On Day 5, Peter picked us up at the country house and we were headed to the Rhein Falls that separates Switzerland from Germany on the Northern border. On our way to the Rhein Falls, we stopped at a local farm that produces it’s own meat, milk, eggs, & vegetables! What’s even more interesting is that you walk in to their “store” that is located inside a barn on their family farm. You pick up what you need, write down what you bought on a note pad and deposit your cash into a tin can! It’s on the honor system and you can find these small farm stores all over the countryside and along several of the roads we travelled! Absolutely farm fresh food and direct from the producer themselves!
The trip to the Rhein Falls was spectacular! We were able to walk right up to the falls from the Swiss side. You could hear thundering roar in the background as we got out of the car. It became nearly deafening as we walked right up to the edge of the observation area. The spray and mist were all around as we got a first hand look at these beautiful Falls.
There is also a boat tour that will take you out to this rock in the middle of the falls! You can climb stairs to the top of the rock where you see the Swiss flag flying in this picture. In the gallery below, you can just make out the tour boat as it pulls up to the landing to offload passengers wanting to make the trek up to the top.
After the Rhein Falls, we were off to the charming town of Stein am Rhein for lunch. It was just beautiful with cobblestone streets, shops, bistro’s, & cafes’.
We had lunch at the hotel Rheinfels sitting out on the balcony overlooking the Rhein river. We were just up river from the falls and here, the river was this tranquil ribbon of water.
We were taken in by all of the church steeples we saw throughout the trip! In every town and city, you had these beautiful, spiraling steeples that stood out among the buildings and landscape. Our eyes were naturally drawn to them everywhere we went.
Thankfully, Peter was doing the driving cause the streets everywhere were so narrow! I couldn’t imagine most of the U.S. made cars fitting on the narrow, winding roads that we saw on our visit.
After lunch, we met up with Daniel back at the country house and were headed over to Friedrichshafen Germany. We took the ferry across Lake Constance to visit the Zeppelin museum and learn more about Friedrichshafen’s history.
We could have spent an entire day at the Zeppelin museum and Friederichshafen. The museum was filled with the detailed history on the beginnings & evolutions of airships in Germany. It went in to great detail on their construction and evolution over time and how they were also used as PR for the Nazi party around the World.
There was a mock up of what it would have been like to travel in an airship that included a lounge, sleeping area and bathrooms. Only the very wealthiest of individuals could have afforded to fly in one at that time. I was impressed with the layout and level of detail inside the museum. It was also interesting to see how they handled Germany’s involvement in WW II. I would say that they were factual and didn’t shy away from the negative side of it’s history.
On approach to Friedrichshafen, we saw the ZF transmission plant which is where the transmissions were made for Steppin’ Out! It was a great surprise to see the plant and had we known ahead of time, perhaps we could have gotten a tour. Next trip perhaps! Well, inside the museum, we learned that ZF provided transmissions for the airships. At the end of WW II, management of ZF feared that the allies would dismantle the company so they donated the assets of the company to the town of Friedrichshafen hoping to keep the company alive. Today, ZF is a global business with over 72,00 employee’s with 122 production facilities in 26 countries!
That’s it for Day 5! Our next installment includes trains, mountains, glaciers and more mountains!!
2 comments
Cool. Itta and I were in Italy, Georgia and Germany about the same time. Life is good.
What a small world! I’m sure our paths will cross soon and yes, life if awesome! Thanks for following along Steve!