My Teaching Journal

On Friday we woke up early and drove to Schwangau where we went to a big fairytale-like castle called the Neauschwanstein. It was a 45 minute walk up the mountain through snow covered trees and there were stunning views – very cold though! Afterwards we drove a few hours to Natalie’s grandma’s house which was on the border of Austria. Only about 4,000 people live in the town and it’s surrounded by snowy mountains. She lives in a big apartment where she lives on the ground floor. We stayed on the first floor and Lilo and Claus (Nat’s parents) stayed on the second floor. The house was very cute and ‘grandma-ish’.

On Christmas Day we started off the day with a walk, up the hill and up a look-out tower. From there we could see all off Freudenstadt and views of the Black Forest.  Christmas doesn’t officially start until 7 pm in Germany so we had a a wee of a nap because we knew we had a busy evening planned. For Christmas Dinner we had a massive Fondu with Nat’s family with lots of different meat, veggies and dipping sauces. After a few wines and a yummy cocktail we went to a pretty pumping two-storey club in town (the only club in town). It was soooooooooo packed and it was a mission going to the toilet. I saw a guy buy a massive bottle of Absolute Vodka, it looked like 6 l for like 200 euros!!! At the bar you can buy bottles of vodka and mixers, but we got the smaller ones, not the ‘high roller one’…even they were 40 euro. We danced the night away until about 6 am, I taxied home but Si stayed on until 7.30 am.

We woke up at like 2 pm on the 25th, which was weird because it was technically NZ’s Christmas, but Germany’s Boxing Day. Natalie’s family organised a massive breakfast with yummy croissants and it was also Elena’s 21st birthday (Natalie’s sister).  It was pretty much a right off day, we watched a couple of movie’s and went to bed!