Germany part 2

Having left Sophia, I took 3 or 4 trains to end up in the Black Forest.

On the way I stopped for a picnic lunch in a town called Villingen and had a bit of a walk around there. It was pretty. I then continued on to Sankt Georgen, where I was met by Hans Hartwig. There weren't too many people on the platform, so it was easy enough to figure out which one was him, and he immediately recognised me thanks to the resemblance on the Orr side of the family. We went to the car, which turned out to be one of these:


A two-seater electric car, with pedals too but thankfully we didn't have to use them! The whole top opens forwards. And my rucsac just about fitted into the back!

We arrived back at the farmhouse just in time for Kaffee und Kuchen, after which it was straight out to the vegetable field to do some weeding with Anke.

The next three weeks consisted of more work in the vegetable field, including it being plowed by oxen; bringing the cows up to fields in the morning and back down in the evening; helping to make cheese; selling cheese at the market (and not being able to understand people!); getting stung by nettles; getting chased by geese; looking after the children; eating lots; making hay; and other farm-ish work.

They also involved meeting lots of people. When I arrived on the farm, as well as the family (including 4 children), there was one guy there for a year, one school pupil there for 3 weeks, a woman and her daughter there to learn cheesemaking, a pair who had been building a raft to sail along the Danube, who set off a day or two after I got there, as well as a couple of others who were sometimes there and sometimes not, to make cheese or help with the market, or do finances. It took a while to figure out who everyone was, but they were all very friendly! During my stay a few others came and went, so it was very interesting to get to talk to all these people - and definitely improved my German!

The area around was beautiful, and one afternoon we went and climbed a near by tower to get a better view of the area, but even around the house and fields it was beautiful. The weather wasn't fantastic, and there were a number of thunderstorms at the start, but it did mostly stay dry.

I don't have an awful lot of photos but the black forest ones are here:
http://s303.photobucket.com/albums/nn157/clareorr/Germany%20etc%202009/Schwarzwald/
and Spiekeroog ones are here:
http://s303.photobucket.com/albums/nn157/clareorr/Germany%20etc%202009/Spiekeroog/