A Final Frolic in the Black Forest

Our final chapter took us through the Black Forest which is found in the southwestern part of Germany.  Not sure why it is called the Black Forest but it has tons of hillside towns and towns in the flat areas of the region.  Because the land has so much topography, though, there is a lot of the forest that remains unsettled and uncleared, which makes for beautiful foggy mornings where the clouds are sitting among the trees.  The last part of our German adventure took us through the Black Forest to a few different towns.  

Our first stop was Triberg, which is a town that every German we met was kind of looking at us with a blank stare like “why are you going there?” It was a cute little hillside town, reminiscent of Big Bear, with a lot of steep roofs and medieval architecture. But what it is famous for is the worlds largest cuckoo clock and tons of homemade cuckoo clocks. We arrived at our Airbnb in the evening and after dropping off our stuff in our lofted rooms of the top floor, headed out to find some dinner.  Welp, the whole town was closed besides Netto, the local grocer.  Lydia loves local grocery stores so of course we wondered around, bought more snacks (I have more snacks than I can possibly consume at this point), and a few pizzas for dinner from a pizza and kabob place inside the Netto.  Pizza and kebab are definitely the foods of choice here in this town.  We headed back to the Airbnb for wine and pizza and got ready for the next day.  

Our first stop was the cuckoo clock which was incredibly underwhelming with the bird popping out for 2 cuckoos on the half hour.  There is a much better cuckoo clock experience in the back that costs 1 euro and goes on demand, which is ironic and the recipe for a tourist trap I suppose. We also hiked up this lovely after fall which gave us a sense of just how much topography was in the Black Forest.  It was foggy and misty the whole way for a mystical feel as we hiked. We celebrated our hike with a slice of Black Forest cake, which was as good as cherry chocolate cake can be, but definitely not my favorite. 

After saying goodbye to Triberg we headed towards Gengenbach, which is the town that represents Düsseldorf in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Another quintessential medieval German village, it was so picturesque and quaint.  We had a lovely lunch of traditional food from the area, I got what was called ravioli but definitely not the Italian kind, it was more like a potato or pasta staffed ravioli with chive and three pieces of bacon (Black Forest ham I would imagine) on top. 

After wandering around the village we decided to head over to Strasbourg, France, to pick up some wine and a pastry or two. Driving around France was more treacherous than Germany, and kudos to Carolyn for driving us around 2 countries.  Of course as on as we crossed the border all the signs were now in French so a completely new set of things to learn.  We ended up directing ourselves to the cátedrale which was another epic building.  It just doesn’t get old for me, marveling at historic churches.  It is so amazing to wonder how they built them so beautifully.  This particular church had a unique clock in one of the side transepts that had a celestial clock in it. We didn’t see it move, but apparently there are figures from the Bible and Jesus’ second coming that move around at certain times of the day, you know, cuckoo clock inspired. It showed what sign of the zodiac we were in right now, and the date, and all of that, it was incredibly elaborate and something unexpected to be in a church. Otherwise, Strasbourg had some amazing modern residential architecture!  

From there we went on a quest to find a good French wine. We went into a wine shop that also had all sorts of weird looking sausages and some specialty cheeses.  We had much conversation with the very nice sommelier who inserted himself into our conversation to make sure we didn’t buy bad wine “If you would like me to make a suggestion I can…” translation - don’t buy that one.  He gave us an excellent choice and then we went with the softest and most mild cheese in his case, Munster, which turned out to be not very soft and definitely not mild.  After we completed our shopping with a couple baguettes, we headed back over to Germany to our final destination, Baden Baden.

 

Baden Baden is a much bigger City than Triberg or Gengenbach, and a resort town with mostly Germans.  We took a walk through this city as well after a wine down happy hour in our room.  There were slightly more people but not by much.  Baden Baden is famous for its “terme” - baths that are built around natural hot springs.  Very different from the baths in Koreatown, LA.  The one we went to was called Caracalla and was just lovely.  There were indoor and outdoor pools of varying temperatures, saunas, a salt room, and infrared light areas.  My favorite was one of the 90º outdoor pools that became a whirlpool every 10 minutes so you were basically running laps with the current around the pool. We purchased 3 hours in the spa and it not by quickly.  From there we wandered around to do a little chocolate shopping and got some lunch. Our last real German meal - Carolyn and I got the biggest plate of barbecue ribs ever!  

The whole city had a red carpet advertising tourist attractions

And then we were bound for Frankfurt, with one final stop in Mannheim.  This was just a drive through stop because it was recommended by Christiane, but a much bigger and more industrial city. There is a palace in the middle that is just enormous, built in the 1800s.  We couldn’t believe how big it was, the photo below is only 1/3 of it.  It now houses one of the Mannheim universities, which is perfect for the building. 

And so brings us to the closing of our trip, our return to Frankfurt!  I write this as I am at the gate awaiting my flight to Rome, while Lydia, Carolyn, and Kristyn are waiting for their flight at the same time that is heading for LA.  This was such an amazing trip and I am so grateful to Kristyn for deciding to run the marathon, and inspire me to stay put in one country for 2 weeks.  I never would have done that without being influenced!  Seeing Christiane’s home turf was super special, and meeting great new people along the way was awesome.  Now, on to a country where I can at least pronounce the words I don’t know how to translate! And a final GUTE FAHRT!