The next morning, we started our 6 hour road trip to Stuttgart, Germany. We started by driving through the mountains of Slovenia. The roads were fantastic for a zippy sports car and it was a lot of fun. Then we hit the highway through Austria for the middle half of the trip. We drove through a miles long tunnel that, when we looked back at it from the amazing rest stop on the other side, it was incredibly impressive to us that a tunnel had been created through such a huge mountain!
Yes, I said incredible rest stop. It almost approached Japanese rest stop levels of awesomeness! SMS got a large plate of goulash while I picked up a few things from a multi-table buffet layout. The food was very good. The rest stop was really clean and had nice seating with good lighting. There was a small shop where I bought a few Mozartkugal, which are delicious candies I remember from my brief Salzburg trip in 2006 (pre-blog!). Alas, apart from the highway and rest stop, this was not a road trip for Austria stops. Another time!
Our drive slowed as we approached a border checkpoint. We didn’t realize that we were listening to “Welcome to the Jungle” a little on the loud side so, combined with our nearly expired new car plates, we were waved over to the extra-scrutiny area. Fortunately, this only involved a thorough look through our papers and some limited English/German exchanges. Basically, once they figured out we were Americans, we were deemed not to be a threat.
From the border to Stuttgart, we had an uneventful ride except for one light traffic straightaway where SMS broke the 150 mph record. Sagoy! It was amazing and also, a little scary. Although SMS is a great driver and the car is built for speed, I could almost tangibly feel the potential for catastrophe. I can’t believe that race car drivers go over 200 mph. That’s crazy!
We pulled into Stuttgart and stopped in a bar near our AirBnB rental. It was speatchle time, yay! We both had a beer and a plated special. It hit the spot!
After dinner, we met up with our AirBnB host. It was definitely a shady setup where she wasn’t supposed to be subletting her apartment. She had tape over her stuff because people had gone through it before and I just had the feeling that there was a hidden camera somewhere. Which, I understand wanting to keep your place secure but maybe don’t rent out your primary residence as an entire apartment rental?
After we checked in, we walked over to the fairgrounds for the second night of Cannstater Volkfest, the second largest Octoberfest in Germany after Munich. We were a little tired so we just walked around for a bit and then headed home. We decided we’d eat and go on a ride the next night.
