Road Trippin' in the USA...ahem EU.
The first few months of our expat adventure were exciting, but felt slow...The cold winter months were partially to blame and now that the German climate has friendlied up a bit, we've been bitten by the travel bug. Bad. We've spent the last couple of weeks mapping out all of our summer travel. The beauty of living over here is that we can plan last minute getaways BUT we are learning that there is most definitely value in planning ahead. Especially during the high-traffic-summer-travel season.
We planned our trip to Prague just a couple of weeks ago and sort of ended up with last choice accommodations. Mind you, we stayed in a GREAT location. But especially when traveling with a baby, we've found we prioritize comfort/look of the lodging moreso than our pre-baby selves might have. Why? Well, Asher can hang a bit passed his bedtime and we've taken to getting him jammied up before dinner in case he falls asleep in his stroller, BUT we spend more of our evenings at our home-away-from-home than galavanting around town. So, immediately after arriving home from this trip, we booked our next.and next.and next.
We road tripped to Prague (about a 5 hr drive - with perfect road and traffic conditions) and, again, learned some lessons about that. If you've read any of my previous posts, you know, I'm not a fan of car rides. But I am a fan of travel, so if we decide thats the best way to get there, so be it.
However, the benefits of a roadtrippin' are the possible stops along the way. We mapped out a halfway (ish) point and decided to grab lunch in Nuremberg. If you're a history buff, than this city should sound familiar. It's the site of the Nazi rallies during WWI and subsequent trials. It's a city with a complicated and tragic history. Nuremberg doesn't hide this fact and offers many historical attractions to help tell the story. We didn't have enough time to site-see after lunch, but plan to come back for a day trip this summer.
I did some research on restaurants & actually found a highly rated BBQ restaurant in town. YES. You read that right. BBQ! It got great reviews from Europeans & Americans alike, so we had to check it out. The American owner has ties to St. Louis and many of the chefs have ties to the Carolinas. The ambience and the menu made us immediately feel at home.
We both got the pulled pork (because we just had to compare it to our Kansas City fav, Joe's KC). It was a delicious taste of home. The weather was perfect and made for a perfect pit stop.
But...it wasn't our only pit stop. It is required that all drivers on the Czech highways have a toll sticker. They do not have individual tolls on their roads, so this sticker is your fee/access to the roads. We weren't totally sure how to go about this, but once getting closer to the Czech border, we saw signs for toll sticker purchases at almost every rest stop. It was a super easy process. So it could have been a quick 2 min in & out, but since Asher also kind of hates road trips, we stopped for some snacks and playtime.
And then about 90 mins later, we had arrived! (PS Follow my insta stories for more of the moment-by-moments of our travel adventures!) It was evening so, we let the babe have some playtime, went for a stroll & then it was off to bed for him (and us shortly after!).
ever yours,
lindsey
