Thursday, March 13, 2008

Rothaus Brauerei

A few days ago I went down to Egg (pronounced kind of like "Ache"), a small neighborhood in Constance. It's really quaint and exactly how you'd picture a small German town. It's also right on the lake, so I got to walk along one of the beaches.

Here are some of my pictures from the brief trip:


mailbox


A bunch of the houses in this region of Germany have these huge rain shelters full of firewood.


Lake Constance as seen from Egg - Unfortunately, this is not one of the angles from which you can see the Alps.


more of Lake Constance
Although you can't see the Alps, you can see basically everything else! You can see the entire way across the lake into Switzerland!

Alright, since there seems to be an enormous amount of interest in my living quarters, below are photos of The Room. I swear I didn't clean before I took the photos; it's actually stayed that clean! (And if you don't believe that, how about "I only cleaned a little bit"?)


before shot
I took this my first night (March 3rd). This isn't the worst view (eg. you can't see the spiders!).


after shot
I did a fair amount of cleaning, buying and decorating.


view of my sink and a chair I sniped off the side of the road - It's actually pretty comfortable.


last shot - I'm sure you've seen enough photos of my room now.


Yesterday on our way to class it rained a little. The result: a full (180°) rainbow looks like it's arching out of the town. Ever ask yourself what's at the end of the rainbow? Now you know: Constance.

After class yesterday we went to the Rothaus Brewery in the Black Forest. It smelled gross everywhere. Even outdoors, which is actually quite the accomplishment. The first thing we did when we got there was watch this heinous movie that was supposedly about the "history of the brewery." Think Clockwork Orange style propaganda. "Rothaus is the best in the land!" It was really cheesy, too.

Then we toured the factory. It's was almost interesting, but you couldn't really hear the tour guide because of all of the machinery noise. Plus she was speaking German.


shot of the inner workings - They make thousands of bottles an hour. I forget the exact amount. I'm thinking 90,000 or 60,000.


This is me next to some huge copper things that I'm pretty sure are used in the fermenting process. (What else would they be used for?)

Overall, tho, I'd have to say I LOVED the trip to the brewery. Want to know why? It was free! Everything. And at the end as a part of this free trip (kostenlose Reise), we got a huge meal with as much beer as we could drink! And the beer was all really good and chilled. Plus I got lots of bread rolls and sausage. Mmm! How much more German can you get? Beer, sausage and pretzels in the Black Forest?

Oh, and PS ANNALIESE - HOLY COW HAVE A GREAT TIME IN JAPAN! I wanna see photos and an email with stories from your trip!

10 comments:

Colin said...

Oh, and I forgot to say thank you Grandma Pat for the wonderful poem!

Catherine said...

Great photos, your room looks uberclean and uberspecial!
Here we are, outside the Genius Bar at the Mac Store, with my dead computer, hoping or a resurrection of sorts.
And Annaliese is on her way to Tokyo
And Colin, there you are in Constance, on the other side of the rainbow, drinking beer, eating German breads and sausages.
Pretty cool
Thanks for the new view into your world
love ya!

Karl said...

Mmmmmmmmm Black Forest Rothaus beer, pretzels and sausages! Truly a German experience. And- that is quite the pad, Colin. You need a disco ball, maybe a lava lamp. Tom Jones/ Austin Powers it up a bit!

Cody said...

The pic of the firewood looks like it was taken at Murray's "cabin"! hahaha. Nice pictures, it looks really nice over there, the room looks good too. The snow is finally melting here and I stepped in a huge blob of mud, that wasn't cool. I bet the beer factory was fun!

Paul Halverson said...

Thanks for the room photos - looks like you fixed it up pretty nice! Also notice you've already been painting... you'll have to post some pictures of what you are working on... Anna is half way to Tokyo now... probably sleeping. What an exciting adventure. Strange feeling to watch each of our children walk thru the security gates into the airport off on great adventures... Mom's computer is staying overnight at the Genius Bar - they are running a bunch of tests to see if there is a hardware problem. For the battery, the guy took one look at it and filled out the form to get a replacement... no run-around at all like you got on the phone with AppleCare... so at least that part worked out well. Keep up the great photos!

Paul Halverson said...

Oh, by the way, I set up Skype on Anna's computer, so if you get your internet set up in time, you guys can talk - you even get to see her since she has the camera built in to her laptop....

Pat M said...

Surprise for everyone...your room looks neat and tidy and useful. The photos from Egg are great, just like all of them have been. Lake Constance is beautiful, and just think, I'm looking right across into Switzerland! The beer tour and food was quite suitable, Colin; can almost taste the sausage. It is SO MUCH FUN reading all this; prob more fun for us than for you, but THANKS. I know you are speaking German at the university. When you are with other students from US, do you still use your German, or lapse into English?
I'm writing Thurs evening 10:30 pm.
Had choir practice tonight so didn't get at computer till late.
Guess I'm trying to figure, are you one day earlier than I am here?
LOL Grandma Pat

Unknown said...

I'm glad to get this perspective!
First, I knew you were in the southern part of Deutschland, but I did not realize you were right on the border with Switzerland!
"Egg" must have its roots as a farming community. You are near our family's roots! The Eg(g)enbergers were the "harrowers of the mountains".

Catherine said...

Annaliese, if you happen to check Colin's blog when you are in Japan, here is a message for you:
To check your email while you are in Tokyo, go to mail.magnaspeed.net
then go to "Mailbox" and "Inbox"
Dad and I weren't sure if you know how to check your mail while you travel internationally.
How is Tokyo????

Colin and Annaliese - best to both of you as you explore the world!

love ya!

grandma mary said...

Hi - Neat pictures! I love the name Egg. I didn't realize you were so close to Switzerland. The lake pictures are expecially great. On Wed. we had a beautiful rainbow with very bright colors. It was a perfect arch so the end of the rainbow is in Jackson, too. You did a good job decorating your room.
It will be weird to stay at Byron next week with both you and Anna gone.
Love, Grandma Mary