welp, we planned on going to Switzerland over the summer, but plans changed and we ended up going to four different countries and about 10 cities in a span of almost 3 weeks. was it a whirlwind? yes. did we bite off more than we could chew? perhaps. was this a wake up call that we are no longer in our 20s and feet and legs start to hurt after 15,000 steps? absolutely.

it also didn't help that the weather for the first half of the trip was blistering hot. yes, we were there when the heat dome came upon Paris and lemme tell ya somethin'. in French, that means, "the Airbnb has no AC and the host left us with only two fans." our Paris itinerary: wake up, regret everything, find shade, drink something, question your life choices, repeat.

ok, enough about that. we love Paris! in the Fall.

this would be our first international trip with Clyde. Gordon and I wanted to travel with him since he is now older, and honestly, he's never been a bad travel mate. since he was a wee lad, he'd always been so chill when we traveled, and we knew it was time to take it 5,600 miles further.

our first stop was Cologne, Germany. we climbed all 533 steps up and all 533 steps down the Cologne Cathedral on our first day. it was pretty amazing and easier than we thought it was gonna be, though Clyde kept jokingly mentioning it gave him ptsd every time we had to climb up some stairs. and boy, did we climb up A LOT of stairs. we also walked the Hohenzollern Bridge and took respite in a few beer gardens. the temperature had already risen, so fatigue and the desperate urge to find solace in an air conditioned room took a toll. we debated whether we should go back to the hotel (it had AC) or keep exploring. I made the decision to keep exploring because I knew that if we went back to the hotel, we would end up staying there the rest of the day, and it was only our first day. let's just say I had a bit of FOMO, because looking back, we should have gone back to the hotel and settled down.

the following days, we took day trips to Bonn to visit Schloss Drachenburg and to Aachen to get a dose of our medieval village obsession. I wanted to surprise Gordon and Clyde by going to the Haribo store in Bonn, but I spoiled it because we went to Bonn on a different day than planned and the store was closed, so beer garden it was! we did, however, score some cheaper Haribo at REWE.

have I mentioned how much the heat just sucks the energy out of you? every time our day ended and we would head back to our hotel, it was like we were dragging our feet because the heat just kills a little bit of you at a time, and the trek back to the hotel seemed to last ages.

some visuals on our first day: