We arrived!

Tuesday, September 20th and Wednesday, September 21st

We made it to Germany! As I noted earlier, we were flying standby, which means we can only ride if there are extra seats on the plane. We were elated to make it because there is only one flight to Stuttgart, Germany a day. We chose to fly into Stuttgart because this week was the start of Oktoberfest, and Munich was looking crazy. We made it on the flight, and even better, we flew first class! I felt so fancy and well fed.

Tanner and I landed in Stuttgart Wednesday morning. The metro runs right into the airport, so we went to a kiosk and bought metro tickets to the local Haupbahnhof. The Haupbahnhof is the central train station in whatever town you are traveling in. If you travel to Germany, you need to learn this word: HAUPBAHNHOF. This will be your main place of travel throughout the country, and it will be important that you can easily find it. So, we bought metro tickets to the Haupbahnhof stop, and then went to the information center and bought tickets to Augsburg, where will be staying. We had a couple of hours to kill, so we put our luggage in lockers and headed out. The Haupbahnhof opens up to the city square, and so we wandered into the gardens and a some churches. Afterwards, we got on the train and headed to Augsburg. We were joyfully greeted by my sister Kanon and her husband Nathaniel. By this time, jet lag was majorly hitting us, so we set up our air mattress in their apartment, and laid down our weary heads.

Travel tips from our first day:
1. At every Haupbahnhof we went to in Germany, there are lockers. All of the lockers look the same, but the bigger stations cost more. You just put in the specified amount, usually 1.50 to 2 euros, take out the key, and you are good to go! We loved the lockers. It allowed us to stow our stuff while checking out a new city.

2. The staff at the Haupbahnhofs are extremely helpful. Go and tell them where you would like to travel, and they will print out a schedule, and you can be on your way. I will post more on the German train system in my next post.

Until then,
Auf Wiedersehen!