Honeymoon Day 12 – June 12 – Freiburg, Germany – Christoph and Karen’s Wedding!

We got into Freiburg at 6am, and luckily, we had a room reserved at the Intercity Hotel, which is connected to the train station. It might seem a little silly to have a hotel room that you only use from 6am until noon, but those were some pretty key hours. We took a nap, showered, got ready, and had an awesome German breakfast (complimentary!), before Karen’s dad picked us up at 12:15pm.

After picking us up, Rudolf (Karen’s Dad), also picked up two other Americans – friends of Karen’s from when she studied in Barcelona. He dropped us all off at the church where their ceremony would be held. It was a really beautiful old church on top of a hill in the black forest.

People started arriving, and I found Jakob, Martin, Gabriel, and Tobie. Jakob had been in Minnesota on the same exchange as Christoph, and all the rest were friends that Naomi and I hung out with all the time while we were living in Germany the second time we came. It’s the first time I’ve seen this much of the group together in almost 10 years.

The wedding ceremony was very nice – they had a long sermon (about 45 minutes) with the theme of “the truth shall set you free.” It might have been a bit difficult, especially for Jeff, who doesn’t speak any German, but Karen and Christoph had printed out English translations of the sermon for us so we could follow along.

Since Jeff and I had no car and the wedding was in various locations around the black forest, Jeff and I were always just hoping we’d find someone going our way. Our ride to the ceremony was with the father of the bride, but he was fairly preoccupied afterwards. Luckily, pretty much everyone was going from the ceremony to the reception site, so it was easy to find a car with a couple extra seats. It’s a tradition in Germany to drive along all in a row and honk your horns on the drive from the ceremony from the reception, which was a lot of fun.

The reception site was a really cool old mansion, also on a hill. It’s u-shaped, with a really cool big tree in the middle. Christoph and Karen had picnic tables set up under the tree, so when people arrived to the champagne reception, they could grab snacks and drinks and relax at the tables. We sat with Jakob and the other guys from Hamburg and chatted and had great German snacks.

The area is well-known for hiking, so at one point, someone led a short hike around the reception area, and Jeff and I went along.

Around six or seven o’clock, it was time to start moving inside for the dinner reception. There was an ‘international table,’ since a number of people had flown to the wedding from far away, and needed translation, but Jeff and I were seating with the Homberg table with Jakob and the other people we knew. It was really fun to be able to sit with old friends, and easy to ask them questions about the reception.

The reception had a lot of programming. Karen and Christoph introduced every person at the wedding (there were about 150 people there). This is a tradition at German weddings – saying people’s name and a bit about how you know them or who they are. Christoph mentioned that Jeff and I had just gotten married two weeks earlier. He also told the story about the (joking) pact he and I had made 10 years ago (when Naomi and I were staying at his house) that we would get married if we reached some age (maybe 27 or so) and weren’t seeing anyone else.

Each of the dad’s gave speeches. Christoph’s dad talked about how Christoph and Karen had come from different backgrounds – Karen growing up in a loving, Christian household, and Christoph having it a little rough and having to grow-up fast (even at the wedding, his mom wasn’t able to make it) – but how they were both successful and made a wonderful pair. It was a very personal speech, and very nice. Karen’s dad talked about the speech that his father in law had made at his wedding, and said that the best quote that he could pass on came from Mary in the Bible – in the story about the Wedding at Canaan, they run out of wine, and Jesus tells the people to get a bunch of jugs of water. Mary tells the people to “Do as my son has told you.” He said that quote is the best advice for them to keep in mind, too, as they start their life together.

After people got their dinner, there were a bunch more presentations. There was a game where Christoph and Karen stood in front of a screen, and a phrase was projected behind them – things like “under 35,” or “play the piano,” or “more than 3 siblings.” If the phrase applied to you, you stood up. Then Christoph and Karen had to guess what all the standing people had in common.

Christoph’s sister told a couple stories and then did a cute karaoke-style duet with her brother to “Elephant Love Medley,” from Moulin Rouge, which he apparently really liked when he was younger. There were multiple video presentations – photos, video messages, etc. Some friends did a skit about Karen and Christoph being arrested for copyright infringement (they used Calvin Klein’s CK1 perfume logo on their invites and some other things, since it fits their initials). It was fun and cute to see people all do their own little performance, speech, or joke.

Around midnight, all of the performances were over, and people started dancing. Jeff and I stayed up – along with the whole crew from Homberg – well into the night. We didn’t get to our hotel until almost 5am (though from 3:30am onwards Jeff and I were a bit zombie-like, mostly just waiting for the shuttle.)

Freiburg, Germany

I arrived in Strasbourg on Saturday, as planned, and Christoph picked me up. We went back to his house and I met his fiancé, Karen. Karen and Christoph cooked lunch – pasta with spinach and salmon – and we chatted. The weather is nice here at the moment, so we were able to have dinner outside.

In the evening, Christoph had some work to do, so Karen and I went into town and had some tea and shopped a bit.

Back at Christoph’s, the three of us chatted for a bit longer as Karen put the finishing touches on her Black Forest Cake (made from scratch!), and then they headed out to meet friends, and I decided to try to sleep and get on a normal schedule!

On Sunday, I woke up around 9:30am (actually, I first woke up at 5am, but managed to eventually get back to sleep). I got ready, and then I had an awesome German breakfast that Karen and Christoph put together. There was bread and cheese and meat, and weisswurst with spicy mustart – so good!

We went to church at 11:30am – Christoph and Karen go to an English-speaking Anglican church in Freiburg, which was nice since I could understand everything.

After church we went for a late lunch at the home of one of Christoph’s professors. He and his wife were a really nice couple, and they’re visiting DC in June, so I gave them some ideas of places to visit and restaurants to try.

It was starting to get dark by the time we left, so we came back to their place and just had a relaxing evening – catching up on email and all of that.

Monday was my last day in Freiburg. We had another awesome German breakfast of fresh bread with cheese and other toppings.

Karen has been wanting to take engagement photos for the past few months, but they haven’t had time, or had access to a nice camera, or had someone there to take them. Since I was there with my DSLR (and love taking photos), and the weather was great, we decided to take a walk through the park and do a little photoshoot. We actually ended up taking almost 400 pictures – I guess Karen won’t have to worry about finding pictures for their website now! 

I think the pictures actually turned out really great – we found some really cool spots just in the park by their house – I love the ones in front of the graffiti wall especially.

In the afternoon Karen drove me out into the Black Forest to Titisee, which is a big lake up in the mountains. It was a really pretty drive, and a really cute area when we got there. Apparently it’s the area where lots of Germans go on vacation.

After that I got on the train and made my way to Strasbourg!

Freiberg to Frankfurt

Completing our loop, we headed back to Frankfurt – our final stop before flying back to the states. We got into Frankfurt hauptbahnhof (main train station) at about 11am, and our friends Cordula and Neils were waiting for us. Cordula is the sister of the first German exchange student my family hosted in Minnesota. Neils is her husband, who I had heard about but never actually met until today. They live in Goettingen, but had come to Frankfurt for the day to see us. The four of us (Jeff, Cordula, Neils, and me) then met up with Sabrina and Jesse. Sabrina is Cordula’s sister, who stayed with us in Minnesota, and Jesse is her girlfriend. They’re living in a town somewhat near Frankfurt, and had also come in just to visit us.
The six of us wandered around the city, though the weather wasn’t spectacular. There was actually a Carnival parade going on. Lots of crazy floats throwing German candy, and many more of those adult marching bands.
We had lunch at a steak place, were the food was good, and we could all chat together. It’d been four years since I’d seen Cordula, more since I’d seen Sabrina, and I’d never met Neils or Jesse, so there was a lot to catch up on.

After lunch we walked around a bit more and stopped for a cup of coffee (Germany has real coffee – not just espresso!). In the late afternoon, they all headed out, since they had long drives to get home.

Jeff and I walked around for a while longer after that, but since it was Sunday, almost everything was closed. We met up with Diana and her boyfriend, Marco, later in the evening. We were going to stay with Diana, but since her boyfriend was consulting for a nearby hotel, he was able to arrange a nice room there instead. It was very nice of them to do that – and nice for Jeff and I to have a little space to collect our things and re-pack before flying home.

Diana and Marco had thought we might be interested in a more traditional German experience, especially Jeff, who had never been to Frankfurt. So they took us to “Adolf Wagner’s.” It’s an apfelwein (apple wine) maker and restaurant. The tables are family style – with long benches so lots of people sit together. We ended up sitting with about four older German people, who had begun their apple-wine drinking before we arrived.
It was sooo much fun! Since it was carnival, the place was all decorated, and there were old folk songs playing. All the German people were singing along. We had come for the apfelwein and atmosphere, but decided to stay for dinner, since they had such a wide variety of traditional German food. I ordered some kind of pork (it looked kind of like a giant, thick piece of bacon) with fried onions, sauerkraut and potatoes. It tasted incredible. Jeff had slices of beef and potatoes with gruene sauce (green sauce), which is a specialty in Frankfurt. His food was also very tasty. So much so, that I have resolved to try to cook a German meal at my house sometime soon. Diana and Marco got us one of the Adolf Wagner pitchers (bebeln) to take home, and Jeff and I bought a couple bottles of apfelwein, so we’ll be all set for our German night in the USA.
After Adolf Wagners, Marco and Diana took us on a drive through Alt Sachsen Platz (Old Saxony Place). It is a part of town with small pedestrian cobble-stone walkways lined with lots of tiny pubs. It was a really cute area. Now the pubs are all different nationalities – German, Spanish, Turkish, Asian, etc., but before it used to be all traditional German places.
From there, we headed to a more trendy bar, where we relaxed and chatted into the night. Diana and I had been lucky to live near each other a number of times – she lived with my family during the high school exchange, and I lived with hers. I visited her a second time a year later, staying with her family again. While I was in college, Diana moved to a town just north of Boston, working as an oper (nanny), so I was able to see her fairly often then, too. It was great to see her again and chat about what we’re both doing now.

Strasbourg to Freiburg

On Saturday, we started the last leg of our trip. We caught a train from Strasbourg to Freiberg, where Christoph and Jakob were waiting. We went back to Christoph’s house, saw his neighborhood, and took a walk through the park back to town.
Freiberg is a really nice city – home to one of the oldest universities in the world and to many famous philosophers and other academics. It has a really nice mix of impressive traditional buildings and trendy new stores.
We stopped for a doener at what Christoph told us was the best doener place in Fienberg. I actually practiced my German a bit – ordering for Jeff and myself. Re-fueled, we headed out for more wandering around Freiberg. It was actually the beginning of Carnival, so there were tons of random people in the street, dressed in costumes. One of my favorite was two guys dressed as chairs – they had somehow taken all the stuffing out of two fluffy living room chairs so that they could wear them. And they had a mechanism built in so they could sit down and then they just looked like a chair with a head coming out of the back rest.

There were also lots of bands playing. Jeff and I were confused, because it wasn’t like high school marching bands – it was all adults. They all had matching costumes and marching-band like instruments – drums, tubas, trumpets, etc. Apparently these adult bands are common in Germany and often organize themselves specifically for Carnival.
We climbed up the big mountain/hill in Freiberg, and had a really nice view of the city. Though a bit treacherous with the snow and ice, we were able to make it up and back. (Though we cheated a bit by taking an elevator part of the way up.)
Freiberg is right on the edge of the Black Forest, so you can see it on the surrounding mountains and hills as you’re walking around. Christoph offered to take us to a small town in the Black Forest near a lake, but since it was getting dark, we thought we might not be able to see much. That’s on the top of my list for next time, though.

Anyway, all this Black Forest-seeing made us crave Black Forest Cake, or “Schwarzwald Kirsch Tarte.” Christoph found us a cute café where we were able to buy the last piece they had left. Combined with a warm cup of tea, it was the perfect thing to do after climbing down a snowy mountain/hill.

After cake, we headed back to Christoph’s house, where we all hung out for a while and then cooked dinner together. We had a great recipe of Christoph’s for pasta with mozzarella, tomatoes, and spices. Then we spent the rest of the night chatting away – catching up after four years of not seeing each other.