8 hours on the autobahns and my first sighting of an American military base!

Although putting an s at the end of Autobahn is not the correct way to make it plural, I want it to be more obvious to people unfamiliar with Germany that there are many of them, it's simply the word for freeway, as opposed to one place you can drive as fast as you like.

I'm always amazed at how much trouble I have in road trips here, when back home it's normal to sit on the freeway 6 or 9 hours getting to middle Oregon. My husband said, "Cuz you're older?" but it's not that. It's the fact that this country is "only" the size of Montana, and yet we can spend 7 hours driving across the short side. Today I drove only 3.5 hours to Kaiserslautern in the state below us called Rheinland Pfalz, then we continued on to the next state south called Saarland where we saw Saarbruecken by unintentionally driving through the center of that city, which was obviously built with horse and buggy in mind and not autos. I hate sharing the road with streetcars! I bet I'd be excellent at San Francisco driving.

I kept seeing French on signs and only just now looked, we were about 2 KM from France. That's why the signs on the Autobahn said Paris on them, which at that point Paris may have been closer than our home. (Karen, we were very near a town called Zweibruecken which I think you know.)

Lots of signs for Luxemburg and Belgium too. I didn't have a map, and I don't yet have one in my head, so I didn't realize exactly where we were until now.

So why is it so hard for me, these day trips? It's the nature of the Autobahn I think. It just seems that when you're driving between 80 and 100MPH for hours on end, you shouldn't have your Garmin saying, "3 hours to goal" if the goal is still inside Germany!

I really enjoy driving fast, but as you know I don't have a fast car. The Germans are the best drivers in the world, and they don't put up with outlanders' habits. You must be extremely vigilant to drive on the Autobahn (unless you are coasting behind a big old semi). You have to look in your rear view mirror constantly because this is a big racetrack and the rules are STAY RIGHT UNLESS PASSING and no matter how fast I'm going, trying to pass a long row of semis, no matter how often I check my rear view mirror, suddenly there will be a BMW directly behind my car as if it appeared from no where. They must be going over 200, I don't know.

To clarify (again, sorry!) it is illegal to pass a car on its right. That is very dangerous on the Autobahn, you must follow the rules or else people could die. And people rarely do, because most everyone follows the rules. So I was surprised today when I was trying to get out of the way of a yellow Seat Ibiza (our old car!) from Leverkusen (a city near us!) and instead of letting me move right, it flanked me and passed me on my right. I almost hit him, trying to get out of his way. Now that I think about it, I bet he was American.

It's the most common thing you'll hear from people who visit Germany (and actually drive here) - "I was pushing my car to its limit, and suddenly there's this Mercedes on my bumper flashing me with his headlights!"

You cannot drive without it happening, and you cannot take a road trip without it happening repeatedly, and it's very stressful because these people's pants are on fire. (It makes me wonder what it would be like to drive a fast car here....)

So I drive like a bat out of Rheinland as fast as I feel safe, today going as fast as 177KPH but mostly hanging around 134-150, a comfortable speed for trying to make time. But maintaining that is stressful, constantly weaving around slower traffic and getting the heck out of people's way. And the Autobahns are curvy and hilly, at least where we were today, so pretty soon your hands are aching from gripping the wheel, and you get exhausted. I get exhausted. Then I go into my rest mode, where I slow down to 120 or 115 and just coast along slowly, letting everyone pass me in the game of leapfrog. Bye bye Chrysler Voyager, I'll catch ya later....what a nice name for a car, like the starship....and then I get bored and can't stand it anymore and start driving fast again. So I cycle, hour by hour, blazing along, and resting. I wonder how many drivers in Germany do this, or if it's an American thing. (Seattle drivers being the worst in the nation.)

One nice thing: you never have to look in your rear view mirror for cops. That would never happen. If you're speeding, a camera will getcha. Cops have better things to do (I hope). I put lipstick on for the camera today.

Lots of Luxemburg drivers today were enjoying the lack of speed limits in Germany and pushing me out of their way. Lots of French cars too.

The Mosel river valley was beautiful, but I had no chance to enjoy the views. I caught glimpses of south-facing hillsides covered in grapevines - Mosel is famous for its wine. There was also this lovely old tower on a cliff, not a castle or church, just a tower, I wonder what it was - maybe my one reader from this state will tell us.

Kaiserslautern had some American flags flying and I fruck out - what is this place? What is that huge fence with barbed wire....oh, it's a US Military base! How cool, I'd never seen one. I was amazed, the signs on the enormous fence were in English first, then German. It's the first time I'd seen American English on official signage in Germany. (If you don't click the link, it says that Kaiserslautern hosts the largest presence of American armed forces outside the USA. 43,000 Americans work there. Oh my.....)

We almost drove in, but there's  a security gate just like entering Boeing in Seattle. Guards and military dogs! I looked at the guard and thought, "Oh man, those are my people! I could go up to him and speak English and he'd answer in English! Oh, I bet they have root beer in there! And good steak...oh, is there any way I can get in?" If I ever go back, I'm bringing my passport, to see if that works. I think it's so cool that America has bases in Germany, for whatever the reason. This base had a huge football field (American footbal goals) behind the fence, with a running track around it with people running on it, and, unbelievably, a Burger King *inside* the base. I bet that Burger King has root beer, and served with ice cubes! How odd that the BK had signs facing the road, but it was behind the big fence so no one but US military could get in. Now that I think about it, a football field, a BK, of course it's the biggest American presence outside America. We can't have such excess everywhere.

I know it must sound silly but I've been here a long time and I've never seen American presence besides our embassy. And since I found the American Armed Forces radio, I've become fascinated with the concept of Americans living here and not integrating, just living in their own little bubbles, getting American snacks shipped from home, learning only "Hallo" and "Auf Wiedersehen" and nothing more, but enjoying the lower drinking age and the music of church bells.

So, then we drove on to Saarbruecken, and everything was somehow different. I don't know why but the feel of the place was strange. I asked J, "Do they speak our German or do they have their own type?" J answered, "Their type is called Saarlaendisch." They were lying on the grassy banks of the river (?) and there were lilacs and other blooming things everywhere. Further south they have Summer before we do.

I was so happy to get out of there and back up north. We'd gone from our home at latitude 51 down to 49. As I drove on and on, an ambulance passed the other direction. Did you know in Germany when an ambulance is behind you, you don't necessarily pull to the right? The ambulances take the center so if you're in the fast lane, you pull your car as far to the left as possible, leaving a little space in the middle somehow.

As J slept (I love that he trusts me enough to sleep when I drive) I was confused by a sign. It had a diagram of the 3 lanes, and a different speed limit for each lane. It said 100 for the fast lane, and only 60 for the middle. I know you're not supposed to stay in the fast lane, but I didn't want to get caught going over 60 in the middle, so I stayed. When I asked J about it later he said those were not speed limit signs, those were minimal speed signs. OK then. It would really help if signs in Europe had actual words on them, rather than just symbols and color coding. Cuz it will never be natural for me that blue means minimum.

I couldn't get Burger King out of my head, and I have cravings for Whoppers every few months so after 200 km of keeping our eyes open, we finally saw one. I pulled into the drive through (what they erroneously call "Drive In") and said, "1 Whopper." "Excuse me?" "1 Whopper." "What?" "Whopper. W-h-o.." "Can you pull forward?"

My husband immediately said to the poor BK employee, "My wife is American so you can bet she is saying it correctly." I asked J, "How do Germans say it?" "Vah-Pah." OK then. But I'm not gonna do that, it's my language that they're breaking. But oh my that was a great Whopper! I'm good for a few months now. (BTW, it cost 3,50E. Fast food in Germany is not inexpensive, so it doesn't carry the stigma of only serving the poor. It also keeps us from going very often!)

One more thing if I've forgotten to say it, McDonalds and BK won't put ice cubes in drinks unless you request it, because ice cubes are scorned in Germany. The funny thing is, the print on the outside of the BK soda cup today had artistic ice cube images all over it. I said to J, "There are our ice cubes, on the outside of the cup!"

So what were we doing driving all over shinola? We've finally agreed  it's time to upgrade to the next Prius model. Not a new car, heavens no, just a Gen 3 instead of a Gen 2. Ours is 11 years old, and we took it to the 140,000KM mark today. I still love my Prius so much, and wash it gently by hand almost weekly, but it's time. In fact, all my love for this car was obvious today when the salesman looked at it, and when the mechanic gave it an inspection they knew we both took impeccable care of this car the last 6 years.

Why did we drive through three states? They had a navy blue one. I've always loved the look of a navy blue car, and I'd never seen a navy blue Prius before. (Have you?) Well, when we arrived in our freshly washed and waxed Prius, I was appalled at the state of the navy one. It had yellow pollen dust all over it, and was just filthy. My car parked nearby looked so much nicer. I wondered honestly, if they'd left it dirty to hide the scratches, because I found multiple surface scratches in the paint. Then the salesman mentioned it had rained briefly 2 days ago. Then I realized that none of the cars had been washed, it was only the navy one that showed all that dirt! I'd read online that navy shows dirt as much as a black car, but well, now I know. We drove on south to the next Toyota dealer...

...where we found a white one with a solar powered roof thingy. A 2011. I don't love white, but I prefer it to black. And the solar panel on top is so cool, who has that on their car?

Just now J emailed an offer for a trade for the white one. We'll see what happens.

The sun had set at 8:15 and we were still an hour from home. At least. I was in a daze from weaving in and out, yielding and staying vigilant. I finally said, "Can you take over" and my husband did.

Mara and Bellis said, "Dinner is 5 hours late" when we arrived. Oops. I promised extra carrots tomorrow.

There is a perfect crescent moon tonight. We're both exhausted. It feels good.