J&J's European Adventure

3 July

Göttingen to Berchtesgaden

It was a day of trains and buses today. We rode from Göttingen to Kassel on the wrong train, got off, got on the correct train, and continued on to Munich. Because we were running 45 minutes late, we were going to miss our connection to Salzburg, but fortunately, there were others in the same boat, and they held the train while we hustled aboard. We had to scramble a bit to catch the bus that took us from Salzburg to Berchtesgaden, but we made it.

We found a decent, reasonably priced hotel (The Schwabenwirt) just across the road from the train and bus stations. Despite its location, it was very peaceful, with a friendly staff and good restaurant. Germany beat Argentina in the World Cup to advance to the semi-finals this afternoon, so there was a lot of horn honking and shouting when we first arrived, but that all died down before bedtime. We walked around town and ate supper at a local café. Even though we are now in the Alps, it was still quite warm, especially to us since we always seem to be hiking uphill.

One thing we've noticed all over Europe is the lack of attention we get from waitstaff. We commonly sit for quite some time waiting to order and usually have to flag down the waiter to get the check. The latter is just the way they do things here, we think, but it can be irritating if you're trying to get going after eating. But back to the story – it was warm. Our table had a candle on it that we could literally feel the heat from. Trying to stay as cool as possible, I blew the candle out. It was out for perhaps five seconds before a waitress swooped in with a lighter and re-ignited it. We decided that in the future, if we want the waiter's attention, we'll just blow out the candle.

After supper, we took a self-guided walking tour until it got too dark to see anything. Janene's pedometer ticked past 600 miles today.

Daily miles: 5.6

Expenses: 96.59€ (bus, hotel, supper)