Some assembly required, batteries not included…
Jet lag+delayed coffee has left my brain feeling like an unassembled IKEA bookshelf that’s missing the correct allen wrench to put it all together. The rest stops on the autobahn are pretty nice, especially compared to rest stops back home - there’s decent enough coffee (yay!), and free Wi-fi. Spent a few extra minutes catching up on emails, and trying to work on my tour journal. Only two days in and I’m already falling behind. One thing that’s refreshingly nice is the condition of the roads. There might be a couple patches or seams here or there from repairs, but by and large, the condition of the autobahn is damn near perfect. NO. POTHOLES. (How can they manage to do this here, while back home we somehow end up with moon craters you could literally lose a car in?) Also, people are generally very good drivers - and they obey the rules of the road. The penalties are very high if you don’t. This takes on new importance when the speed limit is around 80-85 mph in most sections, while some sections of road still have no posted speed limits at all, meaning cars in the passing lane routinely go over 100 mph. Another fine point: the passing lane is for passing only. As soon as you are done passing, you move over to the right again. (And you do it quickly, lest a BMW or Audi come up on your rear out of nowhere at 100+ mph.) If someone flashes their headlights at you, it means move over - but this is rare, since most people move over quickly anyway. This is something we have apparently forgotten how to do at home. There is no weaving in and out of traffic, no passing on the right, no tailgating (your license can be suspended for tailgating!) Driving habits (weaving in and out, tailgating, road rage etc) seem to have gotten far, far worse in the last few years at home compared to over here. Being on the autobahn makes me pine for my beloved VW. We have a perfectly good little Renault rental car, but I’m still missing my little Jetta - she would be such a delight on roads this good, and after 307,000 mi (that’s nearly half a million kilometers!) she deserves some nice driving conditions too. Sadly, I can’t bring her over.
The First Gig: Illertal Cowboys - a bluegrass club in Vöhringen, D. This place reminds me of so many places back home that hosted the bluegrass jams and concerts I grew up going to. It could have been an Elks Lodge somewhere in the Adirondacks, albeit one with better beer. Illertal Cowboys president Herbert Schildhammer is a large man who likes to tell large tales. How large? If casting for Harry Potter had come to Bavaria, he would have been a shoo-in for Hagrid. He makes sure that it’s a real listening audience (he has thrown people out for talking during shows!) and the people that came were so appreciative and lovely. I wish we could take Herbert on the road with us - we’d never have to worry about rude audience members ever again. This show took a good bit of warming up, and almost the entire first set for the stiffness to finally start to wear off and the music to feel comfortable to play, but we enjoyed playing for such wonderful folks. Touring, especially this kind of travel, makes your body tired in ways you don’t even think would happen (WHY are my FEET tired when I’ve been sitting so long?!?) It was a good way to kick things off though, and we definitely enjoyed ourselves, as well as our first Bavarian beers. More tour, more beers, more thoughts to come…
