Author: Keith

Day thirteen – Wurzburg to Ghent

Distance today – 610 km	Journey time – 7h 55m
Total trip distance – 3,756 km	Total journey time – 2d 10h 30m

This was to be a very long drive. More than 600km and likely to be more than 6 hours….which turned out to be nearly 8 hours as the traffic into Koln (Cologne) and Ghent, which turned out to be Brussels then Antwerp then Ghent as Google re-routed us.

After a splendid castle breakfast, we headed off towards our lunchtime stop, Koln (Cologne), since it was roughly midway to Ghent. The motorway was quite busy in places and once again we saw how drilled European drivers are when traffic slows – the fast lane moves left (towards the central reservation) and the next lane moves right (towards the hard shoulder), making easy space for any emergency services that might need to get through the stationary traffic. It’s genius, but one that it’s unlikely that unruly British drivers at home would adhere to. Driving on mainland Europe is so much more pleasant…

Once in Koln we found a particularly average baked goods place for lunch, before finding others that looked nicer, then wandered for a bit, towards the cathedral. Something we do a lot of in the car is research history and geography for the places we visit, and whilst we knew Koln had been badly damaged in the Second World War we didn’t realise 95% was flattened by Allied bombing, and the population all but left. The cathedral, which was an incredible building, avoided damage.

Back in the car after filling up and collecting new car snacks (long flat thin crisps that tasted like Pringles) we headed on through Germany, across a short stretch of motorway through the Netherlands (sadly not stopping for a smoke and a pancake) then into Belgium. Traffic into Antwerp (our preferred route) and into Brussels (our non-preferred route) was equally horrendous but Google chose to re-route us towards Brussels, then up to Antwerp and across to Ghent. It seemed a lot longer distance but was quicker than sitting in 45 minutes of stationary traffic into Antwerp so we did what we were told.

Whilst driving we discovered very interesting fact about the Belgian flag – unlike most national flags it is shaped with an aspect ratio of 15:12 (most flags are 3:2), yet it is rarely displayed in this shape, especially outside of Belgium.

On arrival at the hotel (finding the car park was not easy) we got to our room then headed for dinner. Everywhere was really busy, but we found a place that sells unlimited ribs (and other things) which got excellent reviews and was absolutely packed. They gave us a 9pm table, so we wandered the dark streets for half an hour before feeding. Extremely good food and beer. Good choice.

We also had a good chat with the waiter, to find out a bit about languages in Belgium – he said it was simple….in Brussels you’ll speak either Dutch, German, French, English, in fact many languages; outside of Brussels the rest of the country speaks Dutch. Enough facts for the night, we went back to the hotel and to bed.

Day twelve – Stuttgart to Wurzburg

Distance today – 166 km	Journey time – 2h 30m
Total trip distance – 3,146 km	Total journey time – 2d 02h 35m

A short hop from Stuttgart of only 2 hours to the next hotel meant we had some time to investigate what Stuttgart could offer before lunch. Jo checked out the options on Trip Advisor and found the second best attraction was the Porsche Museum. The first best attraction was the Mercedes-Benz museum – and she suggested we go whilst in town. We also had 25% off the ticket price having paid for the Porsche Museum.

Breakfast first. The hotel was in some way themed Brazilian, but most of breakfast was the usual buffet stuff – apart from a small corner where they had some Brazilian dishes. Chicken filled dumplings, cheesy bread and something beef, plus three “jams” – acai berry, papaya and dolce de leche (not jam but almost). It was all extremely nice and made for a good change to the usual selection.

The Mercedes-Benz museum was 20 minutes or so away through heavy traffic – probably the first we’d experienced since crossing the Channel. The museum itself is vast and very, very impressive architecturally. Like the Porsche museum the cars and exhibits are arranged around a corkscrew of floors – so you start at the top (or bottom) and work down (or up). This one started by a ride in a lift which shuttled you to the very top, playing audio of modern through to older cars, then horses when you reached the start of the museum. The first display was a horse (it looked quite bored), then the first cars, boats, planes and so on.

As you worked down the floors there was a historical timeline with images and artefacts which told the story of the company from its roots to the present day, plus other historical reference points, all interspersed with cars. It was really fascinating and very well put together.

Whilst most cars weren’t to my taste, there were a handful of exceptions – the gullwing 300SL being my favourite of the non-racing cars.

Towards the lower part of the corkscrew the exhibits changed to the racing displays, and the huge timeline of all kinds of classes of car from across the eras was visible. Pretty impressive to see how long Mercedes-Benz have been at this. There was one car which knocked all others out the park – Lewis Hamilton’s car which he drove to secure his 7th World Championship win. WOW.

With the museum finished we headed across to what felt like a dealership, but with a lot more cars. I’m not much of a fan of their road cars, and sadly there was no AMG One on display, but there were some nice AMG cars at the top of the building which most people didn’t seem to find, but we did.

After visiting 3 car museums, Jo rated them as follows – the French National museum got a 4, Porsche a 6 and Mercedes-Benz an 8. The Porsche factory tour got a 9 out of 10. Not as bad as I feared!

Time for our drive to Wurzburg. It’s meant to be a very pretty city in Bavaria, but on arrival we saw only the heavy industry we’ve seen across most of our time in Germany. And lots of traffic. It took a while to get across the city and up through narrow roads to our hilltop castle hotel, Schlosshotel Steinburg, but once there the industry and busy roads were behind us and we were perched above and around huge vineyards. The view over the city was expansive.

The hotel itself was a castle with a few added wings, some modern, some less so, but contained numerous small, secluded staircases, wooden panelling, lots of interesting doors, and suits of armour. A very interesting place. Our room was at the front of the hotel with a big balcony and view overlooking the city – I believe it was their best room (not sure how I booked that!)

Once unpacked we headed out for a walk, down the hill, through vineyards and eventually onto busy streets. The older part of the city was our target, but none of it felt like the pretty city advertised. Of course, once in the market we sampled Currywurst mit Pomme Frites, and a cherry ice cream, all of which cost us less than €10 – absolute bargain!

We didn’t like the idea of the walk back up the hill, so elected to call an Uber. Turns out the Uber didn’t know where the hotel was nor felt happy to follow his sat-nav (which was correct in its directions), but we didn’t let him dump us at the bottom and eventually we got to the hotel. He wasn’t being awkward, just unsure where he had to go!

Then dinner. We chose to eat in the hotel because a) the walk back down the hill wasn’t wanted, and b) their restaurant has a good reputation. And it’s a proper fancy restaurant. People were generally dressed up (something we’ve not really seen anywhere this holiday) and the waiting staff were obviously well trained in how to treat guests – from the waiter pulling Jo’s chair out for her, to allowing you to taste various wines before committing. The menu was simple – 3, 4, 5 or 6 courses, from a selection of around a dozen dishes. You could eat them in any order, and have anything – 3 desserts if you chose.

We opted for 3 courses (still not that hungry and eating out 100% of the time means little space for excessive quantities) and a different glass of wine each, but both from local grapes grown in the vineyards we could see from our bedroom balcony. Mine was a bit like a Sauvignon Blanc, Jo’s much sweeter like a sherry. The food began with a “welcome from the kitchen”….then another “welcome from the kitchen”, then our choices, followed by a “thankyou from the kitchen”. In between there was bread with amongst other hand made spreads some lard – which was fantastic.

Overall, by far the best meal we’d had this holiday – exquisite food, even if it cost an eye-watering amount.

Day eleven – Konstanz to Stuttgart

Distance today – 199 km	Journey time – 2h 45m
Total trip distance – 2,980 km	Total journey time – 2d 00h 05m

The plan for day eleven was hatched on April 1st at 8:10am. I was online at 8am when tickets for the Porsche museum for the 3 months commencing 1st October became available for purchase, and secured them 10 minutes later. Our 1 hour tour slot was at 3:30pm, to give us plenty of time to travel from Konstanz to Stuttgart, which in hindsight was the perfect time.

We woke up to blue skies and no wind, so the postponed run from the day before happened – a run along the lakeside past a wide variety of hotels and houses, through a forest and into a small park – and back. The lake wasn’t particularly deep by the shoreline, and the water crystal clear.

We returned to the hotel for a shower, and finally saw the view from our room with skies clear of rain. Not an unobscured view of the lake, but you could see the lake well enough from our private balcony. Breakfast was a near repeat of the day before, this time we ordered a waffle-bacon-egg sandwich and an omelette. Both excellent. Coffee still poor, but Jo’s vanilla Roibos tea was apparently very good. Jo also collected some sweets for the journey.

From Konstanz it was motorway nearly the whole way, and more exciting was that sections were unrestricted Autobahn. Unsure of when the speed limit was removed, Jo used Google to find the signs we should be looking for (5 diagonal black lines through the speed limit for the section you have just exited). When we thought we were good to go, we used other cars as indicators to signal the push to V-max (well, not V-max as that would kill our winter tyres which were labelled as being limited to just over 140mph).

The road was 2 lanes wide with numerous lorries and slower cars, so we were careful to use longer, straighter sections to build up speed. Past lorries I slowed so as to avoid being sucked sidewards, and if cars looked like they were coming up behind slower traffic I eased off until I knew how close they were (things come up pretty quick at >100mph. In the end we had a few attempts at faster runs and hit 210km/h – that’s just over 130mph. Having been that speed, settling at 100mph felt quite comfortable. The Macan was coping well and was still accelerating at 210km/h, but of course a car of that design isn’t really shaped to go much faster, nor did I want to push the winter tyres too hard. We’ll just need to return with something faster!

Once in Stuttgart (an unremarkable city, quite industrial) we found the Porsche museum and its underground car park. We had a couple of hours before our tour so decided to check-in for the tour (we got our Porsche lanyards and tour badges) and visit the museum. It’s full of Porsches, or cars Porsche have worked on, but mostly Porsches from the earliest to current models, including a good number of race cars. I really enjoyed it as there was so much to look at. Jo, less so, though she did seem to enjoy the blue Porsche from the movie Cars (yes, the girl car with the eyes for headlamps) a little too much when there were so many other important or incredible cars around.

Rather than spam the page with car photos, here are my favourites then the usual gallery for those who care (make sure you click on the first gallery image and scroll through though!!)

Once finished in the museum we enjoyed some Porsche soup and something to drink, spoke to a German who’d visited the UK extensively and kept wanging on about Brexit despite me starting the conversation suggesting we didn’t care any more, then excused ourselves for the factory tour.

No photos here (very sadly) as all phones and cameras are strictly banned. However, we saw the 911 production line, from the point at which the painted bodyshell enters the assembly line to the final stage where the finished car is inspected. We missed the engine and transmission assembly out as the public aren’t allowed in that area, but otherwise saw the whole process.

Once the painted bodyshell enters assembly it travels through 2 floors and 3 areas of build, moving something like 130 stations where it spends 2 minutes and 40 seconds at each having the next thing done to it. In a single shift they build around 240 cars, and the production line is for ALL variants from the base 911 Carrera to the 911 GT3 RS and Cup cars. The build is mostly done by hand, using machinery to help lift heavier items (dashboard, front glass, etc.) Pretty impressive. Jo gave it a 9/10 for interest. I loved it, and asked the poor tour guide lots of questions.

Once done at Porsche we headed to our hotel, a nice travellers hotel in the middle of a particularly industrial part of Stuttgart only 5 minutes from the Porsche campus, then went out for pizza at Stuttgart’s best pizza place (according to them, I had no reference points to confirm this claim – but the pizza was amazing).

Our first rest day – no driving, no statistics!

After deciding to postpone our run due to heavy rain, we leisurely attended breakfast for the first time at the Riva. What an incredible spread! The highlights were the tiny Le Creuset pots with sauté potatoes and fried egg without white inside, the real honeycomb loaded with honey, and some kind of Danish pastry with raspberries with almonds. The selection also included sweets and bags, presumably for the kids, though the adults were helping themselves.

Once fed we had a wander round the hotel to figure out what we’d do during our rest day. It really was a splendid hotel, and exactly the kind we like.

We needed exercise, so decided to head out for a walk in the pouring rain and high winds – full waterproofs were deployed. Once out it didn’t seem so bad, and we followed a guided tour route through the old part of Konstanz we found on Trip Advisor. Unfortunately we had no idea what any of the stops were, other than usually old buildings or statues. We also stopped off in a few shops to warm up, and for coffee and cake – though the coffee wasn’t, and we had no idea what it was (the lady who served said it was “like” coffee – I’m not sure her definition of like is the same as mine).

Once back in the hotel we enjoyed the saunas (very hot and dry, then hot and slightly humid, then warm and 100% humidity), followed by ice (Jo more than me), then a salt rub and shower, and finally the relaxation room. Jo read, I got up to date on my mobile game Tacticus (don’t ask). Jo then found the rooftop outdoor swimming pool, and before I could join her she’d got out complaining 30 degrees Celsius was too cold.

We decided dinner out of the hotel at a local German establishment – we shared an excellent soup with the cheesiest cheese dumpling imaginable, followed by pork shank with dumpling and gravy (no vegetables) and char (fish) on a heap of vegetables. And weissbier (wheat beer). Rest day done.