The Autobahn

So the German autobahn is not the ideal road to find yourself stranded on with the cars and lorries hurtling past at unknown speeds.  However, Ivan threw a paddy when we left Stuttgart and decided we should visit the hard shoulder for most of the evening. Having left Stuttgart on a complete high and totally relaxed, we popped in to pick up some shopping, and to buy copious amounts of recommended beers. So fed and stocked up we began a 3 ½ hour journey to Frankenjura. We predicted we would make it at half 6 at the latest, with a rest stop half way for a snack and a widdle. About an hour into the journey we were pottering along the autobahn at our usual 60 mile an hour pace (slow and steady wins the race) whilst chatting to Paul I was concentrating on taking a cool pic of the setting sun through the wing mirror…

Autumn Colours

When Switzerland skipped Autumn and went straight to Winter, we didn’t expect to find the vivid colours of Autumn just across the border in Germany. We only explored a small part of Southern Germany, rich with forests, quaint little villages and rolling meadows. Our first stop was the Black Forest, we hopped between villages and enjoyed a few walks, some cake, and a browse round a picturesque town, here are some of the highlights..

Triberg and its crazy cuckoo clocks, every clock was hand carved with fantastic detail, but i think we nearly choked when we read a price tag that said 11,000 euros!  Triberg also had Germany’s largest waterfall, and for an extra euro you can purchase monkey nuts to feed the squirrels. Only we couldn’t find any squirrels to feed (probably the rains fault), but for most of our walk you could see and hear these very noisy black birds. Turning to Paul i was asking “do you think this bird will want the nut?” Paul only got the words “I doubt” out before the bird swooped down and nearly took my fingers with it! Turns out these birds are nutcracker birds, and it didn’t take long until they had demolished my little bag of nuts.

Cuckoo Clock Crazy

Cuckoo Clock Crazy

Largest German Waterfall, Triberg

Largest German Waterfall, Triberg

Largest German Waterfall, Triberg

Feeding the Nutcracker Birds… by accident!

Oi thats for the squirrels

Black Forest in colour

 

Seriously Switzerland!

This is our second attempt to climb in Chironico and Cresciano this trip. First time = +30 degrees with insect infestations (rookie error, arriving in summer), second time = -4 degrees with wet slushy snow!

But the weather has been impromptu, and we are slightly frustrated with our lack of climbing, the last couple of weeks has been littered with thunder storms, extensive rain during the night, and when you wake in the morning the rain has turned to snow and we are sat in a beautifully cold and wet winter wonderland… beautiful but not ideal for climbing.

Recent Road Trip Highlights…

Just some stuff thats really made us smile recently ….

Van Pie – We were having pie withdrawls

Mad Austrian Internet Mushrooms

Picking Up Ivan

Just finished nightshift, some two hours sleep and Paul was waking me up to take a flight to Exeter. Shattered we travelled to Exeter, took a taxi to a bus station, a bus to Tawton (1hour) and then the van owner came to pick us up and took us to a tiny farm house in the middle of knowhere to meet Ivan.

The Insurance Mare

So we found a van, but could we hell find insurance, we have had such a carry on trying to get a full years European insurance, every company we tried had stupid clauses like:

• You must have a professionally converted motorhome
• You can only have 3-6 months European cover
• You can have ‘unlimited’ mileage, which turned out to be 5,000miles!
• Most companies would only cover a hand full of countries.

We finally found a company who would provide a full year ‘technically’ for a small fortune, but as we appeared to have no other choice we reluctantly went for it. The following are the loops we have to jump through: