We were delayed taking off from Heathrow for our annual German Motorcycle Grand Prix trip by about an hour. As we were due to get in late originally, Mike had visions of us sleeping under the car rental counter waiting for it to open the next morning. He probably thought this, as Germany is the scene for our many unusual sleeping locations in the past. Another one this trip would not be out of the ordinary. So far we have had cornfields, windmills, Hilton car parks - to name the first that spring to mind.
One good thing about flying from Britain to Germany is the “alien” queue is very short, as most people are travelling on European passports of some description. So we hurtled through immigration. I stayed to collect the luggage as Mike ran to the rental car counter to try and find it. Turns out our counter was the only one still open - especially for us. Mike had already primed the Opel station wagon and we shoved in the bag, yelled out a “Danke Schoen” to the sleepy man at the counter, took in a toilet stop and disappeared onto the Berlin ring road.
Mike was feeling cocky, and didn't wait for me to:
1) Learn how to operate the GPS
2) Learn how to defog the windscreen
3) Find a map, that may have solved both problems above (navigation aid and useful for waving at windscreen if desperate enough)
… and he promptly hurtled out of the airport into the dead traffic that was Berlin on a Friday night around 12am.
Of course, Mike's bold moves driving are often the portent to him coming down to earth rather fast. People familiar with Mike's now legendary 'I scoff at judder bars' statement as he drove around Kelburn in Wellington with two bicycles on the cycle rack will know that. The second judder bar encountered by the mighty Mirage that day in Kelburn almost threw both bikes off the back. Mike looked appropriately sheepish as he hefted the bikes back on the rack.
So, I was a little bit worried that 'We'll find the right autobahn without any maps or any idea at all' was a bit too similar. His bold navigation stance could have signified the end of a quick, easy drive to the comfortable bed in the ‘Formula One’ hotel, 180 kms down the autobahn. But, on this occasion, he was right. It was easy to follow the signs to Leipzig and end up on the right road. Let's hope the rush of success doesn't go to his head, and the memory of the result of scoffing at judder bars starts to dim. That would be a bad thing.
Meanwhile, I now had time to contemplate the complicated computer that controlled the GPS, the radio and the ventilation. Mike suggested the Owners manual, and can I just say that it made no difference whether I read the English or the German instructions. Nothing made any sense. Opel have a lot to learn about making a system that is intuitive and easy to use. When the passenger struggles to work the beast, how is the driver supposed to cope alone? Mike eventually found the steering wheel controls, but they needed too much of an eye on the system’s little TV screen to be entirely happy about even changing radio stations while driving. Also the screen was positioned so close to the steering wheel that you couldn’t see the screen, and keep both hands on the steering wheel at the same time. We happily rate the Mercedes and BMW systems over this Opel version.
Having a degree in computer science, it was only about 1.5 hours worth of fiddling to eventually hit upon the vague idea Opel engineers must have had in mind when the designed the console, and soon we had better music than ABBA on the radio. Actually, even when I found the ABBA station, I could only make it play for 10 seconds before it would switch itself off. And I could only get it back by manually selecting the station again. After 1 minute of interrupted 'Fernando' (which some might say is the only way to listen to that song) I finally hit upon the menu option that selected a station permanently. I selected ‘Rock Music’ as our preferred category (or I think I did, as although I had switched GPS woman into English, all the text on the screen was still German) and we found some decent music to drive by.
But, by then we were almost at the Formula 1. Mike swiped his credit card – a lot of times, since the card reader in all Formula 1’s is a bit hit and miss, but with eventual success – and we had a room for the night (1:30am meant it wouldn't be a long night) plus breakfast for 28 Euro. Not bad.
Up at 8:30 for some breakfast. The woman in the breakfast room switched to English immediately (how do they know?) and when I told her the room number said that we were the automatic people (that is, the ones mad enough to turn up at 1:30am without a reservation, and swipe and hope!). I could only agree. Yummy bread rolls (and passable jam - left the marmite at home) and coffee later, Mike was awake and we packed and left.
Arriving at the campsite about 1 more hour down the track, we found to our immense pleasure that the camping was free this year. This was a pretty good discount from the 80 Deutschmarks (about 80 kiwi dollars) it cost to pitch the tent last year. We were very pleased. And besides, Mike had decided that we shouldn't bother with the tent and sleep in the back of the rental car - being a station wagon.
We sorted out a daypack for the day and wandered off to the circuit. We had to pass through the tent city on the way to the circuit. It is always fun to look at what people are doing to their tent sites. One year we saw picket fences and pot plants. Another year there was a site with rousing East German socialist music blaring out of the speakers quite early in the morning. And this year, one tent site had a blow up doll hanging about 30m in the air from 5 big helium balloons. It was quite popular as every so often she would be hauled down and then released again. Fortunately we couldn't see what was happening at ground level from our particular vantage point. I was loath to get any closer.
Now, before we left London I had memorised the German for words such as 'invalid', and 'fake' and 'You're not coming in here with those tickets'. Why? Because the ADAC Sachsenring website had a new online ticketing system where you actually printed out your own tickets after buying them online. And the page was all in German so I could only hope I was telling Mike the right thing. They looked okay, but I still wasn't entirely convinced. However, looking around as we approached the turnstiles I could see lots of people clutching similar printouts to ours. And what's more, the turnstiles had signs over the top of them saying 'E tickets hier'. Excellent. Our tickets were scanned and in we went.
The weather had been overcast the night before, and Mike had printed out the 4 day forecast for Leipzig in London, which indicated rain for the next few days. So, we dressed warmly and carried jackets and umbrellas, prepared for the deluge. As soon as we were inside the circuit we realised the error in trusting the weather forecast on The BBC Weather Site. It was hot and sunny. Continental summer hot! We made our hot way to the grandstand at the other end of the circuit, where we had tickets for the weekend.
Our tickets were for Grandstand Number 12, so Mike asked a bratwurst seller if the grandstand next to him was 'Tribune twolf' (Dinglish if ever I've heard it – something between ‘twelve’, the English, and ‘zwölf’, the German). The sausage seller said yes, so we came in and showed the usher our ticket, and they waved us to a few rows in front. Mike and I were mystified as to how anyone could find their seats when the row number did not match the seat number on the ticket. Our row was 16, and our seats 437, and 438. But, those seats were in row 12. It didn't make sense.
But, we sat down and enjoyed a hot day's qualifying. We chatted to our neighbours - to our right were Jurgen and Lars (possibly father and son) and in front the 'Binocular man' and his son. He lent us his binoculars to watch some of the action. Especially when a roller-blader came off on a steep downhill path opposite us and had an awful spill. Last we saw of him was being driven off in one of the on-course ambulances.
We both got a bit of sun. Mike got a lot - because he didn't slip, slop, slap - well - he did slip on a shirt but that was about it. His hat wasn't in the daypack and he scoffed at the sunscreen (remember those Judder Bars, Mike!). Now that we're back in London we both look quite well compared to the pasty white locals – and this is in the middle of an okay English summer. I was able to pull up my flared jeans and enjoy relief from the heat with my hat to keep off the baking sun. Mike just cooked (and grumbled about me misreading the weather) and we could not find his cap in the bag under the jackets or umbrella. The qualifying was good fun. We lived on German bread and weisswurst (well, I did anyway) all day. A great diet (for three days it was ok).
Being so hot we needed a lot of water. Trouble is, most of the water in Germany has fizz added. Mike could only get fizzy water for us to drink, and we were so thirsty that we had no choice. Mike quite liked it by the end. I still suffered it. The bartender told Mike it was ‘Power water’. Ok. Reminded me of a few years back in Munich when we were buying der Bus. We bought six 1.5 litre bottles of water for camping in der Bus, only to find that they were sparkling water bottles. I can tell you that toothpaste and fizzy water do not make a great combination. Mike and I were frothing at the mouth every night and morning!
That evening Mike said we should stroll into town to eat. The closest village is Hohenstein-Ernstthal and is quite small. We'd never been in there on foot so it was time to explore. It was a pity we had no idea where to go (Mike wanted to find the Alt Markt area as there was supposed to be a party on) as I was soon getting tired and finding the industrial area beside the railway lacking in inspiration.
Mike was still determined and asked a friendly German policeman where the middle of town was. He replied I was not far and waved behind us somewhere. His colleagues got the giggles – I wasn’t sure why. Perhaps his German accent was funny?
But, his directions were fine and Mike found an ATM to get some cash and a very nice café where I had a lovely salad and Mike had some ‘Putenbrust’ (like chicken but smaller than a turkey). After a yummy meal, that cost only 22 Euro (we like Euros – so much cheaper than pounds and bearing no resemblance to an Aussie or Kiwi dollar so we have no idea – the DM was nearly a kiwi dollar in value so everything smarted in Germany before) we found a party in the Altmarkt and a Kylie impersonator having difficulty getting something out of her head. She got a great round of applause and said she’d be back after The Clogs. We left and retired to the comfort of the car for some sleep!
This town, and the whole area where the GP is held is changing every year we go. The GP was running very smoothly and getting bigger every year. House prices around seem to be on the increase too. Lots more English being spoken too (although that is a shame for me, as I like to practise German a bit).
I had a fitful sleep, unlike Mike who was snoring 10 minutes after we switched the light off. I had some pleasure when he woke up at times during the night to ask me why I wasn’t sleeping well. But, he went right back to sleep each time. I must have had some sleep, as I wasn’t too bad the next morning. Up at 6am and pestering Mike to get up too.
It was another beautiful day, and after Mike complaining about having to carry umbrellas, jackets and jerseys yesterday, I left everything warm at the car. Guess you know what was in store for us, despite our conversation that went something like ‘Continental weather patterns are so much more stable, so it’s likely to remain hot and dry today’. Yeah, right.
We wandered round to our grandstand and had breakfast before taking our seats for the warm up laps. About now Mike started browsing the program he bought yesterday. Looking at the circuit map I realised it was highly likely that this was in fact grandstand T13 and not our ticketed T12. Doh!
As the races loomed ever closer, the grandstand started to fill. We had merely fluked the only two seats no one wanted as places around us started to fill. Finally, amidst a string of German numbers uttered by someone at the end of our row, we figured out one of our seats was being claimed. Time for our quick disappearing routine. We had to shift grandstands just before the 125 race kicked off. Oops. Stupid tourists - can't read their tickets right. We were slightly wrong last year too, so we're not doing too well on the ticket-reading front. Maybe there's an inherent German technique taught from birth that allows the natives to intuitively discern grandstands from each other despite having no markings that appear to the naked (obviously untrained) eye. And why couldn’t the sausage seller understand Mike’s German?
Funny thing was, when we got to our place in T12 there was hardly anyone around us. We were in a space to ourselves.
The racing was excellent and we had a good view of a fast section of track with a fantastic curve. Valentino Rossi loves passing there and we were treated to some exciting passing during the motogp race. Perhaps T12 wasn’t quite as good a view as T13, but it wasn’t bad. We had a big screen to watch as well, so we saw the critical moments that happened away from our section of track (such as Barros taking Jacque out three laps from the end when they were leading – ouch!).
The 250cc race was cut short, just as Melandri fell off because at that moment the heavens decided to open. As people rushed away or fished out jackets, Mike and I looked helplessly at each other. The raindrops were huge, and any sort of prolonged exposure to such rain and we would be soaked very quickly. Uh oh. But, as the break between the races came, the weather improved and we were soon dry again and the 500cc race ran without rain interruption.
End of the racing, and Mike and I decided to leave with a lot of other people and walk back to the car. It took quite a while, as we were almost exactly opposite the campsite in our section of circuit. So, when we got back to the car it was a two-hour queue to get out of the car park.
Eventually I headed Mike onto an A road, hoping to avoid any ‘Staus’ (German traffic jams, which the autobahns seem plagued with) and we meandered north in a vague Berlin direction. We were hoping to get to Senftenburg where we had stayed at a lake last year in a very nice hotel. But, with a stop for a dinner along the way it was dark by the time we arrived. And do you think it would be easy to find a lake next to a wee town in country Germany? No! Turns out we almost circumnavigated the lake before Mike got sick of looking. So, we found a quiet car park away from any traffic and fell asleep in the back of the car once more.
Next morning, Mike woke up and drove to find the elusive hotel and lake, while I rolled around in the back cocooned in my sleeping bag. It was very easy to get there in the light of day – we’d been on the right road but had overshot the side street that the hotel was on. Mike’s plan was to have a morning swim to invigorate ourselves, and to placate me as I was hoping for a shower by this stage – two days sleeping in a car isn’t conducive to spending time in a plane cooped up with an unfortunate passenger that happened to be allocated the seat next to some smelly tourists. But, as we walked over to the lake shore (me in my pyjama short bottoms and T-shirt and Mike in his shorts and T-shirt) and felt the strong, cold breeze blowing off the lake, and looked at the murky, unsettled lake, we hastily decided to hurtle back to the car, get dressed and continue our drive towards Berlin. Our sympathies for any fellow passengers on the flight later that day evaporated with the wind that also sucked any warmth from our unwashed bodies! I was glad I had packed the ‘Wet Ones’ by this stage!
The rain fairly pelted down during the day, but there were some brighter moments. It had stopped raining by the time we drove into Gubin, a town on the border of Germany and Poland. We wanted to pop over to Poland just to say we’d been there, given we were so close. I had my light trousers on with a fibre pile vest, as it was a little cold. I asked Mike if I looked silly in this, and he just laughed! Which I took to mean an emphatic ‘Yes’. So I changed into my jeans, rolling around in the back seat for the third time that day (yes, I was muttering a bit while I did so!).
Mike and I strolled up to the border crossing, which neatly divided this town into two parts (with the map showing the Polish side to be bigger). Well, the guards at customs thought it was mighty odd that two New Zealanders wanted to cross at this border. They asked us why we wanted to go to Poland and I said we wanted to have a coffee (lucky I didn’t mention that I also wanted a) the toilet and b) a shower ) and that just confirmed their opinion that we were slightly mad. They took our passports to the Polish office (does that mean our passports have been to Poland???) and then told us New Zealanders needed a visa in advance, but that Germans could come and go as they liked. Oh well. We could see Poland clearly. Mike wanted to video, but I was worried about videoing border crossings after we’d been turned away. My German doesn’t run to ‘Please don’t confiscate our holiday video footage!’
So, back to the car (after finding the toilets) and on the road to Berlin again. Not following Reich Highway 1 as the Russians did in 1945 but a parallel road, nevertheless. Mike has just read about the fall of Berlin and the Russian advance, so he was clued up on the events surrounding that campaign. We drive through some picturesque parts of Germany, before arriving at Berlin airport in plenty of time. Plenty of time for a shower! Hooray!
Mike stocked up on Mozart Balls (chocolate we discovered during the Christmas ski holiday to Austria and subsequently found were sold all over Germany) and we flew back to London after another successful German motorcycle race weekend.
