Sunday, July 5

Its time to leave Claude and head for Schwarzwald (the Black Forest in German) but first we hug and hug and say goodbye and then drive over to the rehab hospital to bid farewell to Pierre. When we pull up, he's sitting on a wall outside the main entrance. I think he was eager to see us. We don't stay long. Just enough time to say we're glad we came to see him and hug and hug.

Then its off to Basel and into Germany. The trip to our B and B is only supposed to take a couple of hours. Since we think we're going to have extra time on our hands, we plan to sit around the lake which is nearby after we check-in. 

Various things to see on the road. This trucker was dusting the highway with his load of hay. Should have been covered. At least its organic.

Once we cross over into Germany its not too long before we exit the main highway and enter the smaller roads into the Black Forest. We start going through small towns.

And finding things along the road like a dealership that only sells pink colored cars.

By this time we're getting hungry. We only had fruit at Claude's for breakfast. I'm telling Linda that because its Sunday, we might have a hard time finding a restaurant. Just about then, up pops one right at the edge of the road and I pull over.

Its not clear to us if its a real public restaurant or some type of private club. We open the front door and are in a dimly lit lobby. Another door puts us into a full dining room. The only vacant tables have Reserved signs on them. I catch the eye of a waitress and ask if we can have lunch. She says of course and sort of points us to the deck in the back.

On the deck besides flowers are several available tables and we find one in the shade.

We start with a small beer but get through that pretty fast. 

There is a darker beer on one of the other tables and we ask for that. We meant a little one, but she brings exactly what the other table had. The first one was a pilsner but this one was heavier and sweeter. We're still working on brother Dan's project of tasting as many German beers as is humanly possible.

We were both served a small salad with a couple of pieces of lettuce, shredded carrots, and what seemed like a small mound of white shredded cabbage and a red one and a little pile of rice. Very nice.

I expected to be able to get a schnitzel, but they didn't have any. 

I settled for this pork with mushroom gravy and tiny mushrooms. It was tasty but a bit tough.

Linda ordered what we think was wild boar. It had a distinctive taste, but she's adventurous. 

Along with the boar came a bowl of a berry jelly. Maybe something like serving mint jelly with lamb.

In addition, we shared a large plate of spatzel. German egg noodles.

We head back down the road for about 30 minutes. The Garmin takes us right to the address we gave her, but no B and B. We thought we had the confirmation email stored so we would not need an internet connection - not so. We ask a young woman who is unloading her car but she doesn't think the address is valid. Now what do we do?

A few minutes before we had passed the lake and decided to head back there, find a hotel with internet, and find out what the name of our B and B was. That's right - we didn't have the name. This happened once before in Athens. You would have thought we had learned our lesson. Nope.

We end up at a large building that sells tickets for various things at the lake. We thought it had internet, but no it didn't. I ask a woman at the information desk and she starts doing searches on her computer. Finally, she calls over a colleague who speaks better English and she searches some more. Then, she starts giving very detailed instructions and I call Linda over to get her ears on this too.

We leave not confident of where we're headed. But, down the road we go and go and go.

We're looking for a town named Titisee.

We drive for over 10 kilometers and its not looking good. Turn around and make another pass. Linda happens to have the coordinates of the B and B and we used this once in Ireland very successfully. Plugged the numbers into the Garmin and drove back down the road. Not good.

Lots of signs but nothing we thought we wanted. We really didn't know what we were doing. 

I pulled over and Linda discovered she had put the wrong coordinates in the Garmin. 

We drove and drove and drove up and down the same road at least 3 times, maybe more. Too many times to keep count.

Put them in again and check and double check. I also stopped at a Shell station to buy a map. While I'm in getting the map and a candy bar, Linda finds an internet connection and therefore the confirmation email and therefore the name of the place. Now we're feeling good. A map, coordinates, and a name.

We decide to follow the Garmin with the right coordinates and we're there within about 8 kilometers. It turns out that the second woman at the information desk who gave us very explicit instructions, was right on, but not us.

We check-in. The guy just gives us the room key and takes us up to the room. Two flights of steps and no elevator. Yes, we're still in Europe. 

Nice room with a view of the valley and internet as promised.

We walk back downstairs to the dining room and have our afternoon espresso. They tell us they serve dinner until 7:00 and that there is a restaurant 2 kilometers down the road. We really haven't driven that far but its been frustrating and I don't have any interest in getting back in the car.

Back to the room to write some of the blog and then downstairs for dinner.

Interesting items around and above the dining room. Our waitress was wearing a very traditional German dress over a white, short puffy sleeve blouse.

This was above us. There was also a large assortment of clocks both large and small.

Start with another German beer, of course.

And then mixed meats and salad. All good and too much. For the second time today we ask for a doggy bag. The second waitress puts it away for us in the kitchen to take with us tomorrow.

Those cows in the valley have bells tied to their necks. As they eat, their heads bobble back and forth and they ring their bells. This goes on until it gets dark, but Linda tells me later than it was intermittent during the night.

I think the temperature moderated because we were in the mountains. In the middle of the night, I got up and closed the balcony door and window.

All was good.