Germany

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Weds 17th June
Got up at 10am weather a lot cooler today so what was going to be a lazy day at the pool is going to be a bike ride into Salo . Managed to get out of the house by 2 o clock after Steve had insisted on getting the car ready for tomorrows move on - good news is Dave and Pauline are making tea again tonight so we don’t need to get back till 7pm . Cycled down the hill to Salo and round to Riveria de Garda and then back to Salo for a drink - managed to get a can of Coke for $3.50 - should have bought it from the supermarket and sat on the beach like a chav! The hill back up wasn’t as bad as expected Blackpool in 3 weeks should be a doddle!!!!. Tried artichoke flowers and stuffed vine leaves as part of tonights BBQ - not bad but don’t think they will become a regular occurrence in the fenna household . For some reason we ended up talking about old Eagle Star days and Dave is probably still wondering what the branch code is for Barrow in Furness
( you had to be there) ( for those Eagle Star people reading this if you know the answer please advise - eg Bolton 3105 Blackburn 3109 and Hanley 3110 !! Pauline just thought we were all saddos and she is most probably right .

Thurs 18th June
Cleaned up the mobile home and were packed by 9.45 - original idea was to travel to St Moritz but the temperatures were down and in the evening -2 so Steve decided in his wisdom to out drive the weather front covering the whole of central Europe and drive 540 miles throught italy the whole of Switzerland and into Germany. This took in the Gotthard Pass - lovely scenery - car went to 136 miles and hour ( on a legal stretch of road may I add) and we arrived at the campsite ( Bosen in Saarburg) at 8pm - camped up made tea drunk a bottle of red. Weather has been really nice today as well - could have stayed in Italy another day!


Friday 19th June
Went out to explore Bostalsee on the bikes - only small lake around 7km - cycle path all round and a very handy bar at the end near the campsite. Tourist information had a map for cycling and Steve has planned our 30 mile round trip tomorrow to a place called Freizen. Managed to cycle down every street in Bosen and could not find a shop anywhere. Went round campsite to collect some logs/twigs as there is a fire pit for every 8 tents and we still have some Croatian sausages to cook. Took about an hour to light the fire apparently coated paper is no good as firelighters- Steves patience wore thin as usual and he gave up. I persevered with the lighter and the gas cooker and a lot of huffing and puffing until we had a marvellous effort. Turned round and we had been invaded by Germans - literally 5 cars, 5 adults, 1'0 children and 7 tents had descended in the area between our tent and the fire pit. They were nice enough people and the kids were well behaved . A couple of other parties had turned up as well for the weekend with loud music singing and many bottles of alcohol. I will never call the volume of the ipod again. Went for a pizza takaway to the camp restaurant as the sausages were rubbish - wont be buying them again in a hurry!!
Walked back to tent and then listened to the various singing/chanting till about 1pm however ear plugs are a wonderful invention.

Saturday 20th June
Woke up and some of them were still singing! Weather not overly warm today so we went out for a drive aroung the local towns . Went to Sankt Wenkeld - so not busy for a Saturday morning . Hardly anyone out shopping mind you shops arent up to much , had a coffee outside the cathedral and then drove to Saarbrucken , wasn’t much happening here apart from lots of shopping and has Steve hates shopping we carried on back towards the campsite. Stev e learnt the german for to slice in the bakerei - they should have concentrated on more vocabulary at school rather than the pluperfect passive tense and we might have more chance of functioning in this world. We can ask Wo ist de Rathaus ( town hall) - and what use is that might I ask ( especially when you cant understand the answer anyway!)- whereas reading a parking ticket machine would be much more useful Near the campsite at the see side there is a fun day today and tomorrow with acts and comediams so we had a wander over to check it out. The Germans know how to have fun - the audiences for the three acts were approx 50 people each and the acts included a unicyclist balancing plastic boxes on his finger , a man in his underpants telling jokes and two blokes in stripey swimsuits balancing over a wooden barrel - there were other acts on during the two days maybe we just caught it at a bad time but it was shit. As we came back to camp the invaders were making there way over to watch - hope they enjoy it more than we did!… Back at the tent Norbert had been left behind ( how do we know his name I here you ask) - as we were cooking our tea on the BBQ he came over for a wander - he had had to stay as his son was asleep - he was enquiring about the cost of the tent and gadgets we had as they don’t have a gut selection in Germany. He also told us that they had brought 3 crates of beer and when they got up this morning one had been stolen and the various teen groups around the site were obvious suspects. One group had been asked to leave this am so it was probably them and they had done something else to warrant eviction - would be difficult to find the beer as there were so many bottles on site. Retired inside to watch some DVDs much quieter tonight I think the batteries may have run out on the ghetto blaster.

Sunday 21st June
As the weekend is over most people are leaving today and things should return to the peace we had on Thurs night when we arrived. 30 mile bike ride is today - spitting a bot this morning so waited till 12 before setting off. Auf Wiedersehen to the tribe next door and as we left one of them said see you next year same time same place - who said the germans have no sense of humour! The bike ride took us into glorious sunshine and lovely countryside but also up many hills - some of which my little legs just had to keep resting. Reached our destination in about 2.5 hours following the cycle route and we stumbled across Dannys bar where it would have been rude not to sample the local bier. Had a game of poker on the gaming machine - didn’t need much language knowledge to work that one out. Left after 1 drink then went outside started raining so we went back in for another one to let it pass - it thundered and lightned so we had our tea followed by a cheeky jagermeister and then set off again. Took the road way back which over 50% was downhill which was nice but the rain that started when we were 5m from home wasn’t. Or the hills that came with it and my stupid bike that wouldn’t go in the right gear. Got back in 1 h 15 mins wet through so the tent has become a Chinese laundry and as suspected there are now only about 5 tents left on the campsite instead of the 50 here this morning .

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