We set off from Aosta fairly early, with a plan to drive right across Switzerland into Germany, to stay in Freiburg. It sounds a beautiful place to visit but, when I checked the details for the aire in the town, I found it’s not available when the football club is playing at home and, when I checked, unfortunately, they were hosting Eintracht Frankfurt. We now needed a plan B.
In the meantime, the usually reliable Garmin Camper sat nav was playing up, not wanting us to go via Grand St Bernard. I decided to ignore it, and follow Google Maps on my iPad instead. This was slightly worrying because the Garmin is set up to avoid roads that are unsuitable for Molly, such as those with weight restrictions or low bridges. However, all was well, and we didn’t have any problems.
We did have a shock though. We’d chosen to go through the 6 kilometre long Grand St Bernard road tunnel that connects Switzerland and Italy through the mountains, bypassing the climb up and over the pass of the same name. However, we didn’t realised it would cost almost 50 euros 😱. Maybe that’s what Garmin was objecting to 🤷♀️😆. Oh well… I suppose we saved some fuel and a lot of time!
After some research, I found an aire that we liked the sound of in Breisach on the River Rhine. The town sounded worth visiting and welcoming to tourists. It’s also near to the fortified town of Neuf-Brisach, which is a UNESCO world heritage site thanks to its octagon shaped Vauban citadel. We like a Vauban town and planned to visit the next day.
In the meantime, we parked up on the aire, which is on an island in the middle of the Rhine, then walked into Breisach. The town is in Germany but the aire is in France, with the border running along the river, so we visited 4 countries in 1 day!
Breisach is a pleasant town with an interesting history. It was an important hub and trading point thanks to the bridge over the river, and has been completely destroyed twice, in the French Revolution and in World War 2.
We wandered over and along the river, then through the town gates and up the hill that surrounds the cathedral, St Stephansmünster. The hill is home to the oldest part of the town, and the cathedral was built between the 12th and 15th centuries.
We spent a while exploring and enjoying the views, before heading down to the newer part of the town, where there appeared to be some sort of festival going on. There were lots of stalls in the streets and the squares were busy with people enjoying themselves. We sat at a bar to watch the world go by, and enjoy the music from bands playing in the square.
The final band was playing 70s rock tunes, which we love, so we ended up staying longer than we’d planned and drinking more than we should, ending the evening singing and dancing. Wonderful!
No wonder we were tiddly 🤭… We hadn’t had any tea. We stopped at a kebab shop on the way back to Molly… chips for me and a humongous kebab for John! Plan B turned out well 😆.
Ramblings 
Leave a comment