WHAT’S HAPPENED HERE? VAN LIFE IN GERMANY: BEAUTY vs DEVASTATION

WHAT’S HAPPENED HERE? VAN LIFE IN GERMANY: BEAUTY vs DEVASTATION

v v d v is Das ignorant Brits not pronouncing things properly that’s what Das is n do you know what’s really annoying about this you when in the rain good afternoon everyone um Steven was going to be in this little introduction bit but he kind of just said to me oh you can do it can’t you so there we go there’s his commitment for you right there um we’ve driven to a town quite a bit further south from where we last saw you and we are in a town called veroda and it is meant to be a very pretty sat town it’s got a castle and it’s still in the region we were in before which is known as the Zony anal region I think and it’s all very Central Germany now more specifically veroda is in a region known as the ha region it’s kind of like a national park um and it’s a very mountainous region but not quite mountains mountains just kind of very very tall Hills I think I think the highest point I can’t remember the name of it is about 1,100 M so we’re not talking like staggering here we’re kind of talking like UK level high mountains I guess and we’ve just found somewhere to park so we’re in a little car park that’s kind of just beneath the castle just above the town so really conveniently within walking distance to both um it is a bit of a slope there’s no Services here or anything like that but it is free so that’s quite nice cuz we have paid for a fair few spots as we’ve gone around around but it’s nice to mix it up with some free spots as well otherwise it would just be a very very expensive trip um so yeah we’ll put up with the with the slop Steven did drive up onto some bricks to try and balance us out but it looks really awkward and dodgy so I don’t know if we’re going to keep it like that or not cuz we’re both kind of worrying about it but it seems fine it has kind of wred us somewhat but before we go out exploring we’re going to have a little bit of lunch cuz we’ve been shopping I think we said in the last video I can’t remember now how nice it is to try s the some of the different foods that you see more often and they have all these kind of like pickly potato salad type things so we got ourself another kind of girkin potato salad um I think this is more like sauerkraut kind of stuff but there’s other bits mixed in this is like a salmon kind of dip of salts and then I know this is just kale I think in a jar but I feel like you don’t see that back home so I’m quite interested to use that for something or just eat it so there we are that’s today’s lunch a bit of a variety of everything chucked on a plate I know you can find lots of these Foods back in the UK and that really is just kale in a jar but somehow that excites me even if I can find that back home um it’s just quite nice to see in a big jar like that and the potato salad certainly feels like something we’ve not seen before with all the pickles in anyway I think we said all this before let’s tuck in right scrap all of that for a second we are going to explore the town but we are now just going to we’ve just turned around to go and move the van because we’ve noticed a space further down it’s a little bit flatter and just seems a little bit more suitable than where we are so we’re going to do that before we do anything else there she is there’s our days what you talking about me then there’s my days my little Daisy what may your daffodil Daniel daffodil some old truck what me yeah me yeah probably anyway that looks like a better spot to me it does so we’ve moved moved to this little car park and a lot of people might be like well hang on a minute why have you moved from somewhere that looks really isolated and peaceful and all surrounded by nature but you know what sometimes practical is better than pretty you know because it was slopey and it was annoying so and we were worried about being on the bricks we’re actually now worried that the tire is going down but we’ll worry about that later when we come back um yeah it’s not ideal being in a car park but it feels much better and much more practical to stay in I think what you also have to remember is that David Daisy is a bit old and scuffed yeah and when she’s surrounded by nice new looking cars what are you going to steal well that’s true you’ve just jinxed it hopefully not yeah it’s a practical over pretty sometimes because at the end of the day when you’ve got all your blinds up and you’re sat in bed or whatever you’re doing what if you could be anywhere right that’s what we always say about staying in places like lais once everything’s closed up what difference does it make it’s only nice when it’s really lovely weather and you can be kind of sort of sitting outside or something otherwise it’s not really doesn’t make much difference just like being on the field the other day in the farmer Meadow you know that was lovely but I’ve been fting yeah F to bit to Betsy exactly practical not pretty not always but you know a lot of the time anyway we’re going to walk into town and see if there’s anything worth looking at if not we’re going to turn around and come back and go back what’s it called Stephen the town um atun atun oh what’s it what’s its name I don’t know can’t you pronounce it wi something like that wil and what I don’t know where’ you get from we’re going into verar Roa I’m probably saying it wrong as well to be fair um and it’s getting late in the day now we’re really tired so this first little look around will be a little bit brief but hopefully it’ll give you some idea and then we’ll be staying here and looking around tomorrow possibly the castle anyway enough of us let’s have a look at the town [Music] n [Music] a [Music] so we found a nice little Pub of course we have it’s an Irish Pub two drinks cheers to that what do you think of oh my God I forgot how to say it now right now I’ve reminded myself take two what do you think of verar rodo Steven love it absolutely gorgeous isn’t it no not the beer the town yeah but so it’s just a brief look around then we’re going to head back to the van we’ve come in for a drink it’s kind of just started to rain it’s really clouded over and it is supposed to rain all day tomorrow but this place is like you don’t know where to put your eyes it is absolutely everywhere these beautiful timer buildings and not just in one street like you usually see they’re in every street every building it is just literally A Feast for the eyes and it’s like what do you do what do you do it’s like I’ve never seen anything like it neither of us have have we and it feels like there is no comparison in the UK so I don’t know if this is normal for Germany or if this is exceptionally pretty or what but wow absolutely incredible so cheers to that what have a drink and we will probably see you tomorrow because we’re going to go and explore some other little bits and pieces more specifically here um if it’s not raining too hard all right so let’s have a drink and we will see you later do you know what’s really annoying about this you whenever in the rain filming in the rain is annoying yeah I’m very sorry I’ll stop briefly but when you try and fil in the rain and say oh look how bad it is we’re getting soaked and then you look at the camera and it looks like nothing’s there we’re getting absolutely drenched cuz we never put our coats on stupid men it’s not that it was warm it didn’t seem like it was going to be that bad and the town isn’t that far away but it was just kind of really heavy while we’re walking back anyway we’re going to get back to the van our little Park up and we will show you more of this beautiful city I don’t know where Steven’s just gone maybe I’m going the wrong way tomorrow so we see you tomorrow well that’s some view isn’t it we are in a car park and it is absolutely well it’s not chucking it down but it has been chucking it down and it’s going to rain all day which we knew to be fair and we have been really lucky so we’re not too worried however the plan today is to go and explore the castle up on the hill which if we can go inside which I think we can should give us something to do away from the rain as you can see Steven’s view is just as wonderful his side more rain more cars this morning has been a real slow one getting started in fact it’s almost the afternoon now I think um we’re on a bit of a go slow I appear to be developing some kind of pain under my eye I don’t know what it is we think it might be a sty starting so hopefully whatever it is it goes as soon as possible um cuz it’s really aching underneath it feels swollen it doesn’t know if it looks here than moment um look at the state of that crying out loud anyway so today we are going to go up to verar Roa Castle which is just up the hill from us here it’s a short walk I think um it looks very impressive I don’t think it’s that expensive to get in maybe eight or nine euros each which isn’t too bad compared to some of these places and I think it’s got about 50 rooms you can go and look in um whether we have to go on a guided tour or whether we can look around by ourselves which we prefer I don’t know we’ll soon find out uh but the views of the town meant to be really great from above I’m not sure how good that’s going to be today in this weather but we will make our way up and yeah have a lovely time in a big old German castle and learn something about its history hopefully oh and just very quickly that Pub we were in last night right in the center of this beautiful town they were the drinks were about what £450 each I think Steven maybe about that um which you know that’s still expensive for beer but compared to back home that’s not that bad at all cuz it was like a pint size or whatever it was um so yeah back home especially in a really touristy place like that you would be paying easily 5 550 upwards so quite impressed with that so far in Germany it’s not been so bad for the alcohol prices well this is looking utterly miserable today isn’t it we’ve just walked into town um we’ve come back it is really wet but we’re going to go and press on and go and explore the little castle on the till Hill Castle on the till the hastle on the hill it’s not little anyway so that’s all wrong come on then let’s go let’s go we sound so excited don’t we it it’s going to be nice I’m sure but we’re just feeling a bit uninfused today but it’ll be fine it’s going to be amazing come on SO walking up a steep hill in the rain with no path are you enjoying yourself Steven are you having the best time no look at my happy face but you can actually get a train to the top and it’s not not like a proper train but it’s a train that kind of runs on the road um and it runs every 30 minutes I think it’s this cute yellow thing that goes up so possibly we could have done that but where we’re parked it’s not near the start point so it’s probably just as easy for us by the time we walk down to it we may as well walk up I think we might be a little bit under the weather today literally because we might have had one too many beers last night but don’t tell anyone it didn’t happen unfortunately you weren’t allowed to film in the castle and most of the info was in German but still there was a lot to see inside This Magnificent building which has been redesigned over the centuries originally built in the 1100s as a fortress it was then used as a stopover for German Emperors during hunting trips in the region so basically an extremely fancy hotel despite the weather being more miserable than Steven the views over the town and Valley were still worth the Trek and at least the castle kept us dry for a bit tonight’s van dinner is something a little bit different and we’re going to be using this which I we have zero interest in but we found a use for it thanks to my mom so this tin of bachelor’s soup um you’re probably familiar with it in the UK maybe many of you like and enjoy it um it’s bachelor’s condensed soup mushroom flavor it’s been around for absolutely donkeys years I remember it from being when I was a kid we all remember it right um and it’s like a condensed soup you put in the SAU Spin and you usually have to add something like milk or water or whatever just to kind of give it some texture um when we visit my mom she tends to kind of load us up with things for the van for the food cupboard which we’re really grateful for it’s really nice of her to do that she doesn’t have to do it at all um and we said her not to do it but anyway that’s another story but she she likes you know giving us a few bits and pieces um cupboard Staples if you like and usually it’s all really useful stuff but sometimes it’s like what the hell are we going to do with that you know and we we’re not really interested in bachelor’s condensed soup it’s not the sort of thing these days we would usually eat um but she told us a recipe now my mom’s a really good cook so she doesn’t need to do this or anything but sometimes it’s just nice to have a really simple thing to Chuck together um and she said chucking this in a sauce spin with uh some like onions and garlic maybe a bit of paprika and then some actual mushrooms and then putting it through some pasta cooked pasta and you end up with a really quick and tasty pasta sauce now I’m sure this sounds like whatever to many of you but to us that was like oh that’s a bit of a revelation you know so we tried it not thinking it was going to be that good and it is actually really really lovely so finally these condensed soup tins have an actual purpose um so that’s what we’re cooking tonight and whatever’s going on with my eye that I think I mentioned earlier in the video I’m not sure if it made it or not but yeah there’s something going on with my eye it’s swelling up and now it really seems to be showing so God only knows what that is and what it’s going to actually turn into maybe a sty hopefully nothing worse but back to cooking we had loads of mushrooms I might even have more than this because they always cook down to not I’m not going to say nothing but they definitely shrink considerably so it feels like you always have to get more mushrooms than you think you need then we put a few green peppers in it’s not the normal big bell pepper they’re kind of like the long Pento style Peppers that you often see um they seem to sell them a lot here in Germany and they’re quite nice cuz they’ve got a little bit of a kick to them without being too hot please note this is not now a cooking channel and I think it’s probably evident that that should never happen as well um just to interrupt this riveting cooking segment with a news flash the on the back of the can stevenh just looked at it and there’s actually a recipe for a pasta dish involving this tin of condensed mushroom soup so ignore everything we’ve said it’s not some kind of Revelation thanks Mom we thought you’d been all original there but maybe you just read it off the back of the tin I don’t know to be fair it’s completely different to this one but you know it’s pasta using the sauce all right you get it anyway now you get it it’s still nice and the fact of the matter is it makes a change from using like a jar of tomato sauce or that kind of thing and doing something different with pasta so the Soup’s in I’ve stirred some milk through it it’s a little bit watery at the moment but that will thicken up and now we’ll add a little little bit of paprika which is not coming out of the jar hold that for we’ll add a little bit of paprika I had to do that three times cuz I couldn’t pronounce it then so I’ve already pulled some in I think that’s enough then I’ve chucked in a little bit of fresh spinach and as we all know spinach is a bit like witchcraft you spend a lot on a big bag and it all just Withers into absolutely nothing within seconds it never feels worth it does it but it gives it a little bit of Greenery in this decidedly average looking sauce and that’s pretty much it really I’ll just cook some pasta and stir it through I guess you can add cheese if you like but we like to kind of sprinkle our over the top it’s probably nicer with a bit of cream instead of milk but we didn’t have cream I don’t know why it looks gray like dish water but it does taste all right so we’re back from verar Roa Castle which is just up the road didn’t quite go to plan in terms of the video but what did you think Steven yeah it’s all right it was right it’s nice enough to look around and also how much was the coffee in there cuz we really wanted one it’s like it’s 850 for a large coffee wasn’t it six something but that’s still pretty bad paying that for a and and their large coffees are just like a normal English cup of coffee yeah it’s like it’s not even a a big coffee so we bypass that yeah I W to around and walk straight back out again no Steven was impressed so yeah verer roic car that was it was very pretty it looks beautiful but it’s just such a shame we couldn’t actually film inside but we can tell you that it did look absolutely gorgeous in there like the rooms were lovely I know Steven’s like yeah whatever but they were some of the rooms were really Grand some absolutely beautiful like wallpaper and ceiling decorations and things like that all the usual things to be honest it was very much like the German National Trust if you like um and it’s quite interesting going around these properties well I know we’ve only been to one here but so much of it just follows a similar trajectory doesn’t it where it has all these years of History centuries um with big important people Kings royalty Emperors whatever all kind of coming and going and all kinds of other sort of things happening Wars and yet eventually in the last 100 years like with a lot of National Trust big properties um they they’re kind of it’s sort of surplus to anyone’s requirements like that I don’t know what the term is really it just Falls by the wayside and eventually somehow come into the hands of um not the public but becomes accessible to the public uh yeah so just interesting how so much of that it just represents history probably across Europe if not the world doesn’t it that there were once people uh rulers were riing on these buildings to to dwell in and hold their Banquets and all the rest of it um and now it’s like nobody maybe nobody can sustain them or maybe it’s just seen as something expensive yeah or just just seen as just I’m not going to say not appropriate but it just doesn’t fit in in today’s world perhaps so they’ve just become kind of like museums of the past but yeah very important people did stay there over time as well and it eventually got it had been transformed all through different styles Gothic Etc and in the late 1800s it was remodeled entirely to kind of look like what you saw today um so that was because there was a rule I’m not even going to say cuz I’m just going to explain it really badly but they they had to do that because the person needed it to be changed for something I’m not I can’t even explain it no sacked sacked yeah it’s kind of difficult it’s bad enough when you’re trying to do the English ones and you you’re Vaguely Familiar with like English kings and queens but when you come to an entirely different country and you can’t pronounce them or you’ve got to look up how to pronounce everything it’s quite complicated let’s just say it’s an important building and it’s very very beautiful yeah and we’ll leave it at that shall we yeah yeah and that is pretty much the final product except some cheese we’ll put on the top um I don’t know why it looks really yellow on this camera looks much yellower on the camera than it does in real life but I safe to say I don’t think that’s too bad I mean it’s edible and there we are our gourmet bachelor’s condensed mushroom soup is served yeah it’s nice is it all right yeah I mean that’s nice and quick and easy isn’t it something simple to Cobble together in a van just one quick thing on pasta I don’t know if anyone else in a van or a motor home feels this but we we kind of find it a bit annoying to do we we don’t have it as often as we might have done when we lived in bricks and mo because for one simple reason and it may sound so stupid and that’s draining the pasta water so quite often I’ll try and do it so that I cook the pasta enough so that it cooks with just enough water so there’s no water to drain off which is not always easy to do and often means your pasta doesn’t come out that good so with draining the water of course we’ve got a sink but I I don’t really like to put pasta water down the sink if I can help it because if anyone’s noticed like it can sometimes congeal doesn’t it it kind of goes into some kind of like kind of jelly yeah and I really just don’t want that getting stuck in the sink so the other option it’s like well it’s only past the water surely we can just put it outside and it’s like yeah we can you know if it’s appropriate but often you’re in places like we know it’s fine it is just past the water you’re not doing anything particularly harmful it’s not going to do any harm to the ground um but you know especially if there’s a bit of grass behind where you parked which there nearly always is some trees whatever but it’s like if somebody sees that it still doesn’t look great does it so you kind of wrestle with the idea of oh it’s probably right just to do it but if somebody sees it they’ll interpret it as something else and it will look like you’re kind of not littering but just being a bit disrespectful so yeah just just thought I’d put that out there about pasta and pasta water and why we don’t have it so much is that weird I don’t know is that how we both feel yeah I think it is really isn’t it yeah I also feel like I want to eat my dinner we want to eat our dinner so let’s just get on you can press stop now no the next morning the sun was out so it only felt right to take one last wander around verer Roda when I asked eveneven to come with me I was met with a shrug but at least he got the van ready so I could drag him Kicking and Screaming to the next location [Music] oh [Music] [Music] [Music] morning morning morning morning morning so we’re going to leave veroda today um I had a quick walk into town this morning just to kind of have one last look around um just to mop up some things that we hadn’t maybe seen I think probably we saw some of the same stuff again but it was just nice to kind of walk around again and get one last look at it uh but I think we both recommend this place don’t we yeah definitely it’s lovely absolutely gorgeous um you know maybe we once we see several German towns we might not think so much but I can’t that just looked amazing to us so highly highly recommend veroda including the castle um even though you can’t take pictures when you’re in there yeah but today we’re going to move on it the sun’s out so it looks like it’s going to be a reasonably good day at least for some of it and we’re going to go what are we going to do we’re going into the ha’s mountains to go we’re going to go walking Steve wonderful wonderful you’re just going to love it so much we can have so much fun we could be trekking for hours uphill sweating I’m raring to go oh it would be wonderful we’ll see you in the ha mountains bye just before we go hiking we’ve just nipped into little to do a bit of shopping and return some plastic bottles but another thing that’s really good here that I’d like to point out hang on I’m doing this all wrong another thing that’s great about the supermarkets here as a posted back home is that when you want a trolley it takes three different types of coins usually A50 or €2 I think whereas back home it’s always just a pound isn’t it so much more convenient so we’ve arrived in the ha’s region so it’s one of Germany’s national parks now the weird thing about this is they don’t look that high up um the highest is only 1,1 something meters tall which is brocken uh we’re not going to hike up that today we’re going to go to the second highest point I can’t remember the name of it and that’s about 900 and something meters uh so still pretty tall however it’s far less of a mountain and more like a kind of gradual Plateau sort of thing so when you look around this whole region it just doesn’t feel like we’re that high up um when you’re in Scotland or Wales and you’re on Peaks that are kind of like 8 900 M tall it feels tall you know they often feel like really dramatic perhaps because they rise up so quickly um so I can only assume the region we’re in it just we were already high up perhaps down in veroda and it was like it just gradually Rises so you don’t notice the height um I don’t know cuz it definitely doesn’t feel that high but maybe we’ll change our mind when we get to the top of wherever we’re going but anyway we’re going to have a nice walk we’ve got here we’ve got some lunch we’ve got our baguettes to take with us like little Good Boy Scout um there’s a lot of dead trees around here which we will talk about later so it kind of looks like not as spectacular as it might um but we will go into that later cuz there’s a reason for that which is quite uh troubling in some ways but anyway let’s go and enjoy our hike in the hars mountains [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] well after one day of rain we’re back to Sunshine quite glorious isn’t it yay we’ve been really lucky with the weather because they’ve had some bad flooding in Germany all the time we’ve been here but just not where we’ve been so that works out pretty well so far yeah um anyway today we’re walking around a lake called the UDA take I think it’s called um so we’re going to have a little walk around that and then it takes us further up to the second highest point here which I think is called the brockberg I know I’m saying that wrong um but more specifically a viewing Point called the vules Vite oh God I’m not saying that right I’m just is it vulite that’s what you said vul Vite vulite we’ll write it there I think some people might argue it’s not the second highest point because the highest mountain Here Mount Brock um has many kind of Peaks around it that are a bit higher but they some people might class it as the same Mountain so separate from that this is the second highest peak at 900 and something met so not too bad but still pretty high but there is no indication of height is there right now don’t know I try not to think about these yeah he’s just going to ignore it all I’m thinking about is my sandwich well you can wait till we’re halfway yeah it’s just here for the lunch what else oh for the Glorious Lake for the for the nature I haven’t got a walk for like 6 miles to see just sit down on a rock or something and the joke is you haven’t actually got to walk 6 miles so that because you can actually drive up to where we go in oh sorry did I just yeah yeah never mind so I’ve just looked it up and the place specifically we’re going it’s called The vules V Viewpoint I think that’s how you say it V vas V vas is D ignorant Brits not pronouncing things properly that’s what D is nine [Music] so everything now has just started to take a gradual turn upwards which obviously Steven’s delighted about um so it is deceiving we knew we were going high it just didn’t look like we were going High um but it started now however it is kind of like a gradual incline it’s not too steep so far so it’s definitely doable as it stands not sure if Steven will agree but he’s back there so we won’t worry about that everywhere we’ve seen water on this walk so far all of it has been this orange color so it’s kind of like an orangey Brown including the entire Lake um and I know you can swim in the lake so it’s not dirty water or anything as far as we know but we think we haven’t read it but we think it’s probably like iron ore or something like that in the water um certainly from what we’ve seen in the UK when it’s this color it’s usually to do with iron so yeah it doesn’t look 100% appealing although it doesn’t look too bad on this camera but I don’t think it’s anything bad one of the things you really notice in this region um is the fact that there are so many dead trees some of them have fallen over some of them are kind of like half chopped down and possibly failed by humans after they’ve died and some of them many of them are just standing upright and they just look like husks with no life in whatsoever and the reason for this is due to a beetle called The Bark Beetle which has infested the ha’s mountains and killed off so many Spruce and pine trees um I’m being bitten by something now hold on cuz that’s what happens when you walk in the Hills probably a bark beater or something no I think they’re all right with humans so yeah it’s absolutely decimated the region I know where we’re walking right now you can’t really see it but everywhere you look there are dead trees and it sort of looks like something Dreadful has happened like a storm has passed through or some kind of awful event has taken place and the ground is like long recovering or something um sadly I think this has happened pretty quickly over time I don’t think it’s a long-term thing I think the this Beetle has done this relatively quickly um so yeah it’s not good however where the trees have died new ones are coming up and I think it doesn’t eat all sorts of trees so if a different tree was to replace it um not sure but possibly like deciduous trees um if that was to replace the pines and the sprues then it the the trees might Thrive again um but you do see new Pines coming up so they’re not completely gone or anything and obviously there are still many standing it’s just something that has really taking its toll on these Hills so as I was saying earlier the views are not as spectacular as they might be because there’s something kind of a bit postapocalyptic about these Hills when you look across especially when you’re high up and you see that half of it just seems to the life seems to have been sucked out entirely um so yeah it’s not brilliant but still a beautiful National Park and it’s very peaceful up here and we’re enjoying the wonderful weather so far and not too many complaints about the hills yet Steven give me time give you time I mean we’ve got lunch to go so that’s keeping him going we’re going to wait till we get to the top cuz walking up a hill after you’ve eaten a baguette is just the worst right [Music] [Music] come on I’m starving H me too V’s V the volf’s V that was the Vols V in the HS Mountain in National Park and we will call it a day here and head back to our little humble abod and figure out where we’re going to lay our heads again tonight well I’m thinking you’ve got a video to make so we might as it’s early find somewhere where we just haven’t got to move for a couple of days yeah we can go on with the video rather than get up and find somewhere and lose half the morning yeah I think that was always the plan we’re going to settle down cuz so I can put one of these things together um and we can get a shower maybe somewhere as well I don’t know anyway we will decide that when we get off of this mountain side she pretty Grim to walk down it is grim to walk down walking back is never fun is it it’s like oh we’re done now let’s just go back so we left our little walk and we just came out of the national park although I think we’ve just driven into it again we really were just trying to find somewhere very quickly to stay what the hell have we just found Steen this is amazing a little there’s a over there use the Wi-Fi the beers are about3 it’s a free air isn’t it yeah over there is with electric yeah yeah you got pay for the electric yeah but only for a few coins so you’ve got electric you put your coins in which is pretty good value um there’s a toilet on the on the air it’s just a few little spaces there’s a beautiful river running through it and right next to it is this calf with a swimming pool and we’ve got two beers how amazing well things have certainly changed since we last saw you we’re parked up in our little free air in this absolutely gorgeous Place uh we spent the night here I went for a run in the mountains on a strangely flat path which is like a cycle path there was a river below but anyway now it is like this and they’ve had some really bad floods in Germany since we’ve been here we’ve been lucky so far not to be around them so I’m hoping this just passes through we do have a drain next to us that could be good or bad well the rain and thunder eventually stopped so it wasn’t too bad it was really really torrential for a while but pass through we’ve come out of it unscathed so all good I’m popping one of these video things together and Steven is on dinner making duties yeah what we got Steve sweet potato Curry sweet potato curry couscous so sweet potato curry with couscous can’t beat that we love a bit of sweet potato well I do more than Steven but he’ll tolerate it anyway very nice thank you Steven video’s nearly done it’s dry good end to the day hi hi morning morning so I’ve woken up in our little free air in a place called zebra it is it’s kind of in the hills of the ha’s uh National Park uh it’s been beautiful here isn’t it it is really nice here unbelievable and this place is free so thank you Germany we are very grateful to that um we didn’t show you much I was just here doing a video mostly but if you want to come here uh just even spend a couple of days here it’s well worth it because there’s so many trails up into the mountains I managed to go for a run in them which is really nice you’ve got the river to follow which is beautiful just right next to us uh there’s toilets here which is really great I think they’re open all night um not much like there’s no phone signal not really but there is some free WiFi that you can use um and there’s not really much by way of services but as a little stop over and to see some of the things around you then well well well well well worth it very friendly very welcoming as well extremely welcoming Community here um there’s nothing here there’s no shops either so you kind of have to get your bits and come up but oh my God it’s so lovely and that that place we went to when you saw us very briefly when the sun was out and there’s a swimming pool and the little bar in the shop and they do some food like oh you can you could spend a good couple of days here in a on a hot summer day couldn’t you it would be pretty lovely and there were a few people that were speaking English yeah and they made an effort to come over and talk to us they did yeah they did really nice so that is it that is where we’re going to leave you this week uh please push your subscribe button your like your notification and we will see you on the next one yep thank you for watching I don’t know where we’re going next uh we are heading somewhere kind of like southeast eastsh of Germany that’s all we know at this stage all right so we’ll see you next time bye bye [Music]

Vanlife in Germany has shown us so much already, and this week, as we travel in our campervan through the country, we discover an unbelievably beautiful town straight out of a fairytale, before heading into the Harz mountains National Park, where we find a region that has been devastated by something causing widespread death of the trees here.
#vanlifegermany #travelvlog #wernigerode

We have also since learned that the death of the trees has been exacerbated by potential climate change: drier summers and stronger storms mean the trees are more likely to fall, and as such it’s created the perfect conditions for the bark beetle to thrive.

We also do a bit of campervan cooking using a cheap and cheerful recipe involving a can of mushroom soup, because we have to eat or we’ll perish, and with our limited cooking set up, any new ideas are welcomed with open mouths. And we also eventually find ourselves on a wonderful free aire at the base of the Harz mountains, all the while dealing with the rain that seems to be constant at the moment across Europe. Vanlife: it’s certainly never boring!

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Dan & Stephen
xx