The trip over here was actually much easier than expected. After all the hassle of packing and repacking our bags to make sure that we came in under the 50-lb airplane limit and at the same time remember to bring everything we wanted to bring for our 3-month trip, and after trying to get our house ready for Amy, who is renting our house while we are gone, we were finally able to get on the airplane and be on our way. We need to give a big thanks to Paul, Darren's dad, for all his help in organizing our garage so we could park our car in there while we were gone, for driving us to the airport, and for helping us lug our many bags through the airport to get them checked in. We had to do that by ourselves once we got to Germany, and it sure made us appreciate his help even more than we did already.
Mikayla did really well on the flight over. She only threw one screaming/ kicking/ rolling on the ground fit, and that was on the way onto the airplane. When that happened, and the flight attendants had to help us carry our stuff back to our seats because I had my arms full with a flailing toddler, I was bracing myself for a horrible flight. But, God was merciful, because once we actually got back to our seats and she was able to sit in her car seat and play with the video monitor in front her her she did amazing. She played and she slept a little and she watched "Bolt" on her video monitor about 4 times (she loved the doggy, and pointing him out on the screen whenever he came on). Luckily, there was a little girl about her age in the seat in front of her, so she didn't mind that Mikayla was constantly kicking her seat. The older gentleman that was in the seat next to Mikayla was pretty entertained by her and was understanding about the occasional foot in his food or flying toy. Our flight was a direct one from Portland to Frankfurt, so we had it easy in that we could just settle in and stay there and not have to change planes.
Once in Frankfurt, we were able to get through customs with little difficulty. We did have to wait around for quite awhile for our stroller, which we had checked at the gate in Portland. The gate-checked items had accidentally been sent to the baggage claim with the rest of the luggage and had to be picked up and sent back. We waited for about 45 minutes and it wasn't there yet. Since we were starting to get worried about missing our train to Cologne, we decided to just leave the without the stroller and take the chance that we would have to buy a new one when we were here. It was nice that I had the Ergo toddler carrier with me, so that I could strap Mikayla to my back and not have to worry about my arms getting tired while we were walking. It turned out perfectly, though. We met up with the guy who was carrying our stroller to the train terminal, and we were able to retrieve that and the rest of our luggage and get down to the platform for our train with about a minute to spare.
When we arrived in Cologne, we were met by Olaf, one of Darren's coworkers here in Germany. We didn't really have any time to look around Cologne or see any of the sites since he needed to take us where we were going and then get back to work. I am sure that we will get back there to look around at some point on this trip. We somehow managed to squeeze all of our luggage and ourselves into the car, although there were a few moments when I thought we might need to leave some of it in a locker at the train station. And then we were off on the Autobahn. As Mikayla slept peacefully, we flew down the road at about 110 mph, passing other cars like they were standing still. What a welcome to Germany.
Olaf took us through the city of Düren, where Darren works, and then from there to the little village where the apartment that they rented for us is located. The village is called Embken, and it is located about 16 km south of Dueren. It takes Darren about 20 minutes to drive to work in the morning, so he actually has a little bit better of a commute here than he did in Oregon.
Mikayla did really well on the flight over. She only threw one screaming/ kicking/ rolling on the ground fit, and that was on the way onto the airplane. When that happened, and the flight attendants had to help us carry our stuff back to our seats because I had my arms full with a flailing toddler, I was bracing myself for a horrible flight. But, God was merciful, because once we actually got back to our seats and she was able to sit in her car seat and play with the video monitor in front her her she did amazing. She played and she slept a little and she watched "Bolt" on her video monitor about 4 times (she loved the doggy, and pointing him out on the screen whenever he came on). Luckily, there was a little girl about her age in the seat in front of her, so she didn't mind that Mikayla was constantly kicking her seat. The older gentleman that was in the seat next to Mikayla was pretty entertained by her and was understanding about the occasional foot in his food or flying toy. Our flight was a direct one from Portland to Frankfurt, so we had it easy in that we could just settle in and stay there and not have to change planes.
Once in Frankfurt, we were able to get through customs with little difficulty. We did have to wait around for quite awhile for our stroller, which we had checked at the gate in Portland. The gate-checked items had accidentally been sent to the baggage claim with the rest of the luggage and had to be picked up and sent back. We waited for about 45 minutes and it wasn't there yet. Since we were starting to get worried about missing our train to Cologne, we decided to just leave the without the stroller and take the chance that we would have to buy a new one when we were here. It was nice that I had the Ergo toddler carrier with me, so that I could strap Mikayla to my back and not have to worry about my arms getting tired while we were walking. It turned out perfectly, though. We met up with the guy who was carrying our stroller to the train terminal, and we were able to retrieve that and the rest of our luggage and get down to the platform for our train with about a minute to spare.
When we arrived in Cologne, we were met by Olaf, one of Darren's coworkers here in Germany. We didn't really have any time to look around Cologne or see any of the sites since he needed to take us where we were going and then get back to work. I am sure that we will get back there to look around at some point on this trip. We somehow managed to squeeze all of our luggage and ourselves into the car, although there were a few moments when I thought we might need to leave some of it in a locker at the train station. And then we were off on the Autobahn. As Mikayla slept peacefully, we flew down the road at about 110 mph, passing other cars like they were standing still. What a welcome to Germany.
Olaf took us through the city of Düren, where Darren works, and then from there to the little village where the apartment that they rented for us is located. The village is called Embken, and it is located about 16 km south of Dueren. It takes Darren about 20 minutes to drive to work in the morning, so he actually has a little bit better of a commute here than he did in Oregon.
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