Leaving Germany for France Update

Sorry for being remiss in keeping you apprised of our whereabouts.  So many have you have asked for an update, here goes.

We just left Germany today, as we wanted to wait until the money from the house was ‘in the bank.’ Also, the health insurance companies have been dicking around with Theo—he was led to believe that he could be insured under the National System with the blessing of his last employer in Germany. Well, after four weeks of calls and visits, and pulling paperwork together, and scanning and emailing, and getting the runaround, they finally said “no.” And so the private insurance man came to the house this morning to fill out paperwork so we can get him covered. For Pete’s sake!!!
Then we carefully considered what was realistically going to fit in the BMW trunk, of course leaving the back seat open for the doggies. We knew we had to ship the two large suitcases to France. Then my superior spacial intelligence, along with a good deal of vacuum-packing, cramming, jamming, and creativity to fit in just a little bit more, came in VERY handy. But even though, we had to stop at the DHL store on our way out of town today to send two boxes of paper and one large box of other crap that simply wasn’t going to fit in the car. Yikes!
Two tired dogs and a sleepy papa.

Two tired dogs and a sleepy papa.

And so, four hours behind our scheduled departure time, we headed for Colmar to enjoy a bit of Alsace in summertime. Between taking naps and switching off driving, we finally got to the hotel at 7, walked and fed the dogs, and decided to just let our exhaustion consume us. We each had an apple for dinner…but I’m sure we’ll get our money’s worth at breakfast in the morning!!!
The guys loading the bottom of an ancient cupboard into the truck.

The guys loading the bottom of an ancient cupboard into the truck.

We’re storing some large pieces of furniture in Germany from Theo’s dad’s house in Bad Breisig, until we settle down somewhere. The moving company came through and did a bang-up job of getting those pieces out. Then an ‘Antik and Entrümpelung’ (second-hand dealer) came through and bought a bunch of little stuff for their store. Then it was down to the final push to leave the house—you know, that 2% that consumes SO much energy that you think it’s never going to end? We just experienced it in Aptos a month ago and here we are again. And in the heat and humidity this time. Ugh!!!
The exhausted gang our last minutes in Aptos.

The exhausted gang our last minutes in Aptos.

I’m thinking our fantasy of traveling with the dogs is just that. It’s not fair to keep them in the car for long stretches and it simply doesn’t make sense to try to sightsee with them wrapping their leashes around our legs. And so I think we’ve come to terms with the fact that we will need to return to the Alsace another day (sans dogs) to really explore the area. Our drive time today was just a little over 4 hours. If we high-tail it tomorrow, we can jam through and reach our rental by evening (another 8 hours or so.) And so the BMW Driving Team of Loevenich and Loevenich will hit the pavement tomorrow and see how much ground we can cover. The impetus is there to just power through it. Stay tuned…
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