2019-07-24 Waiblingen To Ensch

Previous Day :: Trek Overview :: Next Day

Waiblingen to Ensch Germany

We are parked on the driveway outside Martin and Ruth’s house, most of the time it is quiet, but the heat is a problem for us. We sleep OK, but I am glad of the small fan that blows cool air inside the camper.

It is hot when we wake, already the temperature is in the high twenties Celsius. We shower at Ruth’s house and breakfast on the balcony. The children have gone to school and Martin is at work. It is a very relaxed and civilised morning. Later Gertrude comes to join us before we leave. We fill with water and say our farewells, getting on our way around 11.00am. The temperature again soaring to the mid-thirties by lunch time.

We drive around Stuttgart on H10 (anticlockwise on an M60 equivalent road) around the north side of the city past the Mercedes Benz museum. It is very busy as you would expect but we get a sense of the size of the city and the good transport links in Stuttgart: train, Metro light tramway and expansions of the road and motorway networks, that all go directly through the city centre. It is all very interesting. We decide to head for the Trier and the Mosel river, so cross the river Neckar where there is major roadworks as they are widening the roads and railway, putting in a new railway bridge over the river. We make slow progress at first because of roadworks, taking the A81 north towards Heilbronn where we turn west onto H6. We make good progress on this road, crossing the lowlands to Hockenheim.

We stop at a service layby for lunch and note that the temperature is now 37°C. A good rest and something to eat and we are ready to go again. There is a long delay as we approach the blue and red suspension bridge over river Rhine north of Mannheim. We cross the river and on the other side, a lorry has blown a tyre and had almost lost the whole wheel, the police are there and the wheel is in a terrible mess on the road. Otherwise all was OK, and we are soon up to speed again on the H6 towards to Saarbrucken. We climb up through the mountains through deciduous and coniferous forest. It is very hilly but picturesque. South of Saarbrucken we take H1 north towards Trier, crossing the Schwarzwalder Hockwald (mountains) from Saarland into Rhineland region. Despite the long steep hills up and down, we make good progress towards Schweich, north of Trier.

Taking the B53 towards Mehring it is a short drive over the mountain and down to the Mosel river and Ensch.

We arrive about 5.30pm, it is 39°C. We empty the grey water and toilet cassette (on the other side of the road to the campsite) and drive over to the campsite. All the spots by the river are taken but we find one under the shade of the trees and set up the awning and get the table and chairs out. There are about 10 campers here, not as many as we expected. We pay our €6/night to the young woman who calls daily around 6.00pm and order a baguette for tomorrow. The bread service here is excellent, you pay for the bread and in the morning it is sitting in a bag by your vehicle. It is too hot to cook, but I cook the chicken I got out of the freezer this morning and we have a piece in a bun with fruit.

We sit out in the shade and play bananagrams word game, it does not cool down much!

Waiblingen To Ensch