One last piece about Germany - this one totally biased

So just a bit more about our trip. We spent the second week in the Bavarian Alps, first in Garmisch Partenkirchen, then in Berchtesgaden. Both areas were stunningly beautiful. Berchtesgaden especially, was one of those places I fell in love with instantly. Started scoping out spots for a future winter cottage rental. Gol, it would be fantastic to come back someday in the winter! Those mountains... they almost make you want to become a skier. A few photos of our travels:

Hiking up Zügspitze. All that backdrop - that's where we had come from.



Towering over Berchtesgaden



St Bartholomä curtseys at the foot of Mount Waltzmann



Königsee (King's Lake) with mountain backdrop. Could I have taken a single photo that didn't contain mountains? Um, no.


For a few more photos, complete with witty captions, click here.

I hope these pictures give you a sense of how ridiculously, sickeningly beautiful it was in Bavaria. The green was so vivid, the air so crisp, the mountains jagged in all the right places, the sky so full of stars. I was like some sort of desert wanderer, greedily scooping up handfuls of pretty and slurping wildly. It was mesmerizing.

I've got to wonder though, it that because I live where I do right now? We've been in the NYC area for about four months now, just long enough for some of the novelty to have worn off. The big and shiny and exciting are still there of course, but so are the piss-scented streets, crowds of slow walkers on the sidewalks, and concrete gray. Gray everywhere. The old question returns, then: am I a city person or am I a nature person? Is vacationing in quiet, wide-open blue and green spaces enough, or do I want to live in them? Could I make it in a small town? Who would I be, how would it change me? Would I have to buy a car? Would I be happier than I am now? I'm pretty happy now.