Plucky Survivors See Europe Day 36: London to Volklingen

As of today, I am officially halfway through the trip – day 36 of 72, five weeks in and five weeks to go.

It’s been both incredible and exhausting; I’m eager to keep going and also looking forward to it being done. 

The good things?  The places and the sights and the food – well, most of all those things.  I’m visiting spots on the globe I’ve always wanted to see and to say this is the trip of a lifetime feels inadequate.  It’s a journey that is both a tonic and a stimulant; nights like tonight where I can sit on a terrace overlooking the German countryside and days like the one I had in London seeing offbeat museums and stumbling upon a street festival with truly incredible food.

I’m happy I did it, but I’m not going to lie: this old body is not used to this level of activity.  It is complaining loudly, like a noisy crow perched on a branch cawing and giving you impudent glares.

Living out of and hauling around very heavy suitcases may be fine for a week, but after five of them I really just want to be able to put my stuff away and have it handy when I need it.  Everything takes longer.  If pressed, I can be up, showered, shaved, dressed, and out the door in thirty minutes.  On this trip I need at least an hour because nothing is easily grabbable, not even the toiletries in my kit. 

And while I do love traveling by myself and truly believe it is the best way to go – you can make your own schedule and don’t owe anyone anything – I will admit that there are times when I wish I was sharing this with someone.  I wouldn’t go so far as to say I’m lonely, but real human contact in places where you don’t speak the language is not easy to come by.

I’m looking forward to seeing what the second half of the trip brings as I wander back through Germany, Austria, Germany again, and a sliver of Italy.  Then it’s on to new countries with Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and The Netherlands.

Crap, I have to learn how to say, “I’m sorry, I don’t speak <insert language here>” in Spanish, Portuguese, and Dutch.  I’m having a hard time keeping German, Czech, Italian, and French straight. 

Oh, I did some stuff today but it was all boring and not worth a long discourse, so some random observations:

Heathrow Airport is one of the circles of hell, I’m just not sure which one.

The British Airways lounge is suitably posh, and they had a good breakfast buffet (sausages, bacon, hash browns, scrambled eggs), but it was stupid crowded and there were no proper places to sit and eat other than a lounge chair with a side table.

PluckyMobile definitely needs a bath.

Driving winding, two-lane country roads through France and its picturesque villages is a lot of fun.

Driving on the four-lane highway through France is like driving through Nebraska with more hills.  So boring I started texting people saying, “Amuse me.”  Thank you to those who did.

The hotel in Volklingen, Germany is surprisingly nice.  It’s one of only about three here so my options were limited but I wish every place I’d stayed in was this nice.  As mentioned above, it has a large terrace overlooking the German countryside and it’s absolutely gorgeous out tonight so I’m enjoying that

Which reminds me, don’t ever stay at the Indigo London at Leicester Square.  The hotel is nice enough and the location is good for sightseeing but the elevators were so slow they were sucking the life out of me.  I’m pretty sure I was 25 when I got into one and pushing 60 when I got out.

But the biggest issue I had was the leak.  There was a metal grate for the air conditioning in the ceiling and at random times I hard water dripping onto metal inside that grate somewhere.  The first time it happened was in the middle of the night and I thought I had put the wrong thing on my noise app pumped through a Bluetooth speaker.  Did I choose rain?  Nope, it was the leak.

I reported it to maintenance who basically said, we don’t know what’s wrong and can’t fix it.  We think it has something to do with the air conditioning so when it happens, shut off the A/C and that should stop it.  So, when it happens at three in the morning, I need to get up and turn off the A/C and have no air in the room?  Yep.  The people at reception were not receptive to my annoyance and did nothing about it.

Anyway, so far the Leonardo Hotel in Volklingen is very nice and they have a restaurant that I chose out of convenience rather than desire.  Imagine my surprise when the pork tenderloin wrapped in bacon and served with a side of pasta and a garlic cream sauce was, frankly, delicious.  I haven’t had the best of luck with things that are supposed to be tender (it’s in the name!), but this was.  A good welcome back to Germany.

Tomorrow, I’ll explain why I’m staying in this particular small German town and then make my way to Stuttgart.  Auf wiedersehen!