23 November

When out of the night, which was fifty below...

As I posted earlier, we went to Sankt Peter, in the Black Forest of Germany, to visit my cousin Erika and her son Ralf. I discovered my German cousins 28 years ago, while I was stationed in Germany, and we have remained friends and have exchanged visits over the years. We had our eyes on the weather for this short trip, and planned accordingly.

Erika is a fabulous baker, and the picture Bill took of her Himbeertorte (raspberry cream torte) does not do it justice. Erika served this our first evening, plus another chocolate cake that she just happened to have left over from the day before. I'm smiling thinking of those goodies, which kept us satisfied until the full German breakfast the next morning. Which we needed, as we were headed to the Keidel Thermal Baths in Freiburg (https://www.keideltherme.com/the-keidel-thermal-baths/) for the day. 

Erika had mentioned that we would do that if the weather was bad, and I had packed my swimsuit to be ready for a day at the spa. Or so I thought. As we were preparing to leave for Freiburg, I noticed that I had only the top half of my bathing suit! What to do, what to do? Now, in desperation, I grabbed a pair of men's boxer shorts from Bill's abundant wardrobe, and figured no one would notice. Which turned out to be true, as I decided to just swim in my panties instead, knowing that the Germans are not overly concerned about modesty.

The spa experience was fabulous. Thermal waters throughout the complex, large swimming pools ranging from warm to hot, various stations with pulsing water. Water beating down on sore backs and shoulders. It was heavenly, and I luxuriated in the many pools while Erika enjoyed the sauna and steam bath and Bill relaxed in the hot tub and had a massage. As I was wondering from one pool to another, a friendly German man happened to notice my small tattoo of a turtle. He said something in German, and I said, in English, "it's called a turtle."

His very formal response: "I have not been to Great Britain". I said, "I'm from America." His stiff reply, "I have been to Wisconsin." Me: "I was born in Wisconsin." Him, excitedly, "Oh, do you know Major so-and-so?" 

We left the spa and returned home to meet Ralf's adopted son Mohammed, from Gambia. That young man went through horrors to emigrate to Germany, and has now been there for ten years. We really enjoyed discussions with Ralf about current events in both Germany and the U.S. Ralf is a kind-hearted soul who cannot understand the direction our country is taking--and we could not dispel his concerns. We focused our questions on whether or not I could possibly use my German ancestry to qualify for an indefinite German visa. Bill had the same thoughts about his Hungarian ancestry, but who would want to go to Hungary?

We had planned to stay the week with Erika, but a forecast of heavy snow caused us to depart on Thursday afternoon for the flight out of Basel on Friday morning. Good thing, as it started snowing heavily and we got to the hotel just before dusk. By morning, there was a FOOT of snow on the car and ground! I really did not think we would be able to drive through that. I suggested to Bill that we not turn in the hotel key until we saw whether or not we could drive the short distance (5 km) to the rental car return place.

Luckily, we both had warm coats to wear. Unfortunately, only I had gloves, so my designated job was scrapping mounds of snow off our car. Bill's job was to program the GPS and warm up the interior. It was a struggle, but we finally got most of the snow off the windows, so the wipers would work, and we slowly exited the hotel parking lot. The bad news was, the return place for the rental was now shown as being 10 km away, a mere 15 minutes. In good weather, that is. Not so when it is barely dawn and there is sludge all over and cars getting stuck and inpatient drivers trying to force their way around those stuck vehicles. 

It was horrendous, and the trip that was supposed to go for a few minutes turned into an hour of driving, including a side trip to downtown Basel (population 574,000!), with crazy Europeans riding bicycles, skateboards, and walking along the slippery streets. The GPS could not seem to locate our return address, and kept telling us to make a U-turn as we were driving through a long tunnel. We were getting a bit...testy?...and I even heard one "friggin'" from Bill and it is possible I might have used the "F" word a time or two (or more). Finally, we had had enough. Bill pulled into a gas station to try and call the rental place, while I went inside and found a young man putting out pastries. I showed him our return directions and he asked "rental car?" and "Swiss side?"

He had me follow him outside, and in his and my best German, I gathered we were to go "geradeaus" for a while, then "links" (or was it "rechts"?), then "geradeaus" then the first exit at the roundabout. Maybe that's what he said. Before I forgot, I hurried back to the car. I couldn't really speak, I just told Bill the direction to start driving, hoping the GPS would kick in. Unfortunately, it was so cold the car wouldn't start! Good grief! WTF? And the GPS was no longer working! 

Ultimately, after some minutes, we got back on the road. By then I had forgotten most of what I thought I knew, but...I saw a sign for "rental returns" and we headed for that! We had to follow the plow to use the walkway to the inside, and when the sweet gal asked us if everything went well, we both exploded "NO!" and Bill said a couple of more things, and she immediately directed us to go upstairs to our flight. Which we managed to make with no further problems, other than waiting for take-off while the preceding plane, which had hit the birds (?) was being moved out of the way. I wouldn't say it was a rough flight, but when we landed, the passengers applauded. 

We got back to Porto and 60+ degree weather and finally relaxed, and I asked Bill how he would describe his vacation to Germany, and he said "Holy Crap!" So, I bought us gelatos to help with getting over the fun of it all, and also to fight our withdrawal from Erika's desserts. 

Lory's loquaciousness and Bill's blasphemy