We crossed the border into Germany at Basel, a city that sits right where the Swiss, French and German borders meet. On our previous trip to Switzerland, luggage issues at Heathrow required us to change our flight from Zurich to Basel. If I remember correctly, Basel's airport was in France and the train station was in Switzerland!
Less than a half-hour north of Basel we were in the Black Forest region of southwest Germany. We turned off the freeway to explore some back roads and had such a wonderful time. For one thing, it was so great to be back in Germany. Seeing all the familiar shops and road signs felt a little like coming home, even though we only lived there for a few months.
And speaking of home, the winding roads through the Black Forest looked an awful lot like Oregon, our beautiful home state. It helped that it was raining steadily most of the time. There were logging sites and piles of firewood along the road, which smelled so good and familiar, and wispy clouds hovering between the hills.
There weren't many villages, but in the lower areas there were farms with inquisitive cows and goats.
We drove through a couple small towns, one of which was quite genteel and had some impressive thermal baths, like a smaller Baden Baden (further north in Germany) or Bath (England). It looked like a really relaxing place and maybe we'll return someday! Several signs also indicated the presence of ruins of a Roman bath, but we never did find it.
In another town (which also looked worthy of returning to) we stopped for a snack at a grocery store, which was such fun. We saw our favorite brands of frozen pizza we used to buy in Bonn, David got a salami sandwich on a crunchy roll (below) and I got a laugenstrange, the delicious stick of pretzel bread I made killer sandwiches with.
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