pretty sure this is the place. The other place that was an option as well I check out too. It is most definitely not the place. So I choose to think this is where they were married :)
This picture right here makes me laugh. I was kind of at the point of... what do I do now? So I decided to take some fun pictures. I set up the shot, set the time, ran to the other side and hopped up, then realized I was being watch and started to laugh. They did too and said something in German and carried on their merry little way. Just another crazy American in Berlin.

The next set of pictures has a common theme that is really easy to pick out :) Before I left Natalie and I were laughing and saying how I should take an army man with me and take pictures with him all the places I go. Well we never found one before I left but a few days before heading to Berlin, I got a package from Nat. With this army man in it. So here are his adventures in Berlin (I feel like he needs a name. Suggestions are welcome).

While in Berlin I went to the Memorial for the killed Jews. I don't understand the significance of the layout or the style... It was interesting but I didn't understand so it didn't really do much for me. Underneath this is a different story. There is a museum underneath filled with a lot of quotes and excerpts from letters. It is amazing to see how much fear can be held in a letter still over...60+ years after it being written? The end is what got to me the most. There is a room that is dimly lit, and on the wall a name comes up. Then you hear the story about this person. 2 year old, killed by the Nazi's at Auschwitz. 47 year old, specifics pertaining to his death unknown. It just keeps going and going. Some survive, most die. Some survive the concentration camps, only to die a few days after liberation. It was really hard to stay in there for too long. So much sadness.

There were a lot of little things in the city that remind people about what happened, in hopes I guess of it never happening again. The first quote I read in the Memorial to the killed Jews was "It happened, therefore it can happen again. This is the cor of what we have to say" by Primo Levi. In the city there are "stumbling stones", and on these stones there are names of people killed in the Holocaust and how they died. Just simple, to the point, a reminder to never let it happen again.

These are the stumbling stones I found. It is amazing to me how many people have no idea that they are even there. Few people noticed it. Just kept walking. Not knowing what they were passing. It was odd to see. I was annoyed with people and just wanted to shout at them to look. But I have a feeling that would not go over. People already thought I was insane walking around with my board :)

One thing that really made me laugh in Berlin, was how many guys would try and hit on me, which threw me off, and then I would reply that I don't speak German, which would then throw them off. Needless to say it was just a lot of awkward hitting on. It made me laugh every time, but I am starting to wonder if I should get me a shirt that says "Don't hit on me in German. It is useless" just because then I could laugh at the random pick up lines people use. Those are still my favorites in case you were wondering. They make me laugh and boy do I have some fun stories because of them!

One of the highlights of my day was when I got on the train. All of the sudden a band started playing! Just a kind of fun jazzy kind of band. I really just wanted to start doing swing dance right there in the middle of the S train. Being partnerless I decided against it. I just enjoyed it. They played between one stop and the next, and as soon as we stopped, so did they. I saw random people throughout the day getting on and off of the trains, a group of them with instruments. They seriously made me happy! I am pretty confident that they were just there to make people happy. There wasn't much time to collect change, so in my thought process, they did it to bring a smile to people's faces, which they succeeded with.

After a long day of site seeing and shopping, I decided to drop everything off and just board around. It was a great time! Other than the times I would hit the cobblestone wrong and would all of the sudden be forced with figuring out how to deal with the sudden lack of board under my feet. Have I mentioned how much I hate cobblestone?? Cause I do. They are awful and should all be dug up and replaced (yes they are pretty, but not fun in the least bit to skate on).

During my skate, I skated along the East Side Gallery, which is the longest piece of wall that is still standing. I was here the day before on the scooter and took pictures... check out the blog before this one if you have no idea what I am talking about :) It was really fun, I WAS SKATING NEXT TO THE BERLIN WALL!!! The little nerd in me that I usually try and keep repressed had way too much fun with this and can't be contained while I tell this! I was fantastic!!! Ok... I think I got the nerd in check now.

A whole lot of Pictures of Berlin...

The trip started with a very normal train ride there. Sadly no new friends like with my trip to Paris. All I got was a very grumpy German woman who tried to tell me I was in her seat, in German. Since I didn’t really know what she was saying I told her I don’t speak German, in German. So what does she do? She speaks louder and faster. Yeah. That is going to work. Luckily for her someone leaned over and told me what Grumpy woman was saying.

When I finally got to Berlin, I met up with my friend Annette. Side note for my Mom-When I told you where I was staying was a long story… here is the story. I met Annette online on a site called couchsurfing.com. How it works is that I find people on this site in the city who have a couch that I can crash on, and ask if they will let me stay. We hang out, get to know each other and have a fun multi-culture experience. Mom, for some reason I decided not to tell you this. Turns out that was the best since I got a call later from you worried about me. You would have flipped if I told you where I was staying. No worries. I am safe.

Annette was amazing! She took great care of me, making sure I ate and was all set for bed. He couch was more comfortable and bigger than my bed in Frankfurt, so I had no complaints. The next morning, after a leisurely breakfast of bread and nutella, she took me out on her scooter for a tour of Berlin. It was really fun! We drove past the largest still standing portion of the Berlin wall. Lucky for me they had just repainted it. They I guess are going to do that every 10 years. There was some cool artwork on it. How cool would that be to be one of the people selected to be allowed to paint on THE Berlin wall. Crazy. Below is a video I took while on the back of the scooter. I could have sworn that I was holding the camera more steady :)

Apparently this is one of the most famous/widely known pictures on the wall. So here ya go :)

I just really liked this picture a lot. It is also on The Wall.

I can't get my stupid computer to take off the underline so deal with it :) But I saw this picture and thought of my little brother D.Jay. I know you are more of a Manchester fan, but still got some respect for the Brazil team right?!

Looks like I am stuck with the line... Anywho, this is a really cool mural. It is made up of a bunch of people. I don't think you can tell... But it is, just take my word for it. Or just take a better look at the picture below :)

This is where the Berlin Wall stood. If I had been standing here back in the day, I would have been shot. That is assuming I could even make it that far.

Check Point Charlie. No, it isn't named after a guy named Charlie. I have no idea why there is a picture of some random guy there. It is called Charlie because it was the third check point to get into Berlin. Alpha, Beta, Charlie. Get it?

Me at Check Point Charlie again. You can't see the guys behind me, but they are trying to make it seem authentic and have guys in US uniforms. Hard to fully believe it though when they have VERY German accents :) Just sayin guys...

This is the Brandenburg Tor (gate). Little bit of random information for you-come on, if you know me, you know I am full of random knowledge like this! The statue up there is the Roman Goddess of victory, Victoria (go figure). Well when Napoleon took control, he took Victoria to Paris. When the Prussians got Paris, they brought her back to Berlin. And there she is! The one and original.

Would my blog be complete without another Dom? I think not.

This is really cool to me. This is what it looked like when the wall surrounded East Berlin. It starts out with guard towers (with 3 guards in them, because 1 could run, 2 could work together to run, but 3 it was too risky to talk escape) In between each tower there were dogs, then that open space? Mines. Then the wall. I always wondered why people didn't just hop the wall. This is why. The wall was the easy part if you somehow managed to make it that far. In this little area alone there were about 8 people killed just from trying to jump out of their apartment windows to the other side. Crazy.

This makes me happy. Most of you know how much I really do like graffiti, and well.. This is one of my favorite graffiti artists, Bansky. I randomly stumbled on this and it really made me happy :)

Would a post be complete without something really photoshopped? This is some random courtyard I managed to find myself in. There was a lot of really amazing graffiti here.

The elevator to get up to Annette's apartment (where I was staying) was... special. She lived on the 5th floor. Do you see a button for that? I think not. Go to the 4th floor, get out and then walk up the stairs the rest of the way :)

And this right here folks... This is why I shouldn't be left alone. I find things like this way too entertaining...

This is the square where the Nazi's had the book burning. They burned over 20,000 books. A glass plate set into the Bebelplatz, giving a view of empty bookcases, commemorates the book burning. Furthermore, a line of Heinrich Heine is engraved, stating "Dort, wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen" (in English: "Where they burn books, they ultimately burn people").

This... THIS is my DREAM car!! It is the Bugatti Veyron... Beautiful piece of work. 1001 hp, worlds second fastest car, and I was a foot away from it! I never thought I would see one, let alone be that close! I had to stop and remember to breathe when I saw it.

The

Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church was really interesting to see as well. It stands as a reminder of the war and what war does. It is really interesting to see, since I have never really been somewhere that was ravaged by a war. It is an eye opening experience.

This is why I wish I had people with me. I saw this and the first cheesy joke that came to my mind was about finding Deutsche-umus Prime. But then I realized there was nobody to laugh at my insanely LAME joke. Normally I am fine with my alone travels, but it is the little moments like this that makes me with there was someone else.

A mad Ludwig.... Must be family.

It is 2 in the morning, and I am blogging. Seriously I need to work on falling asleep. Well since I am awake, looks like I am going to be productive and write about my latest adventure.

I waited and waited all week for Friday. That was to be the start of the fun! First off, I started talking to this girl in Frankfurt about what there was to do in Kelkheim, and was informed of a rockclimbing gym right by me. Who knew?! So we went, and I had a blast! Vikky was a blast to hang out with! We took turns climbing and then when we were taking a little break I saw something that mad me almost die with joy! There were slacklines set up inside!! If you don't know what that is, check the picture below. It is kind of like a tight rope concept?

It is something I started doing back home with some of my favorite people in the world! I love those guys! We had so much fun slacklining the summer I lived in Provo... ANYWAYS back to the story.

We played on the slacklines for a while (I think I got Vikky hooked!) And I actually finally got it! All of these years Neil has been telling me to 'Think manatee". What kind of advise was that?! I finally get it now. It is more of a clear your head and relax, float along like a manatee. It all clicked when I was trying to clear my head and the song from the Lion King popped in my head. Before I was only able to take a few steps. Then all the sudden all I can think about is "I have a lovely bunch of coconuts de-de-le-de..." and then I realize I am on the other side of the rope. Holy crap Batman! I did it! I did it a few more times and loved it! I tried the bigger ones and soon realized I needed a longer song. When I got to the "... big ones small ones, some as big as your head." I starting think "well, when Mufassa.." And I got distracted and would fall :) Good times.

After that Vikky drove me into Frankfurt. We did really well getting me to Anna's house considering I had only been there once and I only knew how to get there by train. Thank heaven for people with patience :) Finally we found it and we said our goodbyes. Before I left though Vikky invited me to go to... This one place that is just across the French border. We are going shoe shopping there on Friday. I can hardly wait!

I get to Anna's, and since she loves me, she gave me a key so that I could just come whenever and crash so I didn't have to wake her up. I go to my room there (yup I have a room. The cat isn't too happy about me stealing his bed, but I know that I am bigger than him), and I try to sleep. It wasn't even 11. So it didn't happen. I just laid there for a bit and then remembered I had a letter from Lisa! Can I just tell you how amazing that girl is and how much I love her?!

At about midnight Anna wakes up. Turns out we didn't have to leave till 1:30 am but her alarm was fast so she was up. She let me make a grilled cheese sandwich with bacon on it! Oh it was heavenly! Wonder bread. Real cheese. Real bacon. Normal milk. Best. Thing. EVER! All of you back home, don't take those sandwiches for granted. They deserve better than that.

After a lot of good conversation we got in the car and headed for Wiesbaden. That is where our tour bus was to pick us up and take us to Bavaria, and to the amazing castle of Neuschwanstein. I could hardly wait! I had dreamed of going there for as long as I could remember. I always loved this castle for two reasons. 1-it is the castle of 'Mad King Ludwig' (focus on the Ludwig part if you would...) and so I have always imagined that we are related and that I am just some lost little Princess :) With my imagination how could I not?? 2-In my Grandpa and Grandma Beazers house they always had this puzzle (huge puzzle, I think 5000 pieces?) of this castle. It was covered in snow and looked magical.

The bus ride was... rather long. It was I think, 5 hours all together? We had to take an hour bathroom break/food break, because that is one of the mandatory rules so the driver doesn't get sleepy and what not. Seemed longer I guess cause I was too excited to sleep, and those seats are not designed for a whole lot of sleep. I think I got a few hours that night. Maybe.

For the record, I would like to point out how touristy this trip was. I went on a big yellow tour bus, and took tours with a tour guide. So odd! All in all I had fun though. We got our tickets and had fun buying random crap :) I love my stuff! I got a necklace with a crown on it (lame sounding I know, but I LOVE IT!), and I bought me a jewelry box that sings edelweiss. We had about... what almost two hours to kill before our tour? Nothing was really open so I took a lot of pictures of the first castle we went to. This one is called Hohenschwangau Castle. This is where King Ludwig II grew up. Since we had a lot of time to kill, here are the pictures :)

This is me and Anna in front of neuschwanstein castle.

We really had too much fun taking pictures....

It was nice to be in the mountains again! The 'Alpine foothills' were beautiful!

Ok this one... It is here just cause it made me laugh. Anna was taking a picture of the.. May pole? Whatever. The funny part is 'blondie' and 'pretty boy'. They are the two guys walking there... They are important to the story later.

This is the first castle. Yellow... They chose yellow. Whatever. Your castle.

Having too much time works out well sometimes :)

"don't forget God whilst drinking and eating"

The tour inside the Hohenschwangau Castle was pretty fun. The tour guide was hilarious, and there were some amazing things. Sadly pictures were not allowed inside. LAME! but just go google them. There were some amazing paintings on those walls. I mean ON them. Not hanging on them, they were painted there, and are still there in fantastic condition. There was also a piano there that Richard Wagner played. I really wanted to touch it, just to say that I had... I didn't though. I followed the rules. For the moment.

Wanna know something? Castles are freezing! It was warmer outside than it was inside! (for once it was a beautiful sunny day. I was shocked.) I have no idea how they did it back then... ugh! There were a lot of cool little quirks to this place. There were I think 80 things with swans on them (Hohenschwangau, Swan is in the name and a big part of this place). There was also a hidden door in the wall that lead to a set of stairs down to the queens room. Also the kings room had the night sky painted on the ceiling, and the servants would... How to explain this... They would put light behind some of the stars and also change the phases of the moon with the lights. Amazing to say the least.

After killing some more time walking around and buying more random things, we decided to take the horse ride up to Neauschwanstein castle. I was perfectly ok with this. I was tired, and I love horses :) There were a lot of us crammed in that carriage though... that was my only complaint. But I liked thinking that we were going up the same way they use to back in the day. Good times.

(I took this picture while waiting in line for the bathroom... Yeah, this is just a bathroom view! Imagine the real views!!)

This castle, was always something that was magical to me, and in real life it didn't let me down. It was huge and gorgeous! I took so many pictures! Inside we were not suppose to take pictures, but everyone was, and I finally caved and took one. It was at the top of the stairs. I am in a spiral staircase taking this picture, looking up.

Should have taken one of King Ludwigs room. There were so many amazing things! There was a lot of detailed carvings and stuff, all together just in his room it took the artisans 4 years to complete it. I think he only lived there for 108 days before dying (nobody knows what happened still. Murder? Suicide? Accident? My money is on murder. My theory is that they made the eccentric king look insane to get the throne, and then killed him off for good measure. Did I mention that the Doctor was also found in the lake with him? They both drown in shallow water even though King Ludwig was an excellent swimmer. Eh eh?) There was also a throne room (no throne, King Ludwig ordered it, but once he died his family canceled the order) that was beautiful beyond belief! He also had a fake cave built in one of the corridors. Pretty much everything followed a Wagner theme. The tour guide, who made us feel like cattle and rushed us through, was always saying things like "This room is based off the play 'such and such' by Wagner. This place made me happy cause it was somewhere that imagination had been brought to life. We must be related. This guy got it. Little over the top, but he got it.

At the end of the tour we were looking at the window and there was a bridge (I think it was a gift to king ludwigs mom?) and there were people on it. Someone asked about it, and the tour guide, looking down her nose informed us that "the bridge was closed and there was a gate to keep people out, but that some people just didn't listen and wanted to get those pictures of the castle". The bridge is where everyone gets a great view of the castle... The next thought in my mind, how can I convince Anna to let me go?? Before I even formed a way to bring it up, Anna says let's go find the way to get to the bridge! SWEET!!!

Turns out the 'gate' that is suppose to keep people out, it is just a pitiful little thing you can slip around. And slip I did! Behind me slipped Blondie-real name Daniel, everything about him screamed army from his walk to his clothes, Pretty Boy-Obviously cute, in the pharmacy division of the army, and Chick who liked to flirt with pretty boy-was there with her mom, and no I didn't laugh when she slipped in the snow.. the first time. Second time I just had to :)

After a nice little walk in a little snow, we made it to the bridge. I will let the pictures talk do the explaining how amazing it was...

This was really going to stop people??

Now I want you to focus on something right now. After we got to the bridge, the path kept going. We wanted to see where it went, so we did. Half way up Chick started slipping and saying she was kinda done. The guys were like "Oh I guess we could stop... blah blah blah" and then I informed them I was almost there and I was not stopping so close. I wanted a picture from there. Needless to say the guys kept going. Chick waited for us. It didn't take long, so stop feeling bad for her. It isn't her fault she is a whiny wimp :) Or maybe it is. Pretty Boy got to the top first, so I yelled up to see how different it was. He said there wasn't one. So please, tell me. The picture above is from the bridge, below is from the climb. Do you see a difference and think my hike was worth it?

(these are both from the hike not the bridge. I am meaning the one above the story and below it.)

After the hike down we went and got something to eat. Anna was nowhere to be found, she wanted me to socialize with pretty boy and blondie :) Anyways, they get their beers (Pretty Boy not so hot with a beer in his hands) and I get my non alcoholic drink and chocolate cake :) We had some interesting conversations. At one point in time they were making fun of country music and other things, and I was like "yeah sure pick on the hick from Utah", and they started talking about how they think of Mormons not hicks. Joking around I said "Oh are you just going to start making fun of everything about me then??" and they kinda were joking around with me "oh does that drink have caffeine in it??". That is when our lovely tour guide Patrick at the other table pipes up, "You know, there was once this time when a bunch of Mormons came in to help out with some stuff. They were the best people I have ever worked with. They were hard working, got things done, and were honest." I just sat there grinning at that point :)

After that, we all headed back to the bus... Blondie was in the seat in front of me, and Pretty Boy was in the seat back one and across the aisle. We all were joking about how we were going to sleep on the way home as long as the small children let us (there were a few kids from like 8 months to 3 years old. Actually one of the couples with kids were from SLC, small world). Well we sit on the bus and are starting to get comfy..... 8 month old, right behind Pretty Boy starts screaming. I look at Pretty Boy and we both just started laughing. After all the joking, it was going to be a reality. Or so I thought. I decided to try and sleep because I was going on about 30 hours with only the tiny bit of sleep I got on the bus ride down. I crashed good. I think I might have been out for two hours. Dunno. nothing really eventful happened on the bus ride back. We slept, ate, slept, and then we were home. We all parted ways, I still don't know Pretty Boys name, and that is ok. He can forever be Pretty Boy in my mind. Anna and I got home, and just crashed. We were home at about midnight and had church at 9:30. I was dead, but I loved it so much! The trip was a blast and I really loved talking to Anna about things and spending time with her. The castle was all I wanted and more. My imagination didn't do this place justice, which is saying a lot.