I guess as a consolation to having to work on Saturday and some Sundays, many businesses and tourist attractions in Germany take Monday off. So we found that the chocolate museum that we planned to go to was closed.

All that was left to do was to walk around and shop. Ordinarily, this would bring me great pleasure but the fact that we had to drag 3 kids around in the cold was no fun. I was able to go explore the town by myself while Ken stayed with the kids during their nap.

Afterwards, we decided to pile in the car and go for a drive. Ken lucked out and found a Getränkmarkt (drink store) pretty quickly so he headed in to load up on beer. We heard that a town called Bergheim was supposed to be quaint and set our sights on it. It was almost 6:30 by the time we parked and did not expect to find anything open (German store hours you know!) We were surprised to find at least one open, however. Lucky for me, it was a china store who advertised a company (Hutchenreuther) who makes the crystal eggs I have begun to collect! I walked in and asked very quickly if they had any of these eggs, and they told me “no”.

As I turned to go, my eye caught hold of a jewel of a find. There on display was one crystal egg. I asked to see it and discovered it was an egg from 1994. I wondered what the price would be. Now the eggs that I have bought so far have risen in price sharply the older they get. I purchased a 1996 for about 45 Euro. I expected to hear an outrageous number when I asked how much, but the salesperson said, “25 Euro.”
When that came out of her mouth, I about fell over with excitement!

Ken says he has seen 1994 eggs selling for about 100 Euro. That just made my week!

Tuesday morning we tried the chocolate museum. The smell that greeted you at the door was enough to make your mouth water. We were able to see cocoa trees, beans, and pulp. We learned how they grow, how they are harvested, dried, and stored. We then went on to see how the cocoa beans are shelled and crushed. There were machines everywhere and you could watch the life cycle from bean to milk chocolate bunny (or heart, or soccer ball, or even corn cobs! ). We taste tested a bit to make sure the quality was being kept up.

Of course, on the way out we had to stop off in the gift shop and get our fill of chocolate to take home.

Then, we were off to Holland. It only took about 4 hours to get there from Köln. That landed us in Aalsmeer, Holland for dinner. I will give you one guess as to where we ate dinner that night! Old faithful, “we are saved!”, McDonald’s was right off the highway.

We found a grocery store for a few drinks and munchies then actually made it to our hotel.

Already, we can tell that life in Holland is a bit different. If it were not for the windmills everywhere and the cute houses with thatched roofs I could have believed I was driving through parts of Indiana.

Even the Dutch language seems like they took German and English words and smacked them together to make the Dutch language. Having a background in both we can almost make our way around the towns and stores.

Thank goodness most of the Dutch do speak very good English (it’s almost a second mother tongue) and we are happy to take them up on using it.

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