Where the Mosel and the Rhein meet; oder ich heiße Elisabet.

I had a great plan. If stayed up really, really late Wednesday night, surely I'd sleep on the plane and beat jetlag, right? Right. Or not. Maybe I forgot how tiny airplane seats are and how OCD I am about how I sleep. I didn't sleep a wink, despite my best efforts. I know this because I was listening to my iPod for all my sleep attempts and I didn't miss any songs. I was very, very awake.

But I threw aside all advice and downed some gross coffee with the lovely plane breakfast and BAM, I was awake when I met my aunt Sylvia at the airport. I was everywhere. Singing, dancing, clapping to "If you're happy and you know it." Brittany, my travel buddy, was staring at me like I was possessed -- and I was, by the caffeine demon.

Unfortunately, my high only last as long as the car ride from Frankfurt to Nomborn, where my grandparents live, and by the time I got there, I was in a stupor. Do you have any idea how hard it is to translate German with a mind that hadn't gotten more than 8 hours of sleep over...60 hours? The whole 9-hour-drive-to-Indianapolis-to-Chicago-to-Indianapolis-to-weaving-through-the-hicktowns-of-southern-Kentucky-to-NC-to-Charlotte-Frankfurt-Nomborn-in-a-tiny-cramped-and-hot-plane-with-a-stiff-back-and-dead-mind thing started wearing on me as I stared at my Oma and blearily tried to figure out if "kaput war Deutsch" and what the heck "Abschluss" meant and whether or not "Rucksack war an Americanish word?"

I could, however, understand the numerous "She doesn't understand you's," though. OK, I actually understood a lot, considering how little sleep I'd gotten. My main problem with German is my inability to pronounce things. I hear it, I repeat it, and all I get is blank stares. My lips and tongue and vocal chords cannot, for the life of me, speak German. I can spell it, sure. But speak it? Um, no.

But alles gut! Brittany and I went for a walk around Nomborn like good little jet-setters then read funny stories then we were off to Limburg with Aunt Sylvia where we ate spaghetti eis. My stomach does not really like eating when it's tired, though. I think it was very confused as to why it had been up for 30 hours and why I kept shoving food into it, but, whatever. No sleep. We could not sleep. If we stayed up all day, we could beat jetlag!



And we did. We passed out at about 7:30, after staying up for 30-plus hours, but whatever, we're 20-somethings, we can take it. When Aunt Sylvia woke us up at 11:00 the next morning (um, in my defense, I did wake up at 6 and 9 a.m.) to a lovely lunch, I was feeling very...not jetlagged. Oma's cooked for us three times now. It's awesome. Brittany doesn't know what to do with all the food, though. If you don't clean your plate, Oma assumes you hate her food. It's tradition for her to ask if you like the food about 50 times a meal, so the first German phrase Brittany has down pat is "Schmeckt gut!"

Then, after dinnerunch, it was time for our first tourist expedition! Aunt Sylvia picked up a friend in Montabaur and we were off to Burg Eltz, which is Rick Steves' favorite castle in all of Europe. It also happens to only be 45 minutes away from my grandparents' house. It was a lovely drive, along the Mosel. The castle is kinda plopped in the middle of nowhere, though, stuck amongst lots of rocky hills, with a little stream wrapping around it. Since the castle has been in the same family for 800 years, it's still in great condition. The tour guide spoke great English, too -- but with a German-Australian accent, since she learned her English in Australia.









I thought we were done after that, but Aunt Sylvia's friend had suggested we go to Koblenz, where the Mosel and Rhein meet. So we did. And we had ice cream and tap water. I always forget how glorious tap water really is. Lecker!






We ended the day with currywurst and pommes, sauce over alles. Mmm. Brittany is addicted.



Morgen wir gehen nach Amsterdam! Whee.