Day 7, 12 May – transit, Trier

Today was generally a transit day. We left Strasbourg to; you guessed it, cloudy spitting rain. Our route took us north and west across the French/German border at Saarbrucken. Again, setting the NAV system to avoid highways was an excellent choice, as the drive was fabulous. Once past Saarbrucken, and a much needed fill-up and carwash, we made for Trier.

When we arrived there, and emerged from the parking garage, we were very pleasantly surprised. Trier is the oldest city in Germany, with its founding going back to the Roman occupations. In fact, there is still the last of four original Roman gates, the “Porta Nigra,” still standing. Anyway, the inner city is all pedestrian only and was simply alive with activity. It probably helped that it’s Saturday today, but still, it was crazy. We were able to grab a late lunch at a bakery and toured through the cathedral; reputedly the oldest church in Europe. It was spectactular. The stonework was exquisite and presented several photographic opportunities. We were in Trier for a good 3 hours.

The drive to our Eifel region hotel, the Hotel Wilhelmshoehe in Auderath, was awesome. We went up through Bitburg, and then went off the beaten path a little bit past small towns with names like Dudelburg, Wittlich, and Filz. We passed the US Air Base of Spangdahlem, and saw many cars that appeared to have been shipped over with their US Millitary personnel owners, since they all had German plates using the US plate shape.

We arrived at our hotel around 7:30 or so, and Jaqueline, the owner, greeted us by name. The hotel is very B&B in its atmosphere. Our room is huge, but our bathroom has a critical flaw: there is no shower curtain and the shower head is at tub level. Why can’t these Europeans seem to grasp the concept of an actual shower with a full-length shower curtain?

We had a veerrryyy looonnnggg, but very good, dinner in the dining room and are just now really settling down to go to bed. We’ll try to catch another episode of Heroes before we shut it down, though.

Tomorrow is the big Nurburgring day. Our Ring Taxi ride is at 11:15, and I am hoping beyond hope that I can drive my car on the track. If not, I suspect that we won’t hang there out very long, since I don’t want to subject Angela to an entire day of amateur motorsports.