So we departed the United States on Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Monday, January 17th, 2011. It had been an intense few weeks leading up to it. We rented a car and travelled to Ventura County to visit Chris' family for Christmas, then drove up to Sacramento on Christmas Day to visit my family. Although the process for Chris' job started in September, we didn't get the actual orders - that is, the confirmation that we were actually going - until December 26th.
From that point, the race was on. We were to immediately contact our local transportation office and schedule movers to pack up all our worldly belongings and ship them across the Atlantic. Unfortunately, that didn't go smoothly, and we weren't able to schedule the movers until the Friday before we left. In the meantime, we realized we had to get married as quickly as possible, so I could be put on the orders and we could go to Germany together. We decided on the 31st that the soonest we could get married was on the 3rd.
Despite the last-minute nature of our wedding, it was pretty awesome. I found a dress I adored that I can totally re-use as a classy cocktail or party dress. A surprisingly large number of family and friends were able to join us for our Monday wedding at the County Clerk-Recorder's office, and we all celebrated over dim sum at Oakland's Legendary Palace afterwards. I'll write more about the wedding and post pictures soon.
From there Chris and I departed for our honeymoon and last trip to the California Coast. We stayed at Timber Cove, which is between Jenner and Gualala in Sonoma County which I will ALSO write more about and post more pictures of when we have the time.
We returned to the bay area on Friday the 6th, and most of our time was taken trying to wrap up loose ends with regards to our move and get our plane tickets. We celebrated Chris' birthday on the 10th, and a few days later we found out we'd be leaving in less than a week. Then it was a whirlwind of packing, cleaning, and trying to figure out all the things you need to do when you're leaving the country for at least three years. Basically in the last 3 weeks we've slept very little and done an amazing amount of stuff. So it was something of a relief to finally get on the plane, even if I hate flying.
Luckily the flight wasn't as bad as I'd feared. Our direct flight from SFO to Frankfurt am Main was 11 hours, but it was also half full, so we got our own row. My cat traveled in the cabin with us, and was very well behaved, even going through security - where I had to remove her from her carrier and walk through the metal detector with her! I wore pajamas on the plane at the recommendation of my mom and some friends and Chris hasn't stopped making fun of me, but at least I was comfy and didn't set of the metal detector like someone else I know.
The weirdest thing was the short night we flew through - since we were heading east, it got dark very quickly even though we departed SFO at 2:00 p.m., and 7 hours later it was getting light again as we were just flying over Britain. Very strange, but exciting. We could see France as the sun rose!!
At Frankfurt we embarked on the runway and got on buses - at which point I realized I'd left my purse, with my passport and Chris' wallet - on the plane. I shoved through everyone, leaving Chris with the cat and 3 bags, to run back on the plane. I got the purse but saw the bus drive away as I was running back down the stairs. Luckily the crew bus went to the same gate, and were able to transfer to our Lufthansa flight without further incident.
The flight from Frankfurt to Stuttgart was very short, only about 25 minutes. The Stuttgart airoprt was small, but confusing, but we finally found our sponsor, the person assigned to help us acclimate and take care of the many, many things we need to do. We arrived at our hotel, and managed to stay awake long enough to have a typical Swabian dinner (more about that later!) and fell asleep around 6:30 p.m. local. We'd been up for 26 hours at that point, not to mention all the sleep we'd lost out on in the preceding weeks, and yet I still woke up in the middle of the night over and over and over. Jet lag!!
More to come soon, hopefully with pictures!
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