A busy days touring heading up the Rhine, passing through Oberwessel (where we managed to obtain one of those magic parking clock cards), St Goar and Loreley and then attempting to get to the junction of the Rhine and the Moselle at Koblenz but finding the roads closed and all sorts of confusing directions, so we turned left and started to follow the Moselle.
The Moselle is very pretty indeed and the autumn colours made it even more spectacular. It was a pity that the weather started to close in, dulling the scene considerably. Finally we arrived at Cochem as the rain started and parked on the site Mosel Camping Cochem, which we found to be a pretty miserable place with loads of vehicles parked up nose to tail on muddy pitches. I suppose it would be much nicer in sunnier weather. We then splodged into Cochem, wandered around this very pretty town (despite the rain) and found ourselves in a family restaurant where we had a fit of the giggles when they played Gompe's version of Living next door to Alice - with the kids at the next table singing along to ALL the lyrics.
A short hop along the south bank of the Rhine to Burt Bacarach and a front row pitch at the Stellplatz at Camping Sonnenstrand. We sat for a while watching the huge vessels chug up and down this mighty river before setting out to explore. An interesting town, and well worth the bimble around, plus we scaled the incredibly steep vineyards above the town to admire the views.
Dinner was a very nice Jaegerschnitzel in the campsite restaurant overlooking the Rhine. It was here, however, that we discovered how pigging noisy the Rhine is at night. With a railway line on each side of the river, and massive barges chugging along all night, the sound reverberated in the valley, almost shaking us out of bed.
In the morning it was a quick dash back down the high street as, after a couple of weeks suffering severe withdrawal symptoms, she needed to buy a pair of shoes!
In the morning, after a fairly late start, we finally found the Burstner showroom in Kehl and spent a little time wandering around the new models. We then asked for the location of the spares shop as we wanted some grey fridge covers. We were given directions of a sort, but told that it would close for the typical German lunch break of 10 hours in about 10 minutes. We headed off and searched...and searched, eventually finding it just after it closed for lunch. Doh! We did see loads and loads of interesting "stuff" at all the various workshops about the place though. Given that we had a longish drive, we didn't bother waiting for it to open but headed off, hoping to stop in Heidelberg. However, Heidelberg was hell and we kept being diverted down tiny streets and, unable to find any stellplatz to park for the night, we gave it up as a bad job and headed towards Bingen. Again, Bingen was packed so we followed the signs for the stellplatz, which is a good few miles out of town, and settled down for the night without actually seeing any of Bingen or Heidelberg.
Heading North out of Titisee we followed the back roads through some stunning scenery to find Germany's highest waterfall at Triberg. The final descent into Triberg down a very steep road was a bit hairy, and following our experiences through Austria last year, we went very easy on the brakes and stopped half way down for them to cool. I suppose it is not surprising that a large quantity of wine plus a large, heavy brick of a motorhome is not going to compete very well with gravity!
Having found somewhere secure to park we set out to explore the waterfall and had a good time wandering about the place. The paths were very steep so we were pleased to have had lots of hill training in the Alsace and we whizzed up and down like mountain goats. After firing loads of photos we went to have a look at the House of 1000 clocks and admired all the cuckoo clocks therein. Some were tacky, others very pretty and some commanded price tags of 1,000's of yoyos! We decided that a cuckoo clock in the bus would probably only survive 1 night before being chucked out of the window so we departed, again heading north the 60 miles or so to Baden-Baden (why is it named twice?).
Finding the Stellplatz-Stellplatz we walked-walked into town, which turned out to be a 2.5 mile trek, but we really liked the town. We bimbled around and had a beer in the overpriced Lowenbrau beer house, where we were surrounded by Brits obviously in town for a conference. We both agreed that Brits on a conference in town all dress and speak the same way and we likewise agreed that we were glad that we no longer had to suffer that experience.
The following morning we decided that we would like to see a bit more of the town so we caught the bus-bus back in, walked through the lovely gardens, laughed at the conference attendees with their braying voices and shiny suits, had some delicious apfelstrudel, did some food shopping and went to the bus stop to figure out how to pay for the journey back. Luckily there was a very well dressed lady at the bus stop who said "Pay boy on bus" so that was OK.
Back at the bus we headed off again to find the Burstner Factory in Kiel, which is on the Rhine and just over the border from Strasbourg. We found the factory, and saw thousands of Burstners of all types lined up waiting for despatch, but we couldn't find the showroom. Time was getting on, so we quickly crossed the border and booked into the excellent new Indigo site at Strasbourg, where we enjoyed a very quiet night despite wandering around for hours in the dark trying to find a fresh water tap.
