Saturday morning (Sept. 27) we were still struggling with jet lag but managed to leave the AirBnB before 9A and headed south towards Zweibruecken, the town where Nicholas lived from boyhood until he headed for Pennsylvania. Along the way we stopped at the quarterly market in Homburg which, as providence would have it, was held in the square that Saturday.
The market was delightful – teeming with vendors hawking everything from sausages to cheese to local apples to honey to alpaca wool products (with a live alpaca tethered next to the booth!) to schnapps, wine, and wood carvings. We explored the town center a bit and climbed up the Schlossberg to get a view of the town from up high. Then we descended back down to the square to decide what to purchase and ran into Klaus and Regina who were up from Bexbach to enjoy the market themselves. After chatting for a bit, and getting to see a band of horn players sound out traditional hunting party tunes, we purchased some smoked meats, cheese, and very fresh apples.
Next we went to the Homburg city park to get in a round of disc golf so Levi and I could maintain our streaks. It was a nice park but the disc golf wasn’t great. But hey, disc golf! We finished our round and resumed our journey towards Zweibruecken.
On the way to Zweibruecken my brother insisted we stop at Globus Bauhaus to look for Wera and Knipex tools. They are very nice tools. We didn’t stay incredibly long, but while I was waiting I got a lovely weisswurst from a street vendor in the parking lot. Finally, we drove the rest of the 10 km to Zweibruecken and found a parking lot near the Schloss.
We walked around the Schloss (which was already built when Nicholas lived there) and the Lutheran Church (also dating from before Nicholas’s time), then strolled along Rose Garden Street (Rosengartenstrasse) by the canal past the palace stables down to a Biergarten (Valentin’s) on the river bend from where the canal is fed. We stopped for a beer, saw the model of one of the earliest submarine prototypes (which was developed in Zweibruecken by a man named Wilhelm Bauer in the 1850s), then entered the Rose Garden (which is part of the Schloss grounds).
The Rosengarten, even in fall, is beautiful. We lingered there for the better part of an hour enjoying the flowers and shrubs then walked back to the Schloss to get the car. We headed down to Ringweilerhof, the farm where Nicholas worked after he married the Amish farmer’s daughter (Anna Bachmann). It is now owned by a Mennonite family named Showalter. We didn’t have an invitation and hadn’t called ahead, so we didn’t stay long – just enough to get an ussie in front of the farmhouse. Then we drove over towards Gutenbruennen, a small community situated around a natural spring where Nicholas’ mother Katharina lived out her widowhood. Gutenbruennen is also private property, but the farm road is open for hiking so we hiked 3-4 kilometers through the valley and then back down.
All in all we walked nearly 15 kilometers that day between exploring Homburg, playing disc golf, rambling through Zweibruecken, and hiking around Gutenbruennen. We called it a day and headed back to our AirBnB, getting sausages and bread. I grilled sausages on the charcoal grill on the patio and we had a late dinner, playing cards and drinking apricot schnapps before turning in for the night.
Soulfood 
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