Bodensee aka Lake Constance

Meersburg
1.5 hours drive south from Tuebingen lies the Bodensee, known in English as Lake Constance. This stretch of water is shared between Germany, Austria, and Switzerland, and in fact the Swiss border bisects the city of Konstanz. The Bodensee is the largest lake in Europe, and the source of the Rhein River.

This is another beautiful part of Europe. The lake is busy with all kinds of boating activities, ranging from pedalboats and rowing dinghies up to keelboat cruising and racing, and passenger and vehicular ferries. Unfortunately, a local boating licence is required for any vessel bigger than a pedalboat, and boat rentals are not exactly cheap.

We left the car at Meersburg to check out the old castle there, which claims to be the oldest in Germany (although it appears a lot more modern as the outer parts of the building are only a couple of hundred years old). We then took the ferry across to Konstanz to go for a wander.

Meersburg was buzzing with a German Red Cross exercise. All the DRK units from the region were out in force with simulated fires (complete with the biggest smoke machine I've seen), car accidents, motorbike accidents, etc. They really do this well - the "victims" were made up with very realistic (latex and stage makeup) injuries, and they used wrecked cars and horribly realistic mutilated dummies to simulate accident scenes. In hindsight, I wish I had some photos to post, however it seemed to ghoulish at the time to photograph the dummy with its head squashed between the bumper of the car and pillar of a building, with blood and brains splattered liberally across the scene.

The DRK also had information stands, showcasing their equipment, and most interestingly, their sniffer dog training program. They train labradors to search for survivors at disaster sites (building collapses, aircraft wrecks, etc).

Konstanz
Konstanz is just another pretty little city on the border between Germany and Switzerland. I didn't find anything particularly unique or noteworthy about the local architecture, but the harbour entrance is quite pretty. With it's little lighthouse and rotating statue.

The statue is apparently quite controversial - she is thought to be exposing too much flesh.





The Organ Grinder
Organ grinders are a fairly common site throughout Europe, with their little animated dancing monkey (or in this case, conductor). This guy is apparently blind. The dog is a guide dog, and the woman on the steps is either an organ grinder groupie, or his wife - all I know is that she followed him home.

Of all the organ grinders I've seen so far, this is my favourite. It had a nice tone to it, and a little glockenspiel with wonderful clarity. Nevertheless, I don't think I'll be pursuing a career in this field...