Travelog for: Tenderheart

I am packed and all ready to go on my first journey. I have some things to bring with me: my blanket, my towel, my glasses, my hairbrush and most importantly of all, my camera!

Emmi is trying to find me a host so that I can get going 

Phileas arrived today, just in time to join my farewell party!

We all gathered around to read the postcard Phileas brought from Greece. It looks sooo beautiful, I hope I can go there myself one day



Then it was time to get ready for my party and my journey. Boone was our photographer, he took lots of pictures to help us remember this special time.

Ballet Cindy helped me with my hair


We all ate banana cake and had a wonderful afternoon together


Then it was time for me to leave, I said goodbye to my best friend


Gathered up my things,


and then I was ready to begin my big adventure. Germany (and Fam-United) here I come

After a very long travel I arrived in Bruchsal, which seems to be a nice little city. I'm happy to be out of my box now.

Today Petra showed us the palace of Bruchsal and the palace garden. It is a really nice place.

Here you see the tower of the church called St. Damian and Hugo. The building of the church you see on the second photo on the left side



When you walk down to the park you find some statues, which guide the way


In the park there are four statues showing the four seasons winter, spring, summer and autumn and four statues showing the four elements water, air, fire and earth




Then we walked to the front side of the palace. Here is a view to the local court of Bruchsal, which is the 'highest' builing on this photo.


The Damianstor (Damian's gate) is the entrance to the palace area.


Here you see the front of the palace with the entrance and also the entrance of the church on the left side. My hosts are going to the service there on Sundays.


This is the local court building again



And just turning around at this place to see the main building of the palace again

What a busy time it is here. Today Petra had to fix the colours on many many silk cloths. She made about 30 cloths for stuff at her school as Christmas presents and we were allowed to help her. She was so happy to have us here and she told us, she would have needed a longer time for everything without our help.


















After all that work we enjoyed sitting next to the advent calendars, that our hosts loves to collect.

Finally it's Saturday and we will visit the Christmas market of Trier, which is the oldest city of Germany. Although Bruchsal has a little Christmas market too, my host thought, it would be much more interesting for me to see the Christmas market there.

Here you see me and my friends on the autobahn, short before we drove over the bridge near to Speyer.



And some more photos with us in the car. We had to drive about 2 1/2 hours.

When we arrived in Trier at about 3.45pm, we drove to a youth hostel were we stayed for the night. I met the best friends of our hosts there. They drove in the car behind us, so I haven't seen them earlier.

After we had prepared the beds for the night, we walked into the city. I had been so excited, because it's the first Christmas market in Germany, that I wanted to see in a few minutes. It only took about 10 minutes and then we saw the big cathedral of Trier and also the first lights of the Christmas market. The air smelled like one big gingerbread with a little smell of punch too.

But now I will be quiet and just show you the photos.


The part of the Christmas market, that is on the market place.


That's the way we went to see the Porta Nigra. I love these half-timbered houses.


It wasn't that easy to take the photos at night. I have some more very beautiful photos without tvs, because they just catch the light.


I know, that this isn't me, but my photo somehow didn't look really well enough.

When we walked back to the hostel it was about 9.45pm and we looked forward to sitting in the warmth again. We played some piano ( sorry, no photo here) and drank some warm tea before we all went to bed.

Here you see me with a very young toyvoyager, that is still without name. We are in front of the Porta Nigra, which is a gate to the Roman city Augusta Treverorum. Trier is about 2000 years old and Unesco World Heritage.

(this photo will be here later)


This is me about with my new friend Tenderheart Bear, who comes from Australia.



Here you see the cathedral and church next to the cathedral, which my hosts love even more. We have no photos from inside, because there was a service in the cathedral and the other church was closed.




Here you see me with the Kaiserthermen (the Roman bath ) in my back.


Because we all wanted to have a view over Trier from a higher point, we drove to the Petrisberg (haha, my hosts name is Petra - maybe it is her little hill).

On this next photo you can see the oval of the Amphitheater and also the shape of the Kaiserthermen.


Although the Moselle is very important for Trier, you only can see this river on this photo far behind on the left side and also only a little little piece of it.


If you look carefully, you maybe can see the cathedral in the middle of this following photo.



The next photo shows the synagoge of Trier.

We thought it was really funny, when our hosts told us, that they wanted to drive to Luxemburg to fill up the tank of the car, but when we saw the prices there, we really understood.
It is funny, that this town is called Wasserbillig, Water cheap. It's not the water, that my hosts want to buy here, but the petrol, which is about 30 cents cheaper than in Germany. Because the petrol is so much cheaper, there is one street with many many petrol stations.



We also were in a shop to buy some chocolate and other things that are cheaper there than in Germany.



Here is another photo of Wasserbillig and of the 'border' to Germany.

Back in Trier we saw this nice church from the far. It is called St. Matthias and there is the grave of the apostel Matthias.

Finally Petra found some time to bake Christmas cookies and we were allowed to help her. She told me to tell you, that you just have to ask her for the recipes, if you would like to know them and she will translate them and send them to you.

It's really cold here since a while, but today morning it was a big surprise when we looked outsite. All the trees were covered with hoarfrost and everything looked to beautiful. We were happy, that it was Petra's school free day so we decided to walk in the palace park and take some photos there.
You can't imagine, how cold it is, but happily we all are bears and now wear our winter coat.

At home again it was time for baking some more cookies. So just take a look at some of them.



Schwarz-Weiß-Gebäck --- Black and white cookies

Today we baked some Buttergebäck --- butter cookies. They are really nice for children.


Then we sat on our nice place in the kitchen to watch Petra baking some other cookies.


Here is the nice window decoration in the kitchen. Petra made some more parts of it in the afternoon. I'm sure she will take another photo with me so you will see it too.

It's the fourth of Advent today and so all four candles of the advent wreath are lit.