The next morning at breakfast, I ate with the appetite of a west Texas field hand! And with such a beautiful day we hit the backroads. Yes, I know I keep talking about “backroads” and some of you have really wondered how far “back” we go….

Here’s an idea of the easy “far back” roads

Chief navigator and curiosity seeker Suzie, with our little Mercedes A-190

And finally we start seeing views such as this beautiful overlook of the wooden fence guarding a huge field of Springtime yellow dandelions and fresh spring grasses, the red clay tile roofs of little Lermoos Austria, and then the Alps rising high up into the rain clouds and above.

Are you’re getting some idea why we like driving vs. rail, back roads vs. autobahns, outlying areas vs. cities?

By 1000 hours (10:00 AM) rain clouds formed and then grew into a daylong drizzling rain and grey day.

For lunch we found Sam’s Café in Lermoos and had probably the best Gulaschsuppe and Spaghetti Bolognaise we’ve had in Europe in our 14 plus visits since ’95.

After lunch, we drove to other nearby bergs such as Ehrwald, on to Reutte, Füssen, and the famous castles of Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau. Both castles were lost in the fog and rain clouds. Although you could see the Ehrenberg castle ruins outside of Reutte, it was cold, wet, rainy, and muddy. Not conducive to mountain climbing, we thought, so we returned to Lermoos.

That evening the neighboring town of Lähn was opening is travel season with a Tirolean musik folk festival. We joined two other couples in our Pension, grabbed the free taxi and headed for the party. 15€ each at the door and we were inside to enjoy a great Tirolean Musik group