Cruising the Autobahn...

(I pulled this the other night but I think it's fine to put it up now.)

We dropped the car off in Munich a few days ago, but this is the first chance I've really had to reflect on the actual driving experience of the 6 days we spent traversing Germany.

We travelled almost 2000km in 6 days in a little Ford Cmax. Once we worked out the best way to make things work it was an absolute breeze. This method involved Justine driving, and me navigating. This is mainly because: a) I'm better with technology and it took a little bit to realise when we put in a district on the car's inbuilt GPS it wiped out the street so kept taking us random places so I handled the iPad with maps, b) Justine is completely incapable of shutting up whilst I drive and finds it necessary to tell me EVERYTHING that is happening on the road as if it is a giant truck about to hit us (This happens in Sydney as well so was not surprising and made the decision of giving up driving rights a lot easier) and c) I'm much better at reading maps. In fact, the only times that Jus has tried to guide us anywhere this trip we went 1km in the opposite direction.

So Jus drove and I sat in the passenger seat. I had no problem with this. She probably didn't either...

If you are thinking of doing a big Europe drive I highly recommend something like an iPad with a local 3g sim in it. Of course, I'm fairly sure I got raped by O2 in Berlin and may have been put €50 a month contract of some kind as I can't read the documents they gave me. Also, I'm not sure about the rest of the carriers but O2 doesn't get much 3g outside of the cities so it pays to cache up your maps whilst you can as sometimes you are stuck on REALLY SLOW internet. That being said, the luxury of the map you can move around and see everything on was great and I'd highly recommend it.

There's three things particular I noticed whilst driving around Germany.

1. - Autobahns

Everyone has heard of the Autobahns, the German freeways with no speed limit. The country is very proud of this massive network of road, and they should be. They are EXTREMELY effective. Imagine being able to get from Sydney to Canberra in 1.5 hours doing 150-60 kmph! Or even better, imagine being somewhere that you actually want to be! This system of over 12,000kms of roadway is simply amazing. Crisscrossing the country to join everything to everything else, it has taken the infamous German efficiency to the extreme. Sure, there's more deaths per year than in Australia but there's also a hell of a lot more cars. Throughout the whole time we drove we didn't see a single accident. In addition, there is a level of responsibility to the driving that you don't experience in a lot of Australia. People actually kept to the inner lanes when not overtaking. Every driver has to be in control, because at those speeds you know when you aren't. A great way to get around.

For an interesting comparison, check out this article I found.

2. - Windfarms

From the moment we left Berlin, there were wind farms EVERYWHERE. Apparently, Germany is now receiving 25% of it's power from renewables, of which 40% is from wind. Compare this to Australia where renewable energy still produces less than 9% of our energy needs (yes, I know there are other factors such as distance and density etc.) Germany proudly states it's environmental claims, declaring itself the first major "renewable energy economy," and you can see it in the masses of wind turbines that are scattered amongst the corn fields (probably producing ethanol) and pastures from Berlin to Bavaria.

3. - Cyclists

This is not something that is refined to Germany, as we saw them all throughout Vienna, Prague and now Innsbruck as well. European cities are all about bikes these days. One of the things that makes it innately easier for anyone to ride in these cities is that there are no helmet laws. You wanna ride a bike, it's fine. Just hire one and off you go. The bike lines are usually well laid out, separated from cars and pedestrians, and as the cities are mostly flat it looks like the best way to get around (apart from the public transport systems which I'll talk about another time.) I imagine it is anyway, as I of course don't do anything like physical exercise... When you see these cities, with few cars and lots of people riding around on bikes, you actually start to understand Clover's vision for Sydney. I think the personal responsibility aspect of removing mandatory helmets is an important aspect of this. It allows for communal bike sharing schemes that allow tourists to easily get around.

Of course, we also saw some segue tours which looked great.

Overall, the driving experience was fantastic and I'd highly recommend it. This is not to discount train travel though. I'll talk about that when we get back to London.

Sorry about the rambling nature of this blog. I wanted to get it out tonight as I want to write something a bit more serious tomorrow. Until then, salu.

RaC