(Sunday, Sept. 20) As well bid adieu to Reutte about 10:15 am, a local bicycle race to the top of a local ruined castle was about to begin and the sun was shining brightly through a “blue hole” in the clouds. But shortly after we left town, the clouds got lower and light rain showers began to fall: A portent of what the rest of the day had in store for us as we traveled across three countries (Austria, Germany, and France) to reach Ribeauville in the Alsace region west of the Rhine River.
Google Maps had suggested that we go straight north on the A7 Autobahn to Stuttgart, then head west until we reached France, then drive south to Ribeauville. But our friend, Ben Woythaler (an American married to a lovely French woman, Anne-Sophie), had suggested that we stop at Lindau on the Bodensee (aka Lake Constance) if we had time, and our innkeeper at Reutte said that would be a much more scenic route. (Michelin’s on-line mapping service had suggested going that way, as well).
Traffic heading to the A7 Autobahn was heavy in both directions with weekend travelers heading home, and it picked up in volume and speed once we hit the A7. After turning off the A7 to the A980 autobahn heading west to the Bodensee, traffic disappeared almost completely. Even when that “freeway” became a two-lane road, there weren’t that many cars headed east or west.
But as we entered Lindau around noon, we saw lots of people walking along the main street, police stationed at every street leading into the old town, and full parking lots. We pulled into one lot that appeared hopelessly full, were elated when a friendly guy waved that he was leaving, then were exasperated when another car coming down the adjacent lane of parked cars pulled right in front of us and into the spot. We decided to leave town, but quickly discovered that there is just one way in and one way out. Lindau is on either a natural peninsula, or a man-made one connecting a former island to the mainland. The only way to get off this little land mass in the direction we were headed was by train, so we gave up, parked the car in the farthest lot from “downtown”, and went in search of lunch.
What we discovered were police everywhere, especially near one of the waterfront hotels, music playing, and someone making speeches or announcements over a PA system. We guessed that either a rock start was coming or, more likely, one of more candidates in the upcoming German national election.
Picking our way through the crowds and heading in the opposite direction from the big doings, we found our way to a konditorei, had a nice simple lunch, and then decided to leave town. Unfortunately, the political event (we later saw people carrying political banners, and a large plastic cow painted with the colors of the German flag and inscribed with some inscrutable slogan, confirming the nature of the goings-on) had ended, and everyone else was trying to get out of Dodge, too. Lucky for us, once we got out of the central part of town, most cars were headed east, and we were westward bound.
But our luck ran out a while later as we tried to get around the north side of the Bodensee and to the autobahn at the end of the lake. About midway, we hit a stream of cars creeping along like snails. This is a big resort area, and driving here on Sunday afternoon is like driving on the north shore of Lake Tahoe on a summer Sunday when everyone is headed home from the lake. |Traffic finally cleared, and we’re speeding on our way again, but well behind schedule, and with at least two to three more hours of traveling left to go before reaching Ribeauville.
