Like a church spire

Speyer, Schpeyer, Shhhpeyer? Not sure the correct pronunciation of this town (Spire) but we find ourselves in Speyer today. After the very looooong day yesterday and busting out my 90’s dance moves, we did not have to wake up early today or rush off the boat and were able to leisurely wake up on our own time (hello 6:00 am….sometimes I hate being a morning person). But, even waking up according to my natural circadian rhythm, it was nice to wake up on my own time (though I believe I probably actually woke up to my friends texting before they went to bed, you know 9 hour time difference).

One thing I have yet to mention is, I’m working on earning my Master’s Degree at this specific point in time, and well…..even though I’m on vacation, my grad school courses are not. So in between all the cruising, touring, eating, drinking, dancing, picture taking, and sleeping, I am trying to make sure I am keeping up with my course work….. thankfully, because I’m an early riser (ugh) I was also able to finish my assignment and turn it in. Granted it probably wasn’t my best work and doing school work on a moving boat while I have a touch of motion sickness is really the last thing that I look forward to. Anyway…… I passed the course with a B+ and I’m blaming the harsh (on a luxury river cruise on the Rhine River in the middle of Europe) study conditions as to why I didn’t finish with an A.

Well after being a responsible student we went for breakfast and were able to finally have a nice sit down breakfast without the rush of needing to get off the boat. Another couple cups of coffee (I normally drink one cup a day at home, but here I have 2 or 3 each morning), and delicious breakfast I returned to the room to get ready for the day and low and behold, I walk in and waiting for me is two beautiful pieces of carrot cake under a cloche on the desk…..Now you may be asking yourself why is there carrot cake in your room? Is this something that naturally happens? Well to answer your unasked question, no. This is not standard practice. Buuuuuut because our Program Director is the greatest of all time (Gavin), who shares in my love of carrot cake, special arrangements we’re made.

Remember when we were in Cologne and left the boat for dinner to get Italian food and ate the big wheel of goat cheese? Well even if you don’t, that night ON the boat the dessert included with dinner was carrot cake, which I did not know until we returned from the boat and Gavin (the GOAT of Program Directing) mentioned that we missed out on carrot cake. When I proclaimed my love of carrot cake and we bonded more in that moment, he made it his mission to get me a piece of carrot cake. He went and asked the kitchen if there was any left, which there was not, so he called and woke up the chef to find out if any was hidden away, there was not. The next morning he had told me he talked to the chef and the chef had instructed the pastry chef to make carrot cake again for dessert…..but of course this was the night we would be off the boat dancing in a German tavern ! Well the request went out to save me some cake and hopefully it would be in my room when arriving back from dinner, well it was not. Long story longer…..I wake up, do school work, have coffee, have more coffee, eat breakfast, and then magically as if the carrot cake fairy flittered into my room herself…..there was cake! Specially and specifically made for me to rectify the disappointment I experienced missing out on carrot cake two nights in a row (this moment in time right here is where Gavin went from good program Director to the Greatest Program Director of all of Viking).

So today, we did not join any walking tours but instead took ourselves out and around. We took a left off the plank onto dry land not the river, and began walking toward town. We come to a parking lot and Viking guide who said we needed to go the other way, but really I think we could have cut through the parking lot and still reached our intended destination. But we walked the other way and well, it was prettier. Probably not shorter, but prettier.

As we walked into the town of Speyer we came immediately to a very, like, very large church, or better known as a Roman cathedral. A big red stone church with not much to look at but a fountain on one end and a statute in the middle and some extremely heavy doors that led to the inside that needed all my core strength to open. The church is set at the end or on the corner, I’m not sure the geographics, of the main street to which we meander down.

Speyer is really very pretty. It hosts some very beautiful buildings and cute cafe’s. At the end of the street you come upon a large clock tower that is relevant to something in some way but I will for the life of me not remember what. The building it is attached to which is the original building from sometime ago has been turned into a hotel, because that seems to be the thing to do with old buildings in Europe.

As we walked through the clock tower and further down the street we came across another……I’ll let you guess…..you got it! Another church. A religious bunch the Europeans. This church though just happened to have someone playing the church organ and the sounds of pop music superstar Ed Sheeran was echoing through the cathedral. I of course got video of it because how often do you here “Perfect” being played on an organ in a church in Germany? I mean maybe the Germans hear it often but it was a new experience for me. Now, I would upload the video and share it, but since I am not on a premium subscription here, I don’t have that ability. But if you follow this to my Facebook page, I’ll have it there in the comments. Otherwise you will just have to use your best imagination and of what it sounds like while looking at picture of the outside of this church.

After the mini Ed Sheeran cover concert, we continued on walking and looped ourselves back around the outskirt of town and back to the main street. We were feeling a little peckish at this time and decided that food and spritz was a great idea. But first a stop in the candy shop for all things sweet.

And now, I know that you all don’t know me extraordinarily well but if you did or do, you may have knowledge of my love of soft pretzels, or in Germany they are just pretzels. And well we have been in Germany for a couple of days now and until Speyer, I did not yet have a pretzel , so that was also a priority and let me tell you it was soft and salty and delicious (and would not be my last pretzel for this trip, I think maybe 3 or 4 more to come). Anyway, with candy and pretzels in tow, we sit down at a gelateria and order our Aperol Spritz (no we are not bougie or on the trend, we discovered these many years ago, 2016 to be exact when we toured Italy on a culinary vacation). My aunt decided on a gelato and ordered what can only be described as a chocolate tower of goodness (I’m pretty sure they had a different name for it) and I ordered just two small scoops of vanilla and strawberry.

One of my most favorite things about Europe is just sitting outside at a café and looking at the surroundings and the people and really just slowing down to take in life happening around you, and the town of Speyer did not disappoint. There was beautiful buildings, amazing food, great shopping, friendly people, lots of cute dogs, and a gorgeous green park to walk through. Not to mention the cute restaurants lining the path along the water. I know that I should pay more attention to the history of things, but I tend to just immerse myself in the food and people watching instead.