A self portrait at the border.
Aaron in front of the Castle at Vianden. It was a really neat castle, but the weather was horrible. The temperature was low for the season, and it was pouring. Ugh! Typical when we visit castles...
We did a self guided tour of the castle (not too shabby job interpreting the French text on the displays since we don't know French), and they had an exhibit of cartoons from a contest. Here is a picture of two of them. They had to be related to medieval times (we think). There were some really funny ones. We would have bought a book, but they didn't have them!
Self portrait after the visit.
A picture of the castle on the way out of town. Yeah, I could live there :)
Next we drove a few minutes down the road to Diekirch. We walked around this nice little town and had a sandwich for lunch. Here Aaron is in the center with a fountain. The donkeys all had moveable body parts!
Our main objective in Diekirch was to visit the National Museum that detailed the portion of the Battle of the Bulge that affected Luxemborg. We used an audioguide to tour, and it was an excellent visit. We were so glad we made the stop and took the time to use the audioguide. They had tons of memorabilia including uniforms, supplies, ammunition, vehicles, newspaper clippings, etc. Really cool! This is Aaron with a US tank outside the museum.
Our next destination was Belgium. Here is a self portrait of us with the Belgium sign. That's another country off Aaron's list (I had already checked it off).
We stopped in Bastogne to visit the US War Memorial for the Battle of the Bulge. Bastogne was an important town, and they have a museum and monument. We were too late for the museum so we can't tell you why it was important, but we had a nice visit to the memorial. Here I am on the top. It was very windy, and I was cold!
Me with the memorial. This is to give you an idea of the size.
Aaron with the memorial.
Just a nice picture with the American and EU flags.
We hopped in the car for another hour drive to Bouillon, Belgium. This is actually very close to the French border. They have a nice setting on a river, and yes, there is a castle. We stayed for the night at the Bellevue B&B. It was a nice place to stay with an owner who spoke wonderful English. After we got ourselves organized, we went for a walk and had some dinner. This is me in town on one of the bridges. It was a quaint little town.
Here is me with the castle in the background.
This is me at the restaurant (Chez Betty). I had a huge bucket of mussels in a white wine sauce that were excellent. Aaron had a steak in a brown sauce and Roquefort cheese. He helped me with my mussels since there were too many. We also had crepes with chocolate sauce and whipped cream for dessert and some great Belgian beer. Not bad for our first menu in French (although the owner was a good guy and helped us out)
This is the castle at night. Aaron went out and got a few night shots that turned out great, but I stayed inside. It was too cold for me (and I was lazy).
Another great day of vacation!April 30, 2008, Vianden and Diekirch, Luxemborg, Bastogne and Bouillon, Belgium
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