Herding cats across Deutschland

Thursday, December 28

Today is our travel day.  We are scheduled to drive nearly as far as the length of the German east-to-west distance.  Not counting pit stops and missed turns, the door to door distance from our Bödldorf Airbnb to our next house in Kröv is 581 kilometers (361 miles).  That's roughly the same distance as from Kurt & Jennie's house in Spokane Valley, WA to our house in Tigard, OR.

Because of the distance, unfamiliar territory and desire to get there early enough to see the area in daylight and make our necessary food purchases before stores close.  We set 8 am as our target departure time.  As morning arrives we awaken to something we hadn't seen to this point of our travels:  snow.  About two inches of really wet snow blanketed the farm.  I checked the road conditions and saw that no issues were reported anywhere in Bavaria, but the reports were limited to the major highways. And while most of today's journey would be on Autobahns, we were WAY out in the country and had about 20km to drive before we hit a highway. How challenging were the conditions going to be on the narrow country lanes getting us to Landshut where we get on the freeway?

In answer to my question, a county snowplow drove through the farm (which is bisected by the road).  So unlike a city like Portland which would be paralyzed by this much snow, life goes on as normal in Bödldorf.

We miss our departure time, but pull out just shy of 9 am.  Not bad considering getting 13 people and their baggage loaded, scraping snow, packing all the remaining food after breakfast and saying good bye to our hosts and their menagerie. 

Adding more AdBlue

As we start off, I notice that an alert on my dashboard that I thought I had taken care of has not gone away.  When my replacement van was delivered on Christmas eve, a notice appeared on the dash that more AdBlue (a diesel emissions additive) was needed in 350 km.  Our trip to Salzburg and dropped the remaining distance to add to 40km.  The prior day, when we had exchanged Kurt's station wagon for a van, we had stopped and picked up a jug which had been added the day before. I assumed that the system would identify that we had added the liquid and would automatically reset the notice.  Instead, as we drove to Landshut, the alert gave us updates every 10km that we were nearing the point of no return.  Terry looked up what would happen if we reached zero remaining and learned that for VW's, once the system reached zero, the car would continue to run until turned off, but would then not start again.  This was a problem.

Prior to pulling onto the Autobahn, we called the other car (which we had lost sight of) and explained our issue.  We pulled into a shell station and I purchased another, larger jug of AdBlue.  The info Terry read suggested that the system would reset automatically, but not if only small amounts were added.  I poured in nearly another 10 liters--which filled the reservoir and the alert turned off.

Now  we needed to find Kurt's van, which had taken a different turn than us and was nowhere in sight.  A phone call determined we should meet at a location we could both find that there would only be one of:  Burger King.  A couple minutes later both vans are reunited.  People decide a restroom break and a snack would make sense  before getting on the highway.  We have a small line standing at the front door waiting for the 10 am opening in two minutes.

Finally, at 10:15 we hit the road for good. And then the snow starts.  For about the next 300 km, we drove through flurries, but the highways were plowed and treated with road salt.  With the exception of one stretch, where the inside third lane (the fast lane) had some slush on the outer edge, the roads were not an issue.  We passed two bad accidents heading the other way where traffic was stopped for miles, but our way was smooth sailing.

We stopped in Karlsruhe for a late lunch, but our first two options were closed.  As we were walking back to the vans, we spotted a Döner Kabab shop.  According to Donovan and Jess, these are German's favorite fast foods and nearly on every corner.  The typical Döner shop is owned by a family--Turkish or Kurdish--and have a variety of meat and vegan-based sandwiches, salads and pizzas.  The shop we entered had a huge chunk of meat on a roasting spit and each dish was using shavings from the meat for the various dishes prepared.  It was REALLY good.  On the way out, I was talking to one of the regulars who was getting his meal at the counter, and he said the meat at this one was goat.  "Good goat" he said.  "Some places not so good, but good goat here."

We arrived at our new place on the Mosel River after dark. Despite the relatively early hour, most of us hit the rack after the long day traveling.