During our trip we spent a couple of days in the Burgundy region, notably in the city of Beaune.
Beaune features a walled, medieval city center and a wine shop or cave on almost every street. We went on a wine tasting tour in one of the caves called Marche aux Vins which featured 4 white wines and 14 reds scattered throughout a dimly lit, cavernous underground cellar. One of the impressive sights was racks and racks of wine behind bars that sported dates from the 1940's and the 1970's. Lots of tasty Burgundy.
We stayed at a 2 star hotel right across the street from the train station called Hotel de France which I would highly recommend. For about US a night we got a two story room, the first floor housing the tv, a bed, and the bathroom. The second floor had about 4 beds, ideal for a family. The hotel operators were very friendly and spoke english. We also dined the first evening in their restaurant and it was a fabulous dinner, truly great. I splurged on a 1995 bottle of Burgundy with dinner that cost US and was a dream to drink.

We spent our first night in Europe at a hotel in Freiberg, Germany after flying into Frankfurt and taking the train south a couple hours. This photo shows me in front of one of the cathedrals. We walked around quit a bit and instead of eating out we bought fresh fruit, cheese, bread, and salami for an impromptu picnic. Freiberg has a different type of cobblestone that uses palm sized rocks cut in half, which gives effect of flower petals.

They also have little streams running all throughout the town, down cobblestone channels on the edge of the street/sidewalk, through alleys, and bigger channels along some of the roads.

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