Germany into Switzerland

July 18.  BAUTZEN, GERMANY.  Before we left Poland, we met with city officials in Wagrowiec, from the area we believe my great grandparents were from.  They gave us a gift of a book from the area and gave us information on how to contact the archive location where all church records area kept.  As of today, we believe the original spelling for Wahowske is Wachowski. It was nice to have been in Norway and Germany/Poland....where the roots of Danette's family are from.  We are in areas of Jim's family origin but do not have actual city names.

July 19.  DRESDEN, GERMANY.  Dresden is over 800 years old.  During February 1945 the city was demolished by an allied air attack.  Some of the buildings are still left with the blackened exterior from fires and bombings.  Most buildings have been restored, and there is still rebuilding in the Old Town.  This city was one of the top on our list so far.  10 million visitors come here each year and most of them are from Germany.

July 20-21.  PRAHA/PRAGUE, CZECH REPUBLIC.  We drove to the Czech Republic.  Rained all day for the first time on our trip, and drizzed rain when we went to Prague.  We were here 12 years ago at Christmas and loved it.  It is now a heavy tourist area, especially in the summer months.  It is still a beautiful city to visit and walk around.  We enjoyed the side streets and ate great food and drank great beer!

July 22-23.  FURTH IM WALD, GERMANY.  We stopped in PLZEN/PILSEN, Czech Republic, and went to the Pilsner Urquell Brewery.  This company is now owned by SAB/Miller.  The tour was great in that we saw the new production lines as well as the old beer cellars from 1842. 

We drove into Germany and stayed at a nice campground, walking distance to the village.  We spent Saturday walking around the village and stopped for bratwurst and Weissen Beer.  We saw the mascot of the city, which was a dragon from the 1400's and now is a mechanical dragon and is used in festivals in the area.

July 24.  BUCHS, SWITZERLAND.  We drove across southern Germany, a small section of Austria, and landed in Buchs.  It is located adjacent to the small country of Liechtenstein.  Werdenberg is a small area next to Buchs from the 1200-1400's to today which has an old castle and 37 homes.