Samantha's Visit June 2008

My niece Samantha came for a two week visit. Everyone concerned would say that it was a successful trip. Mom got to travel and visit friends, Pam, Sam and I got to see Barcelona and Sam found a new passion, fußbol.
Samantha arrived on Sunday June 22nd. She came out of the customs door escorted by 2 US Air employees. Because Samantha was an unescorted minor, Mom had purchased the ability to see her off at the gate in Philadelphia and the escort in Frankfurt. I feel that Sam could have managed on her own, but there is peace of mind knowing she was getting some help.
Sam is competitive and she wants to be able to visit as many countries as possible. She has already been to Italy and Germany and traveled through Switzerland (transferred planes). On this trip she was going to accumulate two more countries, France and Spain.
On Tuesday Sam and I drove to Strasbourg, France. Strasbourg is about a 90 minute drive down the Rhein Valley from Heidelberg. Strasbourg is built along the Ile River and the old town is bordered by the river on one side and a canal on the other, effectively making the old town of Strasbourg an Island.
Sam is not the most talkative person in the morning (but not difficult to get moving either) so she was pretty quiet in the car on the way down. We made it to Strasbourg in about 75 minutes or so. Driving across the border into France is completely uneventful. On the German side of the Rhein there are no remants left of the passort control and on the France side there is just the islands that the booths used to sit and a Welcome center.
I followed signs and the cathedral spir to the old part of town, parked the car and we walked overand through the old town to the Cathedral. By this time it was lunch time and we were both pretty hungry. We ate at a sidewalk café near the cathedral.
After lunch we walked around the corner to the Cathedral. I had taken Sam to the Cathedral in Heidelberg so she would have something to compare Strasbourg against. The Strasbourg Cathedral is of a completely different architectural style and much more ornate and a whole lot larger, it was the tallest building in Europe when it was built and is still the 4th tallest church in the world. It also houses a very large Astronomical Clock.
From the church we walked over to the canal for a canal boat ride around the old town. We chose to take the enclosed air conditioned boat instead of the open air boat as it was warm. During the ride around the town you can listen to a narrative with a headset and choose your language. You also proceed through two locks, one up and one down. Samantha had never been through or seen a canal lock working and I explained how it worked. Then second part of the trip is past the old town and down the Ile River to the EU Parliament Building. It is a beautiful glass and metal building.
Wednesday was very hot and very humid! Of course it always seems hotter when you depend on fans to keep cool and not air conditioning. Sam and I took the #5 Straßebahn to Mannheim. Samantha said that Mannheim felt more like a city to her. It has mostly modern buildings. During WW2 Mannheim was a major manufacturing center and was totally destroyed by Allied Bombing. Heidelberg on the other hand is half the size of Mannheim and was not much of a manufacturing center so it was virtually untouched by the war.
After walking around and doing a little shopping, Sam and I were in quest of a restaurant. Not just any restaurant, it had to have Schnitzel and, more importantly, it needed to have air conditioning. It was a hot quest but we succeeded. The restaurant Maredo looks and sounds like it should be a Mexican restaurant, but not by American standards. We walked in and were hit by a nice blast of cold, American air conditioning.
While we were eating, it had started raining. We paid the bill and got to the front door where about 5 people were watching the water flow down the street like a small river. We waited for the rain to slow, while I worried about whether the windows were closed at home. The rain slowed and we walked to the straßbahn and went home.
Thursday we left for Barcelona in part 2.