You, Me, and Germany: frankenstein + darmstadt

Sooooo, it's been a hot minute (or several...) since I last wrote a blog post. I thought no one would really notice...boy, was I wrong. I've had a lot of you ask when I was going to post something new, and so here I am finally to deliver. And to those of you who have asked, thank you for being so supportive of this part of our journey and reminding me of why I started this blog to begin with!

Since I last filled you in on our life here in Germany, we've announced a new addition coming soon to join us in our adventures here! Baby Koch is due December 31st, and we could not be more excited!!!!!

We've taken several ridiculously awesome short trips! Today I'll share 3 of these places with you, but I'll be playing catch up over the next couple of weeks so that nothing gets left out.

Rich and I are STILL in awe of living here. He's totally right when he reminds me that everything we've seen so far is within 3 hours of the house, so aside from gas, food, and our regular souvenirs (magnets, postcards, Christmas ornaments), we really haven't spent much money at all in the way of travel. The history that we've seen here is seriously unbelievable, and Rich and I both love this so much!

A few weeks ago, we headed out on a drizzly day toward Darmstadt (pronounced darm-staht) to visit Burg Frankenstein! In German, a burg is a castle, so you guessed it...we're talking Frankenstein Castle here!

Built around 1250 A.D., Burg Frankenstein is rumored to be where Mary Shelley got her inspiration to write Frankenstein in 1818. Touring this place on a cloudy day seemed to add to the eeriness of it all, too.

Our first view of Burg Frankenstein.

There was no admission charge, so we were able to walk right on in.

The chapel was just built a few years ago, but you can actually get married in there. If you're into that...creepy...kinda thing.

It's obvious that there's been some restoration, but the older parts are definitely still visible.

This is Rich. Not Frankenstein's monster.

This is Frankenstein's monster. Not Rich.

Frankenstein's monster looks a lot like my husband.

As always, I got distracted while Rich went looking for the monster up the steps:

This ladybug ain't afraid of no monsters.

Once I was over the pretty distraction, I went up the steps myself to make sure the monster didn't throw my husband in a lake while making boats out of flowers. You have seen the original Frankenstein, right? With Boris Karloff? Watch it. You're welcome.

I never found Rich up there, but this monster kept scaring the fool outta me!

What. A. View.

I swear, that ol' monster had a thing for me.

The stairs leading up into the tower (pic above) are pretty worn. Think a lot of people visit this place?

Still looking for Rich, I headed back down to ground level and down the hill where alas, I found the monster staking his claim on a big rock. I guess he didn't want me to mess up the fancy fencework down there. "Abby-normal?" (Bonus points if you get that movie quote!)

While I was down there, I got distracted. Again. Go figure...

I didn't notice the bug hangin' out on that leaf until I edited this photo!

This bug thought he was being sly, but not sly enough.

The view from down that hill.

I eventually found Rich. Turns out, he was chasing the monster to protect me. See, chivalry isn't dead! We walked back to the car and decided to go into Darmstadt to check out the digs there.

Darmstadt was chartered as a city in 1330 A.D. by the Holy Roman Emperor Ludwig the Bavarian. It is now known as the "City of Science", as the element Darmstadtium (atomic number 110) was discovered here.

Now, for the sobering part of living in Germany that I haven't yet touched on. In 1942, over 3,000 Jews were forced from Darmstadt into concentration camps where most spent their last time on Earth. If you haven't ever seen the movie Schindler's List or the Band of Brothers series, please do so. Both are true stories and will leave you with a real look at the Holocaust, the War, and how it affected everyone involved.

Anyway, Darmstadt was severely damaged by a British air raid in September of 1944. Most of the city was rebuilt using plain architecture, and very few buildings were reconstructed in their original historic style. Because of this, we honestly didn't find Darmstadt a beautiful place, visually speaking. But this goes with the history.