Day 6 - Berlin to Marburg

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Day 6 - Berlin to Marburg

After a couple of days of walking and heat we were ready to sit in the car awhile. Today's trip was a little less scenic but we had some destinations in mind so we took the autobahn rather than driving through the back roads.

First we headed back to the Harz mountains to see the Rubeland Caves near Elbingerode. We passed by on our way to Berlin but didn't have time to stop. The cave we toured was called Baumannhohle, or Bauman's cave. It was discovered in the 1600s and has been toured and excavated since then. The tour was in German but one of the guests helped us out by translating some of the bits. While we were in Rubeland we had lunch at a cafe inside a mine entrance and some ice cream then we were off again.

Once again we were at the mercy of Garmin (it tried to take us on a few roads that have not been built yet) but after a couple of hours and some rather nice old towns we made our way to Marburg. It's the beginning of the Fairy Tale road and we had stopped here on our way to Wolfsburg.

After checking in (we had to wait for them to pass out the room keys to the bus load that checked in right before us) we headed up the hill to find a cafe for dinner. As we sat there trying to decipher the menu (we couldn't find Auflaf in our phrase book) the clouds started to move in. Suddenly a strong gust of wind came rushing up the hill, ruffled through the cafe and knocked over some bikes. The rain started not long after that and then everyone moved inside. Soon it was pouring and thunder and lighting was starting. It was a great storm and being on the top of the hill we had a wonderful view. We moved to the back of the Cafe to watch the storm and wait out the worst of it while eating dessert (apple strudel and a chocolate hazelnut drink of some kind).

What we learned today:
*Cave tours sound much the same in any language
*Tony's least favorite sign on the Autobahn is "Ausfahrt"
*Trucks are slow and hard to pass in any country
*Rain is wet

Tomorrow we head back to Frankfurt and then home. We've had a great trip and Anne is ready to get back in her comfort zone. Hopefully nothing blog worthy will happen tomorrow.

Gutentag!

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Photos

The town of Rubeland
They didn't allow cameras inside the caves. This is taken from the exit above the town.

Marburg tower
This tower sits across the valley from the Marburg castle.

Houses perched on the hillside
Houses and buildings were built right up to and over the edge of the cliff.

Lightening strike
Tony managed to capture on of the many impressive lightening strikes from the storm.