A Festivus for the Rest of Us!

Yesterday morning the sunrise over Europe was quite beautiful:


Then the sun finally appeared on the horizon, officially kicking off the morning:


Back in the fall, I went to a wine festival here in Weisbaden Germany. But in December, I really enjoy the Christmas festival. The weather was nice the first night I went. I hunted down my favorite greasy treat. I call it a fried potato thingy with applesauce, but it might be called kartoffelpuffer. At least that's what the signs say at the stand. Here's a picture of the guy cooking them:


He said something to me in German when the camera flashed - I almost ran off, but I wanted a kartoffelpuffer! And here it is:

(I had to sneak off into an empty area to take a picture. I was by myself and I didn't want anybody to think I was crazy.)


Another treat I enjoyed here was oven baked pizza. This woman is checking the pizzas in the wood burning oven:


Gluhwein (pronounced glue-vine) is the drink of choice at the festival. It is a mulled wine and many stands have souvenir glasses that you can keep or you turn in for the 2 euro deposit.




Here is the glass I got the other night:


I didn't actually drink all the gluhwein, because I didn't like it very much. Maybe if I could speak a little German I could figure out which type tastes the best...

There were lots of tents with vendors selling their wares. Here is a cookie stand:


This artist welded really cool characters out of pipes, nuts and bolts.


This woman's "fairy" stand gave me the creeps so I didn't get any closer than this:


Candles, candles candles! There were a lot of candle stands. I saw a lot that I liked but only bought a couple bee's wax candles:


Here's a big Christmas tree with a manger display in front of it. There is no war on Christmas here!


The fair also has kiddy rides. I had to take pictures of the creepy carnival statues in front of this one.


Do you like how they "Christmased" them up? A red coat and a green holiday rope lights is all you need!

There was also a very large double-decker merry-go-round.


Here are the treats that the kids were very excited about.


A couple of years ago I brought home a big long box of these, labeled the "Dick-o-meter". Yes, it was about 1 meter long and full of these Dickmann marshmallow treats. Even the Germans were laughing and pointing at the box as I carried it through the airport. Apparently, these are a holiday treat because I found these boxes at a store in the train station, and I have not seen them any other time of year. (Unfortunately no Dick-O-Meter box this year.) They are sold individually at the market, but they don't travel well.


Cranky and I need to go stuff some stockings now. I'm so happy to be home!

I wish everybody and very merry Christmas and a happy New Year!