DAYS 13 THRU 16: A BREAK IN BERLIN

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BERLIN — Turns out that somewhere around Day 13, it hits you that this whole thing is more than just a fun little family vacation and it crosses your mind that you might be ready to head home...except you don't actually have a home and your furniture is still floating on the ocean, and when you do get home, it will be in a new country where you don't speak the language and have to start all over again anyway. And then you get really tired and realize you need a little mental, emotional, and physical break. Which, the depleted mother wrote gratefully, is exactly what Berlin has afforded so far. 

We got to the city late on Monday night after a 50 minute flight from Copenhagen and two trains in from Schonefeld Airport. It was well past their bedtimes, but the kids got their fifteenth wind and way outpaced us on the trek in. Surrounded by a dozen humorless train passengers, Owen asked which country we were in, and upon receiving his answer, excitedly shrieked: "Germany! That's where HITLER is from!! Can we go see the Hitler statue?!" (Two fun facts about Owen: (1) he thinks everyone who dies turns into a statue that is on display somewhere in the world, (2) he is fairly certain Hitler is responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs.) Needless to say, we put the kibosh on that pretty quick.

We checked into adjoining rooms at the Westin Grand (thank you, Starwood points), relieved to spend a few nights in a place where someone else would tidy up after us and we wouldn't have to worry about being publicly reviewed after our stay. The kids were happy about the change of scenery (Owen: "Since we're not in someone's apartment, does that mean we can mess everything up?"), and we took a little hiatus from touristing; Tuesday and Wednesday were Real Life Days, where we went shopping for car seats, had the screen on Aaron's iPhone replaced (because, as I conveniently omitted from the last post, I dropped and shattered it at Tivoli), and dealt with a suitcase full of dirty laundry. (Travel tip: if you're in Berlin, London, or Paris, there is an awesome service called ZipJet — the Uber of dirty clothes — that sends someone to your door to pick up your laundry, washes and folds it, and brings it back 2 days later.) Today we went on a bike tour of Berlin, and given the rainy forecast, are planning to spend tomorrow at a museum.

We found cheap Ryanair flights from Berlin to Bologna for Saturday and will spend a week in a Tuscan farmhouse outside of Florence (Eliza: "We're going to Hitaly!"). We're renting a car for the first time on the trip (hence the car seats, which we'll also need in Barcelona) and are hoping to do a little non-city exploration. It's hard to believe that we're not yet to the halfway mark of this trip, but after taking it easy in Berlin, we're excited and ready to tackle the next 3 weeks!

DAYS 11 AND 12: THE FUN OF SAYING "YES"

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COPENHAGEN — After arriving in Copenhagen late on Friday night, we got a very early start on Saturday morning thanks to an obscenely early sunrise (4:26AM), skimpy blackout shades, and children who think any sunlight is a indisputable sign they should be awake. Bleary-eyed, we walked to a park around the corner and had coffee while they kids played. We had an early lunch out and then walked down to Nyhavn and back through Torvehallerne, a covered food market, where we bought some ingredients to make dinner. It was definitely nice, but more so for Aaron and me than for the kids; between the abbreviated night’s sleep and the really long walk, both kids were pooped and collapsed for hours-long naps when we got home.  We’d planned to take them somewhere fun after dinner, but it got too late so we settled for a lame 15-minute redo of the morning’s park trip.

We’re asking a lot of our kids right now. A whole lot. They have no home/routine/ toys/friends, and in the 18 days since we sold our condo, they’ve slept in 7 different beds in 7 new places. It’s a lot of changing and moving and uncertainty, even for two adults who (supposedly) know what’s going on. So far they both seem to be doing fine — great, even — but we know we’re essentially requiring them to be little super-humans right now. And we both felt pretty bad that their Saturday kinda sucked.

So we made today all about them. And what a day it was.

Because we came to Copenhagen with no expectations (read: not a clue what was here), we knew Tivoli Gardens was a must-see, but we really didn’t know why. We wandered over without any real urgency around noon and figured we'd stay for an hour or two, but we couldn’t have been more dazzled when we walked in. It was busy in the good kind of way that makes it lively but not crowded, and oh-so charming and lush and kitschy. Add to that a 70-and-sunny day and we had a feeling it was going to be a good one.

Aaron and I agreed that our answer to everything that day would be: “Yes.” We’d just say yes to anything they wanted to do, for as long as they wanted to do it. We had a junkfood lunch and watched a pantomime show, ate heaping bowls of ice cream, went on more than a dozen rides (some five or more times), and played on one of the more interesting playgrounds I’ve seen. We couldn't stop smiling at the two little people who couldn't stop smiling. Aaron said it best: “I’m just delighting in my children’s delight.” We kept saying yes and yes and yes until it was 8:00 and we’d spent the entire day at Tivoli. We might well miss most (all) of the other cultural sights in Copenhagen, but if Tivoli is all we get, it was worth the trip.

DAYS 9 AND 10: ON TO DENMARK

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COPENHAGEN —I was falling asleep last night and randomly started thinking about my childhood obsession with the “Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego” game show. I didn’t care much about the game itself — three school-aged contestants battling it out over geography trivia — but I was totally obsessed with the finale: the last "gumshoe" standing got to play in a bonus round, and if she won, take a trip anywhere (well, within the 48 contiguous states…it was budget programming) she wanted. If victorious, she’d ceremoniously flip over a card and reveal the Dream Trip Destination she’d written down. I’m not sure why, but that moment was nothing short of enchanting to my 10-year-old self — the idea that you could just pick a place, any place, and go there.

Two takeaways: (1) maybe, from an early age, I was fated to take a trip just like this one, and (2) Inverness, Scotland would not have been my Dream Trip Destination.

Inverness was fine but dull; I’m fairly certain the Loch Ness Monster was the brainchild of a brilliant and forward-looking marketing agency from the early 1900s. On Thursday we took a pleasant 3-hour cruise around Loch Ness and were force-fed “fun” facts better suited for mass murders and sadists than small children with follow-up questions (e.g., you could fit 80 billion human bodies into the volume occupied by the lake’s water; a Wellington Bomber sank to the bottom of the lake when it lost power and crashed in 1940; 1952’s land speed record-holder tried to break the water speed record on Loch Ness but died instantly when his boat crashed and disintegrated). The weather was nice, though, and the scenery was impressive; it was a laissez-faire alternative to venturing out and trying to see the sights on our own.

Our rental apartment surprised us with a very large terrace overlooking the water where the kids could romp around and feed the hovering seagulls. It also provided an ideal and picturesque meal location (provided said seagulls were monitored and didn’t snatch our food). Since embarking on this trip, we’ve aimed to eat 1 (but ideally 2) meals at home every day — it’s healthier, cheaper, and much less stressful than eating out with two antsy kiddos — and the terrace inspired us to stay at home for every one. We even got to watch a beautiful sunset…at 10:12PM; last light in Inverness is at 11:20PM and first light is at 3:13AM, so there wasn’t much “night” to speak of.

This morning we took a 10:45AM train back down to Edinburgh, arrived at the station at 2:45PM and took a bus straight to the airport for a 6:45PM flight to Copenhagen. Accounting for the one-hour time change, we arrived at our Copenhagen AirBnB at 11:30PM. This traveling circus covered a lot of territory today.

The apartment is great (from what I can tell in the dark). But unlike the three previous apartments, which were strictly vacation rentals, this one is actually someone’s primary residence. That someone's name is Anne. Anne left for her country house after we arrived (an hour’s drive away) so that we could spend the weekend in her home. She is also, incidentally, 37-weeks pregnant. Now I think that AirBnB is the greatest thing ever — it is enabling this trip in a way that hotels absolutely could not — but displacing a soon-to-be first-time mother on the [near] eve of her delivery seems like something that should be explicitly against rental policy. I felt horrible watching her go and had this nagging urge to spend the next 3 days nesting instead of sightseeing. I’ll let you know if we get displaced before Monday by the arrival of a newborn.

DAYS 6, 7, AND 8: GREAT SCOT

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INVERNESS — Edinburgh proved to be the perfect follow-on to London: a low-key city with cobbled alleys for lazy wandering and wide grassy expanses for ever-important energy release. We stayed right on Old Town's Royal Mile in a breezy top-floor apartment whose only downside was the 92-step climb to the front door (credit to Owen for his painstaking stair-counts).

Thanks to sunshiny weather, we spent most of the three days outside. Monday was filled with walking/climbing/picnicking on Arthur’s Seat, a huge hill with towering cliffs and dozens of choose-your-own-adventure-style paths. We all hiked together for a good while, and then Owen and I broke off to tackle some of the higher trails; like any good 4-year-old boy, he has an insatiable appetite for climbing and was thwarted only by his mother’s own uneasiness about heights and cliff edges. It was a day to remember. Every evening over dinner, we each name our favorite part of the day and I write them down in our travel journal; that night, there were four identical answers — “climbing the mountain.”

After the kids went to sleep, Aaron and I reluctantly acknowledged that it was time to figure out our next where-to, seeing as we’d become homeless at Wednesday’s 11:00AM checkout. We’ve got a love-hate relationship with the itinerary-building part of this adventure. On the one hand, it’s a special kind of awesome to look at a map of Europe and start picking destinations willy-nilly; that aspect does not go unrecognized. It's surreal and I have to pinch myself regularly.

But on the other hand, we’re traveling with 2 small children, which means there are a ton of factors we have to plan around: optimizing price and weather and location desirability, but also finding family-friendly accommodations, minimizing flight layovers and train switches and drive times, keeping total stay-in-your-seat travel time to under 4 or 5 hours at a time, trying to stay in a place long enough to make it feel temporarily like home. We're learning a few things as we go (e.g., the very first order of business at every new place is to send one parent to the grocery store so that "Mom, I'm hungry" doesn't evolve into an epic food-hunting meltdown), but much of this is still straight wingin' it. 

After we sat far too long in front of Google Flights, we’ve got (most) of the itinerary set for the next week or so. This morning, we took a four-hour train ride up to Inverness in the Scottish Highlands (where the Loch Ness Monster ”is”) and we're staying in a rented apartment right on the lake. (Owen is threatening to keep round-the-clock vigil for a Monster Sighting.) On Friday we’ll take the same train back down to Edinburgh and immediately catch a flight to Copenhagen for the long-weekend, which will hopefully involve bike rides and possibly Lego Land (we're saving that as bribery bait). On Monday night we’ll fly from Copenhagen to Berlin, where we’ll burn through some Starwood Points at a comfy Westin until Thursday. We’re thinking we’ll probably plop down in one place for a week or so after that — maybe in a more rural and quiet countryside somewhere — but not entirely sure. Suggestions always welcome.

DAYS 4 AND 5: BECOMING TRAVELERS

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EDINBURGH — I would, of course, be lying if I said traveling for 5.5 weeks sans itinerary with two kids under 5 is all sunshine and rainbows. Parenting victories come easier when you’ve got home court advantage, armed with a fleet of attention-diverting toys and a pantry of tried-and-true foods, familiar beds and respected time-out corners. Doesn’t mean it's not still great, but there are some aspects that make it feel like we’ve got long odds.

Take, for example. the simple logistics of getting from Point A to Point B. We’re not traveling with car seats — they would’ve missed the early exit in London and been checked through to Barcelona — so we’re only using public transportation for now. The kids are slowly but surely learning the right and wrong ways to ride trains and buses, but they inherently see poles and seats as irresistible invitations to climb and throngs of people as encouragement to practice lateral sprints. Add luggage to the mix, and we have certifiably lost all control.

And then there’s the time change to contend with. Our bodies and our brains are still battling over what time it is, and I’m pretty sure we’re all on four different biological schedules. When we traveled abroad with the kids in the past, we went out of our way to avoid shifting their internal clocks; we tolerated having them stay up till midnight or 1:00AM, and loved having them sleep until 10:00AM or 11:00AM. But now that we’re here to stay, we decided to try and acclimate naturally over time — in retrospect, a poor choice. We’ve had to rely on the kids to tell us when they’re hungry and tired, which — when you’re talking to a girl who communicates her hunger by melodramatically hurling her body onto the floor, and a boy who swears he stays awake in his bed all night, every night — have not provided the most dependable cues.

Aaron and I agree that we never [ever ever] would have chosen to take this trip unprompted; even for two non-Spanish speakers moving to Spain, that would've seemed a little absurd. But now that we're here, I will say: it's actually pretty fun. Obviously there are moments when I wish I could just jump, unfettered, into a carseat-less cab or tend solely to my own jet-lag issues or pack only my own suitcase, but it's been really neat to watch the kids adapt and settle into being mini-nomads. On our train trip up to Edinburgh from London this morning, both kids were adamant about carrying their own backpacks and their own suitcases. Onlookers thought we were singlehandedly the worst parents ever, but hey, you gotta learn sometime...