5 May 2025 – Wir Fahren Auf Der Autobahn

Miles driven today = 253

Total Miles to date = 5,400

I had bit of a disaster last night.  My laptop keyboard must have been thirsty because it tried to drink my beer while my back was turned and now it's completely dead, so the last few days of this blog are going to have to be laboriously tapped out one-fingered on my phone.

First stop before we left Wurzburg this morning was at Lidl for our final shop of the trip and we managed to track down some of the local Silvaner in its dumpy little bottles, so a few of those went in the garage and we will reminisce with fondness of our afternoon there when we get around to drinking them.

Then it was back on the A3 Autobahn.  This time it was the River Main we crossed several times as we made our way through the beautifully forested Bavarian countryside and then on around Frankfurt.

The original plan was to follow the A3 all the way to Cologne but the overhead gantries warned of an accident causing one hour delays so we diverted onto the A48, crossing the Rhine near Koblenz before pushing northwards again on the A61.  The A4 then took us West past Aachen to the Dutch border.

We only gave ourselves 5 days to cover the 1,300km from Vienna to Calais so I am afraid that, much like last year, we have charged through Germany much quicker than we would have liked, but we are now in the little tongue of Dutch territory which sticks down between Germany and Belgium.  We initially headed for the marina at Maastricht but they only had spaces available for smaller vans so we found an alternative just 5 minutes away in a campervan area attached to a restaurant called De Dwaze Herder, which apparently translates as "The Foolish Shepherd".

It's €31 a night to stay here which is daylight robbery in comparison to what we have been paying half that for in Greece, but it seems to be the going rate round here. Even the local ACSI sites don't allow their discounted rate in May for some reason, although they do in June!

We are an easy 5km bike ride from the centre of Maastricht, famous for the eponymous treaty which founded the European Union in 1992.  But having spent 6 hours on the road all we wanted to do was sit in the bar and sink a couple of beers.  They have some rather un-PC signs in the car park with spaces specifically reserved for "big boobs", "small brains" and " gold diggers".

There is a nice looking pool here which we are specifically forbidden from using even if it were warm enough, although we are allowed to use the adjoining toilet and shower.

And this rather odd watchtower is equally off limits.  To be honest I'm not sure if there is a great deal around here worth viewing from altitude anyway. 

LATE EDIT - Tort's keyboard here.  It's OK, I'm alive. I was only messing.  I'm a bit hungover and my Caps Lock light is permanently on but otherwise I feel fine.  Woohoo!

6 May 2025 - Donkmeer