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The Milavsky RV Letters
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Camping Europe in an RV |
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Letter
06
Dear Everyone: The campground in Augsberg with its mostly "static" clients and the one in Berlin that was also mostly summer renters have made us think about "summer fun". These campground "statics" are comparable to summer bungalow colonies, except that there is so little land between caravans and that the units themselves are so much less convenient than a cottage. We find it rather difficult to see how sitting around all summer in a stationery caravan with limited running water, and very little room, always just a few feet on all sides from your neighbors can be seen as fun. As far as we can see, they never move. Having left Augsberg in the morning, we reached Munich after about an hour and a half. We found the campground with no trouble, got the RV situated and then walked the short distance to the bus that takes you to the metro. We got off in the center of the city, where there was a choice. Change trains or walk. We decided that walking was better because you can see the city. Off we went – and we were rewarded. The first thing we saw was an Internet Café. Naturally, we stopped. Afterwards, we continued our walk. There are two squares close together in the old city and they contain the old city hall – the Rathaus – with the famous Glockenspiel in the tower. There are also several important churches and a permanent outdoor food market. Who wants to guess where we headed first? We were sorely tempted by the foods at that market, but we were strong. We already had a full refrigerator. We did get a cup of coffee (though all the people in the picture were having a beer!). Then headed back to hear the Glockenspiel – which only "plays" at noon, at one p.m. and at five p.m. We joined literally thousands of other tourists – many of them German – who come to the square to listen to the bells and see the movement of the figures. Those squares and the pedestrian-only streets full of shops that lead to them are an integral part of the European experience. Ron says that you could describe them as if they were open-air malls – they have shops that range from big department stores and recognizable chain store shops to small boutiques. There are outside tables scattered everywhere, usually full of people drinking coffee or beer, eating a meal or having an eis (ice cream). Ron says it is very like a mall’s food court, except that it is spread out all over the downtown area. In some ways the mall analogy is correct. But there is an essential ingredient in these streets that is missing in the mall. A large proportion of the people that are wandering about did not come to go shopping. They came to see the street performers (like these musicians), to walk around, perhaps to buy some fruit or to have an ice cream. It is a social occasion, with people of all ages participating along with their pets. And it is not a weekend phenomenon. We see lots of people out walking around every day. It is quite exhilarating and it is true in every big city. America has generally gone a different route – allowing downtown areas in big cities to wither away and building suburban malls in their place. We spent three days in Munchen. We didn’t see everything. To our regret, we didn’t get to see the inside of the main churches. We walked a lot. Many hours were spent in three huge museums. One, the Bavarian National Museum was reported to be a history museum, but most of its exhibits were local works of art – textiles, clothing, examples of local carving, some dating back to the dark and middle ages, etc. The next day, we went to the two huge art museums. The Alte Pinakothek contained Old Masters – Rembrandts, other painters of his time, and early German and Italian works. The Neue Pinakothek had galleries full of "new" paintings – among them Van Gogh’s vase of sunflowers. (Recognize the painting?) As we got good at negotiating the transit system, we have formed some clear opinions about Munich’s public transportation system. It is very complicated since it consists of busses, trams, suburban-line trains and subways—a rich array. You can go anywhere within a large radius of Stadtmitte (that is, center city) on one or more of these conveyances. And they all are in great shape, pretty new, well kept up, and clean, with comfortable, smooth rides even on the subways. The people who ride them are well-mannered, orderly, and very polite. It is usual here and in other German cities for people younger than we are (almost everyone) to get up and offer a seat to us when we get onto a crowded car. All that being said, and meant, Munich’s government should give some serious thought to firing the person responsible for the public information side of the system, the part that provides information about what goes where and where they stop. We give you one example of the problem. In most cities here and in the US, if one gets on a subway, there is a map posted above a door that lists in order the stations at which the train stops. That allows you to know if you are on the right train. It helps you judge how many stops there are before the one you want and even identify the stop just before the one you want, so that you can get ready to leave the train at the right station. In Munich there is no such map in any car. Instead in every car there are maps of the whole system, both subways and suburban trains. There are at least 8 separate subway routes and at least the same number of suburban train routes in Munich. When you look at the map they provide for you, it is like looking at a schematic wiring diagram for the mother of all computer motherboards. There are at least 15 different colored circuits, multi-color letter notations, switches and an assortment of other unidentifiables, possibly including some very tiny insects. We found it hard to identify the subway line we were on, let alone to determine if we were going in the right direction and how many stops there would be before we arrived at our destination. Furthermore, this map does not include the tram or bus systems. If you do need to transfer, you can’t tell where or when. To make matters worse, place names often are very similar. It turned out to be a challenge but we are happy to report that we conquered it. (See if you can make sense of this subway map.) Munich is the last city we will visit in Germany before heading to Italy. So it is time to take stock of our impressions. It seems to both of us that there are far fewer obvious immigrants in Germany than we’ve seen in Holland. We have seen a handful of black people – most of them dressed in African clothes – and a number of obviously Muslim women in headscarves – even some dressed all in black with very little of their face showing. But mostly, we saw caucasian Germans. The country is a lot like America. There seem to be large tracts of forested land as well as large tracts of farmland. But the farmland we’ve seen rarely includes animals – just huge fields of crops. And we mean really large fields. We see very few animals at all. Some dogs – Westies being the most popular – very few cats and almost no squirrels, other small wild animals or birds other than sparrows. Every city seems to have a pedestrian-only area and there are always thousands of people out walking on them. There are business people too, of course, but most of the people strolling along with their dogs or their baby carriages seem to be out for a breath of air. The dogs, incidentally, are also taken along onto the buses or subways. And speaking of baby carriages, we always thought that the Germans have a very low birth rate. If that is so, then every baby in Germany has been paraded in front of us! We have been in specialty stores selling food, in open-air markets, in supermarkets. The food is quite different from what we’ve seen before. Particularly in the meat departments. No matter where we went, there was a very limited amount of fresh meat and a huge amount and variety of sausage, ham, cold cuts and pates. There are open-air cafes everywhere and they all seem to be full. Judging from what we see in the city centers, Germany generally seems to be very prosperous. There are some exceptions, like Leipzig and other parts of East Germany. Perhaps it is the drag of that area that explains the news reports we heard in the US about Germany being one of the least prosperous of the European nations. And the prices we have seen support this idea. Things are generally much less expensive here than we are used to. We have seen beggers on the streets here, not only in Leipzig, but in other large cities as well. These are not the kind of panhandlers Americans are used to seeing. These kneel and raise their hand in prayerful supplication, some bending over and touching the pavement with their foreheads. A few had a pillow to kneel on but most knelt directly on the concrete. The supermarkets are generally small affairs, perhaps half to a third as big as what we consider supermarkets in America. They rarely sell paper plates, napkins etc. but do have such odd merchandise as clothing, shoes, hardware, etc. usually in large bins in the middle of the aisles. These are not like Wal-Marts. They seem to be more on the style of job lot stores. We’ve seen nuclear power plants but we’ve also seen huge "fields" of modern windmills…twenty or thirty at a time. There are virtually no billboards, making the driving a bit more pleasant. The signs are very good on the roads. The exits off highways are well-marked. But there are more detours than you can imagine – and we find that even last year’s maps are no longer correct. There are new exits in some places, and many signs on the roads have red metal bars indicating that exits are temporarily closed. It gets confusing sometimes. In all this time, we’ve seen relatively few young men who might be U.S. soldiers. Even in towns where we know that they are stationed, they do not seem to be in evidence. We’re not talking men in uniform. Rarely did we see young men with Army haircuts but civilian clothes walking on the streets with their families. Their accents would be our clue. Ron and I agree that Germans, in general, seem to take life very seriously indeed. And do not under any circumstances think that the fact that you are next in line will impress any little old ladies. They apparently have carte blanche to get in front of you! The further south we went in Germany, the more forthcoming the people were. But in the north, we felt that even the campers we passed were annoyed that we said "Morgen". They answered, but they didn’t really mean it. In one campground, the lady in the reception area put Ron in his place when he was asking her for information. She reminded him that "You are on holiday, but I am working here". There are a lot of motor homes on the roads in Germany and Italy. One day Adelle played a child’s game. How many motorhomes can you count on the other side of the road in five minutes? The answer: 25. There are more here than we have ever seen. But it should be noted that in France when we saw a motorhome coming toward us, they invariably waved or honked or flashed their lights. In Germany, we ignore one another on the road, and try not to interact when in a campground. There were rarely any signs in German cities that indicated in which direction you should walk to view the local tourist attractions. Since there seem to be a lot of tourists, we find that a bit odd. Incidentally, when we were in Prague, there were signs everywhere. To find local landmarks, we always had to look at our maps. When we did this in the UK, invariably someone would come over and try to help us. Only once did any German volunteer help – and that was in the south. Part of the German reserve is undoubtedly due to the fact that we speak different languages. Once one is identified as non-German-speaking it is natural that attempts at communication would be curtailed. But we do not remember noticing quite so much avoidance in France where people would try very hard to make us understand. And in Holland there seem to be many more English speakers than there are here, so we had no trouble at all in finding out what we needed to know. It is the beginning of August. We know that our family members in Connecticut and in Florida have the air conditioning turned up high against the extreme heat. Germany has been mercifully cool. It has rained nearly every day, and while it is very comfortable in the sun, clouds make it very chilly. In fact, Adelle is wearing a T-shirt, a blouse, a sweatshirt and a jacket! Indeed there have been many mornings that the first thing we did was turn on the electric heater. We have been told, though, that this amount of cool and rainy weather is very unusual for August. Campgrounds are full of Italians looking for cooler temperatures! In spite of the stand-offishness of many of its campers, Germany is a very comfortable country for Americans. The people you see on the streets look very much like Americans. The clothes in the stores are similar too. We have been in other countries in Europe where all the clothes we see in store windows are meant for the 15-28 year old crowd. In Germany, there are also places selling clothes that are aimed at adults. Every street has a café and a place that sells flowers. There are many beautiful old buildings, and every place seems to have nicely cut lawns, lots of flower gardens, and beautifully kept up stucco houses – usually whitewashed – with red tile roofs. Every bathroom is clean and orderly, the coffee is good, the pastries delicious – what more could anyone want? What’s so important about people who seem friendly and helpful? Or about signs to guide a tourist? Don’t let all our complaining lead you to think we didn’t enjoy touring Germany. In fact, we did. But as in every situation, there are some things we would have liked to be different. That’s it for now. Adelle & Ron
Adelle and Ron Milavsky, Authors © Adelle and Ron Milavsky, 2005
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