Bad Nauheim: A Town Known for Elvis, Saltwater, and Alligator Farms

On Thursday, our last full day in Germany, I had my usual breakfast of a buttered sesame seed roll and a cup of coffee. During breakfast, Uncle Winfred called and told Oma that he was going to take Nick and me to Bad Nauheim at 1:30pm. Since I assumed this would take up the majority of the day, I decided to run some errands in Oberursel-Mitte and pack before he arrived.

The trek to Bad Nauheim via the autobahn was only about a half an hour. As we got closer to town, my uncle started pointing at these brown signs that had a picture of an alligator and the word "farm" on them. Apparently on the outskirts of Bad Nauheim there is an alligator farm; go figure. My uncle parked on the street and as soon as we got out of the car, he pointed to the Cardiology Center that we were next to and said he had stayed there for three weeks at somepoint in the last year. This didn't really surprise me considering he has 5 stents already and he is pretty much a walking heart attack who smokes like a chimney. We then wandered over to what appeared to be a giant wall of roots with a water wheel, which is apparently one of many places where saltwater is mined and pumped to the surface in Bad Nauheim. We continued to wander through the park and into the main part of the town to the information center where there were banners advertising the upcoming Elvis festival. Apparently Elvis Presley was stationed in Bad Nauheim for 2 years while he served in the US army, and the town has lived off his legacy ever since.
Up the street from where we were was the Hotel Grunewald, which is on the corner of Elvis Presley-Platz. There is a monument erected in his memory across the street, which happened to have some flowers and candles placed on the ground in front of it, since people who can't make it to Graceland in Nashville tend to use this as a memorial to the King of Rock 'N Roll. After gazing at everything Elvis, we decided to have lunch at Wiener Kaffeehouse. I opted for a slice of chocolate cream cake with a cappucino, which was a marvelously delicious decision.
On our way home from Bad Nauheim, Uncle Winfred drove us up over the Feldberg and into Bad Homburg so that we could see some sights in the park there, including a statue of Kaiser Wilhelm, a Thai temple made of gold, and a fountain. Soon we were back at Oma's for our dinner of schnitzel and potatoes. Oma spent some time meowing at me and laughing because my cat back home is named Schnitzel and she has always been confused that I might actually eat my cat. The joys of a language barrier yet again. I guess the big surprise for everyone, though, was the fact that Uncle Winfred was actually drinking water out on the back patio. From my interpretation, I guess he typically will not eat or drink at Oma's because of the dog. The rest of the evening was spent chatting with Oma, Aunt Edith, Uncle Winfred, and Monika before heading off to bed for some sleep since we had to get up at 5am for breakfast before Herta and Ralf drove us to the airport.

As you can assume, we landed safely at JFK. Chrissy was kind enough to pick us up from the airport to drive us back to East Stroudsburg. I spent the rest of the afternoon catching up with her about life from the past two weeks since we both have had a lot going on. I made sure to stay awake until 11:30pm in an attempt to get me back on a normal sleep schedule. This has only partly worked because I have been wide awake since 5:15am. Oh well, I have plenty of time to catch up on sleep and recuperate before I dive into the real world and try to find myself a job.

Exploring the Nation's Capital

Now that I have updated you all on where I have traveled since my epic roadtrip, let me get back to the most recent exploring that took place this past weekend. Chrissy finally got done with her semester of school on Friday (Yay!!!) so we decided to trek down to Washington D.C. to explore all of the museums and to visit her sister. Due to the craziness that is life, we didn't actually get down to her sister's apartment until about 10:45pm Friday after having to drive through countless monsoon-like conditions. Being as we arrived so late, Chrissy and I ended up watching the most recent episode of Bones and then going to bed.
We got up at about 9am to get ready for our day of exploration. We drove ourselves to the Pentagon City Metro Station and hopped the Yellow line to L'Enfant Plaza. Once we disembarked the metro, we began our extensive wanderings by heading towards the Capitol Building, bypassing the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. Before going straight to the Capitol, I became intrigued by the baby ducks swimming around the Reflecting Pool near Grant's Memorial. Finally we sauntered over to the Capitol Building, actually saw a couple getting married up on the balcony, and a friendly runner offered to take our picture. She asked us where we were from and we asked if she was enjoying her run.
We then looped around the Capitol to take pictures of the Supreme Court, Neptune Fountain, and Jefferson Library of Congress. Since I'm a nerd, and I knew Chrissy wouldn't mind, I requested that we go into the Library of Congress because I heard the Main Reading Room was quite awesome. Once making it through security, we took in the magnificent architecture of the place. Quotes lined the ceiling, along with frescoes so numerous pictures were taken. On display was one of the original copies of the Gutenberg Bible, which was printed back in 1455. We ventured upstairs so that we go an overhead view of the main reading room, and of course now Chrissy really wants to do some research there. She discovered that there is actually a Middle East and North Africa reading room, which would come in quite handy for her dissertation writing.
After exiting the Library of Congress, we began the long trek down the National Mall. I took pictures of the Washington Monument as we walked along, and I also took pictures of the National Gallery of Art and Museum of Natural History as we walked past. Some girls were handing out free Red Bull, so we took some just for the concept of getting free beverages. We then continued onto our next stop, which was at the Smithsonian Castle. We each got souvenirs before continuing to the base of the Washington Monument. Chrissy wanted to go and touch it, which reminded me of Finding Nemo where Nemo wants to go touch "the butt" (yes I'm easily amused). Given the time, we decided to backtrack to the Holocaust Museum to see if any tickets were available for the Permanent Exhibit. Unfortunately, no tickets were available, but we went through the temporary exhibits, including one about the effectiveness of the propaganda the Nazis used during World War II. It seemed fitting that our next stop was the World War II Memorial.
Following the World War II Memorial, we made our way towards the Reflecting Pool, which happened to be under construction, and thus, nonexistent. There was a crazy squirrel on a park bench who seemed to be posing for pictures in an attempt to lure people close enough to steal food that we passed as we walked along the edge of what should be the Reflecting Pool. I had a Forrest Gump moment, remembering how Forrest and Jenny were reunited after the Vietnam War at the Reflecting Pool. We then ended up at the Lincoln Memorial, which has Lincoln sitting in his chair with the "Gettysburg Address" and "Emancipation Proclamation" inscribed on the walls. We briefly sat on the steps of the memorial to enjoy the view before continuing on towards the Vietnam Wall.
After the Vietnam Wall, we got some soft pretzels and drinks and moved on towards the Memorial for the 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence. Next was the Second Division Memorial (WWI) before we reached the White House. There was a mounted police officer who brought his horse over to a fountain for a drink, which greatly amused everybody watching. As we continued on, we stopped by The Willard Hotel, National Theatre, and then a Starbucks for some iced coffee and a frappucino. The caffeine helped fuel us for our trek to Ford's Theater and the FBI Building (no we didn't find Booth unfortunately). We then did a bit of souvenir shopping before touring the International Spy Museum, wandering passed the National Archives, (seeing another wedding at the Pershing Memorial) and then hopping the Metro back to Pentagon City. Once we relaxed at the apartment briefly, Chrissy's sister took us out to the Old Town section for dinner. We ate at a place called Overwood, which is a delicious grill establishment that cooks everything over a wood fire (thus the name). It was a very enjoyable evening full of chatting and laughter over the fact that the air mattress Chrissy and I slept on deflated, making it as effective as laying out newspaper for a bed.
 The next morning, the three of us went back to the National Mall so that we could get tickets to tour the permanent exhibit at the Holocaust Museum. Since we had 1.5 hours before our tour time, we wandered to a Starbucks and went to the American History Museum. We saw the original Washington Monument that made him look like a Greek god, the original Star Spangled Banner, and the Philadelphia. We then got a chance to tour the Holocaust Permanent Exhibit before We going to the Air and Space Museum in order to check out the space, Wright Brother's, WWI, and WWII exhibits. I really enjoyed seeing the lunar module and some spacesuits because my grandfather worked for Northrop Grumman and helped test spacesuits as part of his job. We finished our day at Ben's Chili Bowl for a late lunch before driving back to the apartment. After eating, Chrissy and I packed the car and made the long 4 hour drive back to East Stroudsburg.