Monday October 10, Bad Kosen

Loved the drive through these little towns in the valleys.

Well it has been a really interesting day in many ways, but with lots of variety.

Woke this morning and for once it hadn’t rained overnight, although it was quite foggy. We have been having issues with our wifi in Germany that is through the UK Three Network, which had worked really well in Scandinavia but had been very slow and intermittent here. On Saturday we bought a Sim card with data through Vodafone and this worked really well for a 24 hours but then I couldn’t get it to work. So thought we would go into the Vodafone store in Bad Belzig.

Parked in the Edeka (a supermarket) carpark and walked into town…but it was a bit further than we expected. Finally found it, after quite a roundabout route but didn’t get much help from the guy who spoke very little English. Thought it best to try another town and hopefully get someone who could help us. Really enjoyed walking through this town, and headed back to the van. I have maps.me app on the phone and had downloaded all the German maps onto it when we had free wifi, so can now use it without wifi. Thought it was simpler to find our way back to the van by using this, so searched for Edeka and then found the walking route back to it. Seemed quite a way but eventually got there….then I realised it was another Edeka…on the other side of town!!! Egg all over my face!!! At least we got plenty of exercise and finally after walking another half an hour we were back to Ruakiwi. Ian is not letting me forget my blue, and his aversion to modern technology was reinforced!

It was such a nice day, the sun was out and quite warm so rather than continue on the autobahn, thought we would take the lesser roads South West and enjoy the scenery. Found Bad Kosen on the map with a nice Stellplatz so set Jilly to avoid motorways and let her work out the route. It turned out to be a really enjoyable drive and were so pleased that we took the “slow road”.

We drove through some great forested areas to start with, then more open country and some quite industrial cities. All the time we passed through smaller towns and villages, each with their own look. Initially the land was flat, but then we moved into much more hilly regions with very old villages nestled into the valleys. To get through these old towns, the road really became quite narrow. At one stage we turned into a small road as directed by Jilly only to find that it had been made one way….oops. Managed to squeak through and turn around and edge ourselves out….a bit red in the face.

It was getting close to six and getting a little dark when we finally arrived in Bad Kosen, nestled in a valley with two castles in the hills above us. Look forward to seeing it in daylight.

Love the florists shops in these small towns.

An old railway building with so much graffiti

Narrow roads

A different landscape

The road passed quite close by this barn...and the smell wasn't very good!

View from our overnight campspot.