Day 7 - And On The Seventh Day There Was Rest

We had a lot to accomplish on Thursday. We had to pack up all of gear, bring in all of the lawn furniture, cook some food to eat, and scrub the floors and rooms to make it as clean as it was when we arrived. So we got up at the crack of dawn (10:00am) to get things going. We nibbled on breakfast and began to plan our massive feast that would involved all of the fruits and vegetables that wouldn’t last and all of the meat that was at least questionably editable still. We had a LOT to eat. About four pork chops, two or three coils and one full package of sausages, menudo, a pound or two of pasta, two or three sauce packets, grapes, onions, garlic, strawberries, etc.

Stefan assured as that “we” would be able to polish off the food, especially since we’d be barbequing and he was the self-described “BBQ Master”. I left the barbeque work to the master himself and Daniel while Kelly and I did domestic duties and made the pasta, sauce, and cleaned up around the inside.

Ten minutes later, I went out to check on the boys and the BBQ Master was still having trouble getting the coals hot. It took a few bottles of lighter fluid for the fire to finally get going, but eventually it got up to a maintainable temperature for the BBQ Master to work with.

While the food was cooking, everyone pitched in to mop, sweep, vacuum, and scrub the house down. We actually had our timing down pretty well as the last thing to do in the house was eat all of this food and then do the dishes from the meal. And boy, did we ever eat. Stefan of course put on a food clinic on how to eat half of your own body weight and make sure that it shows. Daniel and I egged him on by saying that there was no way that he would be able to eat all of the food that was left and he kept insisting that it could be done. But, alas, the pound of pasta did him in and that cavernous belly of his couldn’t finish the job. It was a noble effort, but the last thing that we needed on our road trip for the day was 30 pounds of food all over the floor of the car ;o) .

With our bellies full of food and our MB C200 Kompressor full of luggage, we headed to the town of Kahl to do our semi-weekly garbage drop in the Aldi parking lot’s trashcan and buy some more rum for our evening poker sessions. I gave Alex a call from the liquor store phone and let him know that we were off to his scenic city of Bamberg, where he studies and resides. It was going to be about a two and a half hour trip to Bamberg, so everyone got comfortable and I used my pork and sausage stuffed lead-foot as much as I could with our packed Benz. It was a pretty uneventful, sluggish trip except for the fact that we got to see a 911 flying down the Autobahn and pass us.

We got to town at around 7:00 and then had to try to find our cheap hotel that was booked thanks to some of Alex’s buddies who I’d met and hung out with in New York the previous year. The navigation system got to the right neck of the woods, but we still couldn’t find the place. Being a college town, there were some cute girls walking around that I could query with my sexy American-accented German. They didn’t think they knew where the hotel was, but they quickly pointed the opposite direction than the way they were going :o/. Sure enough, we found it after a few more minutes of walking and we headed up to check in while Daniel fetched the car from the parking lot.

After unpacking, the Jagermeister soccer ball was unleashed in the hallway for a quick football session much to the chagrin of our neighbors, I’m sure. We had a few minutes to rest up while Stefan “dropped bombs like Nagasaki” (no doubt to make room for the lunch that was digesting) in our community water-closet and I got on the horn with Alex to coordinate the evening’s activities.

After lounging, showering, and cleaning up, Alex and Verena came by to pick us up and take us out to find a classic German dinner. I had been to Bamberg a few years back when I was in Germany for Christmas and New Year’s Eve and I had already forgotten just how beautiful the old town was. I guess things seem slightly more attractive when you can wear shorts and a jersey outside than when you’re bundled up with a wool coat, hats, and scarves sipping glueh-wein and trying to stay somewhat warm.

About halfway to the restaurant, Daniel said that he and Kelly were already in love with the town. Kelly had dreamed about seeing a town like this with the old buildings, beautiful colors and architecture, narrow cobblestoned streets, and flowers blooming in windowsills. I couldn’t believe that I didn’t remember this city this beautiful, it was like visiting a completely new city to me as well.

We ended up at a small restaurant with bench seating outside where we could have some beers and eat a traditional “Frankish” meal. This particular region of Bavaria was known as Franken and is famous for the number of breweries in the area. There are several hundred in the region and the city itself, which has about 40,000 residents, has about 10 on it’s own. The breweries typically brew lighter “heller” beer as well as it’s specialty: Rauchbier, which literally means “smoke beer”. I am not sure how it’s brewed but it is quite dark and has a very distinctive taste like smoked bacon. It is definitely not something that everyone likes but I had to order it just because I was back in Bamberg.

Other than Alex and Verena, I knew quite a few other folks in Bamberg as well. NYC is a very popular place for people to go work at internships and so I got to know several of Alex’s friends there. In the summer of 2004, I met Hendrick, who I hung out with every once in a while and who I then ran into in Budapest, Hungary while on vacation in East Europe in the summer of 2005. In the summer of 2005, I met two more of his friends, Niko and Soenke. Niko was the one that helped us reserve the hotel room while Alex was studying and working in Spain. These guys are all several years younger than me and wore me out pretty well during their time in my city, so I looked forward to returning the favor in Bamberg :o) .

After dinner, we went to an outdoor beer garden that was situated on the top of a hill overlooking the city, which included an illuminated hilltop cathedral and monastery as well as the old town itself. Unfortunately it was way past dark by this point so we couldn’t see much in the overcast sky.

We met up with Hendrick, Niko, and their significant others as well as the GQ boy Soenke. We all sat up there rehashing our memories and drinking some local “Spezi” heller beer. Apparently this beer garden is only seasonal and wasn’t open the last time I was there, not that I would’ve wanted to sit outside and drink ice-cold beers in the middle of winter!

The garden closed at midnight unfortunately, so we said our goodbyes and promised to meet again the following night, which was when their university was going to have a huge party downtown that we would attend. The four of us (plus Niko and his Norwegian girlfriend) then crammed into Niko’s convertible Audi at the top of the hill and headed back to the hotel, with Niko narrowly avoiding a ticket from some cops at the bottom of the hill just after he dropped us off. Leave it to Niko to sweet-talk the cops ;o).

Back at Ground Zero (our hotel), we got our poker game going and nourished our buzzed bodies with some rum and cokes again. To make this game more interesting, we finally broke out the real money (like $5/Euros, nothing too extreme) and it was game on. Stangely enough, my memory from that night is quite hazy but I do believe that I took everyone to town and won all three games, bringing in a hefty 200% profit on my $5 while at the same time seriously agitating Stefan to the point of a conflict that Daniel settled down. To this day, I have no idea what I said that pissed him off, but it must have been good ;o) .




Justinho