One of the great things about this holiday is that we pretty much make our own schedule, and can get off the autobahn at will for a two-hour lunch in a cute town so charming it merits a return visit. Freiburg, Germany is a place we read about, as a center for solar energy use, and since Germany just declared it will lead the world and go nuclear-power-free, I thought it particularly appropriate to visit.
Alas, in our lunchtime stopover we saw nary a solar panel but we did see a city heavily reliant on the bicycle, and walking. Bikes were everywhere: a dozen parked in an alley, big clusters of them (think hundreds) in plazas and people pedaling everywhere. I especially like the various sorts of carrying baskets, mostly rigid and wire-based, others like milk crates, some soft-sided panniers. Two young women pedal by companionably riding side by side, one in hot pink tights, a short brown skirt and boots. A young mama is walking her bike, with one small daughter in the back of the bike child seat, and the other perched on the seat, though I don’t think she could reach the pedals.
I was able to buy a pair of reading glasses in Freiburg (triumph! Purchasing in German! With help from my mini-German dictionary!). We saw remarkable paving stones – tiny, one-inch ovals all fit together like mosaic, and bigger brick-size stones laid in intricate circular patterns along a plaza – plus a small work crew, including a father and young son, tap-tap-tapping each small stone into place, repairing a disrupted patch of street.
We also found a great vegetarian restaurant, with fresh salad, lentil/apricot/pepper soup and to finish, schokofondant (a tiny cake-like-pudding-like, soft-centered chocolate cake in a glass, Betsy, think pudd-ake) and espresso. Best. Lunch. Stop. Ever.
Alas, in our lunchtime stopover we saw nary a solar panel but we did see a city heavily reliant on the bicycle, and walking. Bikes were everywhere: a dozen parked in an alley, big clusters of them (think hundreds) in plazas and people pedaling everywhere. I especially like the various sorts of carrying baskets, mostly rigid and wire-based, others like milk crates, some soft-sided panniers. Two young women pedal by companionably riding side by side, one in hot pink tights, a short brown skirt and boots. A young mama is walking her bike, with one small daughter in the back of the bike child seat, and the other perched on the seat, though I don’t think she could reach the pedals.
I was able to buy a pair of reading glasses in Freiburg (triumph! Purchasing in German! With help from my mini-German dictionary!). We saw remarkable paving stones – tiny, one-inch ovals all fit together like mosaic, and bigger brick-size stones laid in intricate circular patterns along a plaza – plus a small work crew, including a father and young son, tap-tap-tapping each small stone into place, repairing a disrupted patch of street.
We also found a great vegetarian restaurant, with fresh salad, lentil/apricot/pepper soup and to finish, schokofondant (a tiny cake-like-pudding-like, soft-centered chocolate cake in a glass, Betsy, think pudd-ake) and espresso. Best. Lunch. Stop. Ever.
The bikes in the photo are actually in Heidelberg, Germany -- but we easily saw this many in Freiburg.
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