Uberlingen

We made a flying (well driving actually) visit to Germany on our way back home to France after we had been visiting family in England. Richard has been to Germany before ,but I had not, and I don't know why but I wasn't expecting to like it that much. Happily I was very pleasantly surprised with the tiny part of Germany that we visited. We had been happily driving along on the excellent motorways that Germany has to offer when tiredness got the better of us. One look at the map and we decided to stop for the night at a place called Uberlingen. Uberlingen is beautiful place, and well known specialist health resort with magnificent public buildings in pale green stone, lots of alleys full of half timbered houses, wonderful views across Lake Constance (Bodensee) and glorious gardens. The most important of the city monuments is the Munster, a large medieval structure that required 200 years to build. The larger of its two towers functioned as a military watchtower during wars. On the opposite side of the square is Uberlingen's Rathus which was built in the late 1400's. Now most of its interior is used as municipal offices. It was early afternoon on a Saturday when we arrived, and everything was closed but there were lots of people walking about taking in the air. The first few hotels we tried were fully booked, it wasn't looking too promising. Finally we got lucky at a large hotel called Bad Hotel, Christophstr. 2, 88662 Uberlingen, (Tel: 0 75 51/83 70). From the outside the hotel looked a bit run down, I guess it could have been the paint work, a rather lurid lilac colour. Inside however, was a completely different story, it was very contemporary. Our room was huge, with an equally large bathroom but surprisingly there was no bath just a shower, no matter we were too tired to care. Not too tired to head out and explore the town though. There was some interesting architecture and photo opportunities, it was a shame that the sun was not out though. As most people seemed to be walking along by the water we thought we would too. It was a dull day, and although the locals seemed not to notice, it was very cold, it made England feel warm! There were many bars and restaurants all along the waters edge, so we stopped off for a drink. Most people were seated inside but there were a few people sitting at the outside tables, so we decided to sit outside and watch people go by. We ordered two large beers which were delicious and stayed very cold until the last sip! By now we were feeling very cold, so we went off for a little walk again before finding ourselves unable to resist the temptation of another beer. This time though we sensibly sat inside. This bar was modern, busy and more importantly warm. Richard ordered a dark beer, and I ordered a cola-beer. Richard's beer was good not too bitter, and the cola-beer I had ordered was exactly that, a beer that tasted like cola ~ absolutely yummy! The time seemed to fly by quickly and before we knew it it was dark. Earlier in the afternoon we had noticed that in one of the town squares several stalls were being set up, and there was a band practicing. So even though by now we were absolutely freezing, we thought that as we were only here for the one night we would go along and see what was going on. There were quite a few people there, and all of the stalls were now open, selling food and drink. Neither of us speak or read much German, but the food looked good and we were hungry, so we bought a small roll, just one to share. It was filled with warm fish and lettuce and a tangy sauce, really tasty. At another stall we bought a beer and also tried some red wine, both were good although the wine was a bit too cold to taste the full flavour. After sharing the fish roll I was still hungry so I tried a different food stall, and this time I had another roll also filled with fish and lettuce, but it was cold, it tasted exactly like a roll~mop, so I guess that's what it was! It must have been the cold, but I was still hungry so I went back the first stall and bought another of the warm fish rolls, boy they were good. There were more substantial meals on offer, and lots of people were eating them but there was no way either of us felt like sitting down to eat in that cold weather, we were much happier to pace round, moaning about being cold! When the cold got too much for us we headed back to our hotel, where we had a nightcap in the bar before turning in for the night. The next morning we went down to the restaurant for breakfast, which was a buffet with everything anyone could possibly want. I was particularly happy as there were about 20 different teas to choose from, and there's nothing like a good cup of tea for breakfast. There were quite a few people at breakfast, as there had been a wedding party held at the hotel the previous evening. Had we visited Uberlingen when everything was open I am sure we would have found more to do. We both thoroughly enjoyed our short time in this beautiful place and would highly recommend it.

© Richard Randall

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