Ferienplanung

Back when I was reveling in how easy and inexpensive back-to-school shopping was, I didn't realize that there must be some sort of unofficial checklist, tucked in the collective consciousness of the Swiss.  Ella came home today with another Joker assignment, this one because she no longer had the pencil sharpener that came with her Etui, and she was already out of sharp pencils. Probably from writing so many Joker assignments.

She was in no mood today, resisting the idea of bucking down and doing math and a punishment assignment. She put her little chin in the air, announcing "No. I won't do it." But she would, and she did.

The only comfort I could offer her was the fact that, although her and Alex's summer was cut short, they have a two-week vacation in mid-October to anticipate. It's approaching more quickly than she'd ever believe, so Dennis and I curled up tonight with our cups of tea did a little vacation planning.

First, it's time for us to figure out, finally, when we'll be coming home.  We've always had a vague idea: "somewhere around Thanksgiving or Christmas." But we have to do better than that, and soon.  Looking at the kids' school calendar, the last day of classes here is December 23.  Late as that is, it would be awfully nice for the kids to have the closure they'd get from attending classes up to the official vacation.  Ella, Joker woes aside, agreed that she'd really like to stay here until the end of December.

So if that's our hope, it looks like we're staying here through Christmas. If we were to try to rush home in time for Christmas with the family after school let out, we'd surely be so jet-lagged and haggard that we'd scarcely enjoy the holiday.

But we are going to try to be home in time for the kids to start school with their classmates in January, which means we'll probably need to be out of our apartment for Christmas.

I'm sure you'll eventually hear more than you ever want to about how difficult it is to vacate an apartment in Switzerland.  For now, I'll just say that the apartment needs to be absolutely pristine when you hand over the keys.  Pristine to the point that if you don't hire a removal company to do your cleaning (and this inevitably will cost somewhere in the four digits) you'll never see your security deposit again.  So we need to give ourselves time to get our things packed, and then to let the removal company come, before we leave.

Since we're going to be in a hotel for the holidays, we'll splurge on a nice one: we have our eye on a Kinderhotel in Austria, a five-smiley hotel (oh la la!), with ski lifts right next to the hotel.  I wrote them for a reservation: I think it would be incredibly fun, and we'd definitely leave the continent rested and happy after a week there. We'll be leaving on a very high note, as far as the kids are concerned, and I'm hoping that will help solidify a positive attitude toward this whole crazy year.

And on to more pressing matters. Dennis set aside a week of his vacation for October, and we've been kicking around ideas for a while, now, as to what we should do with it.  But really, in the end, the decision was easy: we're going back to Bavaria.

Dennis tells me, and I've had it confirmed by many, that the Germans really don't like Munich and Bavaria much at all.  They look at it as a sort of backward area of the country. Dennis called it the Texas of Germany. Like Texas, Bavaria has a culture based on proud folk tradition and beer and meat. "But we love Texas," he shrugged. And we do. And we don't see what's not to love about Bavaria, either.

There are a couple of little amusement parks in the south of Germany that we have our eye on.  The board game and puzzle company, Ravensburger, has a children's amusement park called Ravensburger Spieleland.  And there's a little low-key fairy-tale–themed park (similar to the one we visited in Luxembourg) called Märchenwald. And Alex has said many, many times that he'd really like to go back to Legoland: we'd like to do that for him.

And then there are a few things that Dennis and I would like to do, too.  By Lake Constance, there's a pretty little garden island called Insel Mainau. And just north of Lake Constance is Affenberg Salem, an animal park similar to Tierpark Goldau, instead of feeding free-ranging deer, you can give popcorn to wild-roaming Old World monkeys. And Dennis, he'd kind of like another beer and pork knuckle in Münich.

So we've put together a driving route that encompasses all of those. As Dennis looked at our plan, he nodded. "So we'll start in Lake Constance, and then drive through Ravensburger, and then Legoland, and then up toward Münich.  Sounds easy." And then he listened to himself and looked at me, aghast.  "What have you done to me, that this sounds easy?"

But I don't think it'll be hard: the most difficult part will be the planning, I think.  It's ridiculously frustrating, making hotel reservations here. More often than not, you can't book online; rather, you have to call (or, in our case, e-mail, since my German is so shaky) the hotel for a quote for your family, and then you need to wait about 48 hours for them to respond.  And then, when they tell you they're all booked up, you have to start all over again.  But I spent the last hour of my night using Google translate to help me compose reservation requests for some hotels and pensions on our route.

While we were cobbling together our vacation, we put together a little bucket list of other places we'd like to visit before we leave at the end of the year: Appenzell, Liechtenstein, the Romanch area of Switzerland, the Oberland, Mt. Pilitus, the Rhinefalls, Strasbourg, Bern.

The kids don't really have any long weekends for these trips, but they do have their two Joker Tags, the free days from school that kids are allotted, no questions asked. These must be requested at least two weeks in advance so that the teacher can approve them (insuring that the kid doesn't miss any field trips or other school events). We didn't take advantage of the Joker Tags during the last school year, but I think we will this time.  The kids had a such a  short summer break, and their winter break will be brief, too, at just over a week. And they won't get the pleasure of the two-week vacation that their Swiss classmates will enjoy in early February.  The least we can give them is their Joker Tags.

We think we'll use these in early December, to chip away at our bucket list.  We think we'll take a trip toward Strasbourg, which we've heard is really fun at Christmastime, with a beautiful and extensive Christmas Market. And, at the same time, we'll visit Europa-Park for a day or two. The kids here love it: they say it's like a Disneyland without the lines.

My mom keeps asking me if we're sure we don't want to spend a second year here in Switzerland. Truly, it would be nice to stay, and to take advantage of our hard-earned growing familiarity with the region. But we have a home and a family and a life to return to at the end of the year: we have to go back.  But you know us: we'll definitely try to get the most out of our last few months here.