Bavaria Day 2

30 April castle Day 

Car mess:

Prepaid rental car won't happen again. Arrived after looking at wrong address. Man at desk asked for license, credit card, reservation and international drivers license. But we were told twice we didn't need international driver's license! We don't need it. Yes you do. How do we get it? The consulate. Where are they? Don't know. Can u look them up? No. Do you have the Internet? No. Do u have a phone book? No. Ugh. U suck. Oh, go to ADAC, the service center. They can help u. Where is it? 4 kilometers from here. Ugh. Ok. Finally! So the race is on. Run across town. Meet nice woman with excellent English on the road. She gives directions. She's shocked they require the translation. Meet nice man on the road. He says the ADAC has moved (seriously!!!) he tells us its closer now. Hurray! ADAC is closed. We feel like it's an equalizer step in the amazing race. We wait and wait. They open. They translate for us (€20) and give us free maps (lifesaver). We run back across city to the rental car company and a trainee helps us. She is short with us but much nicer than first guy. We are given a nice sports car. Very nice. But we must return it to that specific station, they say. We leave, program the GPS to go to Fussen and notice after 15 minutes we are going the opposite direction to Salzburg. Ridiculous. We ask for directions. The wife finally pulls out map and navigates us back to Ettal. All in all, 3 hours wasted on a day we had no time to waste. going to have to cut something out.

Ettal:
We saw a monk! A real live monk! Modern, not pretend.

Car:
Beautiful. Now I know what fernando midlife crisis will be. 2 exhaust. Nice.

Autobahn:
What is up with the constant speed traps? 80-100-120-80 in the space of meters. Either we don't understand or they don't.

Driving through the alps:
Austrian segment. Was the prettiest segment. Beautiful winding roads, single lanes. Keep almost getting run off the road by buses. Lake- stupendous. Glorious.

Oberammergau:
Voted best town so far. Mom would die here. Christmas shop too cute. Ate strawberry tort in cute little bakery. Nice little old lady. Beautiful and cheap wood carvings. Stopped at grocery store. Their grocery stores are tiny!! Bought yucky carbonated water by accident. Nasty.

Linderhof: First of Ludwig's castles. Beautiful grounds. Small house. Gaudy. Video camera left on and battery died.

Neuschwanstein (crazy king Ludwig's cinderella castle):
Marienbrücke (the bridge with a rickety view):
Who the heck tells tons of tourists to walk on a ridiculously unstable really high bridge? We could just read the headlines: "Unsuspecting tourists fall to death after bridge collapse." Not to mention they had that entire side of the castle covered with renovating scaffolding. Our response? You have got to be kidding me. Worst luck ever on this trip.

Castle tour: audio guide boring and ahead of tour. Boring rooms. Bor-ing!
Trail down from Ludwigs castle:

Very slippery. Do not advice in the rain. The wife slipped and wiped out, sliding down hill. Skinned up knee and one thick chunk of knee skin sliced open. Fernando corageously cleans up her wounds and saves the day once again. 'Course cleaning up the would means peeling back the chunk and unfolding it. Meanwhile she is trying not to throw up. She has felt pretty sick this trip. Maybe it was the swine flu.

Wurst in Neuschwanstein:
Fernando tried two. The first (2.50) was better than the second (3.20). Plus they charged for katsup. Who does that?

Drove back to Munich. Parked car in tiny parking spot at hotel. Scary. Watched "German Idol". Funny. Not very talented people.

Map of driving path.

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