all’s well
by Rach, who drove happily today and who noticed Grandpa had stopped clutching his seat
Kehl, Germany (across the river from Strasbourg, where we tried to go)
2.2m read the sign, indicating the distance between the two concrete barriers into the park where we were to spend the night.
So it was going to be a tight fit for our 2.2m wide Womo, and an impossibility for our 2.25m one. Needless to say, we didn’t even try to get through. Maybe we could have – I mean to say, we had just negotiated an incredibly narrow tunnel, but we just moved on. To be precise, we ended up going back across the Rhein, out of France and into Germany again. It seems we cannot get out of the country for a night! We aimed for Switzerland last night, and tried France tonight – both to no avail. But look where we ended up:
Cool view eh.
And we can walk across the bridge to Strasbourg in the morning.
All’s well that ends well.
Actually, all has been well all day.
Early this morning Grandpa and I set out on bikes for the nearest town, each with a laptop in our backpacks. We took a most unlikely-looking street “just in case”, and saw an elderly couple pottering in their garden. Asking them if there was an internet cafe nearby initially appeared fruitless as they did not understand the concept, but we fumbled through a description of what we were looking for and they assured us we’d find one 8km up the road at the nearest real town. Then, a switch flicked in the dear old man’s head, and he realised we would find luck just 2km up the road in a small town. Dear old wife gave us very explicit instructions and off we toddled. What a beautiful road to ride – barley and corn fields with poppies growing up amongst them gave way to a tree-lined avenue with overhanging branches that formed a tunnel. The town quickly appeared and we asked another couple of friendly souls about internet. No, nothing here, you’ll need to go on another 10km. Hang on – maybe…..and soon we were receiving directions to an electronics store down the road, under the bridge and around the corner. Unfortunately, said store was closed for renovations. But a sign indicated we could ring the bell next door. Which we did. Another equally friendly lady flew down the stairs and informed us they never had internet, but if we went up the road, across the bridge and around another corner we’d find a computer shop. Which we did. It, too, was closed, but due to open soon. Once open, however, it did not provide internet services. But all was not lost – the girl told us to wait for her boss to arrive and she’d ask if we could use his computer. When we explained we had our own, she hooked us up to their network and we were away laughing….Grandpa was even given coffee with cream and sugar! Could it have been any better? Why, yes! When we insisted on paying for the privilege of using their services, the manager would not hear of it – he just invited us to return any time we wanted.
As I say, all has been well all day. On the way home we nipped into a wee supermarket “for milk” (Grandpa’s euphemism for buying apples and chocolate and bread rolls and special dessert and cheese and milk), where we met a Welsh lady, who ended up inviting us to visit her when we get over her way. We explained how many children we have and that just made her all the happier to have us! Who knows? It may turn out to have been a fortuitous meeting. Our short conversation certainly was a bright point in a day of friendly helpful encounters.
Meanwhile, back at the riverside……(SuperHero multi-tasking child-minder and car repairer and lunch maker, Rob, takes over the writing)… I managed to successfully re-line the inside of the Womo canopy with aluminium sheet and expanding foam. This is the area where the sign post had pushed in the alcove, cracking the original lining, which was comprised of an mdf/polystyrene/mdf sandwich glued onto the exterior aluminium. Not an easy thing to repair! However, after a bit of kiwi “just-fix-it” attitude we ended up with a tidy aluminium/polyurethane foam/aluminium sandwich that looks just like the original (if you look at it in the dark, that is). A bit of self adhesive lining to go, and all will be dandy. Check it out below (don’t yawn… this was exciting stuff!) Mind you, stuck in the corner of a Womo canopy for a couple of hours spraying expanding polyurethane foam would make *anyone* happy! Fume city.
All’s well all right.
Time on the road: 2 hours 15 minutes
Distance covered: 146km
Tags: postcard: France, postcard: Germany, postcard: Rhein Road Trip, price, transport
rayres
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