Germany
I took another swig of crisp, clean German lager as I spied the nascent Oktoberfest fairgrounds across the street. Only the steel frames and brewery names were up – the stark beginnings of the world’s …
“You’re American? What are you doing here? Usually Americans just visit Berlin.” This was the response I received after a vendor asked me a question in German. Apparently, most American tourists forego 1,000-year-old Potsdam, Berlin's …
Germany’s most ancient city is Trier, its name derived from the Roman name Augusta Trevororum under Caesar Augustus. It was known as the “Second Rome” before Constantinople. While the Romans had been in neighboring Gaul …
After venturing around London, we hopped on a plane for Berlin to continue our European adventure. (To help with the story, here’s a little background on our adventure: My husband just graduated from the University …
Daylight The lights at Villingen shut off on schedule. Edouard Izac, Harold Willis, and 11 others would become the only Americans to try a mass escape from a German POW camp during World War I. …
The Best Made Plans Toward the end of World War I, the Germans boasted that their prisoner-of-war camp on the western outskirts of Villingen was tight as a sealed tomb. A ten-foot-tall, barbed-wire fence surrounded …
Capture “I rather expected to be wounded or killed or even drowned,” writes Navy lieutenant Edouard Izac. “It was only natural that…the [USS President] Lincoln would finally be torpedoed….But never once had the thought of …
Trains rumbled over the bridge and thousands of padlocks chattered in unison as I walked across the Hohenzollern Bridge in Cologne, Germany, looking at messages of love. Row after row of various shaped and sized …
They say every little girl’s dream is to be a princess. When I told a family friend that I’d been accepted into the Salzburg Global Seminar and would be living in an 18th century castle, …
It is truly easier on the streets of Berlin to buy a bottle of beer than one of water. And no matter what time of day it is, you'll observe someone sipping a cold one, …
Oktoberfest may be the annual climax of Germany’s love of hops, hefs and everything in between, but Münchers worship their golden beers year-round. Begin your journey at Hofbräuhaus (Platzl 8), the unofficial headquarters of Munich …
No visit to Munich, Germany would be complete without a visit to Hofbräuhaus, the most famous beer hall in the world. Dissatisfied with the quality of beer being brewed in Munich, Duke Wilhelm V established …
Matmail: On vacation in Ecuador, I met an 80-year-old man who claims that during World War II, he and his German parents were rounded up by the Ecuadorian government at the request of the U.S. …