Our Dulles flight took off on time. Lufthansa served us complimentary drinks (Seth and Ross appreciated this as much as we did) and dinner, then we all attempted to sleep, even through some notable turbulence.
None of us slept too well. Landed in Frankfurt about an hour before scheduled, well before 8am. We walked and walked and walked some more through the airport to claim our one checked bag (which we carried on for the return flight), then got through passport control with minimal wait or fuss.
Hopped on the S8 train to Mainz Hauptbahnhof, and our hotel was just across the street. Were able to check in early, put our bags in our rooms, and enjoy gratis coffee in the hotel’s cafe (where we would enjoy breakfast the next morning).
Then we set out to explore. We went into two churches (which the boys really enjoyed, much to my surprise), had pastries at Werners. Around lunchtime, we found our way to the Gutenberg Museum, paid for admission, then suddenly, all of us were overcome with the overwhelming urge to nap, so we headed back to the hotel and crashed for about 2 hours, which was exactly what we all needed.
Refreshed, we headed back out, towards the riverfront. The trees along the walk were tagged in numerical order, so we took a photo of tree #313 in honor of Steve’s triplets, whose birthday is March 13 (and the first apartment # he had on H Street).
Dinner was schnitzel and Bitburger; walked back to the hotel and turned in early-ish. Slept for 8 hours, thanks to the effective combination of melatonin and benadryl.
Soup Is Not A Finger Food 