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rememberthattime · 4 years

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Chapter 58. EuRoad Trip, pt 3

Ah, fall. Crisp air. Colorful leaves. A reprieve from the heat of summer.

To fully enjoy my favorite season, Chelsay & I continued into the third and final phase of EuRoad Trip: “Fall”, with stops in the Dolomites, Bavaria, and the German Black Forest.

The change in season wasn’t gradual for Chelsay & I: we went from summer to fall in a matter of hours. Like, the three-hour drive between the Italian Riviera and the Dolomites.

Over the course of our drive, the setting went from Mediterranean chic to the Sound of Music. We’d left pastel-colored homes along the sea to log cabins dotting the mountainside. I love this setting. Obviously, I enjoy the Mediterranean, but it’s hard to beat an alpine autumn.

The Dolomites might be the perfect destination for fall. The air is crisp and clean. The leaves are changing. Charming villages sit at the base of undulating green fields, capped by towering limestone spines. The shops have a Swiss alpine theme but not in a kitschy way – it’s authentic. This is just how they’ve always been. Timber homes surround the tiny village, with potted flowers hung from every window and balcony. When planning, I was most excited for this leg of the trip, and it was meeting my expectations before we even left the car.

Our first stop was a picnic high above the Val di Funes, a picturesque acclimation to our new alpine surroundings. Chelsay and I enjoyed some of our recent garlic truffle spread investment, while Indy frolicked and grazed about the sloped green fields.

It was pretty overcast, but we weren’t bothered: it fit the cozy, fall atmosphere. Our only worry was that the next destination, Seceda, required some level of visibility.

Seceda is a unique mountain peak. A gradually ascending green field gives way to a sheer cliff, with limestone spines looming in the background. It looks like if the Cliffs of Dover were transplanted into the Italian Alps. That said, not even Seceda’s prickly spires could pierce this cloud cover.

We took a gondola to the peak but were soon shrouded in thick fog. We couldn’t see 20 feet in front of us, let alone Seceda. Though dense, the clouds were moving quickly, so we decided to roll the dice and stick around.

It’s pretty easy to pass the time with Indy: we teased him with weird noises, laughing at his reactions. We played fetch with anything we could find. Then when Indy got tired, we pulled up Ray Harris Jr and the World War II podcast. Chelsay would forecast potential gaps in the clouds while Ray educated us on FDR’s preference between pencil or pen.

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There were a few near misses. Chelsay spotted incoming breaks in the fog, we’d frantically stir with excitement, but ultimately, each proved impervious. Still, there was hope.

After an hour, we were just starting to question whether staying was worth it. But Chelsay thought there was one more break that might work out. It was excruciating to wait, but slowly, the shy rock began to reveal itself. This was it!

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Not only did the clouds part, but blue sky began to appear and then… a burst of sun. And what’s that? A rainbow?! What an epic setting. The soft glow of sunshine against the limestone crag. Fog still rolling quickly, but abruptly halting against Seceda’s impenetrable cliffside. The clouds shot up like waves hitting the coastline.

This was one of the lasting memories from the trip, and we celebrated with a tortellini feast that evening. We’d stopped at a grocery store earlier to pick up picnic supplies – an Italian grocery store. I’ve never seen so much pasta. And it all looked so delicious that we couldn’t settle on just one: we bought two types of tortellini and three different sauces. We enjoyed our tortellini sampling from our alpine chalet while watching World War II in Color. Ray hooked us.

The next day marked our first real physical activity in at least a week – since the calanques in Cassis. We were taking the 6 mile Tre Cime pass through pretty challenging conditions. Yesterday’s quick moving clouds were stagnant and heavy today. Whenever the weather was too much, Chelsay, Indy, and I would find shelter in the ‘refugio’ huts along the path, warming up with hot chocolate.

After the hike, we stopped at Lago di Braies, a teal alpine lake set between evergreen slopes. The setting looks like a screensaver, but the real highlight was once again Indy. Without his frisbee or other toys, Chelsay and I had been using sticks for fetch throughout the trip. So now every stick Indy saw was a toy.

He’d dart along the shore trying to tempt Chelsay and I into playing with him: “Maybe masters will like this stick? Oh, here’s a big one! Will they like this? How about a wet stick?”

Eventually we gave in – I threw the stick as far into the lake as possible (owner’s tip: that burns the most energy), and he’d inevitably plunge after it. Indy once again drew an audience with everyone taking pictures of our goofy dog in the otherwise serene setting.

That was essentially our last activity in the Dolomites, but before moving on to our next destination, I want to quickly mention the phenomenal food. It’s Italy, so obviously it was delicious. But it wasn’t just pasta and breadstick – it uniquely Italian-Austrian. Ricotta pizzella (alpine pizza), truffle ravioli, venison, and every type of dumpling imaginable.

After the Dolomites, we’d turn north and head back to London, driving through Austria, Germany, Belgium, and France on the way. The main focus of this trip were the Loire Valley, Cote d’Azur, and Dolomites, so while planning, I essentially just looked for spots along the return route. Ultimately this included three destinations + one we spontaneously added along the way.

The first stop in our return journey was Neuschwanstein Castle. Yes, we’d already visited Neuschwanstein, and yes, our goal this trip was to explore new destinations. But there was a delicious currywurst place we visited the last time so Chelsay and I HAD to visit. …I guess the views are pretty magical too.

Jokes aside, Neuschwanstein is very special to me. It was the first adventure Chelsay and I embarked on after moving to London in 2015. I laugh at those two inexperienced travellers, somehow learning that Mary’s Bridge was closed only after landing in Munich. I think back to our can-do spirit to capture that Hero view anyway, and how giddy we were at our success. I think back to the Rick Steves audio tour through Munich, our white sausage breakfast and bowl of coffee, and the hot chocolate from Beluga. And yes, I think about the currywurst from Neuschwanstein.

More broadly, Germany is very special to Chelsay and I. We visited every October while in the UK: first Munich, then Berlin, and then Rothenberg. There’s something about Germany’s dense forests, and heavy ethos (fog, food, their accents, etc) that just fits fall.

So, now consider all of this history as Chelsay and I ascended the hill up to Neuschwanstein. It’s about a 30-minute walk, and I was giddy with anticipation the whole way… basically saying exactly what I just wrote above: “Remember the currywurst Chelsay!?”

Indy was similarly excited but for different reasons: we passed a few horse drawn carriages and he DID NOT like them. He ripped out of his collar and ran back down the hill.

After calming him down (aka distracting him with a stick), we continued up the hill and came to Mary’s Bridge. It was weird not hopping any fences this time.

We arrived just as the sun was setting. Keep Chelsay & I’s history with Neuschwanstein in mind as I describe the setting… Soft light draped the Castle. The sky took on a pink glow. The valley below faded into the shadows. Indy nervously trembled from the heights. It was just as magical as the first time.

As we left the Castle and made the long descent back to town, we were just as giddy as 2015. Unfortunately the currywurst restaurant wasn’t waiting for us at the bottom, so we audibled to the nearby town of Fussen and a neighborhood beerhall. It was clearly popular with a line out the door, and the currywurst had its own page in the menu under the title “Reminders of Home”.

The currywurst lived up to this place’s popularity, but I want to specifically remember how unique Chelsay and I felt in this restaurant. We were clearly the only native English speakers there. That might be the case normally, but it was especially true during Covid.

This was clearly Fussen’s beerhall – owned by the locals. The place where patrons come to relax after a hard week of making pretzels or whatever they do for work. Families were connecting and talking about Bayern Munich or the latest season of Dark. It felt comfortable, even if Chelsay and I were outsiders. It would be like if a German were dropped into a Buffalo Wild Wings.

We hit the road again the next day, but not before a brief walk around Schwansee, the lake nestled below Neuschwanstein. Obviously the Castle was the highlight from 2015, but I remembered I really enjoyed our fall walk around the lake. Also, we had to get some of Indy’s energy out before our drive. This trip’s walk felt nostalgic but was made even more fun with our newest family member.

Our next step was Beilstein, a tiny German village along the Rhine. If Chelsay & I thought Cliousclat (population: 600) or Portofino (400) were small, Beilstein only has 145 residents! It took about 15 minutes to walk the entire town, but it’s incredibly charming: like an authentic Disney village.

I’ll briefly mention this story. It’s a good thing touring Beilstein was so quick, because I needed extra time to bring Indy to the vet. Before returning to the UK, we needed a local vet to administer and provide proof for a tapeworm treatment. The closest vet was a 20 minute drive, so I plugged it into Google Maps and set off.

Well, it seems Google Maps users aren’t frequenting Dr Frank Feiden, because the app took me to an elementary school. I had zero service so couldn’t call, so I was stuck driving in circles around this children’s school… which I’m sure looked suspicious. Finally I gave up, and decided to interrupt either four teachers’ or four parents’ smoke break to see if they could help. Shockingly, they knew exactly where he was and shared the most precise instructions I’d ever received (classic German). It was a bizarre situation to find myself while on vacation, made even more bizarre when the person next to me at the vet had lived near Southlake. We bonded over our shared love of Mi Cocina. These experiences again made me feel like part of the community despite being such an obvious outsider.

Alas, just as we were starting to feel at home, it was time to return to London. Our last day of the trip. I’m now 6000 words and 10 pages into this three part EuRoad Trip post, but still plenty of stories to tell.

First, we made a short stop at Eltz Castle, a romantic palace well hidden in the Black Forest. The castle is uniquely vertical, but I’ll remember this visit for Chelsay falling on the walk down. She’ll hate me for writing this, but hopefully we can remember and laugh. Very similar to my tumble at the Sete Cidades in the Azores.

Finally, our last stop on the road trip was Dunkirk. This was the spontaneous visit I alluded to earlier. Dunkirk wasn’t initially in the plan, but after 20 hours of Ray Harris Jr telling us about Operation Dynamo, we decided we visit Dunkirk Beach for ourselves.

It was extremely windy when we visited, as Storm Alex was moving through with winds up to 60 mph. It was raining too, and the raindrops felt like bullets as we ran along The Mole. The chaos felt fitting though, as this was the location where 300,000 British and French soldiers chaotically escaped the charging Nazi army.

The Mole, a sea break that the British used as an escape dock, is well removed from the city… and hardly marked. You drive through an industrial center and park in what appears to be an employee lot. In fact, I only found The Mole because I crawled Google Satellite View searching for sea piers along Dunkirk beach – there weren’t any other articles or traveller blogs about how to visit.

But this solitude made the pier feel that much more important. This was the place where 300,000 lives were saved, providing the Brits with necessary troops to withstand the Battle of Britain. If not for Dunkirk, would the UK have fallen to Hitler? Then, could the Nazis have focused their forces solely on Russia, and the US after? It’s hard to call this retreat a victory, but the Allies escape along the very pier I was standing was vital, and the moment felt similarly significant.

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The trip from Dunkirk to London was a disaster – I’m sure it felt a bit like those soldiers on Dunkirk Beach. We again took a taxi from Calais, but the driver decided to go directly through the center of London, costing us about an hour in gridlock. Then when we arrived at the house, I found I’d lost the key in transit – brutal. It was 9:30 pm so the property manager wasn’t available. We called a locksmith, who determined the backdoor was the best lock to open. I store the gate code on my phone, but my battery had died, so I had to hop the fence to let the locksmith through.

This must have looked suspicious to our neighbors: pitch black, man jumping fence, commotion in our backyard. Sure, that’s suspicious until you consider Chelsay, Indy, and ALL OUR BAGS AND INDY’S CRATE WERE ALL STILL OUT FRONT!

Anyway, the locksmith and I are in the back. The back lock turned out to be a tough one, so he had to use a drill. He wasn’t wearing glass so a piece of metal shot into his eye. I had to remove it. Brutal.

Then a helicopter showed up. …

The neighbors had called the Hampstead Police, who sent a chopper for a potential B&E. The helicopter hovered over us for 30 seconds, before two officers arrived, batons at the ready. They realized what had happened before calling out on their walkie talkie: “Call of all units.” Were there MORE on the way!?

Anyway, we finally got in and FINALLY changed out of our wet clothes from stormy Dunkirk. All that said, we woke up the next morning and were totally fine. I made myself some coffee, and the whole thing just seemed like a bad dream. Similar to Chelsay falling at Eltz Castle, I think we can laugh about it now.

Okay, now that’s really it. The conclusion of our EuRoad Trip. 16 days. Six countries. 2500 miles. Two seasons. One crazy pup.

I know I’m wrapping this up quickly (sorry, I’m now on page 11 and nearly 7000 words in), but the past two weeks were truly special. Although we’d gone six months without any international trips, lockdown really enabled this journey.

We had plenty of vacation days. We didn’t want to fly, so we drove. This simple equation brought us to extremely charming and authentic places we never would have visited otherwise. Starting with the Beauty & the Beast phase, driving south through France’s Loire Valley, stopping at chateaus, provincial hamlets, and the charming fishing village of Cassis. Moving into the Summer Chic phase, with hot temps along the ritzy Riviera, including stops in Nice and Portofino. And finally, concluding with the Fall phase, passing through the jagged Dolomites landscape and fairy tale castles of Bavaria and the German Black Forest.

This was likely one of our last European trips, but each destination exhibited why we live abroad. New places. Exciting experiences. Escapes from the routine.

Our EuRoad Trip was another reminder of how far you can go in just a few hours.

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