Rhine River Valley

Wow, has this week gone by fast!  My European economics class has been quite challenging.  Yesterday, for one class we got a 61-page review packet.  Thankfully German class has been fun.  So far we have learned basic phrases, numbers, days of the week, etc…

Wednesday the group went on an excursion to the Rhine River Valley.  We went on a lovely boat tour down the river and saw a variety of castle ruins.  After the boat tour the ISU team set up wine tasting for us at a local vineyard.  We were all pulled in little carriages and got a tour on the vineyard, which was beautiful (their was even castle ruins located on the vineyard.)

Thursday was my friend from Eau Claire’s birthday so everyone decided to surprise him with a little birthday celebration.  After a long hunt all over Frankfurt we finally found him a birthday cake.  I guess it is not common in Germany to buy an entire cake – they are usually sold only by the piece.  Nonetheless after all of the searching we found him a traditional German black forest cake.

Today is another day of classes and then we are all taking the train to Berlin for the weekend.  We are staying in a hostel, which makes me a little nervous, but should be an interesting experience.  Hopefully Berlin has better weather than Frankfurt.  I haven’t seen any sun since I have arrived!