The Hotel That Was Not There.

Several things put us off or schedule yesterday afternoon. We had hoped to make the drive from Charles de Gaulle to Freiburg im Breisgau in about 4 hours arriving no later than 5. BUT, but, but … we had to learn how to use the GPS ( a total mystery ) …. How to start our keyless entry rental car (unexpected total mystery) … AND we had to leave the A4 in Rheims to do a drive by of the cathedral (which was unexpectedly HUGE) und so weiter, und so weiter, und so weiter. So that when we arrived in Freiburg, it was pitch dark and raining steadily. BUT we had our trusty GPS and once we entered the address “8 Rathausgasse” we landed in our location in the pedestrian zone of the Altstadt. But WHERE was the hotel? Not there.

I had only slept two hours on the flight over and by the time we arrived in front of the hotel that was not there, I had been up for 34 hours straight. Many thanks to the German woman who looked at our paper work and informed us that in fact we were at the right address, but in the wrong town. We had a hotel in the town of Staufen im Breisgau NOT Freiburg im Breisgau. I was only getting the loose gist of this conversation between her and Hunter most of which was being communicated to me by the deep disappointment on Hunter’s face. He knew he had a sleepless time bomb on his hands. I could not wait for his translation. In desperation I heard myself say to the woman, “wieviel kilometer, bitte?”

So back into the dark and stormy night we went, and a half hour later landed in the charming village of Staufen im Breisgau. We found our way into the hotel restaurant hungry and exhausted at 10 pm and found the crowd was just warming up to the evening. I lifted a dry Reisling to Hunter’s local draft Furstenberg and we settled in to a delicious meal . After dinner, as the clock approached midnight we wandered out into the square to sounds of a private party singing “Wundabar” through the open window of the restaurant. Alles gemutlich !!