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Published: September 29th 2007
View of River Rhine
View of the River Rhine from the Lorelei rock lookout. The legend tells us, that a siren called "Lorelei" bewitched the hearts of the sailors and when they looked up to the rock, their boat crashed and they sank.
After a rather non-eventful flight from LGA (via Montreal), I arrived in Frankfurt at 9 am local time (3 am EST) Friday morning. I was met by beautiful weather and my friend Paul. Paul is a British gentleman I met in New Zealand last year (Jan '06) when we were both walking the Routeburn Track on the South Island. Funny enough, I haven't seen him since but he was gracious enough to offer to host me for a long weekend. I had not expected he would organize such an amazing weekend, but the itinerary went something like this: 1) Friday - driving/walking tour of Weisbaden (where he lives) and then a driving tour of the River Rhine area. Lucky for me, Paul also likes convertible sports cars so we got to tour in his Lotus and the weather was perfect for the drive. It's a good thing there were so many beautiful sights to see otherwise I might have paid attention to how fast he was driving on some rather winding roads. 2) A drive to Munich on Saturday for the first day of Oktoberfest 2007 and The Police live in concert at the Olympic Stadium. 3) Sunday we drove to
Paul's baby
Paul's Lotus on a ferry to cross the river. Salzburg, Austria and stayed at a charming hotel up on the mountain where we had an amazing view of Salzburg and an opportunity to do a bit of hiking. 4) After a leisurely start to Monday we headed back to Weisbaden and along the way took the Panoramic Rossfeld Road near Berchtesgaden. It climbs to a height of 1600m above sea level and offered amazing views. We had lunch near the summit and enjoyed the views. My pictures will never be able to do the scenery justice. On the way back I was busy playing with our IPODs, again distracted so I wouldn't pay attention to the fact Paul was driving around 190 km/hr. We did make good time though. 😊 I really couldn't have asked for a nicer time in Germany and have to admit that I honestly had NO idea that it was sooo beautiful. The people were all very nice, granted I didn't really speak to them since I don't speak German...but they were nice to Paul! Weisbaden is a charming city just outside of Frankfurt and appears to be a lovely place to live. It was beautiful, clean and a good walking city. Munich was quite
Oktoberfest 2007
View of the Festival grounds from the ferris wheel. Think Texas State Fair x2. The place was packed, a lot of drunk people stumbling around. (imagine that at a beer festival!) beautiful as well. They have a large park there that rivals Central Park in NYC and the city was totally buzzing with activity due to the start of Oktoberfest. We stayed in the center of the activity in a really nice modern boutique hotel. I really appreciated it since I knew in a few days time I would be staying in a hostel in Africa. Going to the Olympic Stadium for the concert was awesome! It actually is a quite modern stadium even though it was built in the 70's. We had a more relaxed time in Salzburg enjoying the location and the charm of the hotel. Paul is also quite the German history source, so I learned a bit about Hitler and his activities near the Germany/Austria border. We saw so much that it is difficult to get it all down to share with you, but I will say if Paul ever decides to get out of the PR business, he could easily be a German tour guide! I could hardly pronounce the names of many of the places we went, much less remember them. I took over 100 photos during my long weekend, so narrowing it down to
traditional attire
A few pretty ladies dressed up for the occassion at Oktoberfest. 8-10 to share with you was tough. Hopefully they'll provide you with a taste of the scenery the countryside had to offer. I hope Paul will forgive me for not being as detailed here as may have been warranted, but the internet cafe closes in an hour and I have another entry to write yet. 😊 It was tough to leave after such a nice weekend, but I know more adventure awaits me in Africa...quite a different adventure I'm certain.
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Laura Fernandez
non-member comment
Germany travel blog
Dear Julia, Went to your blog post and it is funny...you were practically around the corner from me when you drove to the Lorelei! Your trip sounds amazing. Greetings, Laura