Schwetzingen and lots of rain!

Today, we got soaked. Let me tell you the story of our soaking-ness.

First, this morning we had our conducting class and concert music orientation. That went pretty well! I was a little tired from only getting 7 hours of sleep last night instead of 8, which is pretty ridiculous since 7 hours of sleep should be plenty. But anyway, after classes were over all of us met and tried to figure out how we were going to get to Schwetzingen. The original plan was for everyone to bike there, but three of us decided to take the bus: Jonathan, Jessica G. and I. Mostly, we decided that we weren't up for the hour long bike ride in possible rainy weather! Anyway, we found out that we had to make the trip on our own (without Andrea or Yvonne, our native Germans who know their way around!) So we walked to our first bus stop from the Pension, and made it off the right stop, then ran to catch our next bus that would take us from the outside of Heidelberg to the city Schwetzingen. Then when we got to the city we got off at the right place, and quickly found our restaurant! However, the rest of our group wasn't going to arrive for about another 40 minutes.

Then it started raining, quite hard. And we couldn't find any cover! We were looking for a cafe of some sort, because we knew that we could go inside and just order a cup of coffee or something. We flipped a coin and decided to go left, but didn't find anything in that direction. On our return path, we noticed something that looked like a small billboard in the middle of a parking lot, so we went to go investigate! Turned out that it was just a sign on top of a van that had a map on top of it. So we did find the coffee shop after another minute or two! We sat for about 20 minutes; Jessica and I both ordered Afaelsaftshorle. This is a drink that is half apple juice and half sparkling water. So delicious! And Jon ordered a coke. The best part was that the waiters didn't speak any English, so we ordered and asked for our bill all in German. It was pretty awesome!

When the bikers arrived, we had dinner at a nice restaurant called something like Baus Louf.. not sure on the name. Anyway, it was absolutely delicious. We all had the classic schnitzel dish that came with a yummy salad and some french fries. Then after we all had a really bad case of food coma we toured the nearby castle that was the summer residence for an elector of something with the government. It was beautiful, except when it was time to head home, it started pouring rain. We got completely soaked! Jon, Jessica G and I decided that we were going to run to the bus stop, and ended up taking Jessica K and Drea with us, too. The five of us made it home to the Pension after suffering through bitter cold, lots of rain, and buses that wouldn't stop at our stops. In fact, it was raining so hard that everyone else who biked to Schwetzingen ended up leaving their bikes there and taking the bus back. And they are planning on retrieving the bikes tomorrow!

So when we all finally returned home, it was a cozy night. I and a few others didn't even step outside again, which was so nice! Almost all of us took warm showers and attempted to dry all of our clothes out. I changed into comfy sweats and a sweater. And the best part is that we get to sleep in tomorrow! Then we have a scavenger hunt at 12, and a barbeque at 5 or so.

I did take pictures today, but I will post them sometime this weekend :)
Bed time once again!