We Made It!!!!!!!!!

We have finally arrived in Germany!!!  We left Washington on the 18th of August and flew to Baltimore.  There we rented a car (which just happened to have Washington State plates) and drove to our hotel near Washington-Dulles airport (the airport we would leave from).  On the way we stopped for one last meal of Chick-Fil-A which we enjoyed immensely.  Our hotel was nice and we slept well.  The next morning we got up and drove into downtown Washington DC and saw the White House, the Washington and Lincoln memorials.  

The White House 

(If you look close you can see Bush in the window)

Washington Memorial

Lincoln Memorial

We were running short on time so were not able to get out of the car to see more.  We drove back to the airport and checked in with United Airlines.  Our flight was uneventful with the exception of the screaming baby a few rows over!  The flight was long (about 8 hours) and I don't think either of us got any sleep.  We arrived in Frankfort on time about 7am (11pm west coast time).

Our first view of Germany

  We made it through customs with absolutely no problems! After all the money and time that we spent to get BoJangles ready to travel with the physicals and proper paperwork, the customs people did not even ask to see one form.  We made it to the baggage claim and all of our bags made it!!!!  By far this was the easiest international travel I have ever had.  We then found our sponsor, Jay, waiting for us outside of the baggage claim.  He took us to a van for our trip back to Vilseck.  It was about a three and a half hour drive.  The drive was beautiful, we passed alot of little towns and everything is so green.  Vilseck seems to be in a very rural area, very nice after living in So. Cal and Columbia.  We arrived and checked into our hotel, the Krystal Inn and than went to have our first meal in Germany: Subway.  It was right across the street and the easiest thing at the time.  At this point we had been up over 24 hours and were past the point of tired.  We went back to our hotel room and crashed at about 2pm local time.  We ended up sleeping until about 11pm when we woke wide awake.  We were up for about an hour before we went back to bed until about 6 this morning.  We got up and had a nice continental breakfast at the hotel and have spent the day getting unpacked and buying food.  The base is on holiday for the next two days so I am unable to start in-processing.  We found out that our car is here, but it looks like we will not be able to pick it up until after we take the Germany drivers test.  This may not be until next Thursday.  We also found out that housing is really backed up and it may take up to a couple of months to get into housing.  At this point we want to try to find a place in private rentals off post.  

Shanan and BoJangles are very tired!

It is so nice to finally be here.  We are still in a daze and I don't think that it has completely hit us.  It will be nice to have a couple of days to get adjusted and catch up on some of our sleep.  Thanks for all your prayers during our time of transition.  We will try to keep this blog updated as our adventures continue.