October 2, 2025 - Dusseldorf, Germany

We were up in time to see Amelia before she was off to Kindergarten this morning. She is a precocious four year old and it was sure fun to see her. After she left, we got ready to leave and said our goodbyes to Stephan and Ashley before beginning our last day in Germany.

Just a side note if you are not familiar with the German school system. In Germany, Kindergarten is an educational facility for children aged three to seven that is similar to American preschool. It focuses on socialization, independence, and play-based learning to prepare them for primary school.

Our first stop was to see Die Kaiserpfalz in Kaiserwerth, the remains of a 12th century castle along the Rhine River. The first challenge was driving through Dussedorf-Kaiserwerth trying to find a place to park. We lucked into a spot a few blocks from this street. We didn't know if you had to pay for parking, but we had seen a police woman checking all the cars as we went by. There was a kind fisherman coming back to his car and we asked him. He didn't speak English and we don't speak German, but he was very helpful. He showed us a timer sticker and said you could park free for two hours. We looked in the glovebox of the rental, and sure enough, we had one also. We set the time and showed him and he gave us a thumbs up.

From our parking it was a short walk to the castle.
All of the signs were in English and German which was great for us. The picture is what they think the castle looked like originally.

It was fun wandering through and seeing everything.


There were wonderful views overlooking the Rhine River.



Afterwards, we walked along the Rhine for quite a while. We even spotted a large "caravan" RV park across the river. Many of the streets in the smaller areas are so small, there is NO WAY I would want to drive a motorhome here!

We decided to grab a doner sandwich since it was getting close to lunchtime. It was pretty tasty. Tobey wanted to explore a little more, so we drove around and through the countryside a bit. I decided I had enough of the tiny roads so we fueled up the rental car and went to check in to the Hotel Villa Casa. We unloaded the suitcases and headed to the airport to turn in the car. It only took a couple spins around the airport before we found the rental car garage, but we made it! Then came the next challenge ... taking the bus back to the hotel. With the help of the woman at the information booth, we headed outside the terminal and found the correct station. We thought we had the right bus, but it wasn't going where our map showed it should go, so we hopped off and walked to the next station. Well ... long story short - after a 20 minute walk we ended up getting on the same bus we had gotten off!!! I'm sure the driver was thinking we were absolutely nuts, but that's okay, we probably won't ever see him again!

We rearranged the suitcases and had some down time this afternoon to catch up on some emails before heading out to find some dinner. Our shuttle to the airport leaves at 4:15AM so we will be going to bed soon. Tomorrow will be a LONG travel day - Dusseldorf to Istantbul, a short layover, then Istanbul to Denver. It's been a great trip, but we are both looking forward to being home.