Get out and explore!

          My husband and I think that one of the best things about living in Germany is being so close to so much history!! You just have to go out and find it! You'd be surprised what you can find so close to where you live! We often get on Google and start looking at surrounding cities to see if we can have a short day trip. Every Sunday my husband and I usually go on a bike ride, we get on Google Earth and look for trails where we can just ride for fun! Well yesterday my husband got on and realized that just 20 minutes north of us there are some castle ruins and a concentration camp. We loaded up our bikes on the bike rack and took off to Flossenbürg. We were hoping to find an awesome trail to ride on but realized that it was straight up a hill. We left the bikes and started hiking. There is a very clear cut path to the top of the hill but of course my husband wanted to take the adventurous way. We ended up climbing up boulders to get to the top. That was a first for me but I enjoyed the challenge. It was like a boys playground, you could climb everything! We explored the ruins and decided to take a different route back to the car. 

               We went down the backside of the ruins where there are huge slabs of granite. There were a lot of "wait for me" and scooting on my behind moments since I'm not quite the adventurous type like my husband but I still enjoyed it! After the castle ruins we drove to the Flossenbürg concentration camp. This was a smaller camp but still at one time housed 100,000 prisoners. There were two main buildings that had museums in them but unfortunately we arrived too late and they closed. We still walked around the grounds and plan on going back to read more, especially since it's also in English! I think it's so important for people to get out an explore. You don't have to go far to find something neat. Just get on Google and start looking. Don't be afraid to drive through a tiny German village where everyone is looking at you, who cares. Just go, explore and have fun! You will feel like you actually got something out of your stay in Germany!