Europe Part 11: Shopping!

Rothenburg the night before. VERY Pretty.

After another mostly normal breakfast, except for the cereal which was Cinnamon toast ‘esque’ and the milk which was a leeeetle bit too warm (you don’t notice the differences until they’re different) we did some neat German shopping. We stopped at *the* Christmas shop for a while and got a few neat souvenirs there. The thing I really wanted to find was a tiny, detailed version of the buildings: how they’re all tall, squashed together, and lined with cobblestone streets. I didn’t find any at the x-mas shop though.



The Christmas store. We didn't see the sign that says no pictures until after we took it.

While waiting for some other shops to open we were standing at the wall and we saw a cat! Our first cat of the trip. (Definitely not the last.) He was pretty friendly and let us follow him around and pet him, but he was *clearly* on a mission. He was rubbing up against cars and marking them (properly marking, if you know what I mean) and patrolling his turf with gusto. We followed him until he wandered into the courtyard of a house. Talk about posh cat digs. I’ll bet he chases fancy *European* mice.


One of the most preposterous clocks in Germany. Also, look at those Steins!

So after stopping at a few more shops and seeing how totally easy they are to wind, we decided that yes, we did want a Cuckoo clock. But only if they were one of the 8-day ones. I kinda liked how overwrought and silly most of them were. So we went to a couple of shops, all of which had a pretty impressive selection, and each of them had their own, unique extra-bonkers one that was a good meter-and-a-half tall and terribly impressive. So we went back to one of the shops we liked and picked a clock we liked and as the nice old lady who owned the shop rung us up we learned she was a horrible, horrible racist.

Selected quotes:

“Look at them (Japanese tourist) they always just come in and look around they never buy anything.”
“See that? They just look at the window. That’s why we had to put the no exit sign over there, otherwise they just walk right through.”
“Ah, she just took something out of the glass. Aaah! (Yes, she actually yelled.) Would you ever do that? I can’t believe it.”

Seriously, for the five or so minutes it took to ring us up all she did was complain to us about Japanese tourists. Maybe someone should tell her that the young Americans being led to her shop by the tour books find that sort of behavior pretty deplorable. At least we have a story to go with the clock.

...If it ever shows up. We had them send it to the house but we haven’t gotten anything yet. We’re getting ready to complain to the credit card company if we don’t hear back soon. Dumb old racist German shop owners. Bah!

Eventually I did find my little miniature cityscape that I wanted at some random souvenir shop, which I really like. Then we got our backpacks, stocked up on ‘travel sandwiches’ and headed for the train station! Then some random stranger gave us directions to where the train station actually was...and we headed to the train station again!

We had a bit of a layover at one of the transfer stations since we had taken an early train because we were there more than an hour early. This happened to us a lot, as it turns out. I blame Jess. So we used the extra time to figure out the last leg of our journey with a travel agent at the train station. We ended up making reservations on a couple of the trains, and we would, later, be quite glad we did. Also, at one of the stations we got a little confused when our train arrived early under a different name, then the banner changed. We ended up hopping on and, lucky us, it was the train we needed. A little dicey for a second.


Jess on the train. This pic is unique because Jess isn't sleeping.

Then, to Fussen! For a long time, actually. We spent a lot of time on trains. I passed the time reading my EXCELLENT book (Transformation, by some Author whose name I can’t remember but we went back to the used bookstore when we got home and bought all the other books of hers that they had) and Jess red her horrible one. Some Indiana Jones novel that wasn’t based on any of the movies. We didn’t bother to get any extras of that one. I also listened to a lot of podcasts, a good way to pass the time.

After arriving at Fussen we went out searching for dinner. Most of the places were closed but we did manage to track down a nice Italian restaurant. Jess got four cheese pizza (her favorite) and I got an *incredibly hot* salmon and broccoli lasagna. After that, back to the hostel. Yes, a proper hostel. Shared bathrooms and everything. It’s part of the experience. Some writing, some relaxing, and bed.

-N