Onward to Lindau

From Rothenburg to Munich is just a couple of hours drive and soon we were enjoying the Englisher Garden once more. As I've shown a lot of Munich in recent posts I'll just include a few photos of my favorite place in that city.

Ciaran, deep in thought...("should I have another Pretzel?") by the lake in the park.

A perfect afternoon in May

My other favorite place is the garden of the hotel. I look down to see if there's an empty table for a nice al fresco breakfast.

 Across the rooftops

Many of our European vacations start when we step out onto our balcony at the Admiral Hotel in Kohlstrasse. I open a complimentary bottle of cold beer from the mini bar in the room and take a seat. I can immediately feel the many hours of travel-usually 12 hours from the time we left home to go to the airport in Chicago-fall away. The long flight through the night is worth it when you have stopped moving and are in your new home-from-home. We love Munich and we love Bavaria.

One evening on TV, back in late 2004 we saw a film called Bavaria from the Air, which was shot from a low flying helicopter. We saw a place there called Lindau that looked beautiful and the name had a special significance for Opera fans like us as it was the place where Richard Wagner, fleeing arrest for his part in the 1849 Dresden Revolution, got on a boat using a false Passport and sailed to Switzerland across Lake Bodensee (Lake Constance) where he would remain for 12 years.

So when it came time to return to Munich in 2005 we had to see Lindau and stay overnight.

It's less than a two hour Autobahn drive on A96 heading Southwest. The town sits on an island and is accessed by a road and a railway line. We would be staying on the waterfront in a beautiful classic hotel called the Bayerische Hof in a suite with a balcony overlooking the harbor.

http://www.bayerischerhof-lindau.de/?language=en

The Hotel

Many of the tourists you see here are on their way by ferry to either Austria or Switzerland, both visible across the Bodensee. There is a constant stream of ferries running from morning to evening.

As seen from our hotel balcony.....

Austria is to the left and Switzerland to the right.

There's no nightlife to speak of in Lindau, for those of you who like to be entertained and dance the night away. We are happy with a quiet town in a beautiful setting and the highlight of an evening for us is a fine meal and a stroll by the water on a warm evening.

There was actually entertainment happening on the harbor side when we arrived- a comedy juggler of considerable skill was performing. The crowd gathered there was laughing but his jokes were in German and we didn't get their subtleties. He was followed by a comedy unicyclist. Good simple entertainment for the passing tourists. They performed near the foot of a tall tower nearby.

This, though is the iconic image that says "Lindau" and is one that Wagner would have known back in 1849 as he sailed out. We just had to have a room with this view!There's an open-air Opera house at the Austrian ferry port of Bregenz where the stage floats on the lake which we someday hope to visit. There was nothing playing when we were there but I hope someday we'll get to visit it and take the ferry over to Lindau to see this lovely town from the water.

A quiet stroll away from the hustle and bustle of the harbor...

Interesting garden ornament

And the real thing relaxing on it's nest in a corner of the harbor wall

At dusk the tourists begin to leave

Wanting to stay by the harbor we decided to dine in the Hotel's restaurant that evening and enjoyed a fine German meal, cooked by a Swiss chef as is so often the case in Premium German hotels. Refined cooking and as always, stellar service. This was at a time when I didn't photograph all our meals-all that has changed of course.

With no night life to speak of, after dinner was spent sitting outside by the harbor listening to the water lapping against the dock. Then a deep contented sleep.

In the morning the procession of ferries would begin again and after breakfast it would be time to pack the car once again and continue on our travels.

Goodbye Lindau! We hope to see you again some day....

Then the rains came....

When we left Turckheim in our rearview mirror we headed over to Colmar for breakfast of coffee and croissants, freshly baked on the premises. I have no idea what the cafe was called but it had outdoor tables so we could people-watch.  French children were being walked to school by their parents. It began to rain. A soft drizzle so nothing to be concerned about.

I can hereby testify that croissants and coffee are best enjoyed in France. So simply perfect.

We set off from Colmar on a long journey back into Germany, to Rothenburg which Ciaran had never visited and we are always happy to visit again. Such a unique old town.

Along the way the rain increased and the skies were ominous. The drizzle morphed into heavy rain by the time we crossed into Germany in Strasbourg, a city I had hoped to see under better conditions.
I saw windshield wipers. Strong Mercedes wipers and they worked tirelessly on the fast speed for the next SIX HOURS. The thunderstorm was following us all the way. I had to focus on keeping us on the road and opted out of any conversation that was occurring amongst my passengers.

It was only when we were 20 miles from our goal that the weather improved and a rainbow came to tell us all was well and that we were finally safe from the onslaught.

The first order of business after checking into the Burg Hotel, our hotel of choice here, was to eat after 6 hours in the car. We played safe by eating indoors-the usual Weinerschnitzel, french fries (pomme frites) and lashings of cold crisp German lager.

We walked the quiet streets in the dark. Quiet because the tourist buses had gone back to the cities they came from. While Carol went back to the hotel for an early night, after our long drive, Ciaran and I found a cosy pub called the Pulverer where we were the only customers for the next hour or so.
We spent the time "catching up" as we hadn't seen each other since 2006-a whole year earlier, when we met in Berlin and then again a few months later when he joined us in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

No rain the next day so we had perfect weather for a walk outside the town, beginning at the Castle Gardens, which affords this view looking back at the walls of Rothenburg.

The Castle Gardens

We walked down to the bridge over the Tauber River

After a couple of hours of leisurely strolling we returned to within the town walls to stop at one of the most photographed street scenes in this storybook town...

Lunch was enjoyed al fresco on the sidewalk in front of Ciaran's hotel- the Meistertrunk. As we already had two visits to Rothenburg in our recent history we wanted to show Ciaran the "events" in the town after the tourists leave for the day, usually around 6 pm.

Such as the drinking contest which legend has it saved the town from a siege...Rothenburg was spared by the drinking prowess of it's Mayor.

And the Nightwatchman drew his usual crowd for a walking tour of the narrow backstreets. He promises it will be "scary". He's such a good talker (in English) that I believe him. He leads his crowd away for the two hour tour.

Another evening of dining outdoors on a warm May evening, followed by a visit to a small Italian gelato shop, followed by a return visit to the Pulverer for Ciaran and I. Endless pleasure always capped by a sound sleep in the night time quiet of this fairytale town.

Next morning we packed as we were on the move again. To Munich. After breakfast we enjoyed a short stroll on the outside of the wall before packing the car. We are taking everything at a leisurely pace as there is no timetable. This is one of the great benefits of revisiting favorite towns and cities. There is no rush to see everything in one day as we know we will be back again in the future. So we can afford to sit in the sun  drinking espresso and eating gelato while groups of tourists are guided around trying to see it all in an 8 hour visit. In Germany, in particular, we like to relax as much as possible between seeing the museums and castles. We like the beer garden pace where you have all the time in the world to soak up the atmosphere. We have our hectic vacations too- usually on Mediterranean cruises, where there is so much history and art to see in each port the ship visits.

The Burg Hotel

Next up we visit Munich, Lindau and Austria....I'm combining 3 trips to Europe in this blog: trips from 2007 (what you've seen so far) 2005-Lindau, and 2008 Munich, Salzburg and Vienna.

I apologize for gaps in the narrative due to losing so many photos to theft of a computer and recently I have been very busy, having just returned from 4 days in Houston, Texas.

Onward to Alsace!

This is one of our driving tours where we move every day or stay a couple of days  before moving.

After a night in Koln (Cologne) we are setting up camp in the Rhine castle Hotel auf Schoenberg, familiar to readers by now, as we visited it recently on the occasion of picking up my new car in Munich back in 2003.

Our familiar turret room at the top of the castle.

The view from the bedroom window. The hotel is almost 1,000 feet above the Rhine and this is what is behind it.

Ciaran and I enjoy a beer on the tiny balcony. This is a wonderful place to relax, unlike any other. Late afternoon with the sun getting low on the horizon. The only thing we can hear this high up are the birds nesting in the castle walls and trees and the sound from the trains that run on both sides of the Rhine.

 Barges sail by day and night. The beers are free, which is cause for celebration!

Looking down on the castle walls. The Rhone river is on the other side of those distant meadows, maybe 25 minutes drive. It's a much quieter river for freight traffic.

An ancient tower near our room stands in ruins. The castle was built between 1100 and 1149 AD.

Carol and I pose for Ciaran the photographer 

We stayed in the castle overnight and had a marvelous  dinner in the nearby town of Bacharach, eaten outdoors on a quiet street in that beautiful small town, known for it's vineyards. No tourists!

Next morning we drove down the hill to a supermarket below to get some snacks for our drive later to Alsace in Eastern France on the border with Germany.  We still had a fine morning ahead and after a great German breakfast buffet in the hotel we set out for a drive to show Ciaran Burg Eltz.....

Now we could return to the hotel to pack our luggage and load up the car for our 5 hour trip to Alsace. We took a few last looks at the Rhine from our bird's eye view. We would drive along it for 30 miles or so before heading inland towards France.

As someone who loves to drive it was a pleasure to spend 5 hours (with a few stops for coffee) driving through unknown territory towards a country that I love but haven't spent nearly enough of my life in. I wish someone had been videotaping it. Normally I would run a video camera myself-something I have done on many drives in the western USA but abroad I need to keep my wits about me and both hands on the steering wheel.

On our last coffee stop before our destination we were in France and I had the distinct joy of being able to place our orders in French, a language I love and which I knew would come in useful one day.

We were staying overnight in the tiny village of Turckheim but once we had dropped our luggage at our hotel there (Hotel Deux Clefs) we drove the short distance to the closest city-Colmar which is notable for it's canal and this area known as la Petite Venice. While  Ciaran and I sat at a sidewalk cafe (always my favorite place to be) drinking French beer we had a very nice waitress. I loved to hear her talk to the locals at the nearby tables and so when I needed an ashtray (and I always do) I asked her for one in French and we got to talking. I could hear some foreign accent though in her voice and asked her where she was from? Scotland! We dropped the French immediately and had a lively chat as we are from Northern Ireland with some Scots blood flowing in our veins. It just struck me as odd that I would meet someone with a common background and upbringing, here in Colmar, a city I had never even heard of before planning this trip.  Once Carol returned from her visit to a local museum where everything was spoken or written in French we went looking for a French brasserie for a nice dinner.

We spent a pleasant evening in Colmar eating outdoors in the warm evening weather, enjoying the musical sound of people speaking French all around us.  No wonder it is considered a Romance Language. The food was good (as expected). A wonderful evening. We drove back to the humble ancient hotel and were told by the owner when he let us in to listen out for the Nightwatchman singing later. Sure enough as we drifted off to a deep sleep he was singing in the small square before our hotel. Not something we hear everywhere we've stayed and it just added to the magic of France.

Our hotel was very basic in comparison to our usual lodgings. I chose it as I just wanted us to have the experience of staying in a small French village. It was very Spartan by American or German standards. I think it was about 400 years old. The floors weren't level and they creaked.

Turckheim, Alsace

Some shots of Turckheim. We drove into the village through this narrow archway in the tower. That's a stork's nest on top of the tower....the village is a haven for storks.

This is the small square in front of our hotel

The view from our bedroom window. Ciaran and I are waiting by the car. The luggage is already loaded. All that is missing is Carol. We are heading next to Rothenburg back in Germany. It's almost 300 miles but the weather looks nice for a drive....

Hope to see you there!