It was a clear warm day!
First, we ran a few errands, to the post office, the ATM, and the tourist information bureau. While we were at the ATM, Erika, the owner of the shoe store saw us and came across the street to tell us what she learned about Andy's grandfather. She had called her mother and her mother remembered the name of Richard Baldes because her father (Erika's grandfather, Arno Appis) and he had been friends. She remembered Arno talking about Richard as his friend who went to America when he was 20 years old. Erika owns the family shoe store which was begun by her great grandfather Christian.
We stopped by the Tourist Bureau to sign up for the Saturday Dunkelgrafen (Dark Duchess) tour (which is on Saturday afternoon). It's going to be a big group so we'll have to satisfy ourselves with whatever German we can understand!
We biked back to the hotel and walked over to the Therme restaurant (above the Thermalbad) for lunch. The lunch was yummy.
We also spent a long time talking to the young waitress. Her father lives in Detroit and she wants to visit him this Autumn. She understands English very well but has some trouble speaking it (probably more fear than real trouble). She was very nice and let us stumble along in our bad German, which gave us some much needed practice.
Then, we spent the afternoon at the ThermalBad (pictured below on a postcard). We did not take a camera. It was fun. We did water aerobics with groups of mostly old folks for 15-20 minutes each hour. We were laughing so hard at ourselves. The music was a hilarious mix which included Sweet Home Alabama. We can't make this stuff up! I'm sure the other folks wondered why we were so giggly. We spent over three hours there, mostly in the indoor round pool, but the last bit in the outdoor lazy river pool (we waited for the sun to be low enough that we wouldn't sunburn out there).
Then, we stumbled back to the hotel (50 meters or so!) and showered and went down to supper. We were the only folks in the dining room but clearly the man-of-all-tasks working that evening (waiter, hotel manager, front desk worker, all the jobs in one man except for chef) was running in and out to other folks elsewhere. We finally figured out there was some outdoor seating, not very close to the dining room, where he was serving others.
The food here is spectacular and sometimes we just ask for something random like "how about some chicken something like <name of dish that was a salad with chicken> but with some potatoes" and they come up with something yummy for us.
The desserts are fantastic. Andy had a strawberry something or other that was on the day's special menu. Amelia had her favorite, the homemade white chocolate ice cream with a warm chocolate crepe. The plating isn't so pretty because we had a short panic thinking the sauce was strawberry (strawberries are very common here and Amelia is allergic). However, it was raspberry so all is well. The little orange fruit is a physalis. MMMMM...
So, not much excitement today but some much needed physical and mental rest.
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