Today we did the “touristy thing”. Enough of that steep climbing and biking that has happened most days since we arrived in Europe. We went sightseeing!!! We started out about 9:30am to Triberg, a 24 minute ride by car. Only we did not arrive in 24 minutes, and like we thought before, whoever marks these distances here must be quicker than we are. We had been through this part of the Black Forest in 1998 with Jean's sister and our brother-in-law, Lois and Fran. Anyway, we got there and in line to see Germany’s Highest Waterfalls. It was a very neat waterfalls, but after living so close to Niagara Falls, well what more can we say!! The waters of the Gutach River plunge over 160m in seven cascades into the valley below. It offers 3 trails, Cascade 3/4 hr, Culture 1 hr. and Nature 1 ½ hr. I am not sure which was the most difficult but we chose the Cascade Trail , ended up on the Culture Trail and eventually ended up on the Nature trail. The information brochure is in English, but somewhere we misread the brochure I guess. It was a wonderful day for that adventure, 7 degrees C when we headed out and the further we got on the trail, the warmer we got. It was up to 23 degrees C at the bottom of the trail.
Next stop was to be Gutach as Irmgard, our apartment owner, suggested we see it. However, guess we did not ask what all to see. We realized it was the setting for an Open-air museum of Black Forest farm houses, in the mills, the saw mills and rooms and barns how people during the last 400 years lived and worked. We realized we had been through that in 1998, so decided not to go through it again.
Next stop was Wolfach and Oberwolfach. Again in 1998 we stayed in that area and we wanted to do a bit of reminiscing. We found the lovely bridges with flower boxes on them, the 3 Konige Hotel where we stayed and the endless roadway that got narrower and narrower the further up the mountain we went. It seemed to take us to the other side of the Alps and when the road would go no further, there was a beautiful farm setting there. Most things looked familiar after 14 years but lots more homes and businesses are there.
Maybe the best part of this touristy day was sitting outside at the Wolfach Backerei Konditorei Café having coffee and Black Forest Cake for Jean and Raspberry Cheese Cake for Dave.
On our arrival home to the apartment, the neighbors below us were having a drink outside their apartment. Dave met Mr. last night and he spoke good English!! That always gets our attention here in Germany. They are from Israel and very nice. They did the Touristy Thing today as well and went to Germany’s Highest Waterfalls too!! I wondered if we would have recognized them if we had seen them there today.
After supper here I walked up around behind the Dorerhof farm and took some final pictures of their farm. We leave tomorrow a.m. for Langnau, Switzerland.
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