2010/1 On the Road Again

Well here we are,back on the road again. Seems like we never stopped, back into all the routines – sleeping in,consuming too much French wine, walking for miles. The only big difference is the weather. We arrived in England to a sparkling day of 30 degrees C. We lunched in the garden at the Hare and Hounds at Bidborough, David’s village pub, thinking yay we’ve left the wintry weather behind. Well things have gone steadily downhill since – 10 degree stuff. Thank goodness for the winter woollies that we store in Maureen’s cupboard, we look like we are back on the Alaskan cruise.

It was great to arrive at Maureen’s to find Stan all ready to go.  No mishaps over the cold and snowy winter, although we have had to replace the engine battery which took time and caused a bit of anxiety as we imagined a flat battery when it was our turn to move off the ferry. Well Joanna does all the worrying, David just gets on with it. Stocked the larder and set off for France within 2 days. Spent a couple of days near Arras in Northern France waiting for a new House battery. We took the time to explore some of the battle sites. Visited the Canadian memorial at Vimy Ridge,  which has rebuilt the trenches in situ, so you get a good idea of what it must have been like.  There are cemeteries everywhere over a huge area. It is hard to comprehend the enormity of the whole thing.

Heading on south, paying vast tolls on the French motorways. A brief overnight stop by the river in Metz. Finally felt like we were back in Europe as we sat in the shadow of the cathedral watching the throngs, sipping  beer and red wine.

Have made our way now to the Romantische Strasse in Germany to explore the old towns and castles. House battery still not charging so great gloom. Spent the night at Rothenburg, made a freezing expedition through the streets. All very medieval and charming, if somewhat touristy. We were expertly guided to a repair shop next morning, where we got a new fuse and voila, with typical German efficiency we are all operational again. So now we have an English engine battery, a French house battery and a German fuse.

Have made our way on down the Romantic Road via Dinkelsbuhl and now Nordlingen. We think it is probably a lot more  charming when it is warmer and not pouring with rain. Perhaps we have been a bit spoilt with our adventures to less touristy, less commercialised places, we are a bit disappointed,but looking forward to reaching our true objective – the   Alps and getting into a bit of alpine walking.

Friday June 4 and have awoken to sunshine for the first time in about a week. We are now in the Alps. Yesterday we queued for an hour and a half and were lucky to get tickets to the Passion Play at Oberammagau,along with 4700 others. It is only staged every 10 years. A sumptuous production involving about 2000 people. They have to be natives of the town or have lived here for 20 years. It is over 5 hours long, divided into 2 sections with a 3 hour break in the middle,hence from2.30 to11pm.It is needed because the whole show is pretty intense. It is all in German but we did have an English text which we managed to follow until it got too dark. It is partially open to the outside and so rugs were de rigeur, and poor Jesus on the cross must have been freezing. It is magnificent. They have been doing this show for several hundred years so have had plenty of time to perfect thing. We feel very lucky to  have had the opportunity to see it.

Otherwise Oberammergau has some fine painted houses, lots of tourists and the attendant shops with millions of wooden toys, cuckoo clocks etc.   

We have met up with another Kiwi couple,Frans and Cynthia who are living in London and  spend their summers in a camper van around Europe. Have spent the last few days exploring with them. Franz is a fluent German speaker which is helpful.

We are heading off to castle and walking country over the next few days.  Have just completed a trip up the Wankbahn at Garmisch-Partenkirchen. Up a cable car to about 2000metres. We walked up there for a couple of hours. Panoramic views- great alpine stuff. David thought it would be a great idea to walk down. A somewhat circuitous route, took ages meandering amongst the meadows,cowbells and all that. Now time to send this and attack a red wine.