We were up early to get on the road to Bonn. But there was a delay while we tried to figure out who to pay for the previous night. The previous day we had called the campground, and they told us that they would give us a code to get in the gate. When we arrived there was no one at the campground. After we settled in I sent a text and asked how we should pay. We didn’t have an answer in the morning, and after waiting awhile we gave them a call and they told us to leave the money in a mailbox near the gate.
It was a busy drive from Frankfurt to Bonn, but we still made good time, and arrived a little before noon. The campground was open and fairly full, but once again no one was there to tell us what to do. After a while we found a note saying pick a spot and come pay us after 1pm.
Bonn is most famous these days as the birthplace of Ludwig von Beethoven. Bonn was also the capital of Germany when it was divided between the east and the west. Bonn was picked I assume because no one saw it as a permanent candidate to be the capital once Germany was reunified as it is a small city of around 320,000.
We were both hungry and we wanted a typical German meal, so we headed to a Donner Kebab shop. The food was great and the place was buzzing so we enjoyed our meal.
Ton had been reading about Bonn on the way down the autobahn and told me that the third thing Bonn was famous for is being the birthplace of Haribo which I guess is the most popular gummy bears in the world. So as we were walking down the street we saw a giant Haribo store and headed in. Despite the fact that neither of us has ever had a Haribo gummy bear we ended up with about €20 of candy to take home as gifts. Also, the Haribo candy made in Europe is healthier than that sold in the US as they use a more natural sweetener.
We then headed to Beethoven’s house to see where he grew up. It is a typical town home on one of the main streets of town. We discussed going in but it was getting late in the day so we started to head back.
As we were heading towards the bus stop we saw a nice beer hall and Ton said this was our last day in Germany and we hadn’t had a beer. I didn’t need any convincing so we toasted the German beer industry and then headed down to the bus stop.
Our campground is right on the Rhine River and on our way back from the bus we took a detour to walk down and take a close look at it. Across the river was an old castle and a new castle. At the base of the castles were vineyards that had turned golden.
