Left Frankfurt a couple of days ago to travel further north to Hannover. A beautiful city. Full of medieval charm, mixed with a touch of modernism. Lots of xmas markets ( this is still Germany after all), buskers on every corner (beggars as well), but no hand bag or watch salesmen. In fact the gentlemen from Northern Africa have been conspicuous by their absence throughout this part of Germany. Spent a few days relaxing and taking it easy. Found some great place...

Thursday - Made it into Frankfurt with about an hour to spare before Sam arrived. Frankfurt airport seems to be one of the better organised airports - signs for parking and terminal entry are everywhere. Flight seems to be on time even a bit early, so we didn't have long to wait. Picked up Sam, off we go to our apartment for the next couple of days. A bit of a disappointment when we arrived. The apartment is slap bang in the middle of a construction site - refer ...

Leaving Passau we had a number of choices for a destination, the aim being to get us within a 2 hour drive to Frankfurt to pick up Sam. Nuremberg, Wurzburg, Heidelberg, Augsberg, the choices are many. After considering distance, direction and choices for accommodation we decided on Bamberg, about 2 1/2 hours west of Passau. Nothing too unique to justify the choice, except maybe the UNESCO listing of Bamberg for its architectural heritage. and it really is a beau...

Left Udine on Sunday to travel up into Germany (via Austria). We are going to a town in Germany called Passau. No reason for picking it other than its in Bavaria and it is the confluence of 3 rivers, one of which is the Danube. What should have been a fairly leisurely 3 - 4 hour drive turned into a drive of epic proportions. Left Udine Ok. Found the Autostrada OK. The fog even started to lift as we neared the mountains, pretty soon we were bathed in sunshine. Th...

Making a brief sojourn back into Germany, this time to see Cologne (or Koln as the Germans spell it). We had intended to visit Cologne a couple of years ago but never made it, so this year we're making the effort. The first thing that strikes you about Cologne is that despite it being an ancient city (founded in approx 38BC), its architecture is more modern than most other old cities, probably due to the fact it was one of the most heavily bombed German cities d...