Blogs from Sankt Gallen, North-East, Switzerland, Europe

Blog -- August 3 Where Am I? We biked through three countries in a matter of hours this morning. At times, we were not quite sure whether we were in Liechtenstein, Austria, or Switzerland. But this evening, we are definitely in Switzerland. We awoke to blue skies and warm temperatures. Biking along the Rhine River, we had 40 kms. in before 11:00. It was about that time that we got “misplaced” in the town of Hohenems, right on the border between Switzerland and Austria when we stopped at a store for a supplies. It was also at about that time that the clouds moved in and the temps got cooler. We eventually found our way towards Rorschacherberg, our goal for the evening. About noon time or so, the clouds opened, dumping their load of rain on ... read more

We headed off by car across the beautiful rolling rural countryside of the St Gallen Canton and on into the Canton of Thurgau to the Bodensee (Lake Constance). The back country roads pass through orchards of cherries, apples, pears, occasionally grapes, dairy farms and grain crops. There are many trees dotting the landscape and areas of forest. I think that is one of the things that strikes you about this country and others around - they value their small forests and trees and it makes the countryside so attractive. We, on the other hand see farmland as an area to clear and make every part available for grass. Fortunately we have large areas locked up into National Parks and Forest Parks for the future. On reaching the lake we parked at Uttwil and headed off to ... read more

Hi All, So a long time between posts but we've been having a holiday withtin a holiday during our time in Switzerland staying with Evi and being spoilt rotten. On our second last day in Munich we meet up with Holly's relatives Pepi and Lily and also Pepi's brotre Rolf and his wife Heidi. They were nice enough to pick us up from the station then take us to there house before treating us to a proper Bavarian dinner. The night was really nice and we also so logged some time on the Autobahn! We ending up kicking on late into the evening before returning to our hostel and organising to meet the following morning. As we organised Pepi picked us up near our hotel in the morning to give us a whirlwind drive by tour ... read more

Sunday, May 30th: Sadly, it was time to leave my Bavarian family, and head up north to where my other uncle lives. Normally the drive would take about 5 ½ hours, but we wanted to stretch it out to two days, and drive through and explore the Black Forest (Schwartzenwald), Switzerland, France and Luxembourg. We left late, about 9:00 I think, and it took us about 2 hours to reach our first destination: Lindau, a town on the Bodensee, or Lake Constance. We actually got up to 160 km an hour on the autobahn! That is 100 miles per hour! Whoopee!!!  Lindau is located very close to the meeting point of the Austrian, German and Swiss borders. The old town is on a tiny 1 square mile island that is connected to the mainland by ... read more

St Gallen We arrived at St Gallen and jumped on bus number 3, we stayed on the bus for 6 stops and then Aunty Alice was there at the bus stop waiting for us. We walked back to her place, which was literally 2 minutes. Thank god she had a lift to the fourth floor as my legs were still killing me from the walk down the hill in Locarno with flip flops on. We put our stuff away, had a quick chat and then had a traditionally Swiss meal called Raclett. This involves heating up cheese on little trays and then drizzled it over our vegetables. We sat up and waited for Oliver ( Alice’s son ) to come home from work, had a quick chat then went to bed. The next day Alice & ... read more

Nachdem Marco und Nadia uns um 6.00 abholten und zur Zeit und ohne lästiges umsteigen, an den Flughafen in München gebracht hatten, stiegen wir auch bald darauf in den Flieger nach Paris. In Paris angekommen hatten wir noch ca. 50 Minuten Zeit ins andere Terminal zu kommen. Wir liefen, liefen , liefen und kamen dann auch irgendwann mal an. Wir mussten aus dem Passierbereich raus und dem entsprechend auch wieder durch die Sicherheitskontrollen. Dir Franzosen sind leider nicht gerad die schnellsten und beim Gate angekommen erwartete man uns auch schon. Aber statt uns dann endlich einsteigen zu lassen musste ich nochmals die ganze Tasche auspacken und Gürtel und Schuhe ausziehen.. :-( Der Flug verlief ruhig und wir kamen recht pünktlich in Chicago an. Dort fuhren wir mit dem Bus zum Mietwagenplatz raus und durften unser Auto ... read more