Autobahn Part 3: On bratwurst, bier, and Bavaria

Whoever invented the bed and breakfast is right up there with the genius who created peanut butter and jelly, or the luminary who first put ice in coke. You don't need a Harvard MBA (heck, you don't even need a Massey MBA) to realize that the bed and breakfast is the perfect embodiment of that elusive concept of synergy.

They sure do take their Easter seriously here. Rock does the same with his breakfast.

Rock gears up for round two.

Just another derelict two star trailer park. One wonders what five stars looks like around here, a private castle perhaps?

The baby of the autobahn, the cute little Fiat 500. For such a miniature frame, she sure does pack a lethal punch. Something Rock should be quite used to.


Such a little set of wheels does have some advantages, such as being small enough to zip through the narrow streets of the ubiquitous Old Town without the risk of Rock re-zoning it into a construction site.

140 km/h and we're only half way up the speedometer. Is this a great country or what?

Back to Lindau, this time by day. The lighthouse doesn't have a heck of a lot of work to do on a glorious spring day like this. Sounds like he needs to head to http://j00ster.blogspot.com/.

Apparently Lindau hosts a biennial Nobel Laureate meeting, where the creme de la creme of the world's scientists meet to talk Higgs Bosons and Quantum Cosmologies. This year's keynote address, "Why I traded my particle accelerator for a spreadsheet", will be delivered by none other than the world's third most famous Millennium List dropout.

When the lake is this calm, the breakwater is pretty much redundant. Much like this caption. Or indeed this author.


Ahoy me hearties, is this the bratwurst delivery by any chance?

The view from the top. It may not be 30 Rockefeller, but on the upside you pay only 2 euro instead of 20 dollars. Hang on, that's pretty much the same these days, right?



The Lion, the Witch, and... well, her enormous Anthropologie wardrobe is still at home so let's leave it at that.

Old Town Lindau is actually a virtual island, connected to the shore only via a thin land bridge. This happy geographical situation means that the encroachment of the modern world has been kept at bay.
Well, kept at bay as long as you can ignore that annoying crane in the background. But who will notice the crane when you've got such a cool dude in the foreground? Uhm, that's kind of like saying no one will notice the rest of the internet once they find J00ster Journal.

It's getting difficult to come up with the scintillatingly witty commentary that our expansive subscriber base expects when every second photo is another picturesque old town street. Or, translated out of grandiose J00ster-speak: Rock's getting lazy with the captions, but it doesn't matter because anyone who reads this blog clearly has little better to do than forlornly click refresh on facebook every five seconds in the pathetic hope of living vicariously through someone's mundane status update.

Like most towns in Germany, the town center is best navigated on two wheels. Actually, it's best navigated by pretty much any form of transport that Rock isn't steering.

En route to the Bavarian Alps the scenery is so good it almost makes you want to slow down for a better look. Yeah right.

There is of course only one reason you might consider lifting the foot off the gas on the autobahn. The "Bratwurst, next exit" signs are ten times more effective at slowing traffic down than something as quaint as a speed limit.

Every man and his blog has a set of Alps. The French, the Italians, the Swiss, the Japanese, the Kiwis, and now the Germans are getting in on the act too. How about a bit of originality folks? Not that J00ster is really in any position to claim the moral high ground when it comes to originality.

Bavarian cuisine is a bit like the old Model T: You can have any flavor you want, so long as it's pork.

First sighting of perhaps the most famous castle in the world: the fairy tale world of Neuschwanstein.

Castles don't come any better than this. Unless of course they contain the latest 3D Harry Potter ride.

Unfortunately, King Ludwig II died before he could even finish his most famous creation. Mei suspects a similar fate will befall her given the length of the line to get in.

There's only one thing that Bavaria does better than castles: biergartens!
A big bier for a little girl. Fortunately Mei does not come unprepared, having completed an extensive training session in the clubs of New York with a 4.0 GPA.
A big bier calls for an even bigger plate of fries.

You know they take their bier seriously when the biergarten is so big they need a dedicated beer truck to go out to the far reaches of the garden to bring back a steady stream of empty mugs.

Apparently this place seats 8,000. That's larger than the popluation of most of the towns along the way.

Rock's difficulties start before he even gets to the alcoholic bit; just lifting the mug is proving quite a challenge.

The legendary Augustiner Keller biergarten has been in continuous operation since 1812. That's longer than most countries have been operating. Which is just another way of saying their bier is pretty darn good.