NEW YEARS
New Years Eve day, evening and News Years Day where just WONDERFUL and AMAZING here in Germany.  We had one of those beautiful sunrises to start with that only lasted a few minutes but it was really breathtaking gorgeous.  We celebrated New Years Eve with the Schrade's and the Broo's and Brother Karl-Heinz Lemke.  We walked to the church to meet the Broo's where the young adults where having their New Years Eve party.  Carolin Broo was in charge of organizing it and it all looked really well done.  We got to see the wonderful decorations that Carolin Broo with the help of others, mainly Thor Zimmernink had for the party.   The Broo's drove us over to the Schrade's.  We had a wonderful dinner at the Schrade's home.  I took pumpkin pie because I thought that would be different for the others.  Oh my we ate SOO much!  It was so good.  Then we went to the Broo's in Ludwigshafen.  From there we walked to a bridge over the Rhine River to watch the fireworks.  Oh my, Oh my, the Germans LOVE their fireworks.  I could not capture all the sounds, smells, and sights of that night for this blog.  The whole city was a fireworks extravaganza.  Everywhere you looked, 360 degrees, there was fireworks and it sounded like a war with all the booms, sizzles and pops with smoke and ash filling the air.  The next day we took a bike ride and could see evidence of fireworks party's everywhere on every street.  We had great weather on New Years Eve and on the 1st but Jan. 2nd the rain and clouds returned.  After the fireworks died down we returned to the Broo's home for hot chocolate, snacks, and Jurgen's wonderful homemade ice cream.  Wow! we ate SOO much AGAIN!  It was all so good.  We didn't get home until around 3:30am.

Dec 31, 2013 - New Years Eve morning sunrise from our balcony.
The photo couldn't capture it as beautiful as it was in real life.

The red carpet entrance to the dance for the young adults at the church.

The cultural hall all decorated for the dinner and dance afterwards.

Carolin Broo who did such a wonderful planning and organizing for the New Years Party.

There is no way I could capture the fireworks with my little camera and no tripod but I'll put in some here and with imagination, you might get the picture.

short video - turn up the sound to here the noise.  video isn't very good quality tho

Jurgen Broo, Selina Broo Hales

Wilfried Schrade, Jurgen Broo, Selina Broo-Hales and husband Matt?

Marianne & Wilfried Schrade, Jurgen & Day-Ji Broo, Selina & husband Matt Broo-Hales

Jan 1st, 2014 - We took advantage of the great sunny day and rode out to Ladenburg.  It was pretty warm, maybe high 40's and sunny.  We only went about 14.5 miles but a lot of it was along the Neckar River on dirt/muddy trail.  Nice and quiet, didn't see many people until we got to Ladenburg where there where a lot of people in the parks.

In the Ladenburg river park with the water tower in the background.