Thursday 26 September 2013

MSA Euroclassic.....the last two days.

The weather was still wet and gloomy when we headed out of Stuttgart on the Thursday morning in the direction of Ulm. It was still very wet and miserable when we arrived and parked the cars in front of the church. We had to make sure we had all departed promptly by 11 am as there was to be a church concert later that morning so we had another speedy coffee stop and sped off. 

 
 
 
Our destination was Sigmaringen Castle in southern Germany not many miles from the Swiss border. The castle sits on a high rock above the town with the River Danube rushing beneath its walls. Here we had yet another coffee but with locally made cheesecake of your choice...yum! As we enjoyed our repast we were joined by the owner of the castle Prince Karl Friedrich Hohenzollern.
 
 
He told us briefly a bit about the history of the castle and how it had been rebuilt in 1893 after a fire destroyed part of it. We split into two groups and had a lovely guided tour which lasted for over an hour.




I spotted this lovely little dog outside the castle and had to take a picture! We soon got underway again driving through some lovely scenery despite the dodgy weather. Here is a flavour of what we saw.

 
 

 
All these photos were taken through the window of a speeding car so please excuse the quality! The last checkpoint was at Titisee, a lake and associated tourist shops, and due to the length of the castle tour things were running a bit late so, yet again we had the briefest of stops.


If the weather had been sunny the long drive to Strasbourg would have been lovely I'm sure, but the cloud came down over the high roads and we could see very little of it which was a shame. It also got darker and darker, our arrival at the hotel would be late, would we make the Rhine ferry crossing in time? We decided to not bother with the ferry especially as we went wrong following the altered directions at some road works - and we weren't the only ones to go wrong either! So we plugged the hotel address in the sat nav. and with Nicholas riding shotgun we sped up the motorway through the pouring rain and gathering gloom with our friends following behind and an elderly couple in their Morgan behind them! Quite a convoy! We had a bit of a worrying moment when we hit more road works on the motorway which the sat nav. didn't know about! But after a quick U-turn we all got back on course. We eventually arrived at the Sofitel in the centre of Strasbourg well after dark exhausted!
I'm sorry to say but the last day of the trip was a bit disappointing. The first checkpoint was at a race track which we didn't go around, and then we went to the Smart car factory. Graham and \Nicholas went on the tour but I stayed behind as by that point I had the most vile headache, a result I think of the previous day! The event concluded at the Villeroy and Boch factory at Mettlach before travelling to Luxembourg and the last hotel stop.


We had travelled over 1300 miles in 7 days, not counting the journey to Dover from home. Would I do it again? Well I would love to drive around Europe but not on the German motorways! I would take more time to visit places that we just whizzed by. I loved the local food we managed to find and it would have been nice to have the time to do some shopping and bring some of the local delicacies back home. Would I go on another Euroclassic? NO! this was my fourth trip - previously I've been to Budapest and Vienna - and Graham's 12th so we know what to expect. But this time there was too much driving on motorways and not enough time to enjoy the venues we visited. It was all too much of a blur! After all it was supposed to be a holiday!

A.O.B........ I am in Skipton at the new show Yarndale this weekend with Helen of My Fine Weaving yarn fame. Hopefully there will be lots to report next time!

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