A Night Out

Berit and Dennis came over to babysit Sophie tonight. Sophie seems to quite enjoy it when we go out at night. Maybe because Berit will buy her kinder surprise eggs for dessert or read her a goodnight story three times the length of what I would read to her. 

 Anyway, we had the evening to go out and enjoy Duesseldorf after sundown (not that it was sunny today).

The Altstadt was busy as it was Friday night and a football match with the local team.

We went to the Schluessel brewery for a real German dinner.

 We were not disappointed. While we kept the Altbier flowing, we had pork ragout cooked in Altbier gravy,

 marinated beef with potato dumplings and red cabbage, 

 and the classic pork knuckle.

It was delicious, although heavier than what we are all used to.

So, of course we had to have a Killepitsch (or what Auntie Sandra calls "like red wine") to wash down the food. 

Back on a low-meat diet in a couple of days. 

How About a Rhinefahrt?

After a fun evening of BBQing and playing card games with Berit and Oma, we all headed just south of Bonn this morning to meet with aunt Helga and uncle Ralph (our frequent visitors to California). We had a real German breakfast (I thought I had taken a picture of it). Then we headed over to Koenigswinter to board a ferry up the Rhine to the old medieval town of Linz.

 Here comes the boat.

 We all started out by cuddling up in the beach baskets outside, but most of us soon headed one deck down to the sheltered panorama restaurant.

 These are the Drachenfels ruins, which we visited two years ago. 

At this point I will be inserting a picture of what is left of the bridge at Remagen at a later time. Andrew took this picture and it is still on his camera. 

One of the remaining pillars now houses a peace museum. 

 We had a about two hours to walk around Linz. Fortunately it was staying dry so we were able to stretch our legs without getting soaked. 

This was a fountain created by an artist who is famous for building similar fountains in the city of Aachen. All the figurines had bendable joints to the amusement of not only Sophie. 

In one shop window we discovered these juke box puppets. Upon paying 1 Euro you could choose a song from a long list of tunes and they started playing away. The mimics were excellent including eyebrows raising to the swing of the beat. Oh, and Andrew chose Stars and Stripes Forever. 

Even the local street musician from a couple of blocks down came to join us watching the performance.

 Sophie was enthralled. 

Back on the ferry downriver Sophie received her hot chocolate with cream as promised. She has been such a trooper with all these day trips.