German food shows no signs of improving

I refuse to pay 70 euro cents (that is more than 50p at today’s excellent Currencies Direct exchange rates) to have a pee, especially when you stuck on a motorway service area, miles from any alternative ablution possibility . We were in deepest, darkest and the most backward centre of Germany, where internet roaming is about as well developed as bison roaming, but their sense of commercial exploitation is far more developed. Well, there was an alternative and it shocked a few stodgy Germans when I demonstrated exactly what that alternative involved. It is probably as well for them that I did not need a number 2. There should be, and probably is, a law against fleecing a captive audience in such a way. I was going to attempt something funny here but I realised that it could be construed as toilet humour, so way below the standard you have come to expect as the norm from a successful author such as myself.

So we left the tender embrace of Hanover and set off in the rain towards some more civilised weather in the south of France. The sat nav said it was 12 hours to drive back to Valbonne which is too much to be able to get back to the sunshine in one day, so we stopped at the charming Swiss village of Churs to stay the night having endured rain and spray for much of the journey.

Not understanding very much German, we took a lovely driving tour of the ancient cobbled streets in the old town and were surprised by the lack of cars. It was only after we had parked outside a hotel and booked in that we saw the pedestrian precinct signs.

We managed to avoid German food once again for the final night, after having fortuitously coming across a Thai restaurant just when the chips (read schnitzel or bratwurst) were down, and it looked as if there was no alternative. Once we had freshened up, we decided to explore the town, this time on foot, and had popped into a bar called Cheers (!) for a beer to steel ourselves for what we were about to receive. It was as we left that the Thai discovery was made and German sausage avoided.

Is this baiting the Germans just a little too much?

Over an excellent Thai dinner we reminisced about our time in Germany in the past few days and German food in particular, which we have been able to avoid throughout by the judicious use if culinary expertise from all over the world. Neither of us believe that the local fayre is at all appetising and I think today’s picture says it all. Maybe we found the wholesaler for most of the local produce.

By late afternoon we hope and expect to be sat in the web, our outside bar, in shorts and with a glass in our hands. Peachy Butterfield has already found a flimsy excuse to join us at 5.30pm, and he won’t be expecting a cup of tea, so lets hope there is some suitably crisp and cold card Bordeaux lurking in the fridge, unless Sprog 1 has found and despatched it already.

And then, just a luncheon appointment on Wednesday and then a gloriously empty diary until the weekend. Having turned white over the past week of inclement weather in the north of Europe, I think the time has come for some serious sunbathing ahead of the prospect of wintering in England, but that is weeks away yet and we have a trip to the Amalfi coast in prospect before that depressing departure to winter pasture. On the otter hand, a pint of London Pride would not have gone amiss in the last week…

Chris France
@Valbonne_News