Mom and Dad's Adventure! Day 1

Well, Mom and Dad have left on their grand adventure.
This is Rachel posting for them.
Here's what they've had to say so far!

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Our flight here wasn't too bad. We had personal video choices and I watched Blind Side -- cried my way through it again...then took a nap of sorts. We had a view of the alps as we flew in. Everything here was covered with ice and snow and looked like frozen tundra! We arrived at 10:00 this morning. We had a bit of a challenge navigating our way to the hotel, mostly because every street here has a name that is at least 20 letters long and it is hard to read the signs. I have felt pretty stupid since arriving here. I realized this is the first time I've traveled to a country without knowing at least some of the language. I don't even know how to pronounce the long, confusing words here! I will be going home trying to learn at least a little German in case I ever come back here again. I will not travel to a country again without trying to learn a little of the language. Rachel -- I wish you were here! You would love it. It all looks very German and very European. Pete and I had as much difficulty navigating our way around the subway station -- it really became quite humorous and was probably complicated by our sleep deprivation and jet lag. It was an adventure! We took the subway to Marienplatz which is a shop area, St. Peters church (originally on the site in the 1100s). It is a fun area, but it was so cold we kept ducking into shops every few minutes (even if we weren't interested in them) just to keep warm. I was glad Nancy talked me into knee high bamboo socks, even with those, long underwear, two sweaters, a coat, scarf, leather gloves and ear warmers --it was freezing even in the bright sunshine! Our first stop was to find some lunch since Pete was really hungry. He ordered a pizza, I wanted something "German" and asked the waiter to pick one of three dishes that I had no idea what they were. It turned out to be a glorified mac and cheese dish. We spent some time in the Bavarian gift shops. Most of them sell fancy painted egg shells, fancy coockoo clocks and intricate flat colorful metal artwork of people in Bavarian costume --many varieties -- many of them look like christmas ornaments. Also figurines. We didn't buy anything today -- other than food and "still" water. Our last stop in that area was the famous Hofbrauhaus. We didn't order any beer, but saw lots of varieties of beer around the tables. It was not too loud or roudy since it was mid afternoon on a Monday. Good time to go. Dad had a coffee and pretzel and I had a bowl of brussel sprouts! Tomorrow we are going to drive out to Neuschwanstein Castle. We bought some pretzels and bread back to the room (they sell them everywhere) so that we don't have to go out again tonight. We're both having trouble keeping our eyes open, but are trying to stay awake until 8pm. Haven't had showers since our flight -- so maybe nice hot showers will help. We're excited for our drive tomorrow and thankful for this opportunity to experience another culture see another little part of this interesting planet!