Moving on from Donauworth we had planned to stop at Lauingen which looked like a pretty little town, however on arrival we found that the Stellplatz was closed as they were holding a steam tractor event. Although it looked interesting with nowhere to stay, we moved on and after a quick pit stop at the ‘tractor’ fuel station next door for our first sucessful attempt to fill up AdBlue – why, oh why do they put the fuel tank fillers in such weird places on a Phoenix? – we moved to the next town that we had marked as a ‘possible’…. Gunzburg.

Although we will never know what Lauingen was like, the lack of Stellplatz turned out to be fate as the Stellplatz (14 euros / 24 hours) in Gunzburg was fantastic. It was a secure gated enclosure with large pitches which despite being full and situated alongside an outdoor swimming pool complex was incredible peaceful.

Gunzburg itself is a pretty little town and the Stellplatz was situated on the edge of the Danube and forest which provided lots of walking trails – perfect for a few days relaxation and catching up on the washing. The sun had also come out and not wishing to blind anyone, we even risked exposure of the legs – the shorts have now broken free from the wardrobe and apparently have no plan of going back into it….. This is course without mentioning the most important aspect of warm weather…. outdoor eating and BBQs!

We even embraced the european ‘style’ breakfast by baking some fresh Chocolate, Orange and Walnut brioche for breakfast on the Saturday…. anyone would have thought we were on holiday eating them outside in the sunshine!

After three tranquil nights, we packed up and moved on to Ulm – a little further South West on the Romantic Road to another fanastic Stellplatz (12euro / 24 hrs) located next to the Thermal Spa, just 2km walk/cycle along the Danube to the town center.

The Stellplatz was pretty much full when we arrived late morning, and during the course of the evening it could have filled again three times over with the quantity of motorhomes that arrived. Quite impressive considering there must have been 70+ pitches split between two areas but it is a beautiful city with lots to see.

Although the skies were pretty grey when we arrived and there was a short downpour timed perfectly for when we were coming back from doing our shopping, it soon brightened up providing blue skies and warming things up again.

There are several Forts located in various positions around the city, originally joined by a wall but most of that has long disappeared. We walked up to Wilhelmsburg – which is a fortress built in 1840, later becoming a WWII refugee camp – to get incredible views over the city, then down into the center of Ulm to admire the ‘tallest’ steeple in the world which sits upon Ulm Minster and rises to just under 530ft.

Ulm had a lovely feel to it – not only did it have lots of bakeries, cafes, bars, water and green spaces, it also had lovely architecture. The Town Hall was probably one of the most impressive buildings that we have seen with the detail of the paintwork to the exterior, the fishermans quarter had lots of beautiful ‘higgledy-piggledy’ buildings interspersed by canals – including the ‘Metzgerturm’ which is known as the ‘leaning tower’, part of the original wall built in 1349.

A vibrant city and worth visiting if you aren’t too far away.

After a couple of nights in Ulm we moved on once again, heading slightly further South to Memmingham – a small walled town with a Stellplatz (7 euro / 24hrs) 1km outside the walls and on the edge of nature. The town was deceptive as it just kept giving, the further you explored. The local council have obviously spent alot of money on preserving the central area and making it ‘pretty’ to attract tourism, but also providing shops and museums for people to visit. We spent an afternoon exploring the town and then the following day headed into the forest to do a lovely long walk – a nice balanced stop off.

Wanting to try out some more local food and nothing was coming up on our searches, we took a punt and opted to try a restaurant called ‘Weber am Bach’ which looked traditional although it was located fairly close to the center of town which worried me that it may just be a little touristy. Despite my main course not coming quite up to the same standards as the last couple of places we have been to in Germany – probably my fault for not eating meat – Keith chose a local speciality called the ‘Swabian Triology’ which was effectively a really good macaroni cheese accompanied by two different types of dumplings (filled pasta) for his main course – which was delicious. The Asparagus soup and Salmon Pate and potato pancake appetisers were both also deliciously fresh and tasty, and you couldn’t really knock the apple dougnuts either!

The following morning we packed up again and headed to Fussen, the Southern most point on the ‘official’ Romantic Road map.

Concerned about it being bank holiday weekend Keith called ahead and could actually book the Stellplatz…. a bonus as I am not sure we would have found somewhere to stay otherwise judging on the quantity of motorhomes that were parked up in the carparks around us each night.

There were three Stellplatz within 500m of each other and Keith had chosen the middle one (Wohnmobilpark Füssen – 22 euros a night) which was immaculate and booked us in for 3 nights to get us through to WhitMonday.

There is no doubt about it – the whole area around Fussen is absolutely stunning, you can’t get away from a mountaineous backdrop taking your breath away. Fussen itself is a pretty town but it is over-run by souvenir shops and tourists as it is a natural overnight stay for most if they are doing a tour.

My morning runs alongside the lake were tranquil though and despite hard work at the altitude, truly invigorating looking up at the snow topped mountains and out over the lakes….. that is except the first day when some wild boar ran out of the forest which scared the hell out of me. Needless to say I went the other direction the following two mornings!

On Saturday, avoiding Fussen we walked over to Hopfen am See. Completely mesmorised by the views, we ending up walking all the way round Lake Hopfensee which wiggled in and out of the forest and then back onto the lake. Although the town was small and also busy, you could see that it was a lovely tranquil place to stay whether in the summer for walking, or winter for ski-ing… with views like that you would never tire of them.

Trading in the tranquility for a bit of culture, yesterday we decided to get our ‘Castle’ fix in and walked over and up to Neuschwanstein Castle…. proper fairy tale!

Being a long weekend, the sun was shining and the beauty of our surroundings attracting a large number of people, we weren’t really surprised by the fact that it was busy. We were however impressed by the quantity of people who did actually walk all the way up rather than take the cable car, bus or horse drawn cart… hats off to them as it was pretty warm too.

We had opted to walk up the ‘trail’ through the woods which was far quieter – probably due to the steep incline and slightly slippery rock/mud combination – but once we had admired the views from the top, headed back down the main route with the majority as it provided a quicker route to ”Gelato’ success.

With Fussen being our ‘Southern’ most point of the trip, we hit the road again this morning and have started the rough route home….well we still have 16 days!

We have stopped at a Stellplatz (13 euro / 24hrs backing onto a stream, just outside the walls of Isny im Allgau – the home to the Dethleffs motorhome factory – Irrelevant to most but some may find it useful, so far not a single Dethleff in the Stellplatz though despite being pretty full again!

The town is pretty, although quite small so after a little wander round both inside and outside the walls we headed into the countryside on one of the proposed walking routes which provided us with a spectacular performance of gliders being catapulted into the blue skies and slowly working their way back to ground…..

I am sure that it will be another very tranquil night.

And finally the map… we were just 1km away from the border with Austria in Fussen and are now that bit closer to the Liechtenstein border, although don’t currently plan to cross it – lets see what tomorrow brings!

Waking on the Monday morning planning to stay another day at the Vineyard just outside Iphofen to buy some more wine and explore the area a bit more, we recieved an email from the service center at Phoenix asking us to go back so that they could have a look at the 360 Camera. Not wishing to miss the opportunity whilst we were so close, we made our sandwiches, packed up Fawks and set off ready for another day at the workshop.

With German efficiency and Phoenix service, the camera was replaced within a couple of hours and we were on our way again by mid afternoon. Rather than going too far and battling with the traffic we decided to pop back to Concorde for the night… an easy solution and less than 5km away.

The next morning, putting both Concorde and Phoenix behind us we moved on, wiggling our way further south to find the Phoenix sponsored Stellplatz which is in Bad Windsheim, a Spa town. The Stellplatz was huge with over 100 pitches, all well spaced out and arranged around lakes and streams costing about 17 euro a night.

Although the town itself isn’t as pretty as some of the other Bavarian towns – and the weather was a little ‘temperamental’ – the rolling hills around it provided for lots of lovely walking and three nights enabled us to catch up with some washing, shopping and tranquility…. well mostly as the Frogs were in their element!

Trying to choose our route around our stomachs, we had found a Michelin Bib Gourmand Guesthouse and Restaurant 12km North of Rothenburg ob der Tauber in a little village called Tauberzell and conveniently it had a Stellplatz 5-10 minutes walk away. Laundhaus Zum Falken has it’s own Vineyard, Hives for Bees and Kitchen garden amongst also being a specialist in Sausages. We booked for the Friday night as it was the only time we could get a table and when we arrived we were surprised by how quiet it was as we thought the Germans ate early, however it didn’t take long for a steady stream of people to come in and it was soon full. The food was excellent and we even managed to get some more local asparagus which is still in season. Keith opted for the sausages which came with Saurkraut and beautifully roasted potatoes with bacon, I had trout fillets with Rosemary Potatoes and Salad – both were exceptional. Dessert was a honey creme brulee made from their own honey along with a local farmhouse ice cream and I tried their digestif which was apparently made out of ‘all things good for you’ – which meant it didn’t taste quite as good as a Kirsch… but it wasn’t too bad albeit a little cloudy!!

The walking and cycling from Tauberzell was fantastic – we walked up to the top of the Vineyards along the panoramic walk, where you could see down into the valley where the village sits, and also along the valley base in both directions to the next villages. Incredibly tranquil, despite the Porsche rally passing by on Saturday morning and then about 10 Arctic Trucks honking their horns en route to a wedding in the next village a couple of hours later…. we will be back!

Moving slightly further down the road all of 12km we arrived at Rothenburg ob der Tauber which has to be one of the most impressive towns on the Romantic Road… enabling us to see true Bavarian architecture in its full – although this obviously has its downsides too as it means that it is far busier.

We stopped at the largest of the three Stellplatz that the town has and it was 12 euro for 24 hours, arriving just before lunch and it was already pretty full, filling up completely by early afternoon and although the turnover was pretty high, it was still full both nights we were there.

Rothenburg ob der Tauber is one of only very few cities in Germany that have a remaining wall that is complete, unfortunately, although very impressive, only part of the walkway around the top of the wall is remaining, however as the wall is that little bit higher than some of the others, it is well worth popping up onto it for the views out over the roof tops – especially when the sun puts in an appearance!

Every road led to cobbled streets with beautiful coloured houses, mostly pretty well kept. We did a complete tour of the outside of the wall before coming back in to try out the local delicacy known as a ‘Schneeball’…. or in English ‘a snowball’. Basically short crust pastry rolled out flat and cut into strips of about 1cm width almost to the edge of the pastry. Using a wooden spoon, they then thread one strip over the spoon, one under until all the strips are incorporated onto the spoon. Now, this is the strange bit…. they then take them off the spoon and gently scrunch the pastry into a ball putting it into a metal case at the end of a long stick – which incidently looks a little like a torture tool – and plunge the pastry into hot oil to fry. Once crisp, the pastry is removed from the metal casing (and oil) and left to drain, Then coated in chocolate, icing sugar or a multitude of other things. The one Keith had was Amaretto, Marzipan and Chocolate – an interesting concept and lighter than you expect, although not necessarily something we would run back to try again!

However if you had to choose between the Schneeball and the hanging cage – I think the Amaretto and Marzipan mix would sway the decision!

It is fair to say that Rothenburg is beautiful but Keith and I can only take so much of ‘busy’ places and therefore despite lots of lovely walking and architecture, it was soon time to move on to smaller, quieter places for us… although that said, the next place we decided on was Nordlingen, which although far more ‘normal’ – as in a lived in town- it also has a very impressive ‘complete’ wall, and this one you can walk all the round on top.

The Stellplatz (7.50 euro per 24 hours) in Nordlingen was just five minutes walk outside the town walls and once again, was full by lunchtime. The town was really quiet though, enabling us to enjoy the walk all the round the exterior of the wall as well as through the town center without the hustle and bustle.

The wall contains a number of Alms Houses which appear to be tiny dwellings built into the interior of the wall, however it is only when you walk round the outside, or on top of the wall that you see that some of the houses actually penetrate the wall and have extensions going out to the exterior as well – it’d be lovely to see inside some of them as despite appearing tiny from one side I think they are actually deceptive in their size and form.

The main town square houses an impressive town hall and church alongside the obligatory May Pole and Storks nests that appear to be everywhere at the moment – a unique sight and noise when the storks ‘bark’.

The Maypole history and tradition in Bavaria is quite unique so if you fancy a bit of a smile have a look at this link which provides more details as I found it quite interesting… unfortunately we haven’t found any maypole festivities yet but they may be on Whit Monday… just have to wait and see!

Moving on once again, we chose to come to Donauworth which is where the Wormitz and Danube rivers meet as we fancied a bit of countryside walking for a couple of days and figured that the rivers would be a good location to get the most out of the Bavarian countryside.

We stopped at the Stellplatz (7.50 euro midnight to midnight) which is on the island between the Danube and Wormitz – once again, full by lunchtime. Donauworth isn’t a particularly noteworthy place for the architecture but it was founded by two fisherman and is oddly the beginning of several long walking/cycling routes that go down into Italy, Austria and Spain – Perfect for us to get some lovely walking in both along an old railway track and the Danube… and we even heard a steam train – despite not actually seeing it!

I know it is difficult to believe but we have also started to try and learn German. Slowly but surely we are both falling in love with Germany as it has so much to offer and therefore, although we will never be able to get to the same level in German as we are in French and Spanish, we would like to spend more time here and be able to ‘get by’ on a day to day basis with basics…. Babbel here we come!

And finally, just so you can see where we have been over the last couple of weeks…. the map…

After just four nights at the farm we headed South and caught the Eurotunnel with Fawks to get over to France and despite torrential rain cascading off of the roof into the Passport office, they still let us leave the country and welcomed Fawks back onto the continent for the first time with us.

Heading towards Belgium to have a few pieces of work done, we stopped at our normal overnighter in Hondeschoot where we know we can do a supermarket shop to re-stock on fresh veg, fruit and dairy products as well as some of that all important French wine!

The following morning we set off again, arriving at Werchter where VEE Motorhomes is to get the works done on Fawks and also do a bit more exploring of the area – this time heading into Leuven on the bikes.

We had planned to visit Leuven the last couple of times we were in the area but for one reason or another it just didn’t happen. Leuven is a beautiful university town with lots of lovely architecture, some great grafitti and unsurprisingly, some fantastic looking eateries. As we had a come with lunch prepared this time, we settled for a Coffee and DIY Hot Chocolate – literally hot milk with a bar of chocolate in it – both served with delicious home made brownie and biscuits.

Apparently they have an excellent Christmas market which we missed the opportunity to see last year but I am sure we will get to see at some point in the future.

Despite only intending to stay in Werchter for a couple of nights, one thing led to another – as always – and we ended up staying through to Monday. This enabled us to get some nice walking in, catchup on the washing (as always) and enjoy the 70 year anniversary party for the local Heroes (Similar to Scouts) group which we were kindly invited to. It is fair to say that pretty much everything in Werchter involves music and beer!

We moved on from Werchter on Monday to take advantage of the long holiday weekend to travel past Frankfurt whilst the roads were a little quieter. So a long hop, skip and a jump – for us at least – and we got to our destination for the night in Alzenau, Germany where the Aire was 12 euros a night.

The Aire is next to a lake and bar/restaurant but both were closed when we stayed but looked like they were getting prepared for a late May opening so I am sure it would be more lively over the summer. The town has an abundance of supermarkets, appears quiet industrial, but there wasn’t much else to write home about. However, as I ventured out along the cycle path by the side of the river for my morning run I got a taster of the next town along and the countryside beyond which had more of a Bavarian feel and looked like it was worth exploring further if we are stopping on the way through again in the future.

With Fawks booked back into the Phoenix Service Centre, we stopped over for one night at the Concorde Aire in Aschbach, then at Phoenix, Schlusselfield for a night ahead of a 7am start.

Steering wheel replaced, access to the emergency release for the jacks and cutlery drawer in hand – amongst a couple of other minor bits – and we set off to Sommerach to find some more of that lovely Bavarian wine that we were introduced to last year by the region!

We spoke too early though, realising on the way to Sommerach that the steering wheel we had been given was lacking a couple of buttons – adaptive cruise control. A quick email over to the service center though and the following morning we recieved a very apologetic call at 7:15am asking if we were able to come back as they had the correct steering wheel in stock and could switch them over for us.

Needing to stretch our legs after an early start and hanging around the service center most of the day, we headed out to have a little walk and thought it would be rude not to pop into our local Vineyard Weingut Strobel’ for a quick tasting – just to refresh our memories obviously – before buying a few bottles of white wine… Schuerebe, Blanc de Noir and Silvaner Old Vine……lovely as always.

The following morning we arrived back at the Phoenix service center by 10am and were on our way back to Sommerach with a new steering wheel and a bottle of Phoenix Hazlenut Schnapps in hand by 11.30….. all good.

With the sun shining, after lunch we set off into the Vineyards for a lovely circular walk towards Nordheim am Main and Volkach. Although we did a similar route through the vineyards back in September, it was a very different this time as in September the vineyards were full of people and tractors as they were harvesting the grapes. This time however it was very peaceful, with just a few farmers out with their tractors tending to the vine. We even found a Monk Jack Deer having a little munch on the vine blossom – needless to say he bounced off quite quickly as we got close.

As we rounded the corner and headed back towards Sommerach the weather quickly changed and the dark grey clouds were looming in the distance. They didn’t ‘loom’ for long, instead they just let loose and gave us a good drenching. Thankfully we had our waterproof jackets, it was warm and we weren’t too far from the town, so after a couple of ‘Pit Stops’ en route to do some tastings and a little bit of sun – once it made a re-appearance – we were a little drier….. or perhaps just didn’t care!!

We hadn’t planned to do three more Vineyards, but stopped at Weingut Otmar Zang just to get out of the rain and their wine was actually pretty nice, so ended up tasting and buying a couple of bottles. We then moved on to Norbert Dreshers – which was a planned stop, although we thought it may be closed. They are the only BIO vineyard in Sommerach and unfortunately as much as we tried – and we did pretty much try them all – their wine just didn’t quite hit the mark. We bought a bottle to be polite but their selection just didn’t quite meet our taste as much as some of the others.

Still slightly damp and en route back to Fawks, I wanted to have a look at a curious looking place that I had noticed last time we were in Sommerach but it was closed, it was however open this time….Weinbau Jakob. We were greeted by an 8 month old enormous pyraneen mountain dog and it’s lady owner and after been welcomed into the ‘cave’, we were drowned in their over-generous samplings of wine of all varieties. A lovely little place, full of easy drinking, every day wine… we came out with a full rucksack – another to come back to in the future, although I dread to think how large that dog will be next year… it was already the size of a pony!

Saturday morning as we set off we realised that there was a problem with the Left Hand 360 Camera system – my fault for not having mentioned the dark shadow I noticed when driving on the Friday. Email sent but nothing we can do about it until after the weekend though – it’ll just depend on whether or not they have time to fit us back in before we move too far away, thankfully we aren’t going far at the moment.

We moved all of 20km down the road which took us to a Hamberger Weiner – a Vineyard located in the middle of several beautiful little walled Bavarian towns – Iphofen, Rodelsee, Mainbernheim and Kitzingen. As well as selling their wine, they also have 15 places for motorhomes up to 10m looking out onto the vines for 10euros a night…. along with an honesty wine fridge….

All of the towns in the area are linked by cycle routes, but as nothing is too far and we needed to stretch our legs after a couple of days of doing very little exercise, we headed out on a walk into Mainbernheim which was about 2km away and then decided to loop round, passing Iphofen before heading back to the Vineyard to find Fawks.

The objective had been to get back to pop into the Tasting room but alas, we arrived to find that it shut at 4pm so we had to surfice with one of the wines from Sommerach to accompany dinner!

We hadn’t planned to come to this area but were looking at places to possibly enjoy some regional culinary delights and 99er Kulinarium popped up on the Michelin Bib Gourmand… and we are so glad we took a little detour as not only was the food excellent, the area is stunningly beautiful too.

Although Mainbernheim is pretty, it is a little rustic and to be fair in a bit of a ‘renovation’ phase as there are road and building works throughout…..Iphofen is however, the refined, beautifully finished version. The town has a double wall and a moat – obviously showing wealth going back along time – and now has a lovely path and park area that you can follow all the way around it. Inside the wall is chocolate box like, with all the buildings maintained to perfection. We were incredibly lucky as everything always looks better when the sun shines.

We aren’t quite sure where the last two weeks have gone but hopefully the next five won’t go as quickly as we’ll be home before we know it. The route so far is as follows, where to next is another question…. lets see what tomorrow brings.