A loong day and a short trip

Our friends the Bennetts arrived at our house (AKA the "pond house" as named by O) on Wednesday evening.  They had been on tour in Scotland and London for the previous week and planned this 5 day stop-over before they returned to the UK to travel in Wales.  We are all, especially A and R, glad to see our good friends and have a chance for lengthy conversations in our native tongue and to show them a part of our life here.

The big question, whenever you have visitors, where ever you are, is where to take them.  There are things you take for granted or are unsure if visitors new to the area would like to see.  Do they just want to relax or should you make the most of every moment since they have come this far.  Luneburg is a very nice town and has several historic sights that survived the WWII bombings.  The town feels very German and makes a nice walking tour.  That covers about a day.  Hamburg covers another day (which is where they are today) but is rather limited in things to do with kids in tow.  We also want to see something new to us - or worth seeing a second time.

We decided to take them to a small town, Celle, where we had been before but had missed the Folk Museum and all the shops had been closed on Sunday on that first trip.  It seemed a good place to take kids and was a short enough train ride (30+ minutes) to make a quick day trip.  We even allowed the girls to skip school to spend time with their friends!

Since it was a short trip, we decided we had enough time to finish up some laundry at the laundromat in the morning.  I had also had O scheduled for childcare in the morning and wanted to keep that routine.  So, it was after 12:00 when we were finally ready to head out the door.  Soon, what started out to be an easy day and simple trip to Celle became much, much more complicated.

First, I realized too late that the Bennetts had purchased the wrong tickets.  Without getting too complicated (although it is) they had purchased tickets which allowed them unlimited travel within the "Greater Hamburg Area" of which Luneburg is a part, but Celle is not.  In finding this out at the train station after much frantic button-pushing at the self-serve kiosk and a wait at the Travel Center, we missed the train we had intended to take. We had to wait another hour and purchase new tickets for the Bennetts.  The train we missed was a direct 33 minutes to Celle, the next train would take over an hour plus a transfer!

The other complication (that we had to deal with in their coming from the airport last Wednesday) was that the regional train company, Metronom, has been on strike this week.  This has happened a few times since we have lived here and only once had it caused any problems.  It is a rather odd form of "strike" because SOME of the trains are running, and some are not.  And it seems that you cannot know until that very day (or even hour) which ones are running and which ones are not.  AND you have to be in the trainstation where that particular train is departing to know if it is cancelled.  So, even though we had acquired the round trip tickets to Celle, we had to wait until we arrived in Celle to know which train to take back.

I felt extremely bad that I had not A.) planned the day a little better so we would have known about the train schedule before we showed up at the station and B.) had a better understanding of the train system so that the Bennetts wouldn't have wasted money on a ticket they couldn't use (other than in Luneburg).  Up until today, all of our family travel planning had been delegated such that Tom made the transportation arrangements and scoped out the destination, while I took care of the packing and provisions.  The day turned out to be full of learning "opportunities" and brought me up to speed (almost) with what Tom had been learning over the last few months.

Still, we felt the day was not lost and had hopes that the rest would go smoothly.  As soon as we arrived in Celle, we headed to the Travel Center to find out which train we needed to take for our return trip.  It turned out we had two choices, neither of which the agent at the Luneburg station offered - those were both cancelled.  The first option was to turn around and take the train that left in the next 17 minutes and the second was to take the one that left at 9:06pm - a one hour train with transfer.  Did I mention we had all the kids with us and that the last bus leaving the Luneburg station for our house was at 8:37?

Well, we had come that far and were determined to press on.  So, we headed into the fickle weather and the town of Celle.  We arrived at the Folk Museum first, even though we had only 45 minutes left by this time before closing, and were delighted to find that our luck had changed since the museum was offering free admission that day.  Lucky also because it was somewhat a disappointment.  The description of the museum had said that docents in period costume would be there to demonstrate, but there were none that we could see and absolutely none of the displays or guides were in English.  There were some interesting interiors of historic households and barns, but we had to make our own interpretations.  Interestingly, on our family's previous visit to Celle, we found the same to be true for the Castle across the road. Did they not think that people outside Germany might like to learn something of their history (there was not French, Spanish, or Italian either).

It was fun to see the town lively this time around, however.  The shops were still open for another hour, the pedestrian market area was busy, we saw/heard the town carrillon, and the kids delighted in water fountains at nearly every block.  We had a quick but hearty dinner of fish and chips and a fun conversation with one of the servers there.  We strolled to a French Park with lovely allees and a fun playground for the kids to be themselves before we headed back to the train station.  The rain even managed to hold off until the end, and even then was very light

The first train was on time for the 30 minute ride to the transfer point, Ueltzen.  In the town of Ueltzen, the train platforms were mostly empty and the station (and the rest of the town) closed for the night.  This was the turn-around point for the train we were taking so, the train that was arriving 10 minutes before our departure would reverse directions back towards Hamburg (and Luneburg).  The time for the train's arrival passed with no train and then the marquee posted the time for our train's departure.  Then we noticed that the marquee also had a flashing message.  Between Anne and R, we determined it either said the train was leaving from this point or had "fallen out".  Seeking out one of the few people standing around, it was confirmed that the train was cancelled, due to the strike.  He assured us, however, that the next train, an Intercity (not on strike) rather than regional, was coming at 11:20pm!  He also said that they were honoring the tickets for the regional trains.  At least we weren't stranded for the night, but there we were, outside the train station on a cold and rainy night with five children well beyond their bedtimes.

The kids (and adults) behaved remarkably well considering the late hour after a long and trying day.  We hung out under the train station in the tunnel leading to the various platforms where it was a bit warmer out of the elements.  We were not the only ones waiting, but seemed to have the only children. A very kind man, concerned that we were having to spend the night with the children under the station, offered us water and food.  In the end, the train was on time, took only 30 minutes to arrive in Luneburg, and we easily hired two taxi's to drive us all home about 12 hours after we started our "short trip".

I hope all goes much better with the members of our crew who headed to Hamburg today.  Last report is that all went smoothly with the morning plans!