An Amazing Trip to Europe!

Tony's employer was having a 75th Anniversary Celebration/Sales Conference in Beckum, Germany and invited spouses to attend. That was all I needed to renew my passport and pack my bags!! And we were fortunate to have Tony's mom come stay with the kids! We decided to fly over before the celebration so we could see some things on our own and make it an anniversary trip. Initially I just looked at sites in Germany but then decided since Paris was only a five hour drive from Frankfurt, and I had always wanted to go there and who knows when I'd be back, we should make the detour. It was well worth it! Beautiful, amazing, breathtaking...WAY COOL! I always wanted a picture of Tony and I smooching under the Eiffel Tower and now I have it!
Here's a slide show of some of the highlights of our Paris portion of the trip. We had a room with a view. We had great pre-trip information given to us by our friends the Russells. We felt like we knew what we were doing once we got there thanks to them! The weather was perfect. We cruised the Seine at sunset, ate dinner on the Champs-Elysees, listened to mass at the cathedral of Notre Dame and much more. It was really amazing and I'm so grateful I got to go and experience it all.
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After a wonderful time in Paris we made our way back to Germany. We drove through the French countryside, Belgium and then stopped in Aachen, Germany. (The autobahn made me nervous.) We visited King Charlemagne's octagonal cathedral. It was incredibly beautiful on the inside. Aachen is known for it's Printen, a baked good similar to a gingerbread. It was a beautiful city. Then we went to Cologne, Germany. We took a bus tour of the city and visited the Cologne Cathedral. Another amazing, incredible place. And we took a cruise on the Rhine. I loved the colorful buildings, cobblestone streets and flowers!

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Then we headed to Beckum for the celebration. They had a wonderful spouse program. We went to Essen and saw the Ruhr region with it's old coal mines and new museums. We visited Alfred Krup's house and the Leaonardo Glass company and their museum. It was all very interesting and beautiful. I feel very blessed to have had the opportunity to visit such wonderful places and meet such interesting people.