Day 2:
– We ended up back at Café Reichard for breakfast (we couldn’t find many places that were open for breakfast other than chains we have here in Osnabrück)… and I’m so glad we did! I had this amazing apple and cinnamon pancake I ate the whole thing (other than a few bites for Morgan) and felt sick afterwards, but it was totally worth it!
– Next we stopped at Groß St. Martin. It was founded for the Benedictine Order in the late 12th century. The church was badly damaged during WW II and restoration was completed until 1985. The inside was much more plain than the other churches we’ve looked at, but we did think it was interesting that the stained glass windows used dark colors/looked pretty foreboding.
– Schloss Nordkirchen- When we left Cologne to head towards home we decided to stop at a castle along the way – Schloss Nordkirchen. It is a huge moated castle nicknamed the “Westphalian Versailles”, built in 1703-1734 for the Plettenberg family. We got to walk around the outside and see the gardens, but didn’t get to do the tour of the inside (they have just 3 tours today and preset times). So, we’ll just have to go back again when we have some visitors! We saw at least 4 brides having their pictures taken around the house and grounds plus one wedding ceremony had just finished up.
– Back on the road home we stopped at a far to pick up some fresh spargel. I have never seen spargel being harvested so that was pretty cool. The spargel was planted in the tall mounded rows and when it starts to poke out of the ground they know it is time to harvest. It looks like they just stick their tool down in the mound and cut it from the base. We had ours with some Hollandaise sauce that Morgan whipped up.. it was delicious!
– The last stop of the day a quick walk around Münster. It was really pretty and has lots of nice shops in the beautiful old buildings. I can’t wait to go back and do some clothes shopping!
Another Side Note– Muenster is a cheese from the United States, not to be confused with the French variety, Munster. AKA- there is no special cheese that comes from Münster, Germany (thankfully Morgan looked this up before we asked all over town for some authentic “Münster” cheese).
