The Benderz' Vacation Adventures: Stuttgart with the Bökelers

This picture makes my heart happy! Dr. Bökeler and Dr. Bender! Together again! We also got a great group picture that I'll add as soon as I get it! But I am once again way ahead of things...

This is the face of a boy who is pumped to head to Germany!

Excitement aside, we had one more breakfast at Hotel Bruno and we weren't wasting it!!

After breakfast it was time to pack up and move out.

The trip to the airport in Venice absolutely took longer than the flight from Venice to Stuttgart. First there was the walk through the streets with our luggage...never a problem till you need to go up and down the stairs of 400 bridges.

Then there was the wait for the correct waterbus line to get us to the airport.

More waiting...super patient kiddos!

Then there was the 40 minute ride on the waterbus to get us to Marco Polo Airport. The kids kept busy reading and looking at pictures.

Bender was a totally different story. This ride was a coastal engineer and water resource engineer's dream ride. Bender asked lots of questions about dredging, channel depth and other awesome technical stuff. I have no idea how much of what he asked was lost in translation.

I do know this guy was doing a great job not only driving the boat, but trying to answer all Bender's questions! He seemed happy when we finally arrived at the airport.

Such a different feeling to ride a boat to the airport!

After some confusion about what airline we were actually flying, we got our tickets and made it through security with zero issues. They even let me take my perfume which mistakenly got packed in the bag we were carrying on. Just when we thought it was time to board the plane, we boarded ...

a bus to the plane.

Then it was finally flying time. We left our hotel around 9:45 but our plane didn't leave till 1:10. The trip to Stuttgart only took an hour and a few minutes.

And they had great snacks! Why doesn't everyone give out chips and chocolate? Think about how much happier air travel would be.

We saw the Alps!! How cool is that??

And when we got off the plane...more chocolate. Lindt too. I kind of love Germany already.

This is one well traveled dolphin pillow pet.

Once we got off the plane, we had to find our rental car. While Bender was figuring that out, Zoe was playing with the finger while Zack drooled over the car.

If only he could drive. Zack was stoked about our rental.

Zoe couldn't believe that you have to sit in a booster till you're 12 or 5 ft tall. Had to rent a booster for her.

(This was also the face Bender made when we couldn't get the GPS to change from German to English. And while I think Chris enjoyed driving a Mercedes Benz, driving in a place where you don't know what the street signs say was crazy intimidating. The drive from the airport was the first time this trip I felt outside of my comfort zone.)

A little bit about the fabulous family we are visiting in Stuttgart. When Bender was at URI, Ulf Bökeler spent some time studying there through an exchange program with Germany. Not only is he a fabulous guy, he's a fabulous tennis player and played on the Rhody tennis team. Years later, Ulf got the award for traveling the farthest distance to come to our wedding!

(**note...I'm not sure why I didn't get spellings for names today. Tomorrow I'm going to have to ask someone to write them all down! Until then, I'll do my best while everyone else sleeps! We had the most fabulous time seeing Dr and Mrs Bökeler again and meeting Ulf's wife Steffi and kids as well as his sister and brother in law and kids - one of whom, Marika, was Zoe's pen pal in the months leading up to our trip. All three families live on the same street within five houses of each other. )

This is Ulf's parents' house.

Dr and Mrs Bökeler and Marika welcomed us with open arms. Their house is beautiful and the gardens are amazing . Zack and Chris were picking cherries off the tree in their backyard minutes after arrival. Did you know that cherry trees looked like this?

So good. And Ulf's sister's family lives right next door (with a secret passage way through the hedge...oh the nights planning for this exact set up Ya!) and have a trampoline. Happy Zoe!

Mrs. Bökeler had prepared a traditional red currant cake (so ridiculously good) and had gotten special pretzels from a local bakery. The pretzels were the best I have ever tasted.

Did I mention the currants were from their garden? And that Zoe continued to pick and eat them (and strawberries, white currants, black currants, raspberries, pricker berries and anything else called a berry) all night long? She ate enough berries to keep her going till tomorrow!

I had to take a picture of this idea. Each of these is a photo calendar made for the last 20+ years. We stood and looked through them. I love photo calendars, but this idea makes them a million times better!

Picking more cherries. Needed a ladder because they picked out the branches the could reach from the ground.

About a two minute walk from their house was one of the soccer cages Zack has been hearing so much about. He was so excited to go and check it out. First with Bender and later on with new friend Kent!

Steffi and Ulf moved into their house up the road two months ago, and had a baby one month ago. We picked a super awesome time to visit (can you hear the sarcasm?) But, I got tons of baby snuggles and found out I can still rock the bounce :)

This sweet girl is Ulf and Steffi's daughter. She helped Zoe figure out where all the best berries were in the garden.

Girls on the trampoline!!

Headstand lessons with Zoe and Emme.

While the kids played, Chris and Ulf went to their club to play some red clay tennis and relive some glory days. The club was beautiful...reminded us of some of the private clubs in Rhode Island that Chris got to play at during our summer there. And the boys definitely still have skills! Steffi and I got to go watch for a few minutes before Ulf broke a string and the boys took off on a run. Two of a kind. Ulf wanted to show Chris the sites.

Then it was back home for a traditional Swabien dinner of potato salad, sausages and tomatoes and mozzarella. We also had the best radishes and parsnips I've ever tasted and bread with a delightful spread. And plenty of great beer and local wine.