Road Trip: Our Excellent Adventure in Germany (with a stop in Luxembourg)

April 18 -25, 2003

After much debate about dream trips to Greece or the Canary Islands, we decided that the reasonable thing to do was spend Spring Break in southern Germany. Our goal was to have a kid-friendly, purely fun vacation, with minimal emphasis on sightseeing, culture, arts, history, or other such educational nonsense. We also felt it made sense to see things that are within easy driving distance, rather than flying all over Europe.

So, Kevin arrived home from New Jersey on Friday morning, and we headed for Luxembourg! No rest for the weary, even if he was recovering from pneumonia (no, not SARS!)! Driving to Luxembourg City takes less than 2 hours, but then we spent at least 30 minutes driving around in circles trying to get to our hotel, which was surrounded by construction. This should have tipped us off as to how the driving part of our trip would go. . .

We spent Saturday morning exploring the casemates in Luxembourg. These are defensive tunnels that were dug out of the sandstone that lies beneath the city. Will defended Luxembourg using the cannon pictured below, while Ellen and Berit found a safe place to hide from the bad guys.

Luxembourg City is clean, pretty and sits on very steep hills. Here, Will and Ellen take a break in the middle of a cobblestone road.

Saturday afternoon we headed for Ulm, Germany. This was our introduction to the insanity that is the German highway system. The idea of driving 80 - 100 miles per hour just to keep up with traffic was not the problem, the signage was. Lots of, "Gee, honey I think we were supposed to go that way." We unintentionally took the scenic route to Ulm and got there in time for a yummy dinner at a vegetarian restaurant.

LEGOLAND!

Why Ulm? Because it is close to

Last summer Laura, Ellen and Will spent a day at Legoland in England. Needless to say, it was so wonderful we just had to take Kevin to the new Legoland Deutschland for Easter!

Will and Ellen especially enjoyed getting their driver's licenses at the Legoland driving school. They did a better job navigating the roadways than their parents did all week! And here they got to drive on the right side of the road (unlike at Legoland England!)

Will and Kevin built a Lego robot and entered a competition. Their robot, pictured to the left, won the competition (get as many balls in the target as quickly as possible)!! Meanwhile, Ellen and Laura rode yet another roller coaster!

One of the really cool things about Ulm is that it is the birthplace of Albert Einstein. Since his home was destroyed during World War II, this Lego sculpture would have to suffice as a point of pilgrimage.

For those who know about great must-see sites in Germany, this is the Lego version of Neuschwanstein Castle. Despite the fact that the real thing was a quick drive south of Ulm, this was the closest we would get to it. Remember, this is supposed to be fun - not a siteseeing tour!

Click to see:

* more of our trip to Germany

* our home page