And so the sun sets on another Travelling Goodies Adventure. We had a marvelous time!Both of our bike and boat trips were more than we imagined they would be. We met some great people, cycled some amazing routes and sailed some beautiful waters. The remainder of our trip on dry land was equally awesome. Without a doubt one of our best trips yet!! To all of those who have been following our blog, we hope you have enjoyed our travels as much as we have. Just like the saying from the movie, Most Exotic Marigold Hotel -- "in the end everything will be okay." Everything is 'a-okay' here -- and so it must be the end.

We've Moved on to Freising

We got up early this morning to make the long drive ( 400 Km ) to Freising, which is just outside of Munich. We will spend today and tomorrow here before we head home Monday morning. We had to have the rental car back by noon so couldn't waste any time.You guessed it, the sky was clear for the first time in days as we left Gengenbach at 7 am. The drive was an experience, the German Autobahn is very much like a race track. Ricardo has become one of them. How fast is fast? We were going at times between 140 and 160 and were being passed like we were standing still. Have no idea how fast the fast cars were going but it must have been close to 200. Needless to say you really need to keep your eyes on the road. There where stretches under construction and down to 2 lanes. The lanes were narrow so it was interesting passing cars, but it had to be done. We can now say we did it. Arrived in Freising on time safe and sound. Louisa is still under the weather with a head cold. We were lucky and got into our hotel room right away. This allowed her to have a nap before we headed out to explore the city. Very much like some of the other German cities, except for some reason it seems to be high on bears. They have statues of them all around, which was neat to see. Tomorrow will be an easy day getting ready for the long trip home. Leave Munich at 10:35 am Monday and get home at 4 am Tuesday Germany time ( 7 pm Monday Vernon time ) Bears - what bears !!!!

Schwarzwald Panoramastrasse

Today we took a drive on the scenic route through the southern Black Forest -- the Schwarzwald Panoramastrasse. Very beautiful scenery today! We are staying in the Kinzig Valley within the Schwarzwald. There is a river, the Kinzig, which runs throughout the valley and s eems to have a couple of other tributaries. There are many places where the river really runs quickly and in the spots where it is fairly low and rocky there are a lot of rapids. Very fast! Makes Louisa want to put on her helmet and rafting armour and try another go at it!! (NOT!!). Our first stop on our route today was at Triberg which has two claims to fame: First, it was the first place in the Black Forest where the cuckoo clock was made. Also it has the highest waterfalls in Germany. We stopped at a couple of cuckoo clock shops -- they seemed to be highly touristic and we weren't convinced the clocks were still made in Germany. One shop, however, had a fellow carving parts for the clocks. He explained that the clocks in his shop which were battery driven were no longer made in Germany, but the manual clocks of wood were still hand-carved in the area. They are very beautiful and those little figures that come out on the chimes are so cute! Second we went up to the waterfall (wasserfalle). The hike was within the forest and it was very pretty in there. The trees were very dense in areas, but the pathway was well developed for tourists so it wasn't a backwoods hike at all. The falls are very nice by German standards I suppose, but when you have seen Niagara Falls and even the Helmcken Falls in Wells Grey Park it is hard to be impressed by these ones. Pretty hike though and it was nice to be up there. So, onward we drove through some of the most peaceful, lush, rolling green hills and thick dense forested roads we have seen for some time. Very, very nice drive. We passed at the highest altitudes through two ski resort areas (again, Silver Star skiers may find it hard to be impressed) but there were little chalets for the skiers and tow bars up the hills. We aren't certain about the height of the pass when we started the descent to Wardkirch. We were passing through the clouds on the way down a very narrow, twisting road with limited visibility. By the time we reached the bottom both of us had plugged ears from the altitude decrease. We stopped for lunch today in Triberg and had a Schwarzwald Speciality -- goulashsuppe. It was a very thick and rich beef soup more like a stew and served with some of the delicious bread found in this area. Very tasty and very filling. Richard spent a lot of time driving today and Louisa spent a lot of time asking him to stop to look at the views and take photos!! We stopped back in Old Town Gengenback for Kaffe und Kunchen again today. It was a partly sunny day so the clouds have lifted considerably making some of the photo opportunities a bit better. We must admit we are both a bit travel weary. We have been on the go for many weeks now and are looking forward to coming home. Tomorrow we will just spend around Gengenbach area as we have the long autobahn drive Saturday morning back to Freising to turn in the car. Louisa is starting to feel the beginnings of a cold/sore throat so time to slow down our sightseeing a bit.

Gengenbach and Around

We woke up this morning to more rain. The fog and clouds had moved down over the mountainsides and it was raining quite steadily. A bit depressing when we have so few days here, but we decided to get on with it anyway. We went to Wolfach where there was a glass factory and we could get inside the factory for a demonstration of the glass-blowing process. We had seen one similar in Portugal a few years ago but it was still interesting to see how they work together to form a piece ... and very quickly. They are certainly skilled at their craft. We noticed that the workers were drinking beer and smoking while they were working. Guess the laws in Germany aren't as stringent as other countries !! We stopped for a quick lunch in a town we were passing through - Steinach. Another example of the lax German laws - people bring their dogs into the restaurant with them. One lady seated just next to us had her dog with her and Richard was thrilled to have it nuzzle its head up on his lap twice while he was trying to eat. How do you say "F... off" in German!! It continued to rain a lot as we drove back toward Gengenbach. We had our umbrellas and rain jackets so decided we would brave the elements and take a walk through the Old Town centre. What a pleasant surprise .... we can only say that it was like walking into a fairy tale. What a place! The half-timbered buildings and houses and the curved cobblestone streets. Apparently it was in the opening scenes of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. Barbara (our landlady) said they had asked all of the town people to come out as extras dressed in old winter clothes (it was still summer) and they shot here for a few days. When the movie came out it was only in the beginning few seconds of the movie along with a subtitle "Dusseldorf!" It is a very charming town. You really do get a feeling of being transplanted elsewhere; it is just so different! We will enjoy exploring it further when the sun decides to shine tomorrow. We stopped for our afternoon kaffe und kunchen. Richard decided to try the famous Black Forest torte - which was shot through with Kirsch (cherry liquor). Yummy! He headed off to the WC (water closet) to return very quickly asking "Damen or Herrem" which one means "guys?" It has been a good day despite the weather. It is supposed to clear tomorrow so we will see how far around we can get. But they are forecasting rain for Friday again. Oh well, on the plus side we didn't get this weather while we were trying to cycle the Danube or in Croatia.

In Der Schwarzwald

Yesterday we pulled our bags to the Passau train station and travelled to Freising. There we rented a car and drove to the Schwarzwald (Black Forest) area of Germany. We are stayed just outside of a medieval town called Gengenbach in an apartment on a tourist farm -- Haus Wussler. Barbara Wussler is the proprietor and she is a very friendly and helpful person. Richard used GPS to find the route here from Freising so, needless to say, we travelled for 5 hours on the German Autobahn roads.....crazy traffic at very high speeds. Richard said people were flying by us when he was at 140! He did very well on these roads. When we got closer to our destination we went by a combination of GPS and Barbara's instructions from her website. Lost?!! Who got lost?! We got turned around several times and it was getting pretty frustrating before we actually found the right direction and the farmhouse which is only about 3km outside of the town up on the side of a winding, narrow road. It is certainly not what you would think of as a "farm" coming from the prairies. We arrived in the dark and this morning it is fogged in with rain so we haven't been able to see a lot of the area yet. What we can see is that it is a densely treed area with lots of hills and it is very green and lush ...... and the houses with the typical flowered balconies are kind of Hansel and Gretel stuff! We don't mind the rain today. We have been travelling for over 4 weeks and are in dire need of some clean clothing -- it can be a laundry day! Just a few more days before we head home. We hope to see a few more amazing sights before that happens. Tchuss!