This morning I awoke at 7.05am in Feldberg. Checked emails, shaved and decided for the first time since arriving in Germany that I felt decent enough without showering. I was only going to breakfast alone, anyway. So, I Fruehstuecked on rolls with creamy butter , buttery cheese, or some delicious something in-between. The strawberries were wonderful. Und the coffee schmechlich!
A far cry from the meal I had had the evening before at a restaurant in Feldberg (one of the few institutions open beyond 1pm). It was a fried pancake of sorts with diced mushroom, bacon and onions in the middle. It wasn't great, but the beer that washed it down was.
Anyway, back to today - I chatted with Patrick and Utte, the other two Aussies at the Gaesthaus for more than an hour before packing. They were very accommodating and I fully intend to remain in contact with them - maybe I will go to Darwin to visit them one day. I paid my dues to Ingrid, the owner, and walked the few minutes to the station to make the train just in time.
German trains come on time - it is true! To the minute! I haven't seen any vandalism yet, the ticket collectors are friendly and the trains zoom along. Like right now, as I watch a moving motley panorama of old cottages, mountains, trees, small townships. The architecture is fabulous - straight out of the fairytale books.
I was going to head for Nueremberg and thence Berlin and then south again - but on the train from Feldberg to Freiburg I had an epiphany - to make this a 'south German' trip only. So, Berlin and even Nueremberg towards the middle get the flick! This way I can allow myself a little more time to bask in the expected beauties of Oesterreich die Schweiz und Spanien. And not forgetting, of course, my ongoing love affair with the old, old town of Regensburg, not too far from Muenchen.
The trains have stewards, like on planes. I just bought myself another coffee, thoroughly confusing myself in the transaction. I tried to offhand all my euro cents (the coins) found I didn't have quite enough to pay, so paid by a 10E note and gained more change to weigh me down!
I expected German people to be a bit stiff, or wary, like an animal wounded. Nothing could have been further from the reality. Nearly everyone has been incredibly gracious and accommodating, even to the point of allowing me to say my piece in German (when they probably could have done it much better for me, and in half the time, in English!)
Karlsruhe should be 19 minutes away - I will check my watch when we arrive - I am sure it will say 2.10pm, the ETA. Or perhaps they don't have ETA's here - just 'arrival times'. Knowns, not expectations.
People are sleeping on these very comfortable trains. They are called ICE trains. I was trying to work out what the German acronym could be, until someone told me it stood for 'Inter Continental Express'! Still, I somehow miss the 'clickety-clack' so synonymous with Sydney trains of my youth. Though I don't really miss the lurching from one side of the carriage to the other. And air conditioning. Now wouldn't that have made many a train ride to uni every day in the 70s so much more bearable?
Even the PA announcements on the train 'auf deutsch' - they are much easier to understand than the garbled nonsense than the garbled nonsense that our underpaid European brethren still struggling to learn English could provide us back then.
Maybe I am just being naiive - but in the week since arriving in Germany, I really can't say that I have recognised anyone as being drunk or influenced by any other delusional substances. I think I heard one car horn in one week. I have heard church bells more often than raised voices. Real bells, too...not just a CD that the rector has programmed for every half hour. For that seems to be the regularity of their ringing. And on Friday, at midday, it wouldn't stop...must have been the Angelus, I think.
I finally arrived in Munich, after changing trains at Karlsruhe and Stuttgart, walked through the impressive Hbf (Hauptbahnhof....main station) and, feeling tired, decided to ask a taxi driver to take me to a cheap hotel 'Hotel Rosengarten', that had been recommended. The taxi driver couldn't find it in the directory, so rang base. They didn't know of it. So I asked for any cheap hotel, in German, at which point the driver asked me to get out! Fair enough, I did as asked, collecting my bags, and got into the one behind. The same routine. This driver turned off his motor being opening the door and escorting me out. Either they mistook my German, or I did ... I don't know what I said. I thought I had asked for a cheap hotel. Perhaps they cannot respond to such vague directions.
So I walked 50yards to the Hotel Excelsior and it is here that I will spend the night.
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