Beer Soaked and Bedraggled in Frankfurt

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Finally – Deutschland, and the longest bloody Monday I’ve ever had. (32 hours to be exact – as we flew to outrun the sunset) After disembarking at Frankfurt International Airport, I couldn’t help but recall a story from Keith Richards (a close personal friend of mine who also just happens to play guitar!) as to how someone threw a frankfurter at him on stage in Frankfurt, and then at a concert in Hamburg (well you can guess what was thrown at him whilst there!). Fortunately, we didn’t have to duck from any flying German cuisine.

It was with baited breath that I waited for unsere Gepäke (our bags) to discover if they had made the connecting flight and also as to how the grog survived. My day-pack was the last to come off the carousel, and....................
dang – smells like beer. Not a single bottle was broken (thanks to Nats’ expert wrapping) – just one seal broken, which was still enough to soak both our jumpers. Anyway, like any self respecting Australian male, I toasted our arrival into Germany with the last remaining mouthful of Cascade Premium, kitted up in our thermal gear, and headed out into the early Frankfurt evening. The first thing I realised was how early it gets dark here at this time of year. By 4:30, it’s getting dark, and it’s pitch black by 5. We had some initial confusion with getting the train from the airport as we needed to get a light-rail train to another terminal first prior to getting on the U-Bahn – i.e. subway train. But finally we were heading into the Frankfurt Hauptbahnhof (main rail station). We were all pretty well stuffed from eating on the plane and exhausted as it was now 8pm in Frankfurt (and 4am in Korea) - so we just concentrated on getting to the youth hostel and into bed. Kohen was still unwell, but this didn’t stop him from picking up every bit of snow he came across between our U-Bahn station and the hostel. Certainly, we were all feeling excited about being back in Europe despite our fatigue.

The staff at the hostel were very friendly and helpful, and spoke excellent Englisch, and for the bargain price of 58Euro we had a super-clean triple room with breakfast. Kohen pretty well went off to sleep immediately and I ventured out to grab a beer and sandwich for dinner. I got the top bunk for the night which was like sleeping on a rock, but any sleep in a vertical position at this stage was most welcome. We woke to our first day in Germany to a gentle snow-fall which we watched in the court-yard from the hostel breakfast room. Breakfast was fantastisch warm rolls (brötchen) with cheese and cold-cuts, cereals, yoghurt, and a truly great cup of coffee (plus hot chocolate for Nat and Kohen). We left our bags at the hostel and headed out to explore, as we only had one day in Frankfurt prior to collecting the hire-car at 3.

Well, it was still snowing as we left the hostel, and it was very exciting for Kohen (and us, to be honest) to actually see the individual snowflakes landing on us. We got as far as the first bridge over the Main River, and had to stop for a snappy snow ball fight. With that out of the way, we headed into the Altstadt of Frankfurt to see the Dom (cathedral) and the Weihnachtsmarkt (Christmas Markets). We also had to venture out of town to buy a car seat for Kohen. We were all sorted to call it a day in Frankfurt, so Natalie and Kohen could return to the hostel, while I went to get the car. All good in theory, except the Europcar address was with our bags back at the Hostel – Bugger. So with the cold seeping into our bone marrow, Kohen crying about being cold and needing a toilet, nerves and patience fraying and the quickly approaching darkness, we tried to make our way back to the Hostel, and, in my case back across town to Europcar as quickly as possible. The night was snapping at my heels as I got the car (quite a nice little Opel to be honest) and navigated back across the river to the hostel. Frankfurt peak hour and a light snow was starting, and a single wrong turn (honestly – only the one!) had me crossing back over the river and back again before finally making it to the hostel. By the time we left Frankfurt on Tuesday 7 December, it was full blown night and we still had 1.5 hours to the little town of Sulzfeld am Main, our home for the coming week. Conditions were terrible on the Autobahn with snowy sleet/rain and roadworks which slowed us further – thank God for the TomTom, which I have now learnt to trust to get us around. At least we were able to get a message through to our Sulzfeld landlords to let them know we were running late (I know – us running late, hard to believe right?). Finally rocked up at about 8pm, and the TomTom wanted us to drive up this hill which can only be described as an icy goat track. Dead set, it looked like a recipe for disaster, and as a local Sulzfelder said to me later “it would be OK if you had a tank”! After driving around the town, we still couldn’t find the place – these medieval villages are just not built for cars and certainly not for Australians driving on snow in the pitch black. So, out I get to go searching on foot, while Nat waited at the bottom of Death Valley. A very helpful fellow (Frank – although I’m still not sure if this was his first name or family name) saw me in the street, and thankfully, had quite good English. Bless him, after I explained our dilemma he put some shoes on and agreed to help me find the address. It was during our precarious trek back down Hangman’s Gulch that he made the tank comment. Anyway, we finally found our accommodation and our eminently patient hosts Herr and Frau Eberl, who I’ll tell you about in the next post. The Sulzfeld am Main leg of our journey was about to begin – stay tuned!

Bis später,
Lincoln, Natalie and Kohen

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