Trips with IBEA: Black Forest, Geneva, & Berlin!

Eva Raye
3 days ago
4 min read

It has been sweet to experience trips with those in my program! Here are three exciting trips I took with them and some highlights:

Black Forest, Germany

Something I love about IBEA is that every semester we have a designated weekend we call “IBEA Weekend,” where everyone in our cohort travels together! With Germany being the first country in our program, we started this tradition by going to the Black Forest.

Highlights!

We stayed in a huge cabin house on top of a hill in the forest.
All meal prep was divided by country, meaning each country-specific group of students got to prepare a meal or two for the rest of the group! I enjoyed it so much. We Americans decided to make Mexican food, quesadillas with taco bowls, and it was a crowd favorite. The internationals were coming back for seconds and thirds, saying we definitely won (if it was a competition). The Germans made pasta, the “French” (not all of them are French, but they go to a French school) made delicious crepes and a side salad, and the Brazilians made a type of sandwich I’m not quite sure the name of, with two chocolate desserts I also don’t know the name of (forgive me!).
We played lots of games, like having an IBEA Jeopardy night and enjoying the weather outside with volleyball and monkey-in-the-middle.
On Friday, we went hiking all day and the Germans prepared yummy Bratwurst with Brötchen over a campfire for us! Since it was going to be dark on our walk back to the cabin, they bought torches for us to carry. Definitely a core memory. It was incredibly random and none of us were expecting it, but it did the job and made the walk back after hiking all day so much more fun!

4 Adjectives: quiet, mysterious, majestic, relaxing

Geneva, Switzerland

Some of us decided to travel to Geneva, Switzerland the weekend after IBEA Weekend. I’ve been to Switzerland before, but not Geneva, so I was excited!

Highlights!

Definitely not a highlight, but worth sharing... Flixbus may be cost-effective, but boy, are they uncomfortable to take overnight. We thought it would be a great idea to take one of these buses as both our transportation and sleep arrangement Friday night. Let’s just say I was on the aisle and was woken up every hour when the bus stopped or the lights turned on. Nonetheless, I survived until 3 p.m., when we all checked into our hotel, and Allie and I crashed for 7 hours. We had no idea we would sleep that long! We woke up at 10 p.m. after everyone had already eaten dinner and was hanging out in the city. We joined them and had a great laugh about it later.
My breakfast the next morning was absolutely DELICIOUS, probably the best breakfast I’ve had abroad. Just look at the pic! Yum!
Some tourist attractions we visited were the Jet d'Eau, Old Town, St. Pierre Cathedral, United Nations Office, Lake Geneva, and the Conservatory and Botanical Gardens! The weather was beautiful, the water was beautiful, the buildings were beautiful—it was all so beautiful!

4 Adjectives: breathtaking, expensive, impressive, multicultural

Berlin, Germany

This city is definitely close to the top of my list of travel experiences! I loved it so much I came back a second time (will share in another blog!).

Highlights!

Biking! The city (believe it or not) is 9 times bigger than Paris, which means it takes a long time to get around from tourist attraction to tourist attraction. We biked around 4 hours total over 3 days, just getting from our hostel to the various iconic places we wanted to visit. Since the city is so big, it was a great way to explore—especially because the weather was nice and sunny!
“Sehenswürdigkeiten” or tourist attractions we visited include: Brandenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie, Alexanderplatz, Fernsehturm, DDR Museum, Bundestag, Mall of Berlin, Holocaust Memorial, The Victory Column, East Side Gallery, Berlin Cathedral, and the various churches and important buildings such as the U.S. and French Embassies we passed along the way. Laying on the grass soaking up the sun was one of my favorite parts of this trip because I haven’t seen the sun much here. A couple of us laid on the grass for a while one of the afternoons, and it was so relaxing.
On Sunday, we went to a flea market! I got some new sunglasses, earrings, and a ring. It was such a warm and vintage atmosphere. There were live street musicians and food trucks. I tried a Berlin Currywurst and it was so delicious.
One of our German friends in the cohort is from Berlin and was there the same weekend as us running a marathon. It was really cool to meet up with him and his friends!

4 Adjectives: international, vast, historic, diverse