ERLABRUM (near Wurzburg) – Germany (Sat 22 Aug)

We had a wonderful night last night in an almost luxurious bed and breakfast. This place is a working vineyard (as seems to be most of the village) and these places really do take their wine making seriously, after all this is one of the major wine growing districts in Germany. According to our hostess (who spoke perfect English) over 80% of the wine that they produce is white, and judging by the awards and our limited palate, it is very good. After enjoying a wonderful breakfast we asked if we could stay another night, but unfortunately they are booked out, due to a wine festival in the town over the next three days. It’s a shame that we will miss it. But in keeping with the hospitality that we have experienced throughout Germany, she hopped on the phone and rang around other bed and breakfast places nearby and found somewhere else for us to stay tonight.

This is probably the first time during our travels that we have been booked in before 10:00am. As it transpired, this was a good move. We moved to another small rural winegrowing bed and breakfast on the other side of the Main River. Tonight we are staying in a double bedroom self contained apartment (with kitchen, bathroom, and lounge room) plus breakfast provided, for the same price as a room only. This is cheaper than last night, so that is definitely welcome. The challenge though is that this family doesn’t speak a word of English, and we only know half a handful of German. But somehow we manage to get by, but it does make it interesting. Despite the best of intentions on both sides, you don’t quite know what you are going to get, or what you have agreed to.

We are aware that the way that we are traveling for so long has a definite impact on the way that we spend, compared to most travelers who are on the road for a few weeks and tend to have the mindset that they will ‘put it on the credit card and deal with it later’, they also have everything planned out and paid for before they leave home. We don’t have that luxury. We have also become aware of how people that we meet. are extremely interested in our travel plans, the length of our stay, the flexibility of our plans, how far we are from home. It is encouraging for us, as it reinforces just how lucky we are to be able to do what we are doing, despite the fact that sometimes it feels like we are doing things the hard way. We are fulfilling an opportunity that not many people get to enjoy.

After we had checked in we drove through a multitude of small towns, the 1.5 hrs to Bamberg. Bamberg was for 800 years the capital of the ‘ecclesiastical principality’ ruled by the prince bishop beginning in 1007 AD. But that is not why we wanted to go there. We had read that this was a relatively undiscovered medieval town, and so we thought that it was worth a look, and we weren’t disappointed.

On our way there we were commenting on how pretty these towns are, but also how empty. They seemed to be like ghost towns with no sign of life at all. When we arrived at Bamberg, we think we found the answer, everyone was there. At first we thought that it was market day, and then we found that the stalls seemed to go on forever, winding their way through the old part of town, and then we discovered the real reason. Today was festival day. We still aren’t sure what the festival was about, but we suspect that it was something to do with either beer or wine as most of the stalls were dedicated to this, although they seem to drink a lot of either of these at the least provocation anyway.

We hit the centre square just as a procession was coming through. If you think that lederhosen is just for the tourist brochures, think again. This is heartland Germany and those without traditional garb today were definitely the minority. At the back end of the procession there was a very loud drumming band, and a couple of Latin American Samba dancers in full costume (definitely not lederhosen) looking like they had just hopped off the plane from Rio, followed by what looked like a maypole. We were soon to find out that the maypole was the main event (apart from the drinking). A group of eight guys lifted the pole into its upright position over a period of an hour. Of course the raising of something like that takes a lot of talking, a lot of singing, and a lot of passing around of HUGE steins of beer. Between every upward movement they would need to ensure that the stein had gone around at least once. After everything was upright and in place then the serious business of singing, dancing and drinking intensified.

About this time we headed up the hill to the Dom (closed), through the rose garden (wedding in progress), and on to St Michaels. A very cool church which has botanical themed frescos on the ceiling. This is fantastic medieval town that seems to appear in its unadulterated state. It doesn’t seem to have been knocked around too much by the tourist circuit, which is nice to see.
We finished the day today with a self catered meal and a bottle of ‘house’ wine. We were once told that there was no such thing as a bad red wine in Italy, and we proved that to be true. You can buy the cheapest wine in any Italian restaurant or pizza joint by the half liter, it will be served in the equivalent of a glass mug, and it will still taste damn good. We would like to suggest it is the same here in this region of Germany with their white wines. The only difference is that they take more consideration with the presentation than their Italian friends.