April 17 - Poof - and the trip is over!

St Peters

Happy Easter! Up at 7:30 and off to breakfast, which was samo, samo. Wanted to be ready to go ashore when we docked, which was about 9:30. This stop was Regensburg and included a walking tour but we passed on it and left a little early on our own. I had a map of the old town and easily found the Cathedral which was very gothic in structure. We waited outside and could hear the choir singing and watched the priests carrying in palm fronds. We didn’t know who all the younger men in robes were, as they looked too young to be priests and there were so many. Perhaps a boys choir or really overdressed altar boys. Being Easter and Sunday morning there were no regular shops open.

One of the locks

From on the bridge

We made our way to the Lovelock Bridge where hundreds of padlocks are engraved with couples names and a date and are locked to the sides of the bridge. Could be wedding dates or dates they met. All kinds, colors and sizes. Pretty neat. Further down the river Danube was the 12th century bridge. We did some photoing there and by the time we finished a few shops had opened and we pounced on them, hungry to spend the last of our money on our last day. Can’t bring any home you know. We had to be back on the ship at 11:30 so the race was on. We did our shopping and ended up running into Angela and Terry and we walked back to the ship together and took some photos of them, us and the ship before boarding. Can’t believe the week went so fast. We really like them and it will be a tearful parting.

Kelly, Kerry and Angela at the
Amadeus Classic

We started our packing before lunch. The lunch was excellent. A nice vinegarette over cucumbers, tomato and onion with chives, lentil soup, which I love and I opted for seasoned rice, fish in a nice sauce and mixed veggies. Dessert was a small piece of apple strudel with a vanilla sauce. We finished packing after lunch.

We met up with our gang in the lounge as we had moved further up the river and docked to wait for a group on a tour and this was the designated meeting place. I finished my second book and Kerry and I brought out the rest of our Hungarian sausage and shared it with our friends and some fellow passengers, as we knew we could not take in back into the US. It made a nice addition to the tea and cakes served at 4.

section of the lounge

Everyone was wondering why we still hadn’t left for Nuremberg and at our disembarkation meeting at 6:30 the mystery was solved. We were docked in Kelheim just before a lock and the lock was broken and would not be opening until Tuesday. Uh oh! The captain assured the passengers that the staff was making bus arrangements for everyone to leave from here to Nuremberg to the airport or the train station or busses to Munich airport, which was where we were headed. It ended up that our bus was to leave at the same time as it would have if we left from Nuremberg, so it was no big deal for us. However, our friends Angela and Terry were rather concerned as they had to be at the train station for the only train of the day headed to their next destination.

The baked Alaska

Kelly, Etsuko, Alan, Terry, Angela, Kerry

There was a cocktail reception at 7 and dinner at 7:30. On the way to dinner we were assigned colored luggage tags based on what bus we were taking in the morning. Dinner was excellent. We started with a small mixed salad, then oxtail soup, followed by prawns over herbed risotto. We cleansed out pallet with a berry sorbet in anticipation of the beef tenderloin with garlic scalloped potatoes and a few veggies. Dessert was baked Alaska, which I just had the ice cream. Then they served a plate to share of fancy chocolates and candies. We shared our final cups of tea and coffee and reminisced of the great week we’d had and made sure we all had the appropriate email and mailing addresses. Terry and Angela’s bus was leaving at 7:15 so we didn’t expect to have breakfast together and they left first to get to bed early for their long day. We stayed with Alan and Etsuko a while longer before final packing and showers.