June 14, 2009

We left Prague this morning bright and early. It was about a seven hour drive. We had bagged lunches again at a rest stop. You had to pay to use the bathroom, yet the 50 cents it cost gave you a voucher for 50 cents in the store. Talk about a smart marketing technique. At first I didn’t understand why they make you pay, but then I noticed how clean the bathrooms were than compared to the states. Now I see how 50 cents could be worth it.

We stopped in Dachau Germany to visit the concentration camp. It was sobering to walk through the very same gate thousands of men, women, and children walked through before me. The camp was absolutely huge. I got to see one of the buildings where they lived – it was so crammed and dirty, I couldn’t imagine living such a life. There was a large open area where they had role call every morning. The prisoners had to stand still for an hour straight until role call was finished. They had a crematorium and gas chamber (which wasn’t used). Again, absolutely sobering to be in the same room and see the very furnaces used to burn thousands of bodies. No museum in the US can create such the emotion that being at the very camp where it all happened can. Words really cannot describe the experience. 

 We continued the drive on, driving around Munich. We got to pass Allianz Arena where Bayern Munich plays. Then the drive became amazing. I was looking out towards Munich when I saw some dark wall on the horizon. It then hit me that I was looking at the Alps. There they were, outlined on the horizon, and towering over Munich and Germany. We slowly crept towards them until we hit Austria. The drive to Innsbruck was through a valley all the way – about 70 km. It was just mesmerizing to just stare out at the mountains. And while they aren’t the biggest I have seen (we have yet to see true Alps until we hit Lucerne so I have heard..) they were gorgeous. Innsbruck seems nice, it has been hard to focus; we have a test tomorrow and I need to finish my briefing report on Black and Decker. We are literally in a valley in the mountains. The hotel we are at is really awesome – it is the sports center where they held the Olympics thirty years ago. We are surrounded by a soccer stadium, and indoor arena for hockey, and you can see a huge ski jump off in the distance. It can be hard to understand that the Olympics we held here since all of the venues are so small, but then you just remember that the Olympics in the 70s were much smaller than they are today. I have to go finish studying and hopefully tomorrow we can go into town.

The Alps!