Kristian and Frances

Day Three

We woke up early on the third day of our roadtrip. It was a wonderful night, the quilts and pillows made for an incredibly comfortable sleep. We had stayed up late, mostly because we had spooked each other out with talk of the "Australian Gothic", and our experiences of it in art (books, films... Picnic at Hanging Rock, Jindabyne, The Proposition, Voss) and through personal experience (as children and as adults). In a quiet moment Frankie let out a minor shriek and spasmed, causing me to do the same. This just freaked us out more, and so we had to turn the light on and talk about something else until we had calmed down.

In the town we stayed in there are two castles, as already mentioned, and a great big cable car thing that is terrifying to behold (for someone like me atleast). We went to the castle first, got our tickets and took a bus up the mountain. It was a pretty impressive castle, and we got a guided tour in a group of five (us plus a family of three). The internals of the castle weren't particularly inspiring, nor was the fact the castle was only 120 years old! The European nobility has a very bland sense of style, and just goes to show that money don't buy cool. After we took the tour we headed back down the mountain, this time via a wonderful walk that starts beneath a waterfall and follows the creek down to the town. The pictures do it a little justice. The walk took us about 40 minutes and was a wonderful fresh start to do the day. We then drove up to the cable car site and I noticed that the people inside the cars were squished in like saradines, so that if you weren't being pressed against the window, you would have no opportunity to experience the 1000metre ascent, and so much of your hard earned 16Euros would have been wasted. Considering this factor, we decided against the whole thing (32Euros ($55AU or so) for the both of us, to be squished in a cable car with a chance at taking in the vistas - no thanks!).

Anyway, given it was a bit late in the day and we had a long drive to Freiburg, on the otherside of the country, we thought we might do the sensible thing and book a hotel from Fussen. So we went to an internet cafe and found a hotel, but the stupid internet computers were set to 2004, so when we tried to book a room, it'd only allow us to book rooms in 2004. And there was no chance we'd get across Germany fast enough to arrive in time. So we took the phone number of two places and went to the phone boot. h. I got lumbered with the German hotel, on the understanding that if that didn't work out, F would call the French hotel (Freiburg is relatively close to the French border city of Colmar, which I was also interested in visiting). Anyway, I spoke to the German hotel and arranged for a room that night, and, for some reason, came away with the belief that we had to be there by 7pm to check-in. What we suspect happened was that because of language difficulties, the person I spoke to meant that we had to be there by 7pm to check-in... otherwise we'd lose our booking. I thought it meant that they closed off reception at 7pm, which meant we couldn't ever get in! So we grabbed some good bad pizza (bad pizza that is good!) and set off for Freiburg... and a few minutes later found ourselves at the Austrian border. So we turned around and set off again for Freiburg and drove through some lovely alpine country until we reached the city of Lindau, which I thought was in Germany, and then in Austria, and then perhaps in Switzerland (our map was unclear, and the borders of all through intersected nearby). Fortunately it was in fact in Germany (Austria would have been okay, just in the wrong direction, Switzerland not so good (Visa, Passports, Border Police, Lost tourists etc). It had taken a little longer than expected to get this far, owing to the slow going through the Deutsche Alps (also kown as the Austrian and Swiss Alps). We were a little nervous, but confident that we'd get there in time, Lindau marked the end of the alpine region and the map seemed to indicate that it was just a straight line from here to Freiburg. This was more or less true. What the map didn't indicate to us was; that it was the start and/or end of the holiday season, that the road which followed a massive lake was heavily populated, that there was a billiion mile traffic jam along the length of the lake. So suddenly our arrive time was approaching faster than we were approaching Freiburg, which is always a bad thing. We got stuck in numerous traffic jams, but it still seemed like we'd make it. There is about 50kms of Autobahn along the way, and we managed to make up some time with that (at 150kph on the autobahn you still get overtaken by plenty of cars). We took an exit only to discover another traffic jam, did a quick turn about and F navigated us down another road, saving valuable minutes!

By the time we got to the famous Black Forest (which Freiburg is in the middle of) we had about an hour to cover 45 kms. That isn't usually a problem, the speed limit was 80, and so all the math added up. And then there were the traffic jams. More and more of them! Everywhere! When we finally made our way into the heart of Freiburg we had fifteen minutes to get to the hotel... which was on the edge of the city in an industrial estate... and no map! We stopped into a service station and I grabbed whatever map I could find, thinking nothing of the $10 I just spent on the damn thing (now I think often of it!). Jumped back in the car and then tried to unravel the damn thing. It was folded and cut in some insane fashion so that it was 10cm square folded and about three square kilometres when opened. Time was ticking by, and the streets were full of traffic (which we later found to be a freak event!). We sped across the city, me screeching the tires and weaving and yelling like a madman, Frankie with one eye on map, one on the passing street signs, and one preventing me from driving onto the tram lines, the wrong side of the road, pedestrians, cyclists, and the like. Tyres screeched, Germans honked and holler'd, the clock ticked down. Frankie guided us across the city in ten minutes, together we didn't miss a turn off, or make a wrong turn. We're like rally champions (this was to prove handy for today when she directed me onto a bicycle path - Why are they all looking at us strange!). With four minutes to spare I swung the car into the parking lot and jumped out of the car and raced into reception - passing the 24hour check-in machine - to give Grunter or whoever the chap was a hearty (F says it was Klaus! - but she then says she wasn't there! - but she says "He looked likDaye a Klaus though" - but how would she know, if she wasn't there!, Strange girl, can follow a map, but little else!) Guten tag! He gave me a Guten Abends! His was better, because it was evening, just as he said. Anyway, with my address where I don't live noted down on a piece of paper, and a sweaty signature, we were checked in. When we went for dinner, some time late, at about 8pmr, more people were checking in. The whole 7pm thing had been a wonderful misunderstanding, but we had enjoyed our across town dash and apologise to the Freiburg Council and hope the church can be rebuilt with as little fuss as possible!

We had McDonalds for dinner. It was pretty terrible, especially for a increasingly inappropriately self titled Vegetarian (the truth is, I'm doing pretty darn well to stick to the diet in the land of Meat and Wurst, and without any access to cooking facilities).

We watched some bad American TV (CNBC is undoubtly the most hilariously American thing ever broadcast - people angrily shouting bizarre things at each other, often in agreement, 24hours a day, the except to the hilarity is Conan O'Brien, because while he is funny, he's not actually that funny).

Day Four

Got up at about 8:30am and went to McDonalds for a McDonalds coffee and breakfast. Went to Aldi afterwards to buy some groceries for lunch (what I'd give for a Woolworths or a Banana Joes! - variety!) I'll note here that I actually typed "Coles" instead of "Woolworths", but then F reminded me that we never shopped at Coles, it was Woolworths, and that I always called it Coles, no matter how many times we went there, for, and I quote "some bizarre reason". There is a plenty plain reason, and that is I'm a stupid moron with an ugly face who likes to sniff his own butt.
But, putting that aside...

We drove off into the Black Forest, through the wonderful suburbs of Freiburg. I'll note here that the Germans in general are apparetly fanatical about bicycles. There are no old people on foot, they all ride bikes! Freiburg is even more bike dominant than the rest of Germany that we've seen. There seems to be able an even split between cars and bikes. All around the city are racks and racks of bikes, people on bikes, and doing bike things! I'll also mention the wonderful public transport system. I haven't USED it, so maybe it sucks. But from a coverage perspective! It seems to go everywhere in the city, and last night, while we were searching for dinner (no, McDonalds wasn't our first or last choice, it was our only choice!) we found this suburb under construction, several blocks of colourful apartment buildings. If this was built in Australia there would be no additional public transport built, they might widen a road. Here though, in the very centre of the new suburb, a (new?) tram line had been built, and there was also a visible bus presence, plus of course the park and ride option (and here it means park your bike, not your car). Anyway, we drove into the beautiful forest, up winding mountains, through dark woods, here and there! We had lunch on park bench, randomly placed on the side of the road, somewhere on top of a hill somewhere where we don't know where it was. The lunch itself was awful, but the sitting there looking over the mountains and trees and mist was lovely. I did a pee, and we both threw the rest of our poor meals into the thickets.

We then drove some more, and then a little more, and then found ourselves at the bottom of one of many ski lifts. This one we decided to take, even though it'd blow our budget. Here I'll have another aside, thank you very much. The price of petrol here is ridiculous expensive, and I love it. I hate it, but I love it. It's about 1.30-1.50Euros, which is almost double the price in Australia, and therefore (I'm making vauge approximations here) about four times the price of petrol in the USA. This might account for the prevelance of cycling, but it is'nt so simple! The whole trip we've seen, from one side of germany to the other, a constant stream of outdoor adventure parks. Not disney lands and crap. But places where you go to hike, to bike, to swim, to climb etc. And they were all heavily patroned! Germans undoubtedly have a culture of the outdoors, and not just visiting the outdoors, but hiking through the outdoors! When people get out of their RV's (or just as often, off their bikes!) they go hiking (no matter their age!)... in America you get out of your RV (well, if you do that much!) and sit in the Krispy Kreme on the designated sight-seeing-spot and then go off again. (Of course, there are exceptions!). And as a result, every single little german village, has at least one family home with the words "Zimmer Frei" outside, even in the smallest town we saw, which was only two houses! Anyway, we paid the 15Euros for the trip up the slope into the misty heights. It was well worth it, and when you're in a place like this, far from home, it might be a while before you get the chance to return, so better spend the money and have the fun, money will work itself out later! (within reason!).

Biking is so culturally norm here that we feel like morons (or as F says; Schelps!) for driving a car. We rarely drove our car in Sydney, maybe once a week at the very most. After three months in Prague, and seeing the cycling in Germany it's abundantly clear that the only reason we'd ever need a car would be that the Australian culture is such that governments are allowed to not build public transport infrastructure. I think it was my LJ friend RonaldRayGun who said that roads and transport systems aren't about moving CARS they're about moving PEOPLE (he was speaking of Brisbane, but the principle applies all over Australia). It is such a simple and trivial truth that it's impossible to imagine how it ever came about that the planning authorities don't seem to be able to grasp it.

So why it hurts financially, A LOT (our fuel expense is about 3x as much as we had imagined, so far), I feel happy to pay that much because it reflects a more accurate estimate of the cost of carbon fuel use.

We finished our couple of our drive through the black forest by having a look around Freiburg itself, parking deep underground! The old town is lovely and tight and bright and happy and all the good things one can expect of an old town. In fact, the whole city is just wonderfully inviting. It is a university city, so it has a good sense of youth and all the trappings that entails. It is clean, easy to navigate, bike and pedestrian friendly, green - physically and culturally (the surrounding hills have wind turbines, lots of solar panels on homes, public transport, cycling etc), it snows. I could quite easily imagine living here for a year or so (also Augsburg, and probably a number of other german cities). The one thing I didn't like was this (and it's a good example of everything I've been complaining about in Europe) In a lot of german old towns there is a big old building at each end with a big old archway which is where the main road goes in and out. they are always fun to look at and walk and drive through (and watch the trams go through). Big gatehouses or whatever. Anyway, the one in the old town of Freiburg is probably one of the nicest I've seen so far, until I noticed the words "McDonalds" on the top of the arch. And then the Mcdonalds, which was built into the arch. Now, I don't mind that there is a Mcdonalds in Freiburg (there's at least two others!) but I do mind that they sold out the entryway to their famous old town to McDonalds of all places. It just puts a strange blah to the whole entrancey thing.

And that is the end of the report for day 4.

Germany Day Two.

We leave Augsburg early at about 8:30am after a breakfast of crossaint and coffee. South into more rolling hills and greenery. No castles though, it's like the castles appear on the map only at time we're not in the vicinity. It's all a bit silly, because the romantic road is supposed to be a big tourist thing, but the sights along the road aren't signposted at all, so it's all a bit of guess work. We managed to find ourselves in a nice little town next to a lake, so we had a walk along the banks and saw families and swans and boats. We got back in the car and headed south again, managing to discover relatively little. Somewhere in the distance I spotted an array of radio telescopes, but no indication as to how to get to them, or if they were even available for visitation by anyone except aliens. Perhaps it was a NATO radar base.

The countryside is nice, always fresh and green. But eventually a little boring. In some ways there is a distinct lack of the unknown. Unlike Australia, or the USA, where there's always a creepy sense that you could go missing, swallowed up by the landscape.

We stopped at the town of Wilheim, which has a cute Old Town section, but nothing especially interesting. We ate honey and sub-par german bread next to a statue in the town square. A little kid came and sat next to us and ate ice-cream. It looked a lot tastier than our bread, that's for sure. Left the town and headed south again, and eventually ran into the Austrian/Deutsche/Swiss Alps (they are, of course, all the same Alps, but each country seems to want to declare it "theirs" in some sense, even if they only each have a portion). It got a little more interesting here. Somewhere along the way we stopped at an Audi and had a lunch of bread and antipasto (stuffed chilli's and marinated feta) in the carpark. Eventually We managed to find a castle, ruins in fact, exactly what we were after. Unfortunately they were about 600metres up a mountain side, hidden somewhere in haunted woods and defended by a moat of bears and fire breathing dragons. In the little village nearby I drove on the wrong side of the road momentaril (turning out of an intersection and thinking of how to get to the Information bay we just saw a sign for). These things happen, it happened in America once too. Once is usually enough to remind you.

Our destination today was Fussen, at the base of the alps and a bit of a tourist/resort town. The Youth Hostel was fortunately out of beds. It had a kind of scary Scouts / School Camp kind of feel to it. We went back to the previous town and asked at a few guesthouses, and wound up in this one, in an attic room (oh attic rooms!) for the cheap price of 40Euros for the both of us (the youth hostel wouldn't have been much cheaper, and possibly in a shared room, with freakish Youth Group types). Plus, this town in much smaller, and a hell of a lot nicer really. And it's got wonderful views of the two castles in the area. There is also a cablecar thing that will take us up to the top of the mountains in a terrifying way. I hate heights, but it looks like fun once you're at the top (some 1700metres). We've got a lot to do tomorrow, visit the castle, take a ride up the mountain, and cross over to the south eastern corner of Germany to stay in Freiburg for a couple of days. Frankie scores maximum points for utilising the phrase "Ein loaf of bread bitte" (K put me on the spot! - F), used when we procured dinner (a loaf of bread that was as heavy as a brick and thrice as large plus the remains of the anti-pasto, the olive oil the chillis and feta were soaking in having escaped out of the sealed plastic carton, out of the shopping back and onto the back seat of our hire car!).

A jumble of german and english got us the room for the night, since this place is more or less a family home with extra rooms converted to accomadate strangers, so there isn't a reception staff trained in thirty languages and a background in another fifty, it's quite nice though, the blankets all fluffy and snug like. It was a long day, and we managed to slow the pace down with a few stops, tomorrow will be hectic, then after that we'll spend a couple of days in Freiburg, giving us a chance to explore in a bit more depth.

This place is so country, the air smells of hay, after a horse has eaten and pooped it. Outside as I write a german band is playng "Sweet Home Alabama" it's very out of place. Imagine some Americans singing "Roll Out the Barrels" in Texas, the old time German Classic "Mein Freund".

How does it go again? That's right...

Mein Freudn ist ein gut freund
ja, herr freund ist gut fur mir
die frau fur mein freund ist ein gut freund,
ja, herr freund hast ein frau
ein frau das ist ein gut frau
ja, alle mein freund bist gut freund
sind sie ein gut freund fur mir?

Then there's the rollicking; "Ich Liebe haben ein bier mit Adolf"

ich liebe haben ein bier mit Adolf
ja, ich liebe haben ein bier mit Adolf
wir trinken im der stadt und...

Which reminds me, I had a dream the other night that I was working for Adolf Hitler as some kind of office clerk. He came to the office and asked me to make him a cup of coffee. I said I'd never made him a coffee before, so I can't be sure it'll be any good. But he was nice, and insisted. I asked him how he had it, and it was with one sugar and milk. I remember thinking that I'd spit in the coffee because Hitler was an asswipe. There was some strange termporal distortion going on, because I was in the present, yet he was (obviously) in the past. I understood this, but it didn't seem to be particularly disturbing. It's another dream I've had where I've served some kind of evil person, and plotted against them (I've had two dreams in the last few weeks where I've had to serve a mafia boss after I offended him some way (the most recent by mocking his son).

So, we're in Germany now, The Fatherland, on our way to the Mother Country, England. We are children of the colonial (I'm tempted to write; colonic) powers.

Prague didn't drag my heart away as I had imagined, but I am a little sad to be leaving. It takes me a while to put roots down in a place, Marrickville took between three and six months, and that was in my home land. It takes months to establish routines, favourite places, rituals, linguistic comforts (we left just as we were becoming competent enough to manage transactions without much fuss, apart from some mangled Ceskry in parts, mainly to do with gender agreement and the like). We were even familiar faces to some (well, at least one) waitress. I think three months is perhaps the worst length of time to stay anywhere, long enough to begin to put roots down, but not short enough to do anything with them - they're ripped out as soon as they begin to dig in.

/End Roots Analogy

On the day we left we packed up and put our things in order. My bag could hardly close now, having acquired more books and things, and Frankie had acquired a new outfit (and pet name, see!) which meant some of her new acquisitions had to come across into my bag and so on. That meant I had to carry my enormous backpackers pack, my knapsack, my camera case and the laptop+bag (which was stuffed with books and other bits). I took the key back to our real estate agent and that was the end of that. It was when I got back to Cafe Nordica, a fine little cafe and language school just around the corner from our apartment, that we realised that our bus was due to arrive in Nuremburg only fifteen minutes before the hotel checkin counter closed. We thought to send an email, but what if that didn't work? And we couldn't receive a reply, since we'd be stuck on a bus for the next five hours. So I collected up our remaining coinage, some Czech Crowns and a few Euro cents and went to the phone booth to call the hotel. It took two calls (one to a junior staff member who asked me to call back, and another one, later, fifteen minutes before the bus left to the owner). Thankfully the owner was ever helpful and arranged to leave the key hidden outside the building in a pot plant. This was to cause some anxiety as we took our trip but in the end it was just like every other potential disaster that had confronted us - it fizzled into nothing as the key was exactly where I understood it to be (Inner courtyard, side door, left hand tree).

At the Czech / German border I had the privilege of having my things randomly searched! It was very exciting. Except the guy didn't search all my luggage, just my laptop case. He didn't check my 20kg bag in the cargo hold, or the two bags I had stuffed in the overhead space. It was kind of ridiculous. It made me think about how people tend to generate randomness... When people choose random numbers (or things) they unintentionally use non-random algorithms (for want of a better word), so a random search on a bus won't be Seats 1,2,3 but seats 5, 15, 30... because we subconsciously try to "force" randomness. 1,2,3 and 5,15,30 are just as likely sequences as each other, but the later seems more random. The conclusions, if you're a bunch of terrorists trying to cross the border; sit close together in one part of the bus. A german (or Austrian) teenage girl had lost her passport, and the sole Vietnamese passanger was called off the bus for a short interview (chance or racism?). Our passports were returned to us by nation, thus I was "Australia!".

Crossing the border was like a moment out of a fairytale story. No sooner had the Czech Republic disappeared behind us than a fog began lifting from the forests and green fields of Germany. It was getting late a little dark and the clouds were low and drizzly, but across the horizon a bright orange sunset strip was visible. And as the bus drove along I looked out the window and saw a castle on a wooded hill surrounded in fog with dark clouds hanging low and stretching in all directions except the western horizon, where there was the strip of sunset and just above that, a silver fang moon. Like Croatia, I knew I would like Germany the moment I saw it.

The bus trip arrived at Nurmemburg at 10:20pm, thirty five minutes late (troubles at the border!). We had no money, so the first task was to lug our stuff across the road and into the main train station, where we were relieved to find an ATM (the alternative was to ask a stranger, which wasn't such a bad prospect since German is the language we both studied at highschool and so we remember enough for directions, introductions and numbers, plus bits and pieces more). I took out some Euros and we headed to the taxi stand. Took a taxi 2.2kms to our hotel (normally we would walk, but we were eager to get inside, fearing every second would make the finding of the key more difficult somehow (but how? It was either there to be found or not!)). I asked the taxi driver (auf deutsch!) if the 50 Euro bill was okay. He thought I meant would it be enough to cover the fare, I meant if it was okay for him to give us change of a 50. He laughs, saying (in german, again) that it was only 2.2km to the hotel. I understand and laugh too. He asks jokingly "Nurnberg, ja?", as if we might have wanted to go to WhateverStrasse in Munich. My brain thinks of some banter (What, this isn't Berlin!?!) but doesn't translate it to german fast enough, and the moment is lost. Cheesy German Folk Music plays on the radio. We see little bits of Nuremburg on our short drive, the walls and bastions of the old town, somewhere in the dark. I wonder what city it is during the day and look forward to seeing it. I remember this feeling from Madrid and Cesky Krumlov (what is this place behind the rain and darkness!). As we approach the hotel I notice graffiti on the walls, and my heart sinks a little, as it is prone to do at the sight of graffiti (I internalise graffiti as meaning a "bad" part of town, as I did in Granada, and was summarily rebuked by the city itself!), but then I see what the white paint spells out "Fight Sexism!". Fantastic! I feel better again. The car stops, and the driver indicates to the price on the meter. 6.90Euro. I gave him the fifty note, it is all I have. He shakes his head and says "Kein Klein?" and I say "Nein" he says "Smaller" and I still shake my head. I understand, but he doesn't realise, and I don't understand enough to fluently express this. I look into my wallet, six fifty Euro notes, a ten dollar Australian note and a two hundred Czech Crown note. I say "Czech Korun? Australian Dollar?" and he gives me the laugh I'm looking for. He searches about his wallet and I ask if it is okay, about to suggest that I go get change from the pizza shop down the street, he relents and I give some ground in appreciation and say "Zehn ist OK", giving him a $3.10 Euro tip, enough to please him it seems. We get out and go to haul our luggage out of the back of the car (on top of my bags, F has her big bag, her little bag, Jan Saudek and Sara Saudkova posters, and a grocery bag of... groceries)... and we find our driver has run off into the dark for a moment, just to check that we've got the right place (3.10Euros buys you a location check!). We load ourselves up like pack horses and stride to the hotel, and without a hiccup I locate the hidden keyring. On it are three keys, none of which fit the front door. A minor moment of anxiety until we realise the front door is infact open. We go inside, not sure whether this entire building is the hotel or shared. I've been told we're on the first floor, which means different things in different countries (ground floor, first floor interchange!). So I go up one flight of stairs and open a big white door, finding on the otherside, an art gallery! I have a peek around and go back downstair to report to Frances. We try the ground floor, which is locked, and open it with one of the keys. Hurrah, and inside that door is the familiar hotel thing, lounge, reception (unattended after 10pm, and it's now 11 or so). And we find our room and settle in. A bit depressed that we need a WLAN password to get the WiFi internet connection. The pillows are big. We chat for a time and then sleep happily.

That was yesterday, today we left Nuremburg, collecting our car from the extraordinarily camp Avis office. Curiously, while dealing with a telephone customer who is asking about an apparently non-existent city, one of the clerks puts his hand to the phone and says "What the fuck is fjekddijowdjburg". This is something we've picked up - 1. Germans aren't afraid to swear in the workplace ad 2. Germans swear (at least on occasion) in English, but perhaps only in the context of the English swearing being a universal PHRASE. That is, "What the fuck" isn't a set of words, but a memetic phrase, the other one we've heard is "Oh Shit!". We drove along the autobahn, between 100 and 140kph, having little idea of what the speed limit is. It seems it's a process of elimination (there are more signs telling you that a certain speed limit doesn't apply anymore than there are telling you what it is, and everyone seems to ignore them anyway). After some autobahning west from Nuremburg we hopped on the Romantic Road which takes us south through Castle Country. It was a nice drive, but a little stressful, being a new car on the wrong side of the road again and not having exact understanding of signs/directions.

We passed through some astonishingly pretty little towns, through great walled Altstadt (old towns) with twisty cobblestoned roads and bright big/little houses (I don't know how they do it, but the german buildings are regular size, but seem like cute miniatures of themselves... it's a bizarre thing!). We had to take a detour into unknown territory, but eventually found our way. Looked at only one castle, which was a bit of a disappointment. Castle needs to be refined. When I think of castle I think of stone battelements, towers and walls and keeps. Many of the things called Castles here (and also in Czech Republic; witness Prague Castle and the one at Cesky Krumlov) are just big chateau like things. So from tomorrow we've got the rule of visiting only RUINS. That'll ensure interest.

Tonight we're staying in Augsburg, which is wonderful german city, it's rather small, barely a city at all, perhaps just a very large town. It has trams. Everything is clean and bright. The town is green, with trees and cyclists and public transport everywhere. Lots of old people on bikes having a merry time. Only Dubrovnik has felt so unthreatening! We had planned on staying at the local youth hostel, but having no map of the town, nor directions to the hostel (and in short, being completely lost!), we took to the local chain hotel (Ibis, in this case) and got a room with about the sameprice as a private room in the hostel. We didn't manage to get Wifi here either, though some rooms have it enabled for 8Euro (too much!). There's an unsecure network just outside, but the connection isn't stable or strong enough to complete. (In our Prague apartment there was a secure connection available, with a good signal, but it came from the Pension next door, and so we weren't privvy to the password)

We went for a stroll earlier, and had some dinner in one of the town squares (there seem to be so many places that are the "centre" of this town!). We shared a pizza and pasta meal, with reasonable coffee, and a delicious german beer (better than Czech beer, perhaps!) when clearing up the waitress knocked the (empty) beer glass over, and it shattered on the table! And during the meal, a terrifying bee buzzed around me, causing me no end of spasms of fright... later, as Frankie is enjoying (well, not really enjoying) a coffee at the hotel bar, the waitress there drops a glass on herself, and it shatters on the floor. A sign of things to come!? After dinner we go to "Norma" discount supermarket and buy some yogurt and bread. It begins to rain softly and we find our way home. I am suitably impressed and comforted by the number of Kebab places here, a density of such Turkish places arguably higher than in Sydney. In the morning, before we leave to travel further south, we plan to have a breakfast at the closest. We have left most of our luggage in the car, will wear the same clothes again tomorrow. Why drag those bags up and down!

And so that was the first day in Germany.