ROAD TRIP! Tuesday, July 1

Entrance to Hardenburg









































Our first ROAD TRIP! We booked a room at the Best Western (€ 72) in Idar-Oberstein and we have beautiful weather.

After a breakfast of joghurt and rhubarb pie, we got off fairly early (9:23), filled the tank (3/4 of a tank - € 83, approx $125 - take that you American WHINERS) and got onto the Autobahn. Stopped about an hour later in Bühl (Bueller...Bueller...) and bought a map as the GPS will not be repaired until Friday. We mapped out a route which would take us off the Autobahn and onto some side roads.

Traveling through the black forest and the beautiful little villages is so lovely. We had the top down, our German ball caps on and Cliff Richard on the stereo. We came across a town where there was a HUGE wine barrel - when I say huge, I mean larger than a building. Good photo op, so we stopped briefly. As we crossed through several little mountain ridges, we spied the coolest looking ruin atop one- sort of a cross between a cathedral and a castle, but it was not obvious how to reach it and soon it was behind us. We made a promise to get pictures of it on the way back.

We were driving through the next little village when we turned a corner and there was a castle ruin atop a hill. We found a parking spot and climbed up to the ruin (Burg Ruine Hardenburg.) It was far larger than it appeared from below and we spent about an hour or more exploring all its nooks and crannies. Got some great photos.

Just as we entered the Burg Ruine, Jane's cell phone rang and it was the marvelous traveling Karen calling from South Africa. It was great to hear her voice and especially to hear about her art exhibition, but she also said she was sick! I had a nice longish chat with her (it was very expensive for her because she was calling Jane's cell phone - or "handy" as they call it here.) I can't wait to see her in a little over a week!

Suzanne talking to Karen

We could see the other ruin we had passed, and the ticket taker - who doubled as the archeologist (there was dig going on) - said it was Ruine Limburg, a Kloster (monastary). On our route we got to pass through the town of Frankenstein (photo op) and saw 2 more ruins. There was some lovely farmland as well, and along the skyline there are often enormous windmills, which are beautiful.

By now we were quite peckish so we had some rotten fruit, warm spit and cookie dust, which was all we could come up with in the car. It did prevent an international incident before we could get to Idar-Oberstein and eat.





Finally breezed into I-O, where our first sights were the Felsen-Kirche (church in the rock) and 2 castle ruins (Neues Schloss and Altes Schloss). We went hunting for our hotel, round and round for about 1/2 hour. It was a warning of things to come...it is the largest building in all of I-O, and yet has nothing on it that tells you what it is. We checked in, snagged some of the free packages of gummi bears they had at the front desk, and went to our room on the 12th floor. We had a great view of the city, no air conditioning (duh) and NO ICE. Sheesh.

We dumped our stuff and freshened up, then took the bus to the pedestrian area. We had the most adorable bus driver in the world, young, cute and he was just so friendly to us, and carried on a constant fun conversation with everyone on the bus. We got off and walked around the pedestrian area for a while. It is made up of a lot of small jewelry shops and restaurants and cafes. Above them is the rock cliff with the Felsen Kirche carved into it and two castle ruins above that.

When I was here with Pat and the kids 8 years ago, we ate at the oldest Fachwerkhaus in I-O and the owner was very kind to us, so I was keen to go back. First we stopped at Tina's Pizza and sat outdoors and had huge Radlers and read our books (I'm reading Gary Disher, Jane's reading Robert Ludlum). A Radler, if I haven't explained this before, is half Pilsner and half Sprite. It's really refreshing.

We went in and out of a few more jewelry shops and then found the restaurant, the Zum alten Goten, the oldest fachwerkhaus in I-O, dating from 1420. It is in that style with the white stucco and exposed beams. It's really pretty and had purple petunias in window boxes. There were tables set up outside but they had not been unlocked yet, so we went in and asked a woman in a chef's coat if we could sit outside. She unlocked a table and we sat and had another Radler and read our books. We are the Traveling Nerds.

After a while Jane went in and ordered food for us. I-O has a local specialty called "Spiessbraten," which is a large steak-like cut of meat roasted over coals on a round, hanging grill. We ordered one plate of Spiessbraten with baked potato and herbed cheese (Kräuterquark), and a Big Salad which had ham, cheese and hard-boiled eggs on it. The "waitress" turned out to be both owner and chef, and is married to the nice man who took care of us when we were here 8 years ago. We had a nice conversation with her, and learned that they also own a cafe up at the castle ruin.

The town was deserted and we were the only ones at the restaurant. The owner told us that it was because there was a "Spiessbratenfest" over at the Festplatz and that we could take the bus there. We have had great luck just walking into a fest (once in Denzlingen and then at Hochberg last year) so we had to go for it.

We walked toward the bus stop and while we were walking along we saw a young man laying on the sidewalk. We stopped to see if he was breathing - it really was difficult to determine if he was dead or alive, and we were totally creeped out. A restaurant owner came out and had a look, and went in to call the police. While we were deciding whether or not to roll the guy, a taxi driver drove up and checked on the guy. Finally we heard the guy say, "no, I'm fine..." If you think it's normal to just lay down on the sidewalk and go to sleep, yeah, he was fine.

At the bus stop there were a number of buses waiting to fill up with passengers. We found our bus driver and he was so cute and happy to see us! He wasn't driving but he put us in good hands and we rode the bus to the fest.

The fest turned out to be a cheesy carnival devoted to charred meat. There was cheapo junk for sale, tons of junk food, and rides. There were a number of Spiessbraten stands where you could see the hanging grills with the meat roasting on them. I got a Pils, Jane got a Radler and we sat down to watch the crowd for a while. Interestingly enough, I would estimate that 99.9% of t-shirts worn by Germans are in English.

We decided to leave - we were tired and had had enough of the noise and crowds, so we walked toward where we thought there was a bus stop. Well there was, but the buses had stopped running for the night. We had to walk all the way back through the carnival and on the other side found someone who told us that the buses would indeed be running, but not until the fireworks were over. I don't think I have mentioned this, but it doesn't even get dark around here until 10pm. We were never going to make it, plus we didn't want to get on a bus at midnight with a bunch of drunk charred-meat filled drunken Germans, no offense. We ended up taking a taxi back to the hotel.

When we had checked in, we got 2 keys - one for our room, and one in case we came back after midnight. Good thing we didn't come back after midnight. Even at 10:30 pm the lobby was dark but the check-in girl was still there. We went up to our room and Jane jumped show'. She was only in the shower for about a minute when I heard a yell. The shower hose had fallen out of the wall and water sprayed everywhere. We spent the next 5 minutes trying to figure out how to call the front desk. There was no number except an "emergency" number, which rang and rang. I finally took the elevator down to the lobby - which was deserted. Dark, no front desk staff, no one. If anything happens you are out of luck. Needless to say, I had a bath instead of a shower. European bath tubs are huge - even larger than my antique Victorian tub at home. I filled this one to the top and the water was the color of...well let's say apple juice, shall we?

We got to watch some of the fireworks from our hotel room windows. Better than the fireworks was the sound of them bouncing back and forth among the several surrounding small mountain ranges.

The bedside lamps were so bright that we draped towels over them. We went to bed and were reading our books and I realized Jane was asleep. I woke her enough to get her to turn off her bedside lamp. (At this point I was using a little book light, not my bedside lamp.) I finished my book and walked over to Jane's side of the beds to get a glass of water (did you know that room temperature mineral water tastes like warm spit?) and I smelled something. The towel which had been over her lamp was charred! It was a reminder of when Nancy & I nearly set a hotel room on fire ear-candling.

Made it through the rest of the night without further incident.




"Schwenkgrill" (swinging grill) full of Spiesbraten!




Spiesbraten Festival, 01 July 2008