One of the things we will remember most about Freiburg is the sound of the cathedral bells ringing. In our travels we have heard many, many church bells ring but there was something about the bells in Freiburg that was different and haunting. David described it as some kind of continuous background melody playing along with the chiming bells. He thought it sounded like one huge bell was set up to ring with a constant hum. In any event, we loved that we could hear the bells clearly from our hotel room.
We had a very good breakfast Sunday morning -- the usual selection of cheeses and meats with the most wonderful bread you can imagine. And homemade jams!!! There was also cereal and yogurt available as well as juice, coffee and tea.
That day we had planned to take the train to the nearby village of Staufen, but after talking to the owner of our hotel, we decided to stay in Freiburg for the day. He told David about a museum in one of the old city towers with miniature soldiers set up in various battle scenes so, of course, David wanted to see that. David said the individual soldiers were only 1 inch high and painted in extreme detail and positioned by the thousands in detailed battles. He thought it was great! The hotel owner (sorry, I don't know his name) also suggested we take a walk in the oldest part of Freiburg and then take the tram and bus to the cable car that takes you to the top of Schauinisland mountain. On a clear day you can see the Swiss Alps . . . but it was a little overcast when we were there. The view from the cable car was incredibly beautiful, 750 meters suspended in the air! We saw lots of people mountain biking and hiking. Some people also take their bikes up to the top on the cable car and then ride down. We also saw a few people hang gliding and it looked so peaceful and scary!!!
We hiked around a bit but it was kind of cold at the top and we did not have jackets with us. There was a small restaurant there so we decided to have lunch. We could eat and enjoy the view AND the people watching. David had cream of leek soup and I had --------- a delicious ham sandwich! When we were almost finished eating an Indian family joined us -- they currently live outside of London. They were very talkative and interesting. They had lived in Atlanta and their English was very good. We talked a lot about how expensive London is. The man used to spend over 500 pounds per month ($780.00) just taking the tube to and from work!!! Yes, they have a great subway system but it is very, very expensive!
After lunch we headed back down the mountain on the cable car and, of course, made friends on the cable car too! Our car-mates were an older Indian couple with two college-aged girls; one from Switzerland (Stephanie) and one from Germany who is attending university in Freiburg (Hannah). It seemed like an odd group but it turned out the two women had spent a year living in India with the couple. It was a Rotary Club program. The girls had invited the Indian couple to visit them at their families' homes and then travel around their countries. They were all very nice and the two girls were very enthusiastic about visiting the United States. David gave them our information so I'm sure someday they will show up on our doorstep. Actually, that would be fine because they were lovely young women. When we reached the bottom of the mountain we took a few group pictures and then boarded the bus to go back to the tram to take us back into the town. We parted ways in the center of Freiburg and David and I headed back to our hotel.
At dinner time we weren't very hungry so we decided just to go get some ice cream in the town square and go to bed early and that's what we did. Oh all this fabulous European travel is exhausting!!! Seriously, we feel very lucky to be here and seeing all of these beautiful places and meeting nice people!
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