8 itchy feet

BFF’s and le Tour

Published on August 9, 2016August 14, 2016 by 8itchyfeet2 Comments

D…E…T…O…X… Belinda laid out the letters slowly. Almost as if she had no idea what impact it would have on the game. Triple word and triple letter for placement of the X. 135 points in a single move. It was a killer blow. ‘We’re all playing for second now’, Jase stated in a very matter-of-fact way as he passed over the leader’s yellow hat.

It was so good to see Belinda and Jase again. Maybe I miss home a little more than I thought, even if it did mean getting thrashed at Scrabble. From the moment we drove up and saw them waving down at us from the balcony of our alpine apartment in Megève in the French Alps we were back in a well-worn groove of weekends away. And, whether I like or not, being thrashed at Scrabble is nothing new for me. Emma’s been beating me since 1996. Not one win in 20 years…

Best not to dwell on it. The reason Belinda got the yellow hat was because it seemed in keeping with the Tour de France which had been going on just outside our front door all day. Jase even renamed us all after Tour riders. Emma was Froome (she was favourite to win), Belinda was Quintana, Jase was Vincenzo and I was Bling (Michael Mathew’s – Canberra rider). Quintana’s 135 point move was an unexpected upset. No one saw it coming, except maybe Belinda.

Of course that’s not what happened in the real tour. Chris Froome came streaking past us at just shy of 80km/hr as we lined the barriers on the road in front of our apartment for the individual time trial. As tour leader he was the last rider on the course and he extended his lead by winning that day’s stage.

‘That’s my BFF’ Abby told us all happily, once, or twice or perhaps even thrice. I was captivated. Abby has become a most endearing young lady, readily and happily holding court during proceedings each day. One got a sense Belinda, Jase and Zoe have seen it all before. I was amused. Them, maybe not quite so much.

We had three days of tour fun. The individual time trial was the best because it lasts all day, with the caravan coming through around 10.00 and then riders every two the three minutes from 11.00am ‘til nearly 5.30pm. We alternated lining the barriers and whipping our heads around so fast they almost fell off with hanging out in the living room of our apartment and watching on television that which was happening ten metres away.

Waiting for riders outside out apartment

Watching the peloton come through on route from somewhere to somewhere else was also fun. Which is odd because we’re talking about all of 10 seconds entertainment. It’s that quick from when you spot the riders to when they’ve whizzed past and are gone. The excitement builds though for a couple of minutes before that as the buzz from the chopper following the group gets louder and louder.

The really interesting bit though is why is it fun waiting for the hour and half sitting on the side of the road before that? We all thought it was fun. None of the kids moaned or complained, in fact they were all eager and excited. The hundreds of other people lining the street must have felt the same. I guess the tour has become so big, so well-known with such a reputation that people are just happy to be part of it.

That, and you get free stuff! Everyone loves free stuff. No really they do. It’s almost comical watching people scramble to pick up the worthless advertising guff flung from the sponsors caravan which passes by about an hour before the riders themselves. That’s where we got the yellow leaders hat for the evening Scrabble match. It was one of a total of 14 which the eight of us collected in addition to a similar number of the green ‘Skoda’ bucket hats and one Cochanou salami hat which Emma took a real shine to.

Collecting the free stuff (Emma in the salami hat)

Enjoying the conversation and hats (Oliver got a rider to sign his)

We even waited happily in the rain – Stage 19

It’s a triumph of the free market although I have a strong suspicion 90 per cent of it will end up in landfill within a matter of weeks. Listen to me being the tour grinch! It really is fun, especially dodging the free stuff thrown by inexperienced caravan flingers (I don’t know what else to call them?). Most of the stuff gets flung at your feet but enough comes straight at your head to make you feel like a ninja, and laugh a little at the misfortune of others, whom you don’t know, who don’t move quite so quick.

Of course no weekend away with Belinda and Jase is complete without running. Which was good and bad given our lack of it over the last 6 months. Belinda dragged me out three mornings in a row somewhere between 7 and 8 am. It was almost like getting up to go to work! Only not really. Ok not at all…

Out the front door we went on the first morning and up and up we went after that. The thing about hanging out in a French ski village set up to rival Chamonix and St Moritz is the lack of flat terrain. Belinda was determined to follow a particular path she’d found on the internet but we only had a slightly dodgy map to help navigate us along. Long story short, we got lost somewhere past the golf course and ended up doing laps of the same set of streets in the pouring rain wondering why nothing looked the same each time we ran past.

Meanwhile, Jase who just ran out the front door and followed his nose managed to stumble across our intended path, so on the second morning we tried again. And failed again. The mist closed in after running uphill without respite for 30 minutes. Belinda and I parted ways. She was determined to find the route. I, on the other hand, was determined not to run uphill anymore and headed for home. Belinda showed up two hours later, but didn’t find the track.

On the third morning Belinda abdicated all responsibility for route finding and we ran up the other side of the valley for about 45 minutes. After clearing the forest, we turned around and to our great surprise and pleasure there was Mt Blanc, the tallest mountain in western Europe. Turns out we’d been staying right at its base but couldn’t see past the foothills! We stood and admired and then we ran home, which just goes to show sometimes it’s best not think too hard about where you’re going – metaphorically speaking of course.

It was back to the Scrabble board on our last evening in Megève. Like a sprint rider in Le Tour, I never had a chance in the General Classifications, but I did win a stage (a round) and managed to hold on to the yellow hat for three rounds after that. It was enough to avoid embarrassment, but Froome (Emma) got me before long. So did Quintana, and Vincenzo come to think of it. It’s a good thing Froome is my BFF.

A patched up Froome at the start of Stage 20

‘Why did you even come here?’

Published on July 28, 2016July 28, 2016 by 8itchyfeet1 Comment

You will have to forgive this blog entry. We’ve been moving fairly quickly of late and my head is too full to sit down and write a proper story. I feel like that kid in the Far Side comic that has his hand up in class and says, ‘Excuse me, can I go now, my head is full’. So here’s the ‘brain dump’ version of what happened after Bavaria.

After purchasing an Austrian driving vignette at a petrol station in Berchtesgaden we drove for about four hours through Austria (because we could) to get to Garmisch, back in Germany. We went to Garmisch because we wanted to visit the Zugspitze, the highest mountain in Germany.

When we got to Garmisch I discovered my credit card was missing. Much turmoil and car searching ensued. The card wasn’t there despite my being sure that if I looked hard or often enough it would appear. I did however find a receipt from the last purchase I made with it which also had a phone number so we made a phone call and discovered the card was back in Berchtesgaden, Bavaria. Bugger.

The next morning, we decided to temporarily ignore the lost card and go up the Zugspitze. The summit was a complete whiteout which had Emma and I feeling moody. Amy and Oliver however were loving it because of all the snow and ice. It was cold. One degree, but no wind.

After lingering as long as possible in vain hope that the weather would clear, we caught a cable car a short way down the other side of the mountain to a lower station and discovered free toboggans on offer. Hooray! We couldn’t see a thing, but had hours of fun sliding down the hill in the mist.

The mist broke up after lunch and there were glorious views of the immediate amphitheatre of the Zugspitze though the summit itself was still heavily shrouded. More tobogganing ensued.

By 2.30pm we were exhausted and caught the cog railway back to the base of the mountain where we took a free boat ride provided by the overpriced Garmisch campground we were staying at. Paddling on an alpine lake was just glorious. I went swimming in my undies. I couldn’t help myself and I didn’t want to get out but eventually had to.

Emma and I woke up at 5.30 the next morning and I drove all the way back to Bavaria. Penance for stupidity, but considering that we have made 1264 financial transactions since leaving home (I’m a nerd so I record every single one), I eventually came to the view that forgetting to pick my card up once was forgivable. After successfully retrieving the all-important piece of plastic I drove back to Garmisch. It was 1pm by the time I arrived.

Where the rest of the family waited while Greg drove

We all piled in the car. Emma’s phone started playing Ed Sheeran’s ‘A-Team’ again because there is a setting that plays all her music in alphabetical order and we all cried ‘Nooo!’ in unison. This has been happening since Scotland and we were over it. We drove on to Liechtenstein, because it was more or less on route and we figured why not visit one more country on our way?

We camped for one night in lovely Liechtenstein and paid our respects to the Royal family by visiting their scenic castle on a hill the next morning. After that we all piled back into the car, cursed Ed Sheeran again, and drove on to Zermatt at the base of the Matterhorn in Switzerland, also on route.

The drive through Switzerland was glorious. Twisty roads, mountain passes, mountains everywhere and sunshine all the while. When we finally checked in to a campground near Zermatt the campground man got grumpy with me for only staying one night. ‘There is so much to do! Why did you even come here?’ he demanded. I apologised and slunk away to the tent to reflect on our foolishness and lack of ambition.

The next morning, we decided to try and go up the Matterhorn before we drove on to France. This was perhaps because of the campground man and perhaps because there was not a cloud in the sky and perhaps because we figured it would be a while before we were at the base of the Matterhorn again. The cable car took 50 minutes to climb the 2,500 vertical meters. There were stunning views of the Matterhorn, glaciers and the Swiss Alps everywhere we looked.

The Matterhorn behind us (from up the top)

Another peak – there are people climbing it

We rushed back down again because we still had to drive to Megève, two to three hours away, to meet up with our good friends from home, Belinda, Jase, Abbey and Zoe. The drive actually took much longer than that because our intended route was closed for the Tour de France and because we got stuck in a 40-kilometre-long traffic jam around Lausanne. I fought grumpiness and remarkably I won! For the most part anyway. I may have muttered the odd word of annoyance here and there. We made Megève by 8.30pm. Yay! We were very happy. Jase had beer and the beer was good.

Later that evening several large trucks rumbled past our little balcony at walking pace as we sat happily chatting. The barricades were going up for the Tour de France’s individual time trial which whizzed right past our front door the following morning. More on that to come.

Pomme fritz mit mayo

Published on July 26, 2016July 26, 2016 by 8itchyfeet1 Comment

‘Pomme fritz mit mayo’. It’s German for ‘french fries with mayonnaise’ and it was a key culinary requirement for our visit to Germany. It’s a German delicacy. Or so I told Emma, Amy and Oliver. German fast food is probably a more accurate description and who eats fries with mayo anyway? I tried it when I was in Bonn for work years ago and had been waffling on about it for some time before we actually reached Germany. You know, as you do.

We eventually tracked some down at a curb side kebab caravan in a little town near Bad Feilnbach where we had set up camp for a few nights. I studied German for three years in high school, and was revelling in the fact that I could actually understand the occasional spoken word. I got really into it at the kebab shop by placing our order, one French fries with mayo and two vegetarian falafels, in German.

‘Ein pomme fritz mit mayo und zwei falafel vegetarianish bitte’, I asked stiltedly but confidently. I was clearly understood because the friendly fellow smiled before responding with an onslaught that made it plain my German language ambition exceeded my ability. He was probably just clarifying my order, but I stared back at him blankly as it dawned on me that there is a downside to pretending you can communicate in another tongue. We got our pomme fritz, but we also got three falafels rather than two and one of them wasn’t vegetarian.

Germany, and Bavaria in particular, had other culinary ambitions to be realised as well. Bavaria is after all the home of strudel! Am I right? I was so sure. I had been telling Amy and Oliver about Bavarian apple strudel for even longer than the pomme fritz mit mayo. I’d been going on about it so long I think it may even have played a hand in our choice of Bavaria as the second of our German destinations. That and the reputed mountain scenery of course.

You can imagine then my relief when my eyes latched upon two fine looking apple strudels at a bakery in the idyllic little town on Ramsau near Berechtsgaden. It was too good to be true and proof positive of my assertions re the culinary delights of the region. I would have gloated, but I’m better than that. Nah I’m not. I gloated.

There was nothing to be gained here by botching up the order with poor German so I pointed and stuck up two fingers in time honoured, universally accepted sign language. The lovely lady new exactly what I wanted and strudel was exactly what we got. It was good too, served with healthy lashings of unhealthy cream and wolfed down in the warmth of our little Bavarian apartment on the mountain foothills.

We ended up in said apartment because the weather in Bavaria seemed determined to do all it could to make us miserable. Here we were with four days in one of the prettiest parts of the country and it was forecast to rain without relief. It was sunny when we picked up our rental car in Munich, so Emma and I weren’t really worried. Since when has the forecast ever been right four days out?

Turns out the German bureau of meteorology really know their stuff and it did rain for more or less four days straight. Which was no good for us. There is only so long before clambering out of a wet tent in the middle of the night and walking through the rain to go to the loo starts to wear a little thin. So after two days of that, hiding in the cooking shelter and reading in the car we gave up and Emma found us a roof on Airbnb.

Gotta love setting up the tent in the rain

The view from the driest place to read or blog

Rain still wears thin after a while, even with a roof over your head, but far more slowly. You can pee in comfort for a start! After that it’s the dampener it puts on your outdoor ambitions that are a struggle to come to terms with. The Bavarian Alps are stunning. Not so high as those across the border in Austria and Switzerland, but just incredibly beautiful, idyllic even and we longed to see it all lit up in glorious sunshine rather than clouded and grey.

The whole place is so neat and green and all the locals got the memo about how to make their homes fit the relevant Bavarian style. Meanwhile the mountains launch themselves up into the air to dramatic effect. There are walks everywhere an endless supply of valleys, ridges, alpine meadows, peaks and canyons to explore. I wanted to walk them all. Really. I wished I could. I wanted a month in our cozy cabin with a new trail to explore every day. It was exhausting just containing my unrealised enthusiasm.

Eventually my desire capitulated to the rain. I reconciled the full Bavarian Alps experience to a future to do list and got down to the business of making the most of the few days we had. Because my family is so wonderful, the 8.5 kilometre walk we took up one of the mountain valleys turned into a solid 18 kilometre roundtrip. They marched on, at least partly just for me I’m sure, sensing my desire to know what was around that next corner.

The Wimmbach gorge – lots of water (rain will do that)

Emma and I had purchased a bit of good will with Amy and Oliver a few days before hand. It was raining so much, we gave up on sightseeing and took them to another high ropes course. They loved the one in Scotland so much they were bursting with excitement at the mere whiff of doing another. This one fortunately ‘was very, very, great’ in Oliver’s words. Emma and I watched on from below, rain jacket and pants on, and wishing we had worn shoes and socks instead of sandals. ‘It’s supposed to be summer!’ is what I wanted to shout to the heavens, but didn’t.

So many courses to do – we were there for hours

It was still grey the day we had to leave Berechtsgaden and the Bavarian Alps behind. We pulled into a petrol station and purchased an Austrian driving ‘vignette’. Basically an upfront toll. We planned to drive a couple of hundred kilometres through Austria (because we could) to make our way to Germany’s highest mountain, the Zugspitze, all the while hoping the weather would improve. Little did I know that would not be last time I saw that petrol station, but that’s the next story.

P.S.

I love to stand in places where history is made – in case you hadn’t noticed by now. Tucked away down in the Bavarian Alps of Germany is a mountain hideaway of the Nazi regime that was only discovered after the war was over. It’s called the Kehlstein or Eagles Nest, a mountain retreat perched precariously upon a ridge 1800 metres above the valley floor and given to Hitler for his 50^th birthday.

The same road that he and his cronies drove was the same we climbed up, in a bus with a bunch of other tourists. The 7 kilometre road is only one lane wide with a single passing point at the centre. Precision driving ensures the busses going up and down meet at the middle at exactly the same time. You gotta love the Germans.

After alighting the bus at the top of the road a tunnel entrance is spotted leading deep into the mountain. After roughly 150 metres the tunnel ends at a small domed chamber which serves as a foyer of sorts for an elevator. The brass lined elevator takes you another 150 metres straight up through the mountain to the heavy set stone building above. It’s the same tunnel and the same lift used by same said persons all those years ago. Isn’t that creepy? It was creepy, but enthralling.

The clouds swirled thick and then thin as we visited, so the views weren’t quite what they would be on a gorgeous sunny day, but we saw enough through gaps in the weather to appreciate what a stunning vista it would present.

It’s not a large place, but here is the dining hall and rooms where all the heavies of Nazi Germany met and held council. Today it’s a privately run restaurant with hordes of tourists swarming about like it was any other mountain lodge, sipping latte’s and wolfing down their pomme fritz mit mayo and strudel. I like the idea that a place with such a dark past is now the happy domain of any and all comers.