Saturday 16th July Swidnica to Rosenbach
Swidnica's biggest tourist attraction will have to remain a secret to us, because wherever the town centre was or however you got there, was just too hard on a Saturday morning. Therefore we headed off to Germany, spending our last zlotys as we went.
In Europe the supermarkets advertise and sell bottles of beer, fizzy, water, etc at an individual bottle price but they don’t separate the bottles on the shelf; they leave them packaged in the plastic wrap. So if you want to buy a box of beer, the checkout operator has to open the box and scan one bottle’s bar code and multiply the purchase. It can hold people up and would therefore make sense to have a box price as well. Today we struck a Polish guy who was obviously trying to argue that the advertised price was for the six packaged together and therefore caused a big queue and lots of laughter.
In an attempt to use our last zlotys’ we (note: "we" means J9) bought 2 yogurts, 2 bottles of beer, a loaf of bread, an onion, a chocolate bar, some peppermints and cheese. All up it came to NZ$5.00. Not sure what the creative Master Chef is going to do with those eclectic items but that will be the last of cheap food now that we are back in Germany.
We stopped in Gorlitz which is in Germany; if you walk across the bridge you are in Poland. Apparently after a few changes of ownership and disagreements Poland got to keep their side of the river. Both towns recognise Saint (Formerly Pope) John Paul II, but on their own side of the bridge in their own translation of his name. The petrol station on the Polish side has a sign that flashes between the euro price and the zloty price. The other major difference is the driving, the Polish drive like idiots, the Germans like fast idiots.
(J9's assistant: 95% of german drivers rate their skills as better than average.)
Having arrived early at our destination we are having a well deserved rest in the shade, from the sun, in Rosenbach, a quiet hamlet with just a pub and a parking area for campers. Everybody came out of the houses to see the English speaking people, but only one of them had a small vocabulary of English, just enough to take the money. Actually I will retract that “quiet Hamlet” definition as a party has just started over at the pub, with the MC having a loud speaker microphone and the guests having wheelbarrow races. The bass sounds of the techno-music could be felt until well after 2am....
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Stellplatz in Rosenbach
Polish version of the Pope
J9 and a pole on the border
German border at Gorlitz