By train to Germany Part III

Day 12 Ulm to Sigmaringen

Awake just before our 7 am alarm. Glad to be away from the soft bed and black cupboards. J decides we don’t have time for our six minute transfer between Neu Ulm and Ulm so we walk to Ulm for the 8.17 train which gets us to Sigmaringen at 9.30 following the Danube past a quarry and a number of installations of the concrete factory style.

Hotel am Prinzengarten is physically attached to the Sigmaringen station – not to be confused with the Sigmaringendorf station five kilometres away. Although it is only 9.30, we are made very welcome with complementary coffee while our Alb Cards are made out. These are complementary to us as hotel guests and will give us free entry to the Castle and free rail travel to Tubingen tomorrow.

The day is cold but dry and rather overcast. We make our way to the huge castle that dominates the town and, in the dull conditions rather reminds of Colditz. Inside we are entirely alone and again struck by what a difference this makes to the experience.

The Vichy government of France spent its last months in Sigmaringen between September 1944 and April 1945.

Lunch in serving traditional local food – a huge bowl of potato soup with sausage cut through it in my case and Schwäbische Maultaschen – stuffed dumplings with potato salad for J.

The round tower museum is closed until the weekend but the Evangelical City Church is open and we wander round the town. Warnings of Dachlawine – roof avalanches. Back to the hotel where our room overlooks the rail station where the trains come and go quietly.

Out after five for some photos of the castle in the sunshine which is now with us. Dinner at Zoller Hof: cevapcici and ajvar (Balkan sausage and pepper sauce) for me and schnitzel coated in egg – seems to be a Czech delicacy – for J, all very tasty.

More than an hour watching the BBC waiting for the outcome of the first day of the Papal Conclave in Rome. Black smoke at 9 pm.

Day 13 Tübingen

Good breakfast in the Hotel am Prinzengarten which is a little gem; we are looking on to platform 1 from which our train to Tübingen leaves. Enjoyable journey through richly-wooded terrain; a couple in traditional lederhosen and Bavarian costume. Great view of Hohenzollern Castle we visited last year.

Walk to hotel on arrival at Tübingen takes us through a picturesque cycle/pedestrian tunnel but, although the town is pretty, it is not sunny.

After lunch, walk up to the Castle where the groundwork for discovering DNA was laid in the former kitchen.

Concert at the University in the 21st International Piano Festival, two different performers either side of the interval. We think the acoustics of the Festsaal Neue Aula are rather problematic.

Day 14

Reutlingen and Lichtenstein Castle

Breakfast of pumpernikel and GF cereal we brought with us. Train to Reutlingen ten minutes away. Bus 7606 to Honau at the foot of the mountain on which the Lichtenstein Castle is dramatically on top. There’s the Trout (Forelle) cafe opposite and we let a group of young people set off ahead of us while we stoke up with coffee and cheesecake. However, we pass them before the path becomes steep and never see them again. It’s a rather lovely but scary path to the castle, lovely because of the woodland terrain and scary because of the drop immediately to the right. However we make it to the castle in good time and are signed up for a guided tour in a few minutes. The tours are compulsory and only in German with a leaflet in English covering much of the same territory. Photography is forbidden. So it’s not a great event but the castle is rather charming in a hunting-lodge style and our group doesn’t crowd the place. The climb to the castle and the views of it from outside are the highlight.

The descent is, if anything, lovelier and more scary than the climb but a good deal quicker and we are at the Forelle Inn for lunch by 11.50. In contrast to the Spanish and Italian ways, we are not the first diners. Very nice trout dish of the day.

There are three buses listed at the stop, all to Reutlingen and one on to Tubingen which we decide to take if it comes. However, the first along is the 400 to Reutlingen so we find ourselves there – and very charmed by its old town centre and the Mariankirche. It doesn’t seem to have the same grafitti problem that afflicts Tuebingen so badly.

Back to the same restaurant as yesterday, this time for tripe which is tasty enough.

Day 15 Tübingen to Paris

Shaken awake by the 6.15 alarm, leaving before breakfast for our 7.33 train to Stuttgart. We arrive at the HBF in time for the 7 am train which has been cancelled. However, the 6.33 is running late and we assemble with a gang of malcontents only to have it finish its journey before our eyes. We are directed to the 7.11 to Herrenberg which will connect to a train that gets in five minutes before the 7.30. But on the basis of a bird in the hand, we get aboard. Herrenberg proves to be the start of the Stuttgart metro system so we arrive below the HBF. As they seem to have made no further progress on the new station (“Stuttgart 21”) its a surprisingly long walk to the actual station. However, we get coffee and join the train in good time. Breakfast of the yogurt we bought yesterday with the assistance of coffee stirrers on the 8.55 TGV to Paris Est.

Both well pleased with our trip to Germany and planning a similar one across to Vienna next year.

Hotel Little Regina is just by the Gare de l’Est and looks promising though the room is not yet ready. We leave our luggage and head for a Turkish lunch before wandering in the Marais area of galleries and little shops including Paul Smith. Paris v hot.

The visit to the Biblioteque Sante Genevieve is a curious affair. Security at the door announces “No Visits” but we wave our email confirmation and persuade our way in. At 4pm five of us are gathered – three who booked months ago and a French couple who have inveigled their way in on the day. Student readers come and go though one is rejected as not looking like his pass. The hallway is reminiscent of an 18th century conservatory and this is continued in the main library.

Walk back to the hotel where the room is on the sixth floor – up an astonishingly intimate lift and down a rather vertiginous stair way that curves round it. The room is a good size, not generally a feature in Parisian hotels.

Out to the Faubourg St Denis for dates and macarons and a return to La Quincaillerie for another nice meal though a steak knife would have helped the pork.

Day 16 Paris to Edinburgh

No GF at breakfast but available from 6.30 which confirms the status of the hotel as suitable for these trips – a short walk to Gare de Nord. Security staff quite shouty at eurostar which doesn’t add to one’s enjoyment. Three passport checks – one for each country automated plus a manual post-Brexit exit stamp.

Not only is there a gluten free plate for me on the Eurostar but we are served ahead of the other first class passengers which causes some of them a frisson. We leave our luggage in a secure service opposite King’s Cross for a couple of hours at a cost of nearly £14. On our return, the staff have departed and we are able to help ourselves to our bags.