Friedrichshafen, Germany (2008)

Carmel and I went to Germany for the weekend to go to the wedding of Pogen, who was Carmel’s labmate in Berkeley, and his fiancé Emu. Emu, who is German, is from a small town in Germany near the Swiss border called Hürbel. The biggest town near to her village is the mellow lake-side town of Friedrichshafen, which is where we hung out mostly, though we stayed in Ailengen. We also checked out the nearby town of Ravensburg for an afternoon because it had a name that we could pronounce and supposedly had a Mexican restaurant.

The boardwalk of Friedrichshafen from above.

On the ground with Carmel and her Australian sun hat.

Taking in the shade, watching the water while her kids play nearby.

Random dock thing.

Lovely walk.

Beach weather by the lake.

A little panoramage.

Friedrichshafen is the home of the zeppelin.

Mr. Zeppelin himself.

Lots of these zeppelin statues all around Friedrichshafen.

Another funky lake design.

More lake art.

Taking a break by the flowers.

Sailboats at rest.

Parking lot.

They had this tower at the end of the boardwalk. Can you spot me?

The kids would jump off for kicks.

View from the tower.

Selfy.

Tower pano.

Swabian cuisine for dinner.

The Schwabian noodles were better than this option, which my friend Aaron Stein might have noticed.

I ordered 1 beer. They gave me 2 and wouldn’t take the second back. I did not want to waste…

Watching the sunset on Friedrichshafen.

Lake-side entertainment before heading back to our hotel for the night.

At the bus stop near our hotel, having just finished our lunch of pretzel and chocolate. The graffiti to the right says: “When my heart can beat no more I hope I die for a principle or a believe that I lived for (Tupac Amaru Shakur)"

Our hotel wasn’t bad, which is more than I can say for this hotel (look closely behind the veg and you’ll see the “B”).

We went sailing the next day.

Carmel takes control of the right side in front of Captain Cosmo, who is Emu’s bro.

Cosmo let me be captain for 2 minutes so I did my best to look really important.

One of the few other Americans, Matt was our castaway.

A view of the beach while we sail on by.

Everyone in the water!

Those who stayed aboard.

Next day, going to the wedding chapel in Aulendorf.

View from the hill.

The happy couple, Pogen and Emu.

Lots of wedding cakes, including the double-decker heart shaped one with a picture of surfers and a shark.

All the guests had to write a gift description on a card, put it in a balloon…

…and release the balloons to the sky. Anyone who found the card would send it back to Pogen and Emu, and the person who wrote the card would have to buy the gift.

No comment on the idea of having a tradition of releasing tons of plastic into the environment in a country that is trying to go 100% green.

The castle/estate where Pogen and Emu had their reception.

Yay, us.

More us.

Guardian dog.

Stairs to no where.

Lots of good German food.

This swing/jazz band was really good.

Dancing with Pogen’s mom.

Sunset over Hürbel.

We checked out the town of Ravensburg on our way out of Germany.

In the town square.

See-saw.

You better believe we played on it.

Shower art.

Blaserturm tower.

Part of the city walls.

Walking around the twisting paths of Ravensburg.

Something, I have no idea what. It wasn’t labeled on the icon map.

We did indeed find the Mexican restaurant (actually Spanish), but sadly it was closed.