First day in Europe was very exciting for us! Uncle Martin picked us up from the airport after a longgg travel and we went straight to a beer garden! Parker and I were especially excited about drinking because we were underage. This is where Uncle Martin ordered us Stiegel Weisse which turned out to be our favorite beer all trip! We explored Braunau a bit before we headed back to catch up on our jet lag. Some small things I remember: 1) it was very hot and it was a big issue and all over their news 2) walking through the parking garage was crazy since all the cars were nice BMWs and stuff 3) we saw Hitler’s birth house in Braunau 4) Stiegel was so refreshing and didn’t give you a hangover! 5) I was so excited to get to talk german 6) there’s a historic wall around Braunau that has a skull on it. It was used to scare away enemies.
This place was awesome and it was amazing to have everyone together!! Uncle Martin, Aunt Patty, Fabian, and Martina were all able to make it & I saw Linda the next day but her children were sick so she couldn’t make dinner. It was awesome seeing Parker interact with my family and he really liked them and they seemed to like him too (how could they not?!) Fabi was the greatest to talk to and Parker hit it off with him! He’s so talkative and so funny! I’m pretty sure I ate the goulage and of course had a lot of beer! The cook was 100 years old!!
We spent this day going to the lake near their house. We biked there and checked out their town church on the way, it was beautiful! The water felt great since it was so hot outside and the house had no AC! Having no AC made sleeping pretty difficult — Parker went ahead and slept outside the first night on the hammock since aunt patty and uncle Martin were sleeping outside in their bed (lol) too! But he woke up with spider bites and decided not to do that again lol. Their backyard is so pretty and we spent most of our time out here, whether it was talking, drinking, eating, or all of the above! There was one night we ate dinner (brats) and talked for hours about this and that, it was great. Small things I remember: 1) they made us amazing coffee shakes 2) behind their backyard is a pasture w/ horses which was such a pretty sight 3) there were lots of bugs because all the windows had to stay open cause the heat, but I battled through it💪🏼 4) me (technically Leah) and Aunt Patty had the same dress #twinning
I’m going to have this for most travels because it’s very important — an entry dedicated to food!!!! For breakfast we had a typical European meal — a spread of breads, meats, cheeses, and jams! I also had an expresso and soft boiled egg with that. It was delicious! Also, in Braunau we stopped and got some gelato:)
We ran an errand with Uncle Martin to the grocery store. Some things me and parker got excited about was how big the chocolate, meat, and beer section was at this store (just what you’d expect, right?!?). Got a snap of our favorite beer in Austria. Also, thought it was funny that they had airplane bottles at the cash register as if it was just gum hahaha cultural difference I think we’re missing out on lol!
We visited a nearby castle (haha casual). It had a restaurant inside where we got a beer and brats and fries. The castle was on a river (I believe it’s the Inn river according to the internet which is part of the Danube River). There was also a museum inside the castle that we got to check out, it included the longest cat fish caught in the river and man was it big! I remember Uncle Martin telling us about how bikers would always stop in to get hydrated on their journey, so they would get a drink that was half beer and half lemonade LOL - they’re a different breed!!
Our departure! After our Europe trip, we decided that Austria was our favorite destination!! We really enjoyed the small town feel that we couldn’t experience in Rome, Barcelona, & Paris. Plus, it had our favorite beer ;) The flight out was early, but we made it a good time was morning brews! The mountains around the airport were breathtaking and I thoroughly remembered and enjoyed the walk out to the plane. It felt surreal! Some small things I recall: 1) me and parker both felt like we picked up an accent a little just from the 2 days there!! It was honestly hard to stop and it took a couple days in Italy for us to go back to normal haha 2) Uncle Martin drove us to the airport that morning & said that after he dropped us off he was going to RUN up a mountain (pictured above) then bike down it in a crazy low amount of time — he’s crazy!!! 3) Parker was nervous about getting through airport security and sure enough he was the one who got stopped and thoroughly checked, poor thing😂
1) talking in accents
2) Martin going up mountain
3) parker checked