Baden’s Excellent German Adventure – Part 3

Meeting old Friends

About a month ago, I had made arrangements with our friend Anette to meet her for lunch today as it would likely be the only time that I would have to see her on this trip to Germany. For those of you who don’t know, it was actually Anette whon Barb and I met first back in 1999 and who subsequently introduced us to Frank a few years later when we came to visit her on our first Excellent German Adventure together back in 1999.

It was good to see Anette again and the last time Barb and I had seen her was at the Frankfurt airport on a stopover coming back from Spain in 2003. At that time, we had about 2 hours to spare and arranged with her in advance to meet us at the airport for a coffee.

For dinner that night, Frank and I decided to dine at a local place in Sörgenloch just a few blocks away from his house called the Schloss Sörgenloch. The Schloss was a bit higher up the scale than we eaten so far since my arrival.

The Schloss served what Frank called “German food” which, when you think of it, is really just food to the locals here.

Frank and I both ended up ordering different types of steaks and both of ours was done to perfection. I cold have eaten my steak with just a fork as I hardly needed to use the knife to cut it as it was so tender.

Road trip for a few more place settings

Over the course of the past few days that I have been with Frank, we have talked about a variety of different things – often comparing how things are in Germany to how things are in Canada. Although I had known that Frank and I shared a great many similar interests, cooking was one that has been an ongoing topic of conversation.

A few days ago we Frank brought up that he had bought some new dishes and showed me some of the samples and I immediately recognized them as the very same Villeroy and Boch style that Barb and I have at home. The style known as New Wave were bought when Barb and I went on a driving trip to San Francisco a few years ago and we brought back about 5-6 large bags full of plates from the Villeroy and Boch store in Carmel.

While we were on the topic of Villeroy and Boch, Frank mentioned that the V & B factory was in the town of Mettlach which was within driving distance from where he lived. As we had already talked about taking a driving trip to the town of Trier, doing a side trip to Mettlach was not going to be a problem.

Our plans for the day were now set.

By the time we were heading out to Mettlach in Frank’s car (an Audi A4 Avant), we had already been to several places together and I had already gotten used to driving on the highway with Frank. By gotten used to, I mean that I was comfortable with Frank driving at 160-220 km/hr on the highway which I should point out was fairly typical of the speeds which most cars were travelling here.

If nothing else, it got you to your destination a whole lot faster than it would driving in Canada.

Mettlach is a few hundred kilometres away and we got there in about 90 minutes due to the above mentioned driving speeds.

As soon as you arrive in the small town of Mettlach, it is immediately understood that this is a company town and that Villeroy and Boch is the company.

Overlooking the Saar River and dominating the town is the large 18th century French chateaux-like head office building for Villeroy and Boch which has the large manufacturing facilities (or werks in the area in the back of the main building. Given that Villeroy and Boch has been around since 1748, I’m sure that the “chateaux-like” building is probably very much a real chateaux inside.

Before leaving home, Frank shared with me the long list of items that he planned on purchasing from the factory outlet store. We grabbed the largest cart that was available at the store and went back to the section where the New Wave products were.

While Frank was selecting all of the products that we on his list, I mostly spent my time perusing the other products in the store. I discovered that there was now an extension to the New Wave line called New Wave Gold and New Wave Platinum. This, of course, is a common tactic by most manufacturers that they extend an existing product line and bring out a “limited exclusive” version of it. I told Frank that when they bring out New Wave Plutonium I would consider switching.

After Frank had finished selecting all of his items and that I didn’t have anything that I wanted to get, we headed for the checkout.

We spent a bit more time exploring around Mettlach including the many more factory outlet type stores and also did a quick tour of the Villeroy and Boch showroom for kitchen and bathroom products. The most important discovery that we made here was that one can buy the New Wave versions of a bathroom sink and bathtub. This is important to know so that if you ever wish to serve dinner in your bathroom you’ll be comfortable knowing that everything will be matching.

After all of the shopping and touring the Villeroy and Boch showroom, we had worked up an appetite for lunch and we ate at a small roadside stand selling the usual assortments of wursts (bratwurst, weiswurst and so on) and of course always served with an along with a bröchen (a bun to us).

We were eating our and were joined by many other local people who happened to be on their own lunch hour. Frank happened to ask one of the people how long it might take to drive to Trier (our next destination). When then started was a lively conversation between several of the people that began with one person saying that the trip would take 20 minutes and others saying 40 minutes. It was all in good fun but it was amusing to see that a simple question about driving could start such a big discussion.

For the record it took 40 minutes.

The drive to Trier was otherwise uneventful and we set about to discover a little about the small town of Trier. Frank told me was reported to be the oldest town in Germany dating back about 2000 years. I couldn’t help but think that Vancouver, at about 100 years old, was in quite a different age category.

Given the age of Trier, it is not surprising that there are many Roman-era things of interest in the town which Frank and I set about exploring in the 2-3 hours that we were in the town.

Trier was somewhat unusual in that there are few places in Germany with any hint of Roman remains – especially when contrasted to the experience that we had in Italy last year where there are Roman artifacts literally on every street corner.

After we has seen enough of Trier and seeing how it was getting late in the afternoon, we of course needed to stop for a break which invariably means cake.

We stopped at a nice cafe and found that they had the carried the holy grail of German cakes: Schwarzwälder kirschtorte. To us: Blackforest Cake.

In Vancouver, there are probably hundreds of places that carry Blackforest cake but sadly, all of the places that I have eaten them do not do the Schwartzwald kirschetorte any justice. The biggest problem is that the locally made cakes are far too sweet (especially the whipped cream). All of the German cakes and pastries that I have ever eaten have far less sugar and as a result I find have a much more pleasant taste – never too sweet.

On the way home from Trier, Frank offered me a rare treat as I would be allowed to drive his car back home from Trier.

I have driven the Autobahns before on our last trip to Germany and also on the highways of 4 other European countries. Of course, there is a certain mystique to driving the Autobahn as it is the only highways where unlimited speeds are allowed.

Contrary to popular belief, one cannot drive the Autobahns all day long with your foot to the floor going as fast as your car will allow. In fact, there are many sections of the Autobahn that do have speed limits and often traffic congestion limits your speed in many areas.

All of this notwithstanding, there’s simply nothing like driving the Autobahn. 🙂

In Frank’s Audi A4 (with a 2.0L turbo diesel engine), it had enough performance to be able to reach a decent speed (which for the record, has a top speed of about 235 km/hr) but best of all it got great gas mileage even after a few hundred kilometres of driving in the 200 km/hr range. I’m certain that my own M Roadster would have been sucking back far more gas had I been driving it here but with well over 100 more horsepower than Frank’s A4, we would also be talking about a much better top speed too.

Ah, dare to dream.

After we got back to Frank’s place, we prepared to go to the town of Wiesbaden to pickup Frank’s 6 year old daughter Lisle* with whom we would be spending the evening. Frank had also arranged for us to have dinner with Lisle’s and her mother Maria* the following day (Thursday).

* For privacy reasons, these names have been changed.

I have to be honest that I was a bit uncertain about meeting with Lisle as I don’t spend a lot of time around kids and around kids who only speak German I’d say that was pretty much zero.

Frank assured me that Lisle was quite a good child but that was only worth so much as I have rarely found parents to tell mew that their children were, how shall we say, ‘problems’.

We drove to Wiesbaden which is about 30 minutes away and I met Maria for a few minutes while Lisle prepared to go with us. Maria seemed a bit nervous at first but our first meeting seemed to go well enough.

Frank had asked me in advance if I would be ok with preparing dinner as he wished to spend some time with Lisle. Out dinner tonight was to be what Frank called “a typical German dinner”. This consisted of a variety of cold cuts, buns, cheese slices and a salad that I prepared.

While I was working in the kitchen, I could hear Frank and Lisle playing what sounded like soccer (or fussball as it is known in German) in the large living room.

It turned out that Lisle was learning some English in her school and during dinner we would talk about the German and English words for simple things at the dinner table.

Frank told me later on that Lisle seemed to like this activity of learning new English words and that seemed to break some of the ice between us.

After dinner, Frank left to drop Lisle back at her home and I was left with some time to write some of this down on my computer.

The countryside by bike

When Frank and I were trading emails several months ago about what I might want to do when I was staying with him, I had told Frank that I wouldn’t mind going for a bike ride if the weather was good. As such, Frank had already made some arrangements to borrow a second bike for me and today (Thursday) we spent a few hours going for a ride in the countryside around his town.

Sörgenloch is a small town that sits at the edge of a farming region and within a hundred meters of Frank’s house, there are numerous farms that go on as far as the eye can see.

In between many of the farms are a series of paved trails which seemed to be made specifically for bicycles.

We went out for about 8 or 10 kilometres before stopping at a nice local place called Jordan’s in the small town of Köngernheim. Under the shade of the umbrellas in their outdoor garden area, we enjoyed a great meal and observed many other people arriving by bike along the trail which ran right beside their restaurant. Obviously they were used to people arriving by bike especially on a nice warm day like today.

I enjoyed a nice salad made with a type of crepe that was rolled up with ham and cut into slices. Just the light kind of meal that I was looking for before heading back to Sörgenloch on then return trip.

After we got back to Frank’s place, we prepared to go back to Wiesbaden as we would be spending the evening with Maria and Lisle.

When we picked up Maria and Lisle at their house, we took a drive up to a park known as Nerotal which offered a nice view of the city of Wiesbaden. I should say normally offers a nice view as we found out that much of the view was blocked due to the growth of many trees along the slope.

On the drive up to Nerotal we went through a neighbourhood which consisted of lots of old mansions – many that looked like small castles and ornately decorated. Without a doubt there were many people with money in the town of Wiesbaden.

One of the things that I immediately observed about Wiesbaden compared to the much larger city of Frankfurt where Frank and I had gone just a few days before was how much more culturally interesting Wiesbaden was. By this I mean that Frankfurt had, by comparison, very little that really distinguished itself than just another large metropolitan city. This was in contrast to other cities that I had been to like Berlin and Munich which seemed to have their own unique flavour.

Wiesbaden on the other hand, was in a class all on it’s own as it had so much history and unique architecture that was extremely interesting. I could easily spend a few days in Wiesbaden alone absorbing in the local scenery.

The four of us stopped for dinner at a restaurant called Lumen and we enjoyed a few hours together. One of the things that I noticed is that over the evening, Maria became much more comfortable speaking English and it was easy to take a liking to her as we found more and more things to talk about. Maria seemed genuinely surprised when I ordered my meal in German (I can only assume that Frank told her that I spoke no German). Little did Maria know that I had exhausted about 50% of my German vocabulary merely by ordering my meal.

After we had finished and driven back to Maria and Lisle’s house, we said our goodbye’s and headed for home. All in all, I think that things went with my experience with my two new German friends.

Excellent Adventure 2nd Stage

Today is Friday and I am writing most of this on the train heading towards Hamburg. I have temporarily separated from Frank as I am going onto the northern German town of Flensburg to stay one night with Barb’s uncle and aunt Claus and Renate and Barb’s cousin Steffen. I will be leaving Flensburg tomorrow morning and meeting up with Frank at our hotel in Hamburg where we will be staying for two days after that.

When I get to Hamburg in just over an hour from now, I will have about 7 minutes to change tracks and catch the connecting train from Hamburg to Flensburg. I have made arrangements for Claus and Renate to pick me up at the station in Flensburg but if I miss the connecting train, I will somehow have to contact them to let them know that I will be late.

Hopefully that doesn’t turn out to be something that becomes necessary. Generally, my limited experience with German trains is that they run on time but Frank has quite the different opinion and his feeling was that I would miss the connection to Flensburg. We’ll see.

Part 4 of my Excellent German Adventure will continue in a few days…

Baden

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