BreeAnne wanted to go to the beach. Seeing as how she spends a lot of her time now above the 60th parallel, this seemed like a valid request. So she and I devised a plan to travel to the Bodensee in southern Germany to soak in the sun, sand and surf. Well...it turns out that the beach we went to in Konstanz didn't have any actual sand, but, no bother. It was still fabulous! The weather cooperated and it was hotter than hot all weekend.
Three hours on the train - but it was direct and air-conditioned.
We brought our bikes. There were a few times on the return journey that we wondered if there would be room for them in the "bike car" but we always managed.
We rented a third bike for BreeAnne and headed straight to the beach! There was no sand, but lots of grass. And really, who needs sand getting into everything? The water was surprisingly cold. Shockingly cold. Ok, it was mind-numbingly, achingly cold. I'm still amazed BreeAnne was brave enough to swim out to the dock.
After our afternoon at the beach we rode to our hotel across the border in Switzerland. It was one of the highlights of the trip. Our route took us through the picturesque altstadt of Konstanz, then through the border crossing (no one was around; it was Saturday night after all), and across farmers fields at dusk. It was so gorgeous and we were having so much fun we forgot to take any pictures.
It felt great to cool off in the hotel shower and we had a really lovely dinner at the hotel restaurant. Even though we were only meters into Switzerland the prices reflected it!
Sunday July 15th Konstanz - Freiburg - Karlsruhe
Here we are geared up and ready to start the day!
We chose a different route back to Konstanz and followed the lake.
The fields from the night before are in the distant background.
Even though they were only together for a short time, BreeAnne grew quite fond of her euro-bike.
Down at the lakefront in Konstanz. Blue water, blue sky and hot, hot, hot! Toby's grooving to the big band version of "Where is the Love" ala Black Eyed Peas.
I'll admit it. I'm jealous of her rack.
Waiting for the train to Freiburg on platform 9 and 3/4's...oops I mean "B2"
BreeAnne's friend Julian from Freiburg met us for an iced coffee. BreeAnne couldn't decide which would be better: a grapefruit schorle (beer and grapefruit juice) or a vanilla milkshake. I would have had the same problem if I didn't love iced coffee so much. (The German version involves three scoops of vanilla ice cream!)
Cooling our feet in the river. Julian was an excellent host and great guy. Too bad he's left the country for several months to visit his girlfriend. You know we'll be calling him as soon as he gets back!
The journey home was pretty mellow and hot since the train didn't have much in the way of air conditioning. I had a lovely wipe-out on the s-bahn in Karlsruhe with my bike, just seconds before getting to our stop. In said wipe out my bike fell onto an innocent bystander on the moving train and I fell over and my backpack flipped over my head. Graceful. I 'm laughing now. Ok, I was laughing then too, but in a grumpy way. Still didn't ruin a great weekend though. Can't wait for the next adventure!
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