Fredericksburg

We were up early this morning, as we were taking a road trip to some attractions in the surrounding area.  It dawned a beautiful blue sky day, and we were on the road by 10:00.  (Some times we find it hard to believe that only two months ago we were able to be up and dressed and sitting at our desks before 8:00 in the morning.  Now we have a hard time getting any where by 10:00!)

We drove straight to Fredericksburg, and our first stop was Vereins Kirche Museum on Main Street.  This octagonal building was the first church built in this little German settlement.  There were two doors--one for the men to go through for worship, and another for the women.  Of course, they were seated separately as well.  Today, the building is used as a museum that tells the story of the Germans that made the 60-day voyage to this new country that promised free land to hardy settlers that could homestead in this section of hill country.  It was very interesting, and a great free attraction.

The wild flowers are still a few weeks away from blooming, but the flower beds all over Fredericksburg were beautiful with pansies and ornamental cabbage.  The streets were also full of people enjoying the nice weather during one of the spring break weeks.

We walked up and down Main Street, amazed at the numbers of boutiques and art galleries.  Mark is certainly saving a lot of money by stuffing all our belongings into a 35 foot motorhome.  We don't have room for any purchases that aren't edible, so the only shops we entered sold food.  We were especially intrigued with the chocolate covered bacon and jalapenos in this store.  But we weren't intrigued enough to actually buy any of it.

But Rustlin' Rob's was our favorite store of all.  They had wall-to-wall samples of everything from salsa to barbecue sauce to jelly to pickles to finishing sauces to dips.  They didn't have just a few of each, they had an entire room of each of those categories.  They even had an entire room of different types of tabasco sauce!  You had to have a cracker or a pretzel to try each thing, and I think we had several dozen samples before we got out of there.  An amazing store with lots of yummy things!

The other thing that was amazing to us was the number of German restaurants in town.  Every place has schnitzel and wurst, but we never found any veranika or beirox that we love.  We finally chose the Old German Restaurant for lunch, and ordered the Rouladen with potatoes and red cabbage.  We don't usually include food pictures, but this was certainly good.  Rouladen is a pickle that is wrapped in a thin piece of sirloin meat with bacon and onion, and served with a brown gravy.

Another reason to choose this place is the German bakery inside.  Inside the sack that Denisa is holding is one of the best cream cheese Danish we have ever experienced!  It was big enough to be our dinner on the way home (much later!)