That’s a Brangelina way of saying France and Germany, in case you didn’t get the memo.  Today I was in three countries in one day!  More on that in a second.

When I woke up, the first thing I did was go outside and pick blackberries!  S’s parents have all kinds of fruits and veggies growing in their garden and in the trees and bushes all around their house.  The blackberries are ripe right now and I was very excited to pick some.

They have many bushes – I was out there for over an hour and barely scratched the surface!  I picked two huge bowls worth.  Tomorrow I will pick more, there are still a gazillion out there.  They are sooo delicious!

Picking in pjs and all

In the beginning…

Filling up bowl…

After bowl.  ‘Twas glorious.  After my blackberry fest, I quickly got ready and we were off!  Headed north to Germany.

Along the way we stopped for lunch.  I got a roast beef sandwich on a baguette.

There was some white sauce on it… S and I weren’t sure what the sauce was, but it was tasty!  The bread was super yummy too, with sesame and flax seeds.

Beefy.

When we crossed into Germany, we drove on the autobahn for 20 min or so.  It was pretty crazy having no speed limit – although around the border area there are a lot of sections that they have started to put a speed limit to.  Then we arrived at Freiburg in im Breisgau.  I loved the city right away because they have these little water gutters throughout the streets.

The water is clean and sparkly – not dirty like sewer water. in the road in the US.

It is a fun place to play for little kids, and a drinking fountain and place to cool off for doggies!

I must admit, I almost tripped or fell into it a couple of times when I was walking and talking (or taking pictures???) and wasn’t paying attention.  I’ll bet there are a fair number of sprained ankles in Freiburg each year

We walked around the streets and went into shops.

One place S wanted to visit was one of his favorite bookstores there, where he bought his first computer programming book when he was a kid.  Dork.

He even bought that book… as a memento.  I bought a german grammar book, which has some humor and great explanations, and an intro to German CD/workbook combo.  I will be starting German class in the fall (after last spring’s fail) and can’t wait to learn!

I loved this little poster on the wall of the bookstore:

Do you get it??

For a snack stop, we went to Nordsee, which is a fish restaurant in Germany.  We got it to go.

I got smoked fish!  I have no idea what kind of fish it was… because I couldn’t read the sign.  But it was damn good

One nice thing about Europe this time of year is that everything is very GREEN! 

After our time in Germany, we headed to France.  We went to the city of Colmar.

It was so old and quaint.  The whole city looked like a movie set.

We went to a cafe for ice cream and coffee.

Diet coke for me, please.

There was a pretty fountain…

Which required some serious pictures.

And some not so serious ones…

We had fun

I love ice cream!

There were horse-drawn carriages going through the city, too!

Fun was had by all.

Exhausted, we headed out of France and back into Switzerland.  We drove into Basel, where we stopped at Burger King for dinner.  High class, we know

Behold… our $31 dinner.  For two.  At Burger King.

Yes, that is my 11 dollar salad you see.  Sigh.

To bed for me, before I fall asleep typing!  Going to three countries in one day is exhausting