France briefly and home

As we entered France crossing the border into the Alsace region, we had no idea that the Germans called the country Frankreich!

We were also shocked to see diesel at over €1.55 per litre and petrol even more plus we have re-entered the land where beer is now around €5 per 500ml, almost 5 times what we had been paying in Eastern Europe only a couple of weeks ago.

Three years ago we visited this beautiful region of France, situated between the Rhine River plain and the Vosges Mountains and have fond memories as it was our first motorhome trip. We were happy to have the chance to explore a couple more of the many medieval towns and villages surrounded by vineyards on the Alsace Wine Route, randomly choosing Kayserberg and Riquewihr.

We found they were two very similar towns, both featuring half-timbered houses, picturesque narrow cobbled streets, shops selling all sorts of tourist tat and inevitably an abundance of different wine houses. It was lovely to wander around and make comparisons with the buildings in the medieval towns we had recently visited in Germany.

Remembering a good campsite in Eguisheim, we parked up for the night and took the opportunity to have another explore of this remarkable medieval town which is built in concentric circles so it’s very easy to become disorientated.

Pouring rain moved us on the following day and a 2½ hour drive northwest took us to the sunshine and a campsite near Nancy in the Moselle wine region. The nearby town Liverdun boasted a ‘historical walk’ to take in the sights which of course we did but sadly it was all very uninspiring and lacking in character, it was so quiet that the only indication that humans lived there were the cars parked in the old streets.

Despite the disappointing town the campsite was charming with great facilities and situated right beside the Moselle River, we stayed two nights enjoying the sunshine and a chance to get the awning opened and set up our table and chairs for the first time this trip.The next day despite a very long driving day to Calais it was a delight to be on the open quiet roads of France which was looking particularly gorgeous in the sunshine with its huge fields and wide open landscapes.

After a night on a very ‘Brit heavy’ campsite just 30 minutes from the ferry port at Calais, on Friday 24^th May we crossed the channel knowing it was pre bank holiday and half term and so not surprised to hit the car park that is the M25 and a very slow M4 home. We are already planning our next trip which all being well will start in early July.

Southern Germany

Leaving the glorious mountains and lakes of Königssee we moved westwards at times hugging the border with Austria.

We were broadly following the Deutsche Alpenstraße, a 450km winding alpine route through the Bavarian Alps between Königssee and Lindau on the edge of the Bodensee or Lake Constance as we Brits know it! The Deutsche Alpenstraße (the ‘ß’ is used instead of double ‘ss’) does make the journey about 3 times longer than it needs to be so we dipped in and out a bit.

Our first objective was Schloss Neuschwanstein near Füssen, billed as Germany’s most magnificent ‘fairy tale’ castle. Along the way we drove through Oberammergau famous for the Passion play performed by the Villagers every 10 years. The main reason for our detour here was because Annie’s parents have visited for the Passion play on a couple of occasions and it was a chance to see the village they had talked about, the next play incidentally is 2020. The town was full of busloads of tourists and numerous shops selling Passion play related baubles!

In dull overcast weather we walked the steep climb to the Schloss which didn’t look that inspiring close-up, but when we walked around to the back and a bridge positioned for the masses to take their photos the palace revealed its true charms.

We didn’t pay to go inside, but then we wouldn’t get the view from there.

We camped the night by a lake that beautifully reflected the evening light and the mountains beyond and felt truly spoilt that we can enjoy these adventures together and find such perfect settings.Moving on we drove through the Oberjoch Pass with its 106 bends (we were going west, so it was downwards) from the ski resort of Oberjoch at 1200m above sea level. Between 1938 and 1945 the pass was called ‘Adolf-Hitler Pass’.

As we arrived at Lake Constance and drove through Friedrichshafen we discovered to our surprise that it was the home of the Zeppelin with a famous museum and simultaneously noticed that there were two airships in the skies above us at the time!

A short hop further along and it was a stop at Meersberg a Baroque walled town totally surrounded by vineyards on the Bodensee (which lies on the border of Germany, Switzerland and Austria). A happy couple of hours was spent exploring this pretty town with its castle and two palaces, one old 16^th Century and other ‘new’ having been built in the 18^th Century. Of course we couldn’t resist calling into the only wine house open on a Sunday and made a small purchase before we journeyed on.

Our last stop in Germany was a lovely campsite on the banks of another lake, amusingly named Titisee in the heart of the Black Forest. We would have loved to stay a couple of nights and explore some of the Black Forest area of Germany but torrential rain and a poor forecast forced us back onto the road and heading towards France.

We have really enjoyed our time in Bavaria and trying all the different German beer has been fantastic. Germany certainly wins the extensive taste testing we have carried out across Europe. Each small region or major town has its own delicious brand always with a branded glass and matching beer mat and sometimes even the lanterns outside the bar advertising the name of the beer.

As we were pulling out our French guidebooks and maps in preparation for the country change our forgotten German phrase book fell out as well. It would have been so handy and reduced our reliance on google translate so if anyone is off to Germany in the near future do let us know and we can send you a brand new phrase book!

Bavaria, Germany

Despite our best intentions to avoid towns and cities and find different types of scenery what was the first thing we did? Yes, we stopped at three medieval towns one after the other immediately on entering the German region of Bavaria!

Our first stop was Bamberg recommended by our friends at home Les & Lynn and it was a real gem with a mixture of old merchant houses and grand palaces and churches mingled with the rivers that bisected the town.

A particular attraction is the Baroque Town Hall and its half-timbered ‘Rottmeisterhaus’ hanging over the river Regnitz.From here we drove to Rothenburg ob der Tauber that fast became Richard’s favourite town on our trip so far. The old walled town dating back to the 10^th century has a series of gates and protective turrets around the exterior.

There are wonderfully ornate old merchants houses within the walls and some intricate signs hanging from the outside advertising many stores, hotels and offices.

We then chose a campsite further south at random, travelling without knowing it on what we discovered was Bavaria’s ‘Romantic Road,’ and whilst comfortable it was on the outskirts of another walled town called Dinkelsbühl. Once again we saw one of Bavaria’s best and almost complete medieval urban complex with towered gates and impressive timber frame houses.

The bad news is that the price of beer has risen to €3-3½ for 500ml.

We finally decided to ‘head for the hills’ with our objective being the lakes and mountains near Königssee in the extreme south-east corner of Germany. Along the way we stopped at the Audi Forum in Ingolstadt which is the Audi car maker’s HQ. We wandered around their museum of old cars and motorcycles, learned how the company was formed from 4 different manufacturers (hence the 4 rings on all their cars) and looked at their shop, amazing restaurant and the current range of Audi cars.

That night we stayed on the outskirts of Dachau near Munich, visiting the old concentration camp that is now known as KZ-Gedenkstättean Dachau and is an official state memorial to over 40,000 prisoners who died there. Once again it was a sobering experience to learn of the sheer brutality of the prison guards and the appalling conditions in which the prisoners were kept.

The memorial introduction states: “This camp served as a model for all later concentration camps and as a “school of violence” for the SS men under whose command it stood. In the twelve years of its existence over 200.000 persons from all over Europe were imprisoned here and in the numerous subsidiary camps. 41.500 were murdered. On April 29 1945, American troops liberated the survivors.”

In cold and wet weather on 15^th May we finally arrived at Königssee. Lake Königssee is emerald green in colour and nestled at the foot of the eastern wall of Mount Watzmann in the heart of the Berchtesgaden National Park. We had hoped to take the cable car to the top of Mount Jenner but were thwarted by both low cloud and the cable car to the top station not opening for another three weeks.

Instead we walked to the international standard bob sleigh and toboggan track and looked in awe at a concrete tube with steep and sharp curves that when ‘iced up’ the top level sliders have to conquer.

Friday 17^th May dawned bright and cloud free so we could at last fully appreciate the wonderful mountains surrounding the town for the first time. It also gave us our first glimpse of the “Eagles Nest” a mountain top tea house built for Adolf Hitler in 1938 that he rarely used but is now an historical viewing point (not yet open for the season as its still snow bound after the horrendous winter suffered in this region) and quoted as evidence of “the wondrous sham of the Third Reich”.

We then joined the tourist trail and enjoyed a trip on wonderfully crafted electrically powered wooden boats the full length of Lake Königssee followed by a walk to Lake Obersee and onwards to the Röthbachfall, Germany’s highest waterfall but definitely not the most impressive we have seen!

The walk and boat trip however were a delight stopping for the obligatory quick look at the chapel of St Bartholomä on the return journey.

A couple of local beers at the bar close to our campsite with a beautiful mountain backdrop rounded off a lovely three night stay in this region of Bavaria. Next we continue our journey westwards…

The Czech Republic

On crossing the eastern border into the Czech Republic the first thing we did was to find a garage and purchase a 10 day ‘vignette’ for 310CZK (Czech crowns which is about £10.50) which allows us to drive on the toll roads without being arrested. It’s important as there are no clear indications as to which roads are tolls and which aren’t but we can’t see how any motorway cameras could pick up our sticker and identify if it’s current or not. In Slovakia it was the same price but the whole system was automated with our registration number registered online for instant recognition.

Our first stop was at the ‘Macocha Abyss’ also known as the Macocha Gorge which is a sinkhole in the Moravian Karst cave system of the Czech Republic located north of the city of Brno. It is part of the Punkva Caves system through which the Punkva River flows. To be honest there wasn’t much to see as we didn’t do the ‘boat through the cave’ ride but the walk did us good.

We spent the night nearby in the town of Jedovnice on a virtually deserted campsite with only tepid water in the showers beside a lake that took us around an hour to circumnavigate not counting the 2 pit-stops to sample the local beers on the way.

From here we headed south towards the border with Austria and broke our journey with stops at a number of recommended towns in South Bohemia in Czech Republic. Until we realised that 8^th May was a public holiday (Liberation Day) we wondered why there were so many people visiting the small walled town of Třeboň with its very lovely old buildings.

By contrast our next town České Budějovice, the capital city of South Bohemia, was virtually empty and we felt like the only tourists looking at the arcaded squares, Samson’s Fountain and the Gothic-Renaissance Black Tower.

We found a very quiet campsite by another lake in a small town close to the border where a 500ml beer cost just less than £1 in a local bar.

Waking to pouring rain and icy winds we set off for our final, and by far the busiest town of the three.

Český Krumlov which was packed with tourists of every nationality and as it turns out, justifiably so as it has a magnificent setting surrounded by the Vltava River, and the town with its narrow cobbled streets is dominated by an imposing 13th-century castle.

Heading north again we settled in for a three night stay on a fabulous campsite (our best so far on this trip) on the outskirts of Prague, or Praha as it is called in Czech. It was lovely to have a break from travelling every day and whilst here we hopped on a 15 minute commuter train into the city to explore. Prague is a city with an abundance of impressive sights which include a castle, many churches, the ‘John Lennon Wall’ and the famous Charles Bridge.

We spent an afternoon and evening walking around the city and although everywhere you look there are stunning buildings it was sometimes difficult to enjoy the sights due to the overwhelming number of tourists and tour groups. Returning early the following morning gave an opportunity to see and appreciate the beautiful city waking up with far less people around.

Our final destination before leaving Czech Republic was Karlovy Vary, a spa town close to the western border with Germany. This town was Annie’s favourite on the trip so far and a happy time was spent walking around the Colonnades, numerous hot and cold springs of water including the Pramen Vřídlo geyser, which spouts up to 12 meters high.

Whilst here we decided to use up our Czech crowns (money) by sampling some of the street food specialities we had seen in many of the towns, we especially loved Trdelnik, hard to describe but a kind of cone or cake made of rolled dough and cooked on a spit then covered in sugar and filled with your choice of a variety of delicious sweet treats.

Despite cold and at times very wet weather we enjoyed our journey through the Czech Republic but we are keen for some sights other than towns, churches and historic buildings, however fabulous they may be.

 

Krakow, Poland and into Slovakia

Arriving at a very basic campsite on the outskirts of Kraków we then jumped on a bus into the city centre to explore. It was surprisingly full of people and we later found out that it was a public holiday in Poland. Kraków was a delightful city with its old town having an imposing castle (Wawel Royal Castle) and the mainly pedestrianised streets full of historical buildings, a huge market hall (UNESCO listed despite the ‘tat’ being sold inside) and numerous churches. We stumbled across one square full of people singing along with a group on stage to what we guessed was local folk songs.

Poland is known for its beer and vodka so we had to pop in for a drink in one of the local bars where we had two very tasty large Warka beers for only 16.00 PLN (£3.35 total). They were also doing a rapid trade in vodka cocktails of every flavour combination you can imagine all served in tiny shot glasses.

We then ventured across the River Vistula to Kazimierz, the old Jewish quarter and site of the former Jewish ghetto in WW2. This is now a lively area full of bars and restaurants and again lots of churches and synagogues. We ended the day in a polish restaurant enjoying a delicious 3 course meal which included 500ml of wine and 2 large beers for only £30. All in all Kraków was a delightful surprise to us because the majority of towns we had driven through in Poland lacked any real character and seemed rather utilitarian.

As we have passed through towns and villages we have however been amazed at the colourful cemeteries in Poland as it seems every grave is covered in flowers, probably plastic but still creating a wonderful image.

From Kraków we decided to head south to the Tatra Mountains which form the border between Poland and Slovakia. Before leaving we spent all our left over Zloty on a supermarket shop and fuel, delighted by the fact that you really do get a lot for your money.

Arriving mid-afternoon just over the border in Slovakia we drew up at our planned destination and found a distinctly shabby campsite that consisted of a muddy field and not much else, so decided to drive on and take our chances further into the mountains. Stopping en-route to see the outside of an imposing Castle and an open air museum of period (not sure which period) log houses at Stara L’ubovňa we called in at another campsite which was open but they hadn’t bothered unlocking the facilities and therefore there weren’t any other guests so once again we ended up driving onwards.

Eventually we arrived in the small ski town of Tatranska Lomnica and parked overnight with three other motorhomes in the free car park for the Cable Car into the Tatra Mountains. We had this cable car and a walk in the mountains on our itinerary, however due to snow warnings and sleet plus bitterly icy winds and freezing cold temperatures we chickened out. We further justified our decision by the fact that the cloud was really so low the views wouldn’t have been that special!

We will remember Slovakia for the wonderful Castles we visited often set high above the town or in the hills overlooking flat plains, Castle Spiš looked amazing from a distance and close up less appealing, Castle Bojnice near Prievidza looked like something out of a fairy tale (but was closed) and finally Castle Trenčín dominated the town landscape.

Leaving Castle Spiš we literally stumbled upon Spišská Kapitula – an ecclesiastic town also known as the ‘Slovak Vatican.’ It is from here that the Bishops and Canons organised Slovakia’s church life – shame it doesn’t look nicer.

Another memorable visit on our journey through Slovakia was to the town of Levoča, this again was a surprise after the many towns we had driven past all of which appear to lack any character and have numerous drab looking apartment blocks and at least one industrial chimney.

Levoča was such a pretty town with abundance of old buildings, a UNESCO Basilica of St James with an intricately carved Gothic main altar that is said to be the highest wooden altar in the world at 18.62 metres and whilst very gaudy was still impressive. Equally fascinating was The Cage of Shame in the town square, a birdcage shaped ‘prison’ where miscreants would be locked up for any number of offences such as public drunkenness, adultery or excessive gossiping. It was used mostly on market days and festival and fair days to maximise the dishonour and public humiliation.

We have only spent 4 days in Slovakia so are hardly qualified to comment but we have noticed a couple of things, the restaurants, bars and café are really dark, it’s hard to tell which are open, and inside people are smoking (!) and it feels like you have gone back to the 70’s.

The Slovakians are a hardy bunch of people who love to hike whatever the weather. The country is full of marked hiking trails and we saw so many people out on them even in driving sleet and rain. The campsites aren’t yet ready for visitors and so many are closed or barely open which has proved somewhat challenging.

 

Dresden and Auschwitz

From the Moselle we had two long driving days covering over 670 miles in nearly 13 hours of driving before finally arriving slightly travel weary at Oświęcim in Poland. Incredibly over 450 of those miles were on one road, the A4 that runs through Germany and Poland.

We broke our journey with an overnight stay on a campsite on the outskirts of Dresden and sampled the obligatory German beer in the campsite bar. As there was a bus stop right outside the campsite we decided to get up early and have a walk around the old part of the city, a €9 family ticket that was a bit wasted on us provides a full day’s travel on any bus, tram or train within the city and it’s amazing how they all link up. We jumped off our bus outside the railway station and onto a tram that took us to the riverside walk.

Dresden’s old city area didn’t disappoint at all with an abundance of magnificent buildings and churches all set on the edge of The Elbe River. We had a happy but cold couple of hours walking around and hope our photos do it justice, however due to us getting into the city so early we found that none of the main attractions opened until 10am so we didn’t get the chance to enter many of the buildings.

The little we knew of Dresden was that it was a centre for porcelain china and more importantly was heavily bombed by the Allied Air Force in February 1945. Thankfully many of the stunning 18^th Century buildings survived and to this day restoration work continues.

We were especially moved during a visit (after 10am) to one of the churches where we found ‘The Coventry Cross of Nails’ made up of three carpenters nails from the roof beams of Coventry Cathedral put together after the bombing by the German Air Force in 1940. It was given to Dresden as a sign of reconciliation and peace after WW2 ended.

Leaving Dresden late morning we set off on our journey out of Germany and into Poland along the A4. Trying to find somewhere to stop for lunch proved to be a challenge as every off motorway parking area was rammed full of trucks with no room for us. Crossing the border into Poland (in lovely weather) we pulled into the first service area we found which was yet another ‘truck stop’ but it did have the requisite cash point for us to obtain some Polish Zlotys so we could at least pay the motorway Toll!

When we passed through the lady at the Toll booth kindly taught us our only Polish word which we pronounced ‘Gin Queer’ meaning thank you – it’s actually spelt “Dziękuję Ci” how would you pronounce that?!

Late Afternoon we arrived at the Oświęcim Centre for Dialogue and Prayer, our ‘campsite’ close to the Auschwitz Museum. This very tranquil centre offers camping for about 10 motorhomes in the grounds with simple but lovely facilities. We shared the outside space with a number of international road cycling teams who were using the town for an overnight stop. When we arrived the cyclists were booking into rooms in the centre whilst their back up teams were washing and carrying out maintenance on all the bikes.

A very early start on Friday 3^rd May saw us at 7.30 am joining an already long queue for those without pre-booked guided tours to gain access to the museums of Auschwitz-Birkenau. However all ran smoothly and by 8.15am we were granted what is a free entry to both sites for those happy to do a self-guided visit.We spent the next 4 hours visiting both sites which together form the largest extermination centre of WW2 and the only concentration camp to be preserved in as close to its original condition as possible. Auschwitz I is more of a museum with different themed informative, educational and at times emotional displays in each of the many blocks that made up the camp. These included information ranging from the camp orchestras to sanitary conditions and medical experiments to a focus on Jewish groups from different nationalities such as the Greek Jews. We learnt so much that we weren’t previously aware of and after a couple of hours felt like we had information overload. The most striking new facts for us were that over 140,000 Poles and 15,000 Soviet Prisoners of War were also deported to the camp, over 90% of whom died.

Words are not sufficient to convey the experience of visiting these sites so we’ll post some of our photos and ask anyone reading this to remember the 1,100,000 people, mainly Jews who died here. The Holocaust or genocide carried out by Nazi Germany is responsible for 17 million deaths when taking into account all victims of Nazi persecution during WW2, 6 million of whom were European Jews, ⅔ of the total European Jewish population.

We were overwhelmed with the size and extent of the Auschwitz II-Birkenau site (346 acres or 140 hectares) where the ‘death trains’ delivered their human cargos.

On one side there were line upon line of wooden barrack house foundations, originally designed to hold 400 people, most of which were destroyed and the remaining prisoners taken on a forced march as the Allies closed in at the end of the war. On the opposite side were brick built barracks for 700 all of course housed many more than this. Conditions in these places were indescribable.From Oświęcim we drove in virtual silence for about 1½ hours on to a rather shabby campsite in Kraków and back to present day reality.

Back in our Motorhome

Amazingly it’s just over 8 months since our last Motorhome trip in Ireland and besides a couple of days for a service and MOT we haven’t been near our trusty vehicle and yet lo and behold it started first time! Without wishing to tempt fate, all the appliances are in perfect working order and it was remarkably clean given such a long lay-up.

This trip will only be for the month of May as Richard has to be home in time for an early June golf trip to France, poor chap. Our plan is to drive reasonably quickly across Belgium, Luxembourg (because we haven’t been there and need to tick the country off on our ‘been there map’) and Germany to Poland as our main objective is to visit Auschwitz. We’ll then travel back in a more leisurely way through Slovakia, Czech Republic, Bavaria in Southern Germany and back up through France.

Leaving home our drive to Dover was trouble free so we were able to catch a ferry 1½ hours earlier than the one we had booked. As a result the channel crossing was spent deciding how far we could travel with the extra time we now had in hand.

Fairly randomly we chose a town called Tournai as the guide book stated it was the oldest town in Belgium, added to which there was a free AIRE in which to spend the night. Expecting very little we were delighted to find a charming old town centre buzzing with life even on a Sunday night and a myriad of old buildings around a triangular town ‘square’ dominated by a 12th-century Belfry plus the obligatory church undergoing renovation, actually it is billed as “the huge Cathedral of Notre-Dame, with 5 towers”.

It was a dreary wet evening so our photos don’t do the town justice but we enjoyed wandering around and looking at the sights from the outside at least.

Once again we took to our guide books to decide where to aim for on Monday and we plumped for the town of Mersch just north of the city of Luxembourg mainly so we could say we have spent a night in the country. Setting off from Tournai we encountered a very foggy morning which thankfully cleared for an easy drive but as a result we can’t really comment on the Belgian landscape, a detail you as a reader may be thankful for!

There isn’t much to commend the town of Mersch except that we missed one of their festivals by two days and its clear many people take some pride in the look of their front doors even if some are a little tasteless.

A surprise to us is that there are three official languages in such a small country: French, German, and the national language of Luxembourgish (close to Dutch), not an easy place therefore in which to grow up and go to school or to emigrate to for that matter – you have to be tri-lingual as a minimum and also have a smattering of English!Leaving Mersch behind we had a rapid drive eastwards where we stopped to spend a couple of hours exploring the town of Trier as it’s one of Germany’s oldest towns founded in 17 BC so UNESCO have had a field day.There are Roman buildings, baths, gates & remains, huge Cathedrals and a Rococo palace as well as it being the birthplace of Karl Marx in 1818 but we couldn’t find his house amongst the sex shops now thriving in “Karl Marks Strasse”.

It did however mean that we had travelled through 5 countries in 3 days!

From here we drove to Burg Eltz, a medieval castle nestled in the hills above the Moselle River just west of Koblenz and had a walk through the wooded valley to see this picturesque building before heading to a very quiet riverside campsite for the night.