Travel
Prims Earth Trek continues
I ’ m back ! “ Back from where ?” you ask . “ Who the hell are you anyway ?” Fair enough , I should reintroduce myself .
I ’ m Steven , I write travel books and humorous novels . ( Visit Amazon , search for “ Steven Primrose-Smith ” and buy as many as you can afford . Please . Times are hard .) And I ’ m attempting a very special adventure , but recently I had an injury .
The doctors couldn ’ t find anything specifically wrong with my leg , but the NHS ’ s lack of resources meant they didn ’ t search particularly hard . As someone not leaking blood from every pore I wasn ’ t a priority . That ’ s fair enough .
So my round-the-world walk finally restarted on the 11th July from Maastricht train station , exactly a month to the day that I wearily
The delicious raspberry and redcurrant wine I found in the Netherlands
hobbled into it . As my coach had approached Maastricht , my shin started to throb , almost like a warning . With this in mind , the first day was going to be a short one , just 10 km to the nearest campsite . Ominously , after such a tiny distance , my leg didn ’ t feel great .
So the next day I did another 10 km and things felt slightly better . I kept raising the distance , to 15 , then 20 , then 25 and now have reached the mid-30s km mark .
The part of the Netherlands through which I spent the first three or so days was unexciting , mostly forgettable villages and residential properties . The only bright spot was my discovery of a really delicious and affordable bottle of raspberry and redcurrant wine from the local Aldi . Sadly , this brand wasn ’ t available in the next country I visited . I know , because I checked every shelf . Twice .
I entered Germany and almost immediately landed in the pleasant city of Aachen . That night I discovered the real joy of Deutschland for someone on a low budget walk like this : the huge number of massive forests , ideal for wild camping . I got a shock the first night with what sounded like someone being violently murdered , but which just turned out to be a rather alarmed deer .
The scenery started to improve , with a few more hills appearing . And then I hit the river Rhein and followed it into Koblenz , where that mighty river meets up with another one , the Mosel . For the next few days my route twisted along the lovely Lahm valley , highsided and
Wonderful Würzburg
covered in trees , the water full of boats , the boats full of people , the people full of beer .
Towards the end of this leg , at a sausage snack bar , I met Gabi and Robert , two locals , who invited me to stay at their house a couple of days ’ walk down my path . When I met up with them again the evening was a great test of my German . It noticeably improved after a few beers but reached its peak once the schnapps came out .
It wasn ’ t far from there to Frankfurt . As the city was flattened during WW2 , almost everything that looks old is a not entirely convincing reconstruction , like bad plastic surgery . As such , it lacks the atmosphere of Europe ’ s greatest cities , but it was still worth seeing . Like bad plastic surgery .
My favourite city on this walk so far was next , Würzburg , almost entirely destroyed during 17 minutes of Allied bombing in 1945 but rebuilt , mostly by the town ’ s women . And what a cracking job they made of it ! If my girlfriend ever says DIY is my domain , I ’ ll point her to the Fraus of Würzburg .
Sadly , the EU throws me out of the Schengen Area on the 2nd September and so my journey will have to pause again for a while , but thank you for reading and , as they say now that I ’ ve reached Bavaria , Servus !
Lovely Gabi and Robert , who invited me to stay in their German home
STEVEN PRIMROSE-SMITH PrimsEarthTrek . com
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