Day 5 - Netherlands and Bacharach, Germany

Had breakfast in the hotel at about 7:45. Once again, a great buffet breakfast, good juice, good tea. Yum. Checked out at 8:30 and walked with all our stuff to the bus. The bus is very nice and huge - it's a full sized coach bus for only 16 people. The bus driver is Belgian and his name is Ronnie.

This picture shows most of the group getting off the bus.

At 10:30, we stopped off at an open air museum at Arnhem in the Netherlands. They have all types of displays set up to show you about life in the Netherlands through the years. There were places where they made cheese, paper, linseed oil and linseed cakes out of what is left after making the linseed oil (cakes were for the animals). There was also a big laundry place to show how laundry was done way back when. There was one area where they had all these old timey bikes and little four wheel car type things where you steer with your feet and make it go by pulling a bar back and forth like rowing. The bike had a big front wheel and little back wheel and it was really hard to steer. Noone wrecked, though. Several people on the tour had a race on the little car things. There was also a thing that you could sit on (two people) and rock back and forth sort of like a see-saw, but it also spun around. I rode that with Becky, the young attorney from Dallas, and it was really fun. Then everyone had to try it. Most all of the people in the group tried out all the toys.

We ate lunch at the museum with the group. It was Dutch pancakes. I guess the Netherlands is famous for its pancakes. We had one that had cheese on it, one that had egg, onions and vegetables, and the third was a dessert type pancake with apples, raisins, currants and cinnamon. I liked the third one and the first one was ok, but not crazy about the second one.

We got back on the bus and went to Bacharach, Germany. This is a beautiful little town on the Rhine River. Our hotel is a 700 year old building right on the river, but between the hotel and the river are train tracks! Between these tracks on this side of the river and the tracks on the other side, 400 trains per day go by! Luckily, this 700 year old hotel has triple-paned glass, so the train noise is not too bad. We have a nice river view, but that means we also have the trains!   The pictures below are of our hotel.  The top oneis taken from down by the Rhine and the other is taken from the back side of the hotel where you go in.

We walked around Bacharach for a while. It is a really old town, dating back to medieval times. There is a castle up on the hill. There are a lot of vineyards up the sides of these mountains on each side of the Rhine. The town itself is so quaint and German-looking, it looks like something from Busch Gardens or Epcot Center. I guess those places are modeled after real places like Bacharach, Germany! Before dinner, most of the group hung out on the terrace that overlooks the river and the train tracks and had a fun time. At 7:30, we the group had dinner in the hotel. We had some type of stuffed chicken, potatoes and soup, followed up by ice cream for dessert. It was a nice time and good meal. Afterwards, we went back out on the terrace until about 10:30. Then, we went up to our room, where I proceeded to stay up way too late updating the blog and catching up with email!

The picture on the left is Gary walking through Bacharach.  Below that picture is my "buddy," Jamie.  We all have buddies who we are responsible for checking on every time we are leaving for somewhere.  That doesn't mean we'll wait on them, but we just need to know if our buddies are there.  Jamie is my official tour group buddy, but has also become our unofficial buddy.  She is a really fun girl from Canada.  Gary's buddy is Theresa from Plano, Texas.  She is in the bottom-most picture below - the blonde lady on the see saw like thing.