Germany 7: An easy day on the way to Sigmaringen

While driving around yesterday, I was amazed at just how picture perfect all of the Black Forest towns are.  I went out at night to take some photos, and again this morning to get a look around.

This was the view from the window of our guesthouse.

There were tons of swallows dipping in and out of the air, so I made attempts to photograph them without much success.



As we walked up to the top of town, this flower caught my eye.



Not two minutes into our journey to the next town did the gps lead us astray.  Paritcularly, to a road that did not allow cars.  I decided that from then on, I would only take roads that looked like major roads.  I set course just a bit south of the recommended route, that had us driving through the road that was blocked when we went to Hohenzollern Castle.

A small castle ruins named Burg Honberg was directly in our path, so we stopped there.  The castle ended up being closed off, with massive tents set up inside and advertisements of a radio station plastered everywhere.  We jumped back in the car and left for Sigmaringen, where we would next be stationed.  We encountered just one more road that was shut down.  It seems like every third road is shut down here.

We checked in early, rested a little, and gawked at the view from our room.



Then, we left for a local park, that had a bridge of interest.  On the nine minute trip, we went straight into another road that was under construction, and took a short detour.  The constant road construction has really been getting to me.

We parked at an old monastery that has been repurposed into an adult education center, named Volkshochschule Inzigkofen.  We walked for a few minutes through a row of old trees and then down some wooden steps onto a trail on the side of a cliff.  We had arrived at the bridge, called Teufelsbrucke, with double dots over the u.  It is roughly translated as "Devil's Bridge," however other bridges in Germany are named similarly.



We walked across.  Well, Stephanie walked, and I walked with a spring to my step, as to get over as quickly as I could without having the bridge collapse beneath me.  We followed a few of the trails, and ended up at the bottom, where we found a huge rock with a group of psychotic people sitting at the top, near the edge.



We have seen an extraordinary amount of benches in Germany.  They are absolutely everywhere.  Here is one of the most interesting variants:



Back at town, we had to wait until 5:00 in order for restaurants to open for dinner.  I picked out a Chinese restaurant.  We arrived to find a note that indicated that they were closed for a two week period, and that included today.  We were hungry, so we decided to eat at one of the many pizza and kebab places around town.  We both had falafel and salad.

From there, we walked along the city streets, many of which were without cars, heading towards the castle, to walk around and see it from all sides.  Just before we arrived at the spots that had the best views, we had to cross a platform attached to train tracks.  Looking over, I said, "These tracks do not look sturdy enough to hold a train.  I looked up, and had time to utter, "Oh shit," right as a train was upon us.  I had to suffer through the vibrations of the train on the already unsteady ground.  Stephanie wasn't sure if I had see the train approaching.  I had not.



Here are some pictures of the castle and then one near sunset.  The sunset didn't really work out because clouds came out strong and blocked the sun.



We took pictures, stopped at an Aldi's for supplies, and went back to our room until sunset.  The Aldi's had a strange "Milch Mause" candy bag, which translates to "milk mouse."  I had to buy it.  It was chocolate covering milk and cornflakes.  I was unable to see the cornflakes in the actual bars, unlike what the package would have me believe.  It tasted like a Nestle's crunch bar.