The Palmengarten, Frankfurt

The Palm House - contains tropical, sub-tropical and mountain zones

Em modelling her beautifully straightened hair
(well worth the €150 for a pair of hair straighteners)

Jacket €230, Shoes €80.... cheesy smile priceless!

Wiesbaden Xmas Market

Making Pancakes

Ludwigsberg

Today we're visiting the Royal Palace at Ludwigsberg


The hunting lodge - just a little place in the country!

The Palace courtyard

Stutggart

That Classic Icon of the Germany Xmas Markets

A quirky Advent Calendar

Beautifully decorated Market Stalls

Chocolate covered fruit

Nutcracker...

Dusseldorf

Oberursel

Oh Dear

I didn't have the heart to tell Em that the deer wasn't real :-)

Windmill For sale!

Would you buy a windmill from this guy?

The Hessmuseum

The Hessmuseum features old buildings from around the region of Hesse

Frankfurt

Today we're visiting Frankfurt, the Economic Capital of Europe.


Funky Buildings

Shopping Mall, slightly soiled...

Christmas Market in the old town.

One hell of a BBQ

Interesting Sights around Berlin

We found Berlin be be a grey boring city and really struggled to find anything to photograph. There were however a few interesting exceptions....

How about this for a portable BBQ - gas bottle on his back and grill in front.

You need to work for your beer on the Beer Bike, complete with driver and "barmaid"!

The used car salesman....

Berlin Icons

Communications Tower

Brandenburg Gate

Checkpoint Charlie

That'll be the American Sector them...

The line of The Wall. 

One of the few remaining sections of The Wall 

Berlin

Em gets up close to the Berlin Bear

Pergamon Museum, Berlin

Today Em visited the Pergamon Museum in Berlin 

Entrance to a Babylonian Market

Rolls-Royce

On 1st October we left Kiki in storage in Cornwall - she'll be ok as Brian & Norms (who's caravan is nearby) will keep an eye on her for us.

I then started a three month contract for Rolls-Royce in Germany. This involved taking the overnight (and notoriously unreliable) sleeper train to London each Sunday and flying to Berlin in the early hours of Monday morning. I returned, shattered, late on Thursday evening.

On 12th November Em & I took the "party car" via the Chunnel to Calais where we stayed overnight in a hotel before driving to Berlin the following day.

We're now staying in an apartment in Rangsdorf whilst I continue working for Rolls-Royce. 

Men at Work

On 1st September I flew to Australia for two weeks working for the ABC in Sydney.

Back to the UK

We stayed Friday night at Embry and on Saturday we returned to the aire at Saint Verant.We couldn't get near the aire as the entire village seemed to be having a table-top sale - in addition to the pros with their vans and covered stalls, everyone had a pile of junk outside their house. At 18.30 we managed to squeeze our way into the aire for the night.

On Sunday we drove to Calais, topped up with fuel and some booze before heading to the ferry.

Embry

We left Saint Nicholas de Bliquetuit on Wednesday morning and drove to Saint Valery Sur Somme where we stopped on an aire. In the afternoon we did a 28km cycle ride in the countryside around the Somme estuary. The following morning we got up early and did another cycle ride along the coast before driving to an aire at Le Croty where we stayed the night.

After a late start, this morning we drove to Embry.


The fabulous aire at Emby - a tiny town with nothing there but the aire was by far the best we've ever seen. It has nice level parking spaces separated by planters and a clean toilet/shower block. There are even picnic tables and BBQ's each of which have a little pile of sticks to burn!

Saint Nicholas de Bliquetuit

This morning we drove to an aire at Saint Nicholas de Bliquetuit which is on the bank of the river Seine.

A lovely view across the river Seine from Kiki. Unfortunately there's absolutely nothing on our side of the river apart from the aire and a couple of picnic tables. This afternoon we walked 5km along the river this and this evening we walked 2km the other way.

Honfleur

This morning we drove to Honfleur but decided not to stay in the aire as it was expensive, instead we drove 5 mins down the road to a free aire at La Riviere Saint Sauveur. We then cycled into Honfleur.


Honfleur is the spitting image of Padstow and wouldn't look out of place in Cornwall.

Pretty streets with expensive (designer) shops and lots of Grockles.

I was happy boat watching...

Deauville

Today we're visiting Deauville and it's neighbour Trouville on the opposite side of the river estuary. We're parked in a wild-camping spot by the harbour in Deauville along with at least 30 other MH's some of which have been here for quite a while.

After lunch we crossed the river and walked around Trouville....

... looked at the town...

.... and then crossed back and looked around Deauville.

Evening and low tide with lots of sticky French mud!