We were sad to be leaving our friends, but a little excited about venturing off on our own. So far, George had been holding our hands along the way-which is exceedingly nice when you’re visiting a new culture! We had grown accustomed to George taking care of transactions and we were about to find out how ready we were to do it alone. Dennis had tried to pick up some beginning German, and we had a dictionary, so off we went into the bavarian wine country. (more…)
George, Dennis, and I rode 25 km to Stein-Am-Rhine, where we then caught a train to Schauffhausen to see the Rhinefalls. We got a train pass for the bikes and were able to take them with us, which was handy because the best viewing spot of the falls was quite a ways from Schauffhausen town center!
It was a lovely day, there were many people on the bike paths, being a Monday! We had a light lunch at Stein-Am-Rhine, and sat right by the river. It was gorgeous, and felt wonderful. I had a salad and some apple strudel (yum!). (more…)
After an ample breakfast, we all rode bikes up to Konstanz. The terrain was mostly flat with gently sloping hills interspersed between the quaint little lakeside villages. It was about 12 km to ride into town, we again crossed the Swiss/German boarder with no problems. Sigi gave us a great tour, even stopping along the way to explain about certain historical buildings.
Once in Konstanz, we climbed the steeple of the Munster to take in the view. It was not nearly as high as the one in Ulm (thank goodness!), but the view was equally rivetting. With the sun shining, clear blue sky, and sparkling lake, we were all smiling. Sigi had just taken a walking tour of the town, so he gave us a tour and amazed us with his memory! (more…)
We were all a little tired from Oktoberfest, so we got a bit of a late start. George suggested we stop along the way and spend a couple hours in Ulm (the birthplace of Einstein). Ulm is a traditional German country town. It has a very large church in the town center, which you can climb the steeple and get a great view. Of course we had to-so we climbed all 768 steps to the top of the Munster (Cathedral). I believe it is the tallest steeple in Europe, and it was quite a thrill!
We made our connecting train in Lake Konstanz just fine, and entered into Switzerland without any problems. In fact, there was nobody manning the border. We just passed through a building at the train station, and made the 10 minute connection with time to spare. We arrived at our destination perfectly in time for dinner. (more…)
In pouring rain, Dennis & I made our way down the Leopoldstrasse to the post office. I sent my first batch of postcards, and then we went to an internet cafe. The cafe was small but trendy, set up with Macs & nonMacs. At first we tried one of the Macs, but soon we found out the settings for the keyboard could not be easily changed, and the staff didn’t know how to do it. So, we switched to another machine, and then we clumsily figured out how to change the settings. Dennis was quite frustrated at the whole experience, but eventually we took care of business just fine. Reading email in German was just beyond us, so I’m happy we figured it out! (more…)