We knew the trip was going to be a learning experience since we had never DRIVEN to Germany before (We'd only taken the shuttle bus). There was really only one thing we had to worry about which was finding a gas station before we entered Austria in order to buy an Austria Autobahn Vignette. The vignette was a pass you had to buy and stick on your front windshield before entering Austria. I think it is for the road tax or something. The pass I got was good for 10 days and cost 7.90 Euro. I've heard they have other options of passes to buy but that was the only one I was offered so that's the one I bought.
During our FIND A GAS STATION THAT SELLS THE VIGNETTE adventure, we got off the autostrada and went to about 3 gas stations in these little towns asking if they sold the vignettes. We got a little flashback of the USA when we passed a BP with gas prices about .03 cents more than the one right across the street. Lol.
Finally after 3 straight 'NO' answers from the service stations we stopped at looking for the Austria pass, we got the hint that you could only buy them on the Autostrada. So we got BACK on the Autostrada and finally found an AGIP that sold them. For those of you driving through Austria, the Agip is just over 225 miles from Vicenza. There is a sign for a Sirogrill and I think the area is called Isarco Est. They don't sell the vignette at the gas stations on the autostrada before that one, we know because we stopped at those too. Note to self: In Europe, a Kilometer is often referred to as a click so if you are told something is 5 clicks away, it means Kilometers.
Finally after getting the vignette, we continued in to Austria. It's so funny to me when we go from one country to another because it's no different than going from one state to another in America. The way we knew we were even in Austria is because we had to get off the Autostrada (11.50 euro) and then there was a little sign saying (in German) that we had entered Österreich which is the German word for Austria. The other way we realized it was when we had to go through the toll and pay 8 Euro. I'm not sure if this is for the vehicle size or if it is the standard fee to drive through Austria. Considering how small Austria is, it's a pretty expensive country to drive through since there is a 8 euro toll fee and 7.90 euro vignette!
Before we knew it, we had entered Germany. I'm pretty sure there was no sign saying we had entered another country but we could almost immediately tell because Germany's country side is so much cleaner and greener than Italy. There are corn fields and farm land in Germany instead of the grape vines and vineyards like in Italy. I think Germans use actual fireplaces versus a furnace to heat their homes because each house had a large stack of firewood stacked neatly beside the door. There were also logs ready to be cut sitting in fields everywhere you looked. The trip to Edelweiss was just a bit longer than we expected since we had to stop so much to find the Vignette and the traffic as we entered Germany. It too us from about 4pm until just after 8pm to get there so just over 4 hours and we had expected 3.
Once at Edelwiess we had no problem checking in and ran down to Pullman's Place to eat dinner since they stopped seating at 8:30. Dinner was priced fine (about $43 for 2 dinners, an appetizer, 2 beers, and a mudslide) and it helped that they give E1-E5 a 20% discount on dinner! I did have my heart set on Ziggy's where we had eat the time before but they are not open on Thursdays for dinner.
We got up about 8am the next day and were on the way to Spangdahlem just after 9am. The beginning of the drive was fine and we got to drive on the Autobahn! It surprisingly was not as I had expected. My picture of the Autobahn is about 5-6 lanes on each side with Ferraris and Porsches and Lamborghinis everywhere going about a buck twenty! It's no where near that way. The road is mostly 2 lanes each way and looks pretty much like the interstate in the United States. There is usually no speed limit but when there is it was 81MPH (130khm). The little Kia did good and I drove it between 80 and 90 MPH a lot of the way. Jonathan drove too but only hit about 83MPH.
Another thing we noticed in Germany were the giant windmills! They were mostly along the highway and look small in the pictures but up close they are massive!
After stopping just a few times for a bathroom break for Amber, we arrived at the Spangdahlam Air Force Base about 4:30pm. Our friends met us at the shoppette and we followed them to their town home. Let me just say Germany Air Force base housing is way nicer than Italian Army base housing!
Saturday morning we slept in a little bit & headed to a castle watch tower near the base. It was about a 25 minute drive on pretty curvy back roads. It was nothing worse than the side roads up to Blue Ridge parkway though. Once we arrived we had to hike up a little hill on a path that was designated as a hiking trail. There were a few black berries growing on the way so I stopped to pick some. They were yummy, I just wish there were more of them! As we got to the watch tower we could see the main castle down in the valley. It was huge! Lesli & I took the kids up in the tower and could see the tower even better from there.
Is was, I'd say 7 stories high and all stairs and no electricity so parts of it was pretty dark. We took some pictures with the auto timer (funny stuff trying to get 3 kids and 4 adults into position in 10 seconds) & headed back down the hill. Since Jonathan & Eddie had spent the night before drinking lots of German and Belgian beer, Jonathan was about to puke on the ride home. He was coughing and gagging & I almost pulled over but he said he could hold it in until we got to Eddie's house. Luckily he did and after a quick bathroom break, we headed back out to the Pig festival in Wittlich!
Legend says Wittlich was once a walled fortress constantly under attack by invaders & one evening, a guard charged with locking the town's gate could not find the peg to secure the fortified door. Instead, he wedged a large carrot into the door. Later, a pig ate the carrot, the gate opened and the enemy came in. After the enemy ransacked the town, the angry townspeople herded every pig in Wittlich into the town's market square and roasted them. Since then, Wittlich has been known as the town of the pig burners. To remember the event, the residents hold a pig festival every August. The dead pigs arrive in the market place via a horse-drawn wagon with a spit stuck right from their neck out their booty.
The first pigs are roasted on the spits and the first Schweinebraten, or barbecued pork, was ready to be enjoyed by 3:30. The strange thing was, people can't just go up and buy the BBQ, they had to go first to the Info booth and buy a ticket then trade the ticket in at the pork booth to get their BBQ. We didn't have any BBQ, instead we had brats which are nothing like the Johnsonville brats you can buy in the stores of America. They are about a foot long, skinnier than the Johnsonville ones and gray and I didn't really like the taste but I can't exactly describe it. The breading was a little roll about the size of a balled up fist so the brat was hanging off the sides about 3 inches on each side. Jonathan was pretty funny trying to eat his. I had mine cut up on a plate with mustard.
After eating our brats, we headed back towards the car but had to stop for a pretzel. They were good but not too soft and not salty like I thought they would be. I'm still a fan of those Auntie Anne pretzels from the malls in the USA.
On Sunday after lunch at PIZZA HUT on base, we headed home. We were going to stay at Edelweiss in Garmisch that night too but there was a marriage retreat there & no rooms available when we called ahead. Since we didn't need to stop in Garmisch, the GPS told us the trip was going to take only 9 hours to get home. We started driving, not looking at the route and a few hours into the trip I started seeing signs for PARIS!
Ok, I know I'm geographically challenged but I do know for sure that Paris is NOT IN GERMANY! After looking around at other signs and checking the GPS, it turned out that we were in France! Another one of those countries you enter without knowing because the 'Welcome to France' sign is either 1) in another language (maybe French, LOL) or 2) There was no sign or it was so small we didn't see it (Like they usually are around here). I was driving and wanted Jonathan to take some pictures of France but there wasn't much to see where we were besides fields and weedy countrysides with a backdrop of mountains.
It was pretty cool to know were we in France but it sucked that the highway didn't let us see anything cool. I wanted to go to Paris but the sign for Paris said it was about 360KM away in the opposite direction. I'm sure Paris will be something we will go back to see before we leave Italy though. We were only in France for a short time before we started noticing Switzerland signs. There was even a big Swiss flag hanging from the mountain side.
For the rest of the trip through Switzerland, we saw a para glider and spent about half our time in tunnels that were, no joke, 10 miles long! It was about 8pm and at one point we entered a tunnel with it light outside and by the time we got through it, the sun had set and it was dark out. The tunnels had car pull off areas for emergencies and signs to various doors were about every half mile or so saying SOS (meaning emergency exit I guess). I'm pretty sure I even saw a sign for a restroom in the tunnel. The tunnels looked like how it will look when countries start building towns underground. Our way was not full of traffic but the other direction got clogged up a little bit and looked slow moving.
As we got into Italy I traded places with Jonathan & let him drive because my eyes were crossing from going through those tunnels and my back hurt from driving so long I guess. He was cussing because the entire way we hit NO construction until the times he was driving. It was pretty funny actually. We arrived home about 11pm and were ready for bed. It was a great but short trip and we for sure want to visit Germany and our friends in Spangdahlam again!
Once at Edelwiess we had no problem checking in and ran down to Pullman's Place to eat dinner since they stopped seating at 8:30. Dinner was priced fine (about $43 for 2 dinners, an appetizer, 2 beers, and a mudslide) and it helped that they give E1-E5 a 20% discount on dinner! I did have my heart set on Ziggy's where we had eat the time before but they are not open on Thursdays for dinner.
We got up about 8am the next day and were on the way to Spangdahlem just after 9am. The beginning of the drive was fine and we got to drive on the Autobahn! It surprisingly was not as I had expected. My picture of the Autobahn is about 5-6 lanes on each side with Ferraris and Porsches and Lamborghinis everywhere going about a buck twenty! It's no where near that way. The road is mostly 2 lanes each way and looks pretty much like the interstate in the United States. There is usually no speed limit but when there is it was 81MPH (130khm). The little Kia did good and I drove it between 80 and 90 MPH a lot of the way. Jonathan drove too but only hit about 83MPH.
Another thing we noticed in Germany were the giant windmills! They were mostly along the highway and look small in the pictures but up close they are massive!
After stopping just a few times for a bathroom break for Amber, we arrived at the Spangdahlam Air Force Base about 4:30pm. Our friends met us at the shoppette and we followed them to their town home. Let me just say Germany Air Force base housing is way nicer than Italian Army base housing!
Saturday morning we slept in a little bit & headed to a castle watch tower near the base. It was about a 25 minute drive on pretty curvy back roads. It was nothing worse than the side roads up to Blue Ridge parkway though. Once we arrived we had to hike up a little hill on a path that was designated as a hiking trail. There were a few black berries growing on the way so I stopped to pick some. They were yummy, I just wish there were more of them! As we got to the watch tower we could see the main castle down in the valley. It was huge! Lesli & I took the kids up in the tower and could see the tower even better from there.
Is was, I'd say 7 stories high and all stairs and no electricity so parts of it was pretty dark. We took some pictures with the auto timer (funny stuff trying to get 3 kids and 4 adults into position in 10 seconds) & headed back down the hill. Since Jonathan & Eddie had spent the night before drinking lots of German and Belgian beer, Jonathan was about to puke on the ride home. He was coughing and gagging & I almost pulled over but he said he could hold it in until we got to Eddie's house. Luckily he did and after a quick bathroom break, we headed back out to the Pig festival in Wittlich!
The first pigs are roasted on the spits and the first Schweinebraten, or barbecued pork, was ready to be enjoyed by 3:30. The strange thing was, people can't just go up and buy the BBQ, they had to go first to the Info booth and buy a ticket then trade the ticket in at the pork booth to get their BBQ. We didn't have any BBQ, instead we had brats which are nothing like the Johnsonville brats you can buy in the stores of America. They are about a foot long, skinnier than the Johnsonville ones and gray and I didn't really like the taste but I can't exactly describe it. The breading was a little roll about the size of a balled up fist so the brat was hanging off the sides about 3 inches on each side. Jonathan was pretty funny trying to eat his. I had mine cut up on a plate with mustard.
After eating our brats, we headed back towards the car but had to stop for a pretzel. They were good but not too soft and not salty like I thought they would be. I'm still a fan of those Auntie Anne pretzels from the malls in the USA.
On Sunday after lunch at PIZZA HUT on base, we headed home. We were going to stay at Edelweiss in Garmisch that night too but there was a marriage retreat there & no rooms available when we called ahead. Since we didn't need to stop in Garmisch, the GPS told us the trip was going to take only 9 hours to get home. We started driving, not looking at the route and a few hours into the trip I started seeing signs for PARIS!
Ok, I know I'm geographically challenged but I do know for sure that Paris is NOT IN GERMANY! After looking around at other signs and checking the GPS, it turned out that we were in France! Another one of those countries you enter without knowing because the 'Welcome to France' sign is either 1) in another language (maybe French, LOL) or 2) There was no sign or it was so small we didn't see it (Like they usually are around here). I was driving and wanted Jonathan to take some pictures of France but there wasn't much to see where we were besides fields and weedy countrysides with a backdrop of mountains.
It was pretty cool to know were we in France but it sucked that the highway didn't let us see anything cool. I wanted to go to Paris but the sign for Paris said it was about 360KM away in the opposite direction. I'm sure Paris will be something we will go back to see before we leave Italy though. We were only in France for a short time before we started noticing Switzerland signs. There was even a big Swiss flag hanging from the mountain side. 
For the rest of the trip through Switzerland, we saw a para glider and spent about half our time in tunnels that were, no joke, 10 miles long! It was about 8pm and at one point we entered a tunnel with it light outside and by the time we got through it, the sun had set and it was dark out. The tunnels had car pull off areas for emergencies and signs to various doors were about every half mile or so saying SOS (meaning emergency exit I guess). I'm pretty sure I even saw a sign for a restroom in the tunnel. The tunnels looked like how it will look when countries start building towns underground. Our way was not full of traffic but the other direction got clogged up a little bit and looked slow moving.
As we got into Italy I traded places with Jonathan & let him drive because my eyes were crossing from going through those tunnels and my back hurt from driving so long I guess. He was cussing because the entire way we hit NO construction until the times he was driving. It was pretty funny actually. We arrived home about 11pm and were ready for bed. It was a great but short trip and we for sure want to visit Germany and our friends in Spangdahlam again! 
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