Silver Mine, 26 Juni 2010

Today I visited a silver mine from the middle ages. It apparently really kicked off in the 12-13 hundreds. But also has a Roman ceiling somewhere. Forgive me for not knowing so many facts about it, but our guide had a pretty heavy dialect.

Frau Reinl, Rolf, Uwe (Frau Reinl's nephew) and her brother and I all went. It was a packed car, but the ride was less than an hour. Frau Rein's brother is really kind of old to be going into a mine (especially this one because we had slippery ladders and stairs), but his hobby is collecting rocks. Uwe, I think, is the nephew who's a little slow (she told me so, but I couldn't really tell) and has a mustache like the villains in the old westerns.

First we went to a restaurant and ate lunch. I had a pork schnitzel and french fries. It was good, minus the fact that the main taste I had was the cooking oil. But the portion was perfect. You really have to think about what size plate you order, because there are no carry out boxes in Germany. Except for pizza. Which is dumb. Frau Reinl ordered some kind of fish, and when it arrived I stared. They brought her the whole fish. Let's just say, the only courtesy the cook did was gut the thing. The head was screaming at me, and the poor tail was all burnt. And the bones were in still. I informed everyone that fish rarely comes this way in the States.

Another fun part of the conversation was describing all the wild and poisonous animals we have in Missouri. I explained what a coyote is, a raccoon and an armadillo. Then I said we have a lot of poisonous snakes and spiders, but the spiders aren't very big. And of course I described Dad's adventure with the copperhead in the Property basement. I might have scared them all from coming to MO, because Frau Reinl said she'd stay in the Black Forest. And they don't like the concept of tornados.

So, the mine. We outfitted ourselves with galoshes, helmets and jackets. No gloves. Our guide was a very old man, who was surprisingly spry. I"m not sure if I'd want my grandpa responsible for a group of idiots in the dark, slippery mine with lots of wet ladders and stairs, but he was fine. They told him I was an American, so he made sure I could see everything and all. And at one point said I was pretty. But the tour was about 90 minutes. Its a little crazy that most of the holes and tunnels were built by hand. Insane, actually.

The mine had a lot of iron, copper, flourite and something else I forgot. Besides the silver, I mean. Afterwards, I bought a rock, and then the guide was nice and gave us each one for free. Rolf was like, "I don't want a rock" but then Frau Reinl's brother gave him one anyway.

The ride back was quiet. Once we got home we had some coffee and I ate more of my giant RitterSport. Then I've just been writing and stuff until our company just came. And I smashed up some chocolate bars for my chocolate chip cookies. Rolf gave me a hammer and I went to town. I think they're going to be more chocolate chuck cookies, but that's cook too. Wish me luck, and...USA, USA!