04.30.09
update 4/23/09
journeying through Bavaria and beyond
We left fairly early on Wednesday morning traveling across southern Germany towards France. The southern part of the Black Forest was spectacular! We will see more of it on our way back up to Berlin also. We stopped in Boden right on the shores of the Bodensee. It was a very quaint town and very religious. We stopped at a little outdoor market and met a very interesting artist. We asked about any laws for street musicians and found out that the churches run everything in the little villages. He told us that we could ask the village priest, who might okay it if we did religious music and only for an hour. We didn’t really want to stop there to play anyway, but it was interesting to find out. I guess we won’t stop in the little towns to busk.
We got lost twice in Freiburg, with our GPS. I can’t imagine what we would have done without it. We finally made it into France where we got lost again in a tiny village with very narrow and winding roads. The drivers in France and Germany are very scary. They drive ridiculously fast. On the Autobahn, we were going about 80 or 90 miles an hour, and some of them drove by us so fast, the whole car shook. In France, they also tailgate. We had a motorcyclist come up incredibly fast and get so close to our back end, we couldn’t see him in the side mirrors. Yikes! Dick hasn’t let me drive yet, because he knows how fast I like to go.
We are now in Switzerland with our friends, Ed and Ursula. Ursula and I went for a walk last night and ended up in a neighbor’s wine cellar - basically a cave - where there were about 5 or 6 men and a woman having a wine party. They insisted we join them. I have learned enough French phrases to charm them. Poor Dick was taking a nap and wondered where we had disappeared to until we stumbled in later in the evening. Today we tour parts of France. I love Europe!
Deb
