Europe Tour 1st to 13th Nov 2013 - Day 9

Today only agenda was to make the drive all the way to Paris, and that's it !

600+km of traveling with nothing to see.....But, there was the optional tour to Germany Black Forest! As there was the only thing that we could do, all voted (no choice right) to go for the optional tour.

Day 9 - 9 Nov 2013

A - Hotel Postillon
B - Titsee, Germany
C - Hotel Alliance Hotel Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines

Some background on Titsee:

Titisee is a lake in the southern Black Forest in Baden-Württemberg. It is said it got its name from Roman Emperor Titus. It covers an area of 1.3 km² and has an average depth of 20 m. It owes its creation to the Feldberg glacier, the moraine ploughed up by which in the Pleistocene epoch nowadays forms the lake's shores.

Why is the Black Forest called the Black Forest?

The name Black Forest has its origin because the forest was impenetrable during night time and is total darkness until you can't even see your own hand even if the moon is up.

Black Forest region famous for?

1. Black Forest Cake
2. Cuckoo Cock

Scenery traveling to Germany

 

 

 Black Forest

 Finally reached the town beside Titisee lake

Our shopping place, inside got Cuckoo Clock, Rimowa luggage, Swarovski crystal, Pandora, etc

Tips: 

Rimowa

If you want Rimowa, best place to get, there is an 15% straight tax rebate deducted from your purchase. Plus, the normal luggage say 30" is around $500 euro, Singapore selling for $1.3k without discount.

Swarovski Crystal

Cheapest you can find, plus you can get those member's only item as well.

 

 A swan and clam gotten from there

Cuckoo Clock

Up to individual, you can get here or you can shop around, most shops carry cuckoo clock.

 

 Signature move

Cuckoo Clock making explaination

 

The thing that make the cuckoo sound

One of the rare clock, you can see there is a water mill, actual water really runs down when it cuckoo cuckoo

Free wifi in lunch area

Lunch, included in the optional, Pork Knuckle and for dessert, Black forest cake

After lunch was free and easy, and we took the chance to explore the town. Note that the ice wine is cheap here, $25 euro and Hanuta is damn cheap as well.

Ice Wine

Hanuta is a German sweet by Ferrero consisting of hazelnuts and chocolate sandwiched between two wafers. The name hanuta is an acronym for Haselnusstafel, German for "hazelnut bar".

 

 

Titisee Lake, the wind was strong and was very chilling

 

A lot of ducks

Kids playing

Different parts of town

Meat........yummmmm

Before we headed out to Paris, we bought 2 cakes, one cheese and one apple flavour and that was a wise decision.

While traveling to Paris, our driver time on the road clocked 4 hours and need to rest for 45mins. Hence we stopped at one stop-over point and wasted 45mins doing nothing....hehe..Lucky for us, we got our cakes and we went for picnic.

 

 

 As we headed into Paris, rain started to dizzy down. We stopped at one stop-over point for dinner and the best part was that the dinner joint was somewhere down the stop-over. As it was raining, we were told to wait for the coach. Somehow, there was miscommunication and the coach went forward without waiting for our 2nd group...Oh well, we have to walk in the rain to the dinner joint.

And finally we arrived at Hotel Alliance, as it was pretty late, we went straight into our rooms, would be staying here for the rest of the tour.....

 Our room

Tomorrow would be the city of Paris...............