Well… I think (fingers crossed and knocking wood) we have most of our WiFi Hotspot SIM card issues resolved which surprisingly only took us about three days worth of exciting I.T. time to accomplish. We hope the only remaining electrical complication we have now is finding signal strength strong enough for our WiFi to function properly and keeping all the batteries we have fully charged. Keeping the electrons flowing is no easy task considering how much of our time has been spent off the main power grid and all the various electronics that we need to keep powered-up and functioning. At some point, when I run out of really important things to talk about, I may do a blog on just the electronics that I have collected to make our travel communications, navigation, and photo management so easy and stress free… Not!
As we now head East right through the centre of Germany we find ourselves in the midst of some very sad and emotional, yet strangely fascinating WWII historical landmarks. Many of these truly sobering sites were at one time behind the iron curtain not easily accessible by the general public and not maintained. With the reunification of Germany  in 1990 there has been a determined effort here to honestly recognize, address, and take responsibility for darker periods of past generations. The German government has done an admirable job of maintaining sites and providing easy access with acute information about many of these dark places. The modern and impressive interpretation centres clearly promote the concept of  “We must face our past in order to move on, and we must learn from it so it will never happen again”.  In future blogs we’ll introduce you to a few infamous sites that we’ve visited, many being within close proximity of each other. Until then here are a few pictures of us on the road again.

Well, three nights of free camping has turned into four as we keep finding more castles and villages to explore in this under-publicized gem of an area. We visited 2 wonderful medieval castles and one amazing palace yesterday. It turns out that Burg Vischering Castle is one of the oldest and best preserved fortified medieval castles in northern Europe. It dates back to 1270. Like slipping into a time warp, you can just imagine the lifestyle of the day. In the photo of me holding open a round door in the floor of a castle tower; this is an “escape” hatch for women and children when the castle is under enemy siege and it leads down a circular stair to safety. The amazing thing is, you only have to walk about a kilometre away to visit another wonderfully preserved rival castle, Ludinghausen Castle.
Next, we moved on to our first official campsite and have spent the last two days here in the city of Munster. Some very interesting history here including a very famous Astrological clock in an amazing Gothic Cathedral. We also saw the impressive court room where the peace documents were signed to end the 30 year European war in 1648. We had a delicious bowl of sausage & pea soup in a cold but cool “open market” while enjoying the fantastic 1700’s old town centre of Munster.
On a more frustrating note, we’ve been having some WiFi SIM card issues over the last few days that we hope to sort out soon. Will keep you posted!

We have been very busy the last few days buzzing about shopping for things and setting up our new home on wheels. Thus far the RV is fun to drive, performs well, and despite the square footage that we’re accustom to living in, it’s been very comfortable and efficient.
We capped off our fantastic Valentines Day with super meat fondue at the restaurant in our hotel and the following morning, drove to Munster to return our rental car (It seems everyone in this part of Germany rides a bicycle) we said good-by to our new friends and moved into the RV. The manager/chef at our hotel took the time to escort us to this specially  designated motorhome area (Stellplatz) beside a great recreation centre in the village of Senden about 6 km away from Hiddingsel where we could “free-camp”. We planed on staying just one night but this is our third. Each morning we get up and go for a refreshing swim at the family pool centre about a 2 minute walk away. A 5 minute walk in the other direction leads us to a very cool 300+ year old castle in poorish repair that the town has put up for sale to circumvent the renovation costs.  All the old village centres that we have visited are really terrific and the people have been so wonderful. Today we went into a pharmacy in Dulmen to check out some flu meds to have with us and the doctor owner asked us about our plans… before we knew it we were in his office at the back of the shop scanning his computer and going over all kinds of great places to see and things to do. We spent an hour of fun with him and despite the language gap, we managed to gain a lot of knowledge, information and respect for friendly locals. Tomorrow we will be off to explore another castle not far from here that is more famous and in much better repair.

Today is February 14th, and we just took possession of our brand new 2014 German made Sunlight T-58 Motorhome. We think it will make a perfect home for romping about Europe in and we’re very excited about putting it to work. We chose our dealership well, Michael Thyssen, owner of the very large DUMO-Reisemobile Dealership, and his staff have been absolutely fantastic to work with and have helped us tremendously. Tomorrow we are driving to a vary big motorhome camping store called (Obelink) on the Dutch/German border, about 100km from here to purchase most of the things we’ll need to get this mobile operation underway.  We celebrated this extra special occasion by capping it off with a wonderful fondue dinner at our Hotel, this truly has been a most fantastic and memorable day!  Wishing  all of you a very “Happy Valentine’s Day!”

This is our 130+ year old hotel (across the street from the church) in the tiny  village of Hiddingsel Germany. Everything is very brick and beautiful here and the people are wonderful. Dumo Reisemobile is very handy, about one kilometre directly up the street from our hotel.  The weather has been comfortably cool and mostly dry with a nice mix of sun and cloud. We are making good progress on the motorhome front!

But what a start! We trucked on through the Frankfurt Airport with a cart stacked to the ceiling with 4 hockey bags of stuff and 2 carry-ons. Yes Brad… people did look at us like we were a part of a Canadian Hockey Team but, the bags worked perfectly for the task intended. We managed to score a great little Ford station wagon upgrade from Budget after the attendant took mercy on us after seeing all our baggage. Until turning the key, I didn’t realize it was a standard but luckily by the time I hit the autobahn about 100 meters out the parkade door, I was on top of my shifting “learning curve” and that was a good thing because the next 3 hours was quite a ride. Margot had her eyes closed for most of it as I was traveling rather fast for her at about 140km/hr, but the real concern for her was not me… but instead the cars that were racing past me at well over 200km/hr!!!! My first thoughts of this fast drive were of my friends Rhys and Marcel… guys, this autobahn was made for the both of you and your “rock-in” machines. Our first genuine German meal turned out to be one of the best Pizzas ever. After a great REAL continental breakfast this morning, we spent a successful day RV shopping at “DUMO Reismobile”, the dealership. We think we’ve found the right motorhome for us and so tomorrow we will write-up the deal with the owner, Michael Thyssen. More on that later. Off to a great start so far and having lots of fun!

Wow! these last few days have flown by so incredibly fast that it seems like we’ve just experienced some kind of time warp. I’ll have to admit to some final scrambling in the last few hours and minutes before Cam so expertly delivered us (on time) to the Victoria Clipper to start this first leg of our journey. But, despite those last few moments of higher than normal anxiety, just prior to locking the front door, we did manage to get away happy and with the comforting feeling that everything seems to be in order and under control. To that end, as we flew over Iceland, we still couldn’t think of a single detail left unattended. Even though we had a wonderful send-off celebration from friends and family, I suppose it’s only normal to regret not having had even more time to say “Bon Voyage” before departing. Thanks to everyone for all your kind words of encouragement, best wishes, and support. Having escaped the winter surprise in Seattle intact, our next stop was Frankfurt Germany where the fun really began.