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Christmas Market Trip 2025!
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  • Jen Ritchey

Christmas Market Trip 2025!

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Freiburg im Breisgau Part 2

    22 de novembro, Alemanha ⋅ ☀️ 0 °C

    After walking up the hill just outside of town we headed back and found a nice park, city park, with a cafe that has a vegan brookie (chocolate chip cookie on top of a brownie) and so we tried that and I got a matcha latte and Raymond a hot chocolate and we sat in the sun and enjoyed and it was wonderful! The brownie was probably one of the best vegan brownie I have had from a restaurant! So delicious!! And the table in the sun was not in the wind and it was perfect. We had a nice sit and enjoyed the park and it was great.

    Then we wandered through the park and a small, old cemetery on the way back to our place. It looked like most of the graves were from the 1800’s, but a lot of them were so weathered you couldn’t read them. Then a getting colder and colder walk back home! The sun was going down quickly and boy it was chilly! I had to break out the balaclava to cover my face as it was frozen! Raymond even broke out his gloves (I don’t know how his hands stayed warm all day as mine froze instantly if I had them or if my gloves)!

    Oh! Then the second to last photo was other things we got at the Christmas market - some cinnamon vanilla roasted pumpkin seeds, a cinnamon roll and a banana sesame roll, and a little sheep ornament. The treats are all for later as that is too many treats for one day!

    Then we got Thai food for dinner - a red curry with pumpkin and tofu and a green curry with vegan duck and both were super tasty! The red curry also had tofu skin in and we were saying how we don’t know the last time we had tofu skin, but this is the third time in a week we have had it (it was also in the steamed buns in Milan). So that was odd, but it is delicious so it is good.

    I thought Freiburg was going to be a much smaller town and I thought we would come back for a break this afternoon and then go back out and explore some of the parks on the outskirts that looked nice, but we didn’t have time for them. Oh well, something to look forward to next time! All in all a pretty great day even if it was freezing! Tomorrow is supposed to be cold as well and we are moving on to the next stop! We shall see what we see!    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Freiburg im Breisgau Part 1

    22 de novembro, Alemanha ⋅ ☁️ -5 °C

    Today we woke up to a bit of snow on the ground! Very exciting. When planning the trip I had originally planned to stay in a small town in the mountains close by, it was on a lake but didn’t seem to have much else. No good hiking trails nearby that I could find, but we could always just walk along the lake. Then I found this town and it looked like much more to do so switched to here, but yesterday when we got here I looked and the first place had had snow! A bit sad for me as I love the snow, but oh well. So I was pretty excited when we woke up to snow! Though it didn’t last that long, it was still nice relaxing and drinking my tea and looking out the window.

    Then we bundled up and headed out to explore town. It was -1 with a high of 1 this afternoon and the temp are the other place I thought of staying? -11 with a high of -5!! I was glad we didn’t stay there even though it had snow cause that is too cold!! As it was it was pretty cold here, but we walked into town and spied on the Christmas markets and found a few options for us! We got some hot beverages to warm up (holunder for me and gluhwein for Raymond) and found some vegan schupfnudeln (potato “dumplings” with sauerkraut) for lunch and it was delicious! This is the first time we have found a vegan version as usually the schupfnudeln are made with egg and they add speck to it so it is not even vegetarian. So that was exciting!

    After lunch we went to explore more of town and I was so cold!! I had been fine this morning, but a bit of a wind came up and we sat for too long and I was just an ice cube! But we found a farmers market around the cathedral in the middle of town which was really nice. All the produce looked amazing! I don’t know why we can’t have nice farmers markets like this in Berlin! I guess we don’t grow food nearby? I don’t know.

    We also found a “healthy treat” place that had little cakes made from cashews, flavoring (berries or chocolate), coconut oil, dates, and maple syrup so we tried a chocolate one. Oh my goodness it was amazing! Not very sweet and I could have gotten a couple of them for snacks if we weren’t going anywhere else after this! One of the best things we have gotten so far (though we did have a lot of amazing things in Milan as well!).

    Then we wandered into the cathedral and they had some really gorgeous intricate stained glass windows all over. Some of the most intricate ones we have seen for sure. I was surprised that going into the church actually felt warm! They don’t heat the churches and so normally they are freezing, and it was still cold inside but not as cold as outside! So I warmed up a little bit.

    Then more wandering through town and I saw you could walk up the hill just outside of town for some views so we decided to do that. On the way up we found a bench in the sun and had a nice break as the sun was warm enough! That was really nice as I was like I do need a break, but if we sit I am going to get colder…and then the hiking uphill I thought would make me warmer, but it was cold enough I guess that it didn’t really. Didn’t get colder, but didn’t sweat either in all my layers! And the views were really nice.    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Drive to Freiburg im Breisgau

    21 de novembro, Suíça ⋅ ❄️ -4 °C

    Today we got up and headed towards our next stop - Freiburg in Breisgau. It said it was about a 5.5 hour drive with traffic and there was also a weather warning for snow and ice in Millan so I was hoping it wouldn’t be too bad as we did have to go through all the mountains…when we woke up no snow, a bit of rain and not that cold so that was good. We stopped at some grocery stores on the way out of town and it was very wet snow there. Then started driving and in the mountains it was super cloudy and you could barely see the mountains, but they did have some snow on them. Apparently the cold was coming from the south which was interesting as we went through a tunnel to the other side of the first mountains and no more snow! We stopped for lunch and it was freezing!! The car said it was 5 outside, but it was windy and it was like eat as quickly as we can while trying to stay out of the wind and then jump back in the car! My fingers were so cold they hurt! But driving on it got colder and colder until it was just above or just below freezing so I was glad we weren’t trying to eat there.

    Then there is a long 17km tunnel (in the middle the car said it was 30 degrees! So warm especially when it was so cold outside!) and on the other side of that was so much snow! The photos are ones Raymond took while I was driving and it was so nice! Not actively snowing, but cold outside and really pretty.

    We did miss most of the traffic and took a smaller border crossing into Germany (the main road said an extra 20 minutes! So we said no, let’s go on the smaller road and drove right through). We got to Freiburg in Breisgau and checked in and went for a short walk and it was so cold!! Still windy which makes it colder and I will definitely have to have all my layers on tomorrow as it is supposed to be a high of 1! So very cold! Hopefully it is not so windy…But we walked down to a cemetery and were going to wander through a bit, but it said it closed at dusk and it was already after sunset and getting dark and we didn’t want to be locked in. We would have walked into town but it is a half hour walk and I have book club tonight so we didn’t really have time. Oh well, tomorrow we can do all the exploring in the cold! Their Christmas market is open already so we can spy and see what we see!    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Milan Day 4

    20 de novembro, Itália ⋅ ☀️ 7 °C

    Today I got up and had a lazier morning than I have had. It was supposed to rain so I saved this one Vegan treat place that was close by for today in case it did, but it ended up being another gorgeous sunny but cold day. First I walked by the water tower turned art in 1990 to commemorate Italy hosting the soccer World Cup. Apparently the water turn was falling apart so it was update it or tear it down. This is right across from the hotel on the other side from our window.

    Then the treat place had lots of delicious looking things. I got a chocolate mousse cake, a whipped cream and chocolate cake, 2 strawberry tarts, a red velvet mini piece, a tiramisu mini piece for Raymond (neither of us drink coffee, but I found out in Tuscany that he apparently likes tiramisu which is so odd!), 2 smash nut cookies and a larger cookie that kind of tasted kind of like a sandtart. We only are some of these and are saving the rest for this weekend, but what we tried was delicious! The past 2 days I have walked all morning so by the time I met Raymond for lunch I was ready to sit, but he had been sitting so day so wanted to walk so I relaxed more this morning and did my walking this afternoon instead. Much better plan!

    After we ate lunch we wandered back through Chinatown as it is close to the Microsoft building and Raymond wanted to take a walk and found more mochi I could eat! These were lychee and sesame and they were both very intense flavors, but very good!

    Then I walked down to a matcha place to get some matcha tiramisu. The place we went when we got here had it, but not vegan and I love matcha and never had tiramisu so wanted to try it if I could find it and I did! And it was so so so good! Light and delicious and Raymond was like it is like eating grass 😂 He didn’t like it as much as I did. I did end up sitting in a big park by the matcha place and reading in the sun a bit which was really nice. It was cold, but in the sun it was perfect!

    Then Raymond was at work till later today so I went to spy on the cemetery again. That place is huge! I had about 45 min before it would be too dark and I didn’t get to everything, but I did have fun exploring what I did explore! All the tombs, monuments, and mausoleums are so big! The pictures make them look so tiny, but they tower over you. They are like giant 3 story tall buildings! And so many of them so you can feel really small in the middle of them. It is almost like you are in a small village of tiny, but very tall houses! And most of the graves have lots of sculptures and art on them. There is so much to see as there is so much everywhere! I really enjoyed my wander and I found that it is the second largest cemetery in Milan so the other one is super giant (this one is 62 acres and the largest one is 168 acres!).

    For diner we decided to order pizza - we ordered 2 pizzas and 3 pizzas and some seaweed fried dough which was amazing showed up! I don’t know why we got three, but the pizzas were really tasty so we have plenty of leftovers for tomorrow and the next day! We got one with Vegan mortadella and pistachio and one with zucchini flowers and veggie meat - with think they might have tried making that one and put the wrong veggie meat on it so they made another one the right way and just gave us the one they messed up as well? Because two have the zucchini flowers on, but who knows. Either way we have all the pizza!

    And then we ordered more of that mochi we got the other night that was amazing - almond and caramel ones and matcha ones. So good! I love all the mochi and am sad we will be mochiless tomorrow. But I enjoyed our time here in Milan, probably because were had all the great food! Oh and there are tons of super tiny cars here that look like toys. It seems like every car manufacturer has one and I think they are all electric (though you only get 75km per charge so it is really only for around town). I did see a lot of them driving around while I was walking! Lots of fun and tomorrow we head on to the next stop!    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Milan Day 3

    19 de novembro, Itália ⋅ ☁️ 6 °C

    Today I went for a wander to a Vegan bakery and found a small market euch was fun. I also walked through this mall/park area with all the modern buildings in Milan (according to the Internet) and it was pretty nice. I imagine when it is warm and a weekend it would be super busy!

    On the way to the bakery I also went by someone filming something - likes real production company. I first went by the food cars and was like ??? Then all the lights and stuff. Then I was waiting to cross the crosswalk and there was a person all wrapped in bandages with a blanket on and I was like what in the world? Like you couldn’t see their face at all and it was pretty cold out (I was all bundled up in my layers) so they must have been freezing and then was like oh! They must be in what they are filming and waiting until they are ready for them. So that was fun.

    The treats place had lots of good stuff - a lemon meringue tart, fruit tarts (one chocolate one vanilla), a lemon puff pastry thing, and a pistachio maritozzo (bread with a pistachio cream), and a pistachio mousse treat. The mouse was just okay, but the other things were pretty good. We have an Italian Vegan bakery near us in Berlin and their treats are amazing and their pistachio cream is way better than this one was. Still tasty, but not as good. I remember Raymond commenting when we were in Tuscany why is the Italian bakery back in Berlin better than here?!? I don‘t know. I don’t know if this is more what the non-vegan ones taste like since I have obviously never had them and maybe the one in Berlin is not as traditional and we just like it more? Who knows.

    Then I wandered through Chinatown again looking at all the cute stores and grocery stores and all the fun things. This hotel is in a perfect location for that!

    We went back down there for dumplings for dinner again cause they were so tasty but we also found a place with vegan gelato mochi so had to try some. We got mixed berry, chocolate, and yuzu lemon and they were pretty good. Not as good as last nights, but tasty.

    I realized as we were eating dinner that I have been enjoying Milan more than on previous trips. I think part of it is I am wandering in weird areas that are not main tourist spots (expect for maybe Chinatown) so it is not that busy. I just remember trying to walk by the Duomo last time and there were so many people all over the place. So I have been enjoying my weird neighborhood walks.    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Milan Day 2

    18 de novembro, Itália ⋅ ☁️ 9 °C

    Today I did all the walking! I had wanted to go out to a grocery store we went to in Tuscany that always had good things to pick up a few things for lunch. It was about a half an hour walk away from downtown and was a nice area to wander. Milan is not the prettiest city, So I don’t have many photos from my wanderings, but it was a quiet residential area with small parks and stuff (and one park with lots of pups playing!). Unfortunately the grocery store had nothing I wanted so I was like okay, there is a vegan bakery out here so let’s go see what they have…only they are closed today! So that was kind of a wasted trip, though on the way back to the hotel I did find a different grocery store and they had everything I needed! Hooray!

    I thought it would be a quick walk to get a few things and then relax until I meet up with Raymond with lunch, but I ended up getting back to the hotel just in time to make lunch for us and head over there! All the walking!

    Then this afternoon I relaxed until Raymond got back from work. Then we went to explore Tomba di Manzoni. In the photos with the views over the city (the views from our room!) you can see the giant building right there. I thought it was a museum or an old palace or something, but it is a giant giant cemetery. I walked by it this morning on the way to the store and we went back this evening and saw what we could see while it quickly got dark. I might have to have another wander myself if I have time as it is so huge!

    Then we got some ramen for dinner which was super good! Super spicy too! With these “meatballs” which were silky inside which was not the texture I was expecting! And some almond caramel mochi which was amazing! I am already trying to figure out how I will get back there tomorrow to get more! Might be my favorite thing we have had here thus far!

    All in all a pretty good day. Nice walks and adventures even if they didn’t turn out how I expected :)    Leia mais

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  • Jen RitcheyChristmas Market Trip 2025!Viajante

    Milan Day 1

    17 de novembro, Itália ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    Today is mostly a food post!

    We woke up to a super grey rainy day. While eating breakfast you could barely see the lake so we got lucky with the weather! No rain yesterday when walking around, rain today when we left (plus it was raining ask day yesterday in Milan and today it was nice weather!).

    The drive was mostly raining through Switzerland which was unfortunate as you couldn’t see the mountains as they were covered in clouds. By lunchtime we had gotten to the other side of the mountains which was perfect timing as it wasn’t raining there! So we could stand outside and eat lunch - we have a VW Touran which…is super duper uncomfortable. Raymond even said it wasn’t great and usually he is fine in whatever we drive. So I did not want to sit in the car and eat lunch! I needed a break! I was so glad we didn’t have to drive yesterday as that seat was killing me the prior two days. One of the issues is I have a cushion I sit on as the seat is too hard, but it is too thick so I have to lower the seat so I can fit, but the way the seat lowers is weird and it marred me sit weird and it was making basically my one side super sore very quickly. My hip/butt/lower back/leg on the one side would just hurt driving and then be super sore by the time we got where we were going. Today I tried it with no cushion and up higher so my lower body was more in alignment and that was much better, then my butt just was sore from the hard seat. So then finally after lunch I was like what if I sit on my jacket to cushion it some and that worked great! So so so much better which is good as I wasn’t super sore when we got here to Milan! We have a longer day of driving to our stop after this so I am glad I figured out a way to get there without it being awful!

    Once we got here we went to spy on food. First up was a matcha place with a red bean and grape bun and a pistachio mochi - the mochi was so good!! I have lots of places to spy on while Raymond is working, but I might have to go back for more! The bun filling was good, but the outside was super dry.

    Then we wandered through Chinatown - I didn’t even realize Milan had one until looking for places to eat for this trip! And we ate our way down the Main Street and it was delicious!! Every place had very different flavors and oh, I loved it! We had a tofu skin and pepper steamed bun, some veggie steamed dumplings with spinach, tofu, cabbage, carrots, celery, noodles, soy sauce, and sesame that almost tasted like stuffing! Then some cabbage, mushroom and tofu grilled dumplings (these were probably my favorite! They were so so good!! Mostly cabbage and super delicious) then on to some dumplings with spinach, carrots, tofu and noodles and an open steamed bun with tofu, cabbage and carrots…these were disappointing. Good, but not nearly as good as the things we ate before it! Then we went back to the cabbage dumpling place and got a steamed bun with the same ingredients and a red bean bun as well - so good!! I love it and I will definitely have to go back while Raymond is working and spy on all the cute shops we saw! We are staying very close so it is a quick walk.

    Tomorrow Raymond has work and I go spy on all the foods and see what I see along the way! But today was pretty good. Not too bad of a drive and a nice walk to eat all the things!    Leia mais

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    Konstanz Germany

    16 de novembro, Suíça ⋅ ☁️ 7 °C

    Today we got up, had a lazy morning, then headed off to explore Konstanz. We headed towards a pizza place for lunch that online showed outdoor seating (and we have seen people sitting outside at restaurants even though it is pretty cold!), but when we got there the outside seating was all in small plastic bubbles so defeats the whole point for us…so we got it to go and sat along the water to eat. I was excited for the pizza, one with zucchini and broccoli and one with veggie meat and chimichurri and while they were okay I was disappointed. The sauce was way too watery so the parts of the pizza with toppings were just mush which I don’t love. And the zucchini wasn’t cooked which was odd. It was fine, but not as good as I thought it was going it would be.

    Then we wandered back through the old town and along the water until we got cold and then headed back to the apartment. We did walk down the Main Street here in Kreuzlingen, but there wasn’t much to it. Tomorrow we head on to Milan for the week. Not sure how much I will have to share there as it’s not my favorite city and I have a few things I want to work on while Raymond is working so we shall see!

    This morning it did say it might rain, but I looked at the radar when we got home and it just missed us all day which was nice. Much nicer to wander when it is dry! And downtown Konstanz was pretty small. I kept thinking it would take longer to wander through, but we had fun.    Leia mais

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    Schweinfurt Part 2

    15 de novembro, Alemanha ⋅ ☁️ 13 °C

    We walked by the art center with all the fun art (I like the eggshell seats and the book of lost letters), and then spying on another church (Heilig Geist Kirche). This was the nicest church we went in and I really liked the artwork they had!

    Then we looped back to the car along the water and had fun spying on the sculptures there and other fun things! We did learn that Schweinfurt had the world’s first roller dam! It was invented there so I learned what that was so that was fun (the big green thing before the head sculptor is part of the roller dam!).

    It was a really nice time and I never would have stopped there had we not looked up what the name meant! i had been trying not to get my hopes up too high for the city as I was pretty excited for pig river crossing town and I thought it was going to be super tiny and probably not that exciting, but I really enjoyed it (and it was bigger than expected). I had seen some parking lots in the city you can only park for 2 hours and I thought well if we end up in one of those that’s fine. There is no way we will be there for 2 hours! When we got there I was like okay we should leave by 2, but that is just over 3 hours from now so that should be fine…and it was 3 hours later that we returned to the car! There was so much to see! It was a great stop and I was glad we found it.

    Then it was on to our overnight in Kreuzlingen Switzerland, just across the border from Konstanz Germany. We are staying in a high rise building and picked up some Indian food for dinner which was delicious! Such a nice day and tomorrow we explore Konstanz and the lake!    Leia mais

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    Schweinfurt Part 1

    15 de novembro, Alemanha ⋅ ☁️ 11 °C

    It feels like we just got back from our trip and we are headed off again! This time for Christmas market adventures, but first we are going to Milan as Raymond has a work thing there Tues-Thurs next week. Originally I wasn’t going to go anywhere until a bit later, but since we were headed out anyways for his work thing I rearranged things and were will just stay out and have all the Christmas fun!

    So yesterday we started towards Milan and I booked a place just off the freeway just as a place to stay the night. As we were driving there we saw a sign for Schweinfurt and Raymond and I both were like “what does -furt mean??” Because Schwein is pig (or swine) and I was thinking there are other towns with -furt - Frankfurt and Erfurt were the first I thought of so what is happening with the pigs there?? Well Raymond looked it up and -furt is to ford like ford a river so this is where the pigs crossed the river! Well that was just so much fun, I kept wondering if they were they taking the pigs across on rafts like the Oregon trail game? Was the water low and they could splash their way across?? It brought me such joy thinking of the little pigs.

    As we were driving were kept seeing more signs pointing towards Schweinfurt so I finally asked Raymond if it was on our way to our overnight tonight as sometimes the signs are for places farther away…and it was! So of course we had to go! Though Raymond did point out that the city webpage does state that some historians don’t think the name comes from pigs crossing but rather people migrating from the north, but the people living there refuse to believe that - it has to be the pigs!! (More info here: https://www.schweinfurt.de/en/1631.How-did-Schw…). I said I’m with the townspeople! It must be the pigs!

    First stop was just outside town at der Seelenvater - a place where they used to tie up criminals and also where they executed someone and his last wish was to mark off how far his body walked after death and make it a square and give it to his family so again of course we had to stop where the dead body was walking around! (You can find more info here if you translate it https://www.schweinfurtfuehrer.de/sagen-geschic…).

    Then it was on to town! I had found a free parking place on the island in the river and we got there and got the last spot! It was perfect timing as cars kept coming in after us and then leaving as there were no spaces. Then off to explore town! The first stop was a historic crane and right by there was a map of a walking tour with all the things listed to see so we walked that. Walked along the city wall some, headed up the stairs in the town, sped on a church (the inside was very plain - just white walls and a cross on the alter), and then we found the pigs!! I was very excited for them!!

    There was a market in the main square and it was small, but very nice. The produce was so nice!! Everything was huge! If i lived there I would definitely get my produce there!

    The second church we spied on, St Johanniskirche, is the oldest building in the city! It was still pretty plain inside, but had some fun things. And then more wandering to see what we could see!    Leia mais

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    14 de novembro de 2025