Day 20: and so [we] face the final curtain

What I'm about to say is said with a heavy heart. This is the last of my posts on my "mommy and me" vacation. Please try to hold back the tears. Heck, you can go back and read the posts of our 20 day adventure as often as you'd like.

So, how, you may ask, did we end up spending the last day of our trip together in Rothenburg? Honestly, I'm having a hard time remembering.

...

Now that 5 minutes have gone by, and since my 28 year old mind hasn't succumbed to Alzheimer’s yet, our last day is vaguely coming into view. We had a delicious German breakfast at the hotel. Rolls, cheeses, warm hard boiled eggs, honey, fruit, juices... the works. We parked our luggage in the breakfast/make-shift storage room and made our way over to the medieval torture museum.

We admired all the creativity used "back in the day" and chose the items that would be nice to use on my brothers from time to time. Well over an hour and a half went by and we still hadn't gone through the entire museum. But we felt we gained a sufficient amount of knowledge on how to torture those who require more than just the usual types of punishment known in our day and age.

So, we left and got a bratwurst for lunch. We only had a few more hours to pick up our last souvenirs in Germany so we set about buying a few items. Number one requirement on my list was to buy more schneeballs in a large variety for myself... and a few miniature ones for my colleagues. We went to 3 different schneeball shops to gather the perfect varieties, but it was well worth the search. (For those of you who are wondering, the caramel and chocolate filled varieties were my two favorites).

Once we broke the bank on souvenirs, we took the opportunity to walk the rest of the wall, since we hadn't walked the entire thing the prior day. During the war, part of R.o.d.T was bombed, because there were Nazi soldiers stationed there. The US Assistant Secretary of War's mother had a painting of the town displayed in his childhood home, and it left a lasting impression on him. So, when he discovered that it was in the process of being destroyed, he commanded the US army general to not use artillery in taking over the city. It was eventually handed over by the local militia, due to the German commander not following Hitler's orders in fighting to the end.

After the war, residents of the town set about repairing the damaged part of the city. When people from around the world, who had previously fallen in love with Rottenburg, got word of the destruction they gave donations for the reconstruction of the town. Now the names and hometowns of the donators grace the wall. It's quite a beautiful site to see.

We had an amazing trip, granted it had it's up's and down's, but there was no better way to spend our birthdays than traveling Europe together.