Stuttgart, Germany
Trip Start
Apr 11, 2006
1
11
26
Trip End
??? ??, 2007
Stuttgart,
Germany
Thursday, June 29, 2006
Because of a cheap flight and a friend of Meredith's from her summer in Uganda, we used Stuttgart as our base for the trip, and were lucky enough to be picked up at the airport. On the drive back to our hosts Sonja and Wolfram's house, we saw the Stuttgart stadium, where several of the World Cup matches were played, and the massive Daimler-Chrysler complex, where a large proportion of Stuttgart's economy is generated.
A couple hours later, Wolfi took us to pick up Sonja at work in the medieval village of Waiblingen. Walking out of the subterranean parking deck and mall above it into the old town was a nice surprise, and the city itself was truly impressive. Its buildings are typical of the image we Americans see when we think of old Germany (wooden framing, etc.), and the park that we walked through and in which was the restaurant where we ate dinner, was beautiful and filled with people enjoying the pleasant early-summer evening
Ready to Go
. For dinner, we had vegetarian takes on traditional German food: potato-based balls resembling dumplings, and crepe-like pancakes, both with a great cream sauce and mushrooms. I also sampled my first German beer in Germany, a very good CD Pils from Dinkel Acker and a fantastic filtered Weizen, and Meredith a white wine, Riesling, which is made nearby.In the morning, after our typical German breakfast consisting of hearty breads, jams, and juice, Sonja drove us to the Waiblingen train station, where she pointed us to the track to the Stuttgart Hauptbahnhof (main station). A few minutes later, we were talking to the Deutsch Bahn ticket representative, and bought passes to ride any DB train on any five days over the next 30-day period (€270 for the "twin pass"). Although a bit pricey, these definitely saved us money and helped make things simpler for us as well. They are also good for all cities' nationally-run suburban S-Bahn trains.
(More to come on Stuttgart later)
