Bad Bentheim, Germany

Sometimes there are just places that feel like home and Germany is one of those places. We’ve been here several times since we came to Europe for the first time in 2000 and thinking about, we come here almost every time we come to Europe.

We are blessed with friends in different parts of the country and we love spending time with them and because we are with friends, we get to do things that aren’t touristy – like visiting summer festivals, finding great little eateries, exploring out of the way places.

The only downside of visiting so many friends is, that most of them still work – poor things! Which means that we try to schedule our visits for weekends. But we turn this into a positive by finding new places to visit in between the weekends!

This trip, we visited Passau & Regensburg, Friedrichshafen, Sinsheim (again) and drove up the Mosel and down the Rhine. We were lucky to make some new friends whilst we were in Italy, so we finally got to spend some time in Frankfurt. We also detoured through Kassel to catch up with Sofie, a young German girl that we met when she was travelling in Australia.

We spent a great weekend catching up with Tobi & Christine, reacquainting ourselves with their daughter Lena and meeting their new son, Fabian. We were blessed with glorious weather on the day of our arrival so we had a chance to enjoy a BBQ, skillfully cooked by Tobi! But on Saturday morning, when we went to get the Brötchen for breakfast, the weather was cold! We’d heard that this year’s summer was not a great one in Germany – and they were right!

After the weekend with Tobi & Christine, we were off to spend a couple of days with Tobi’s mum, Ursula but first we did a small detour and spend a few hours in the Thermal Spa at Bad Windsheim. Whilst visiting Ursula, Nick had his moment of fun when he was allowed to go into Ursula’s Nuts, Bolts & Screw shop and pick up some bits that he needed. He only needed a couple of nuts & bolts, but managed to take a long time to find what he said he needed! However, I wasn’t silly enough to let him take his wallet in – he would have bought everything!! Ursula lives in a small village and we managed to score some nice sunshine so spent a lovely afternoon walking around and exploring the village.

Now it was time to see something new and head down to Friedrichshafen which is famous as being where the Zeppelins were made and it is now home to the Zeppelin Museum. Also Friedrichshafen is located on Lake Constance (or Bodensee) and our campsite was right on the shore of the Lake – great outlook, looking across to Austria & Switzerland. This was one of many times that we missed not having our eBikes with us as we sent them home after our previous leg. But it was a short walk around the lake into Friedrichshafen and then we spent a good few hours exploring the Zeppelin Museum. After which we walked through town, discovered a Thai restaurant and decided to have a yummy late lunch!

When we finally got back to the campsite, we were feeling the heat – yes, it was a lovely sunny day, and so I said “Let’s go for a swim in the Lake.”! Well, the air temperature was warm, the sun was shining but no-one gave the message to the water but it was still freezing! However we persevered and got into the water, and even managed to stay in for about 15 minutes, but when we lost feeling in our toes, that was the hint to get out and thaw out in the sunshine!

Next stop was a visit to one of my bestest friends – Sabine. And she had arranged a surprise for us – she had invited one of her friends to visit for the weekend also, so not only did we get to spend the weekend with Sabine, but Ursula as well. We’ve known Sabine since 2002 when she spent time in Australia and we were introduced to Ursula when she came out in Australia with Sabine and they drove from Darwin to Perth, via Broome, in 2006.

The weekend that we were in town was also the weekend of a number of summer festivals and we had a choice about which one to visit – the local festival, the festival in Sindelfingen or in Stuttgart. We opted for the local festival because we could walk there and the weather was great. They had a duo which played traditional German music, lots of beer & radler (like an Australian shandy), as great food! It turned out to be a great evening and definitely the sort of thing that most tourists wouldn’t find out about!

Sunday was a relaxing day which included coffee & cake with Sabine’s parents and finished with dinner with Sabine & Ursula, as well as Simone and her kids – Samuel & Hannah. We are blessed in our friendship with Sabine as she has introduced us to her friends who are always so welcoming.

Sadly, Sabine had to go to work on Monday morning, so it was time to say “Tschüß” and head up the road to Sinsheim – home of one of the best museums we have visited, the Technik Museum. What? We aren’t going to the museum?? Oh, damn! We have to spend the day at the Badewelt – which is a great place with pools, many different saunas and spent the day relaxing. It was a real struggle but someone has to do it! Another score that we found was the new Stehlplatz in Sinsheim – it is located behind the library and only cost €6,50 for the night (with power) AND we got free wi-fi! Well done Sinsheim!

In January 2015, we visited Verdun (across the border into France) because we wanted to see some of the WW1 stuff around there but because of snow we were reluctant to drive down some of the roads. We promised ourselves that we would come back in summer and as we were travelling from Sinsheim to Trier, it was a very easy detour. But we forgot about Bastille Day! And we were worried that things would be closed! Thankfully, we didn’t have a problem and we spend a great couple of days in Verdun, exploring the old Forts, the Ossuary, the Citadel. Nick had a nice birthday lunch and spend a few days dosing up on military history – he was a happy little Vegemite! Sadly, we were also there to hear about the terrorist action in Nice which occurred on Bastille Day.

One of the great things about travelling is the people that you meet. In 2014 when we were in Norway, we met a lovely German couple with a beautiful black Labrador. Once again, they were eager for us to visit them – yes, we were allowed to go back a second time! Not only do they have their black Lab, Benny, but their son who lives next door, he has a Jack Russell Terrier and a German Shepherd. I think that we spent most of the first day sitting in the backyard, enjoying the sunshine and throwing balls for Nielle (?) and Eicha (?) – not sure of the spelling here. On the Sunday, we were off to visit an “Oldtimer’s Festival” – no, it wasn’t a festival for pensioners! It was lots of old cars, trucks & motorbikes – European, British & American. Then it we headed down to see some glorious scenery around the Saar River but first we had to stop off for some ice-cream. Oh, this town is the home of Villeroy & Boch… and they have a Christmas Shop, as well as several Outlet stores! Nick was feeling very nervous but I was very restrained and only bought a few things in the Christmas Shop.

Trier sits on the Mosel River and our next visit would be in Frankfurt, so it was a natural decision to drive along the Mosel River and then south along the Rhine River before we headed to Frankfurt. At the intersection of the Mosel and the Rhine rivers sit das Deutsches Eck with a very imposing statue of Kaiser Wilhelm 1 (not the WW1 Kaiser) and the flags of all the German states. Apparently it has only been in this format since 1993 and there was a lot of controversy to reach the final decision – but the result is an amazing area to visit.

Having a motorhome is a perfect way to explore the Mosel & Rhine valleys because there was lots of Stehlplätze and Campgrounds scattered along the banks of both rivers. We overnighted in Cochem, Koblenz and then Rüdesheim-am-Rhein where we stopped for a couple of days. We took Oscar up to some amazing lookout areas, with some great views, parked up and explored some lovely old towns on foot, walked out to see the statue of the Lorelei, and generally just enjoyed stooging along in some stunning countryside! When we were in Rüdesheim, we got a cablecar up to the Niederwalddenkmal which is a monument celebrating the creation of the German Empire after the Franco-Prussian War. As this piece of Modern History was always a question in the Year 12 final exam when we were at school, it was a real buzz to be there.

Time for a new city – Frankfurt-am-Main! When talking about flying in and out of Europe, Frankfurt is probably the most immediate airport city to think of. We have flown out of Frankfurt but, I have to admit, we have never taken the time to explore it.

Yes, the city today is an example of RAF/USAAF urban-renewal programme that they ran in 1939-1945, so many of the old features are no more. So, we hadn’t ever felt a burning need to explore there until we met Peter & Betty in Italy and they invited us to visit them in Frankfurt. “Come,” they said, “you can park your Motorhome in the garden!”

Peter & Betty were working on the day that we arrived – Betty runs a hairdressing salon but Peter was able to take us out to “Opa’s Garten” and set up us in the allotment. It turns out that the garden is like an allotment garden, so we were on the outskirts of Frankfurt for a few days. We had a typical German BBQ on Friday night with Peter as Betty was busy at work. On Saturday, Peter & Betty took us into Frankfurt where we had some lovely Bratwurst and Apfelwein (like apple cider) and explored a fresh food market. They also explained the intricacies of Grüne Soß which is a Frankfurt staple – it is seems a sauce with 7 herbs (parsley, sorrel, chives, chervil, cress & salad burnet), finely chopped and mixed with sour cream, and into Old Sachsenhausen where some of the old half-timbered houses (Fachhäuser) survived the RAF & USAAF. Peter encouraged us to try a variety of traditional Frankfurt delicacies – Handkäs mit Musik (!), Grüne Soß mit Kartoffeln but I don’t think that I will renew my acquaintance with Handkäs mit Musik.

Last year, in Australia, we met two young German girls who were spending time travelling around Australia – Sofie & Kim. They were schoolfriends and came from Kassel. My sister and her husband (Kate & Dave) visited Kassel in 2013 when they were in Germany before they did their River cruise – and they (Kate & Dave) enjoyed their visit and so we had to come here. For the uneducated, Kassel is also the home of the Grimm Brothers – the men responsible for presenting most of the fairy tales that we grew up with (unless you were Dutch!). We visited Grimmwelt which covers the life of Jacob and William Grimm – but not only their collections of fairy tales. We were surprised to hear that the Grimm Brothers were responsible for the Deutsches Wortes Buch which is the largest and most comprehensive dictionary of the German language. They started it in 1838 and was finally finished in 1961 – but the Grimm Brothers didn’t finish it. I believe they got to the letter “F” when they died! We also had a great after catching up with Sofie – Kim was still in Australia.

By now, we were on our way to Netherlands, and our last night before crossing the border was in Bad Bentheim – nice campground but our GPS excelled itself with the directions!! Bloody *&%##^!!!

Time to catch up with family!