It’s no secret I’m not a big fan of living in a small town. I moved here for my job, and nearly a year later, the job is still the only thing keeping me here. I’m a city girl and always will be, but every now and then, I am grateful for living here, even if it will only be for a short part of my life.

Since March or April, I have been riding my bike to work every day. Just last week, I started walking again. It takes longer but when it’s as cold as it has been lately, I prefer walking. I enjoy having this time to myself, to listen to music and spend another 20 minutes lost in thoughts. Another upside is, it’s so much easier to just stop and take a quick picture.

Today’s sunrise was absolutely beautiful. I have often passed by these fields thinking I wish I had the time to stop and take a picture or I wish I had my camera with me. Today, I took the time to take a few pictures. The pictures were just taken on my iPhone 4S but luckily its camera is pretty good.

City girl or not – I am willing to admit that I am not likely to have an amazing view like this in the middle of Munich. Gorgeous, isn’t it?

P.S. Be sure to sign up for my Christmas card exchange if you’d like to receive a card from me this year.

Back in July (yes, I am really blogging about something I did nearly four months ago) a historical festival took place in a nearby town. It’s a Renaissance festival that takes place in the historical part of town every other summer on two consecutive weekends. As I just moved to the area in January, it was my first visit. In fact, it was my first visit to a historical festival.

I went on the last day of the festival, planning to spend a couple of hours there, not having any idea what exactly was expecting me. Well, I was blown away. I enjoyed my visit so much, and instantly regretted not having gone earlier so I could have visited twice. There were so many performances and I was only able to see a couple of them.

I also thought it was such a shame I had to go by myself. I had asked a couple of friends to come up from Munich for it, but they didn’t, and in my opinion, they really missed out. If I get a chance to go again to the one in two years (i.e. if I still live here), I definitely will. I think I would even make the trip from Munich for this, it was that fun!

It takes place in a fairly small town but hundreds of people participate in the festival and many thousands come to visit, many of them in historical costumes. It is really a unique experience.

The historical part of town makes for a perfect backdrop, it gives the festival this sense of authenticity – knowing that many of the buildings, and the castle are very old and have really seen the time we as visitors are transported back to at this festival.

I ate some Rahmbrot, cream bread, a specialty of this town that has been ‘exported’ to Christmas markets and festivals all over Germany. For good reason – it was absolutely delicious. In fact, it was so good I had two.

I got to see two performances that are very typical of the festival, and I am so glad I decided to see both. One was a reenactment of medieval games in the historical stables, which was very entertaining, and the other was a classic – the hobbyhorse riders – a performance by children in historical costumes in the courtyard of the castle. Very sweet.

I really loved how so many visitors were dressed in historical costumes – some really elaborate, some very simple. It almost made me wish I had a historical costume to wear. I think most people who live around here do.

It was such a fun day. My expectations hadn’t been that high, but I really loved it. If you’d like, you can watch a video of the festival from 2009 here. I think it does a really good job at conveying the atmosphere.

Have you ever been to a historical festival? Are there any where you live?