An Alpine Anniversary

A little over one year ago, I married the love of my life. Among other things, this union meant days filled with laughter, caring for the two most adorable and puppy-like cats I’ve ever encountered, gaining an incredible new family, and striking a balance between my messy tendencies and Scott’s organized cleanliness (we’re still working on it!). With him being an Air Force officer, it also meant marrying into military life. Though I am not the one serving, his life of service directly affects mine. While I knew this going in, I couldn’t predict exactly how it would. And in this year alone, it’s impacted me more deeply than I imagined and in ways I wasn’t expecting. I could write an entire post on lessons learned in this first year of being a military spouse, but for now I’ll touch on one reoccurring theme – planning. The one thing you should plan on in this Air Force life? That plans will change. 😉

One of the most recent examples of this involved celebrating our first anniversary. With our love of travel and ideal living situation (relatively easy access to all of Europe), we knew we wanted to take a trip! It didn’t take long for us to decide on Croatia. While I had been before, it was high on Scott’s list and I was thrilled to get to visit again, with him by my side. We planned to start at Plitvice National Park, head down to Zadar to hear the sea organ, and end in beautiful, coastal Dubrovnik where we’d spend our actual anniversary.

I finalized our itinerary and after lots of research, found the right flights / rental car combo to maximize our time [and our bank account] in each location. All we had to do was book them. But for some reason, we kept putting it off. By mid-March, we still hadn’t booked flights or a rental. Initially frustrated by our lack of urgency, we were soon thankful for it…Scott received word that he needed to travel for work over the exact dates of our trip, missing our anniversary.

While I was looking forward to Croatia and excited to celebrate our first anniversary together, I wasn’t upset. (Admittedly, there were a few tears on May 11th, but I was good to go leading up to it – very used to the long distance aspect of military life at this point.) And I certainly wasn’t surprised. I can’t even count how many times we’ve had to change our plans this past year. AND this wasn’t the first trip we had to cancel (in 2017, we canceled our trip to Vietnam and got married instead ☺️). It simply meant we had to come up with a new plan!

So, a wave of questions ensued. “We have practically the entire itinerary ready to go — do we just postpone it? Book it for a few weeks later instead? But we have to fly…do we risk booking flights knowing that work plans could change again? What’s within driving distance? At this point, should we even do anything?”

Scott, especially, emphasized the importance of us taking a trip away, setting aside time to specifically focus on one another. We hoped this would be the first of an annual anniversary tradition of getting away and taking time for our marriage. And in my mind, if we couldn’t do it now, despite the change in plans, how would we make certain we carve out the time in the future when we (God-willing) have little ones to account for. Given this, our answer to the last question – Should we even do anything? – became a resounding YES. It would just have to be a belated celebration.

After mulling over a few trip replacement ideas, we picked Berchtesgaden National Park!

And it was absolutely wonderful.

Though we still fit a lot in, the week in Berchtesgaden seemed much more relaxing than our original itinerary. Instead of tooling around an entire country, we called one quaint little Airbnb home base for the entire stay, with little transit time required once we arrived. No other reservations were made. No official tours were booked. And no alarms were set in the making of this vacation. I comprised one short wish list of hiking trails, restaurant recommendations, and sights to see based on my research, but even that served more as a reference versus a to-do list. Given everything we had going on in the two months prior, we were ready to slow down and introduce as much flexibility into our schedule as possible.

I don’t think we could have had a better week.

Framed by mountains and filled with lakes, the alpine scenery was breathtaking, awe-inspiring and almost surreal. More than once I fell behind on our hikes because I couldn’t not stop. I felt myself needing to pause, slowly taking it all in, and admiring the beauty before my eyes. Everywhere I looked, I was continually humbled by His creation. And overwhelmed with thanksgiving…for Scott, for our marriage, for making it through a rather challenging first year, and for the opportunity to celebrate that in such an idyllic setting.

From boating across emerald green waters, to hiking through the Alps, hunting down an ice cave, spotting wildlife, eating al fresco, swimming in an alpine lake, witnessing a thunderstorm from atop a mountain, imbibing in a local biergarten, and detouring for a taste of St. Louis on our way home – we cherished every moment of this trip, mindful to stay present during such incredible experiences.

I loved seeing Scott so relaxed throughout the week. And he would comment almost every time he saw me smiling, telling me how happy it made him. According to the frequency of those comments, I don’t think I ever stopped. ☺️

This alpine anniversary was nothing short of amazing and a blessing to us in more ways than one. Not only did it gift us with precious time spent together, but also served as an excellent reminder…

Oftentimes, a simple change in plans will lead to something far greater than you originally imagined.

Photos cannot do this landscape justice, but we gave it out best shot. 😉 Below are a few images from the trip. Posts of each day’s adventures to follow!