day 3 - Heidelberg and Stuttgart

So, you know those annoying tourists who are either driving down a crowded pedestrian street and/or going the wrong way on certain streets? that was us today. We were attempting to get to the Hard Rock Cafe to get a souvenier glass. The GPS recommended certain streets but those were not open so we improvised. Maybe not the best idea. With my brother driving we were probably within about 3' of a couple cafe tables. And there were plenty of pedestrians having to move around us as well. In the end though we made it to the Hard Rock and got what we wanted.

I also got up early this morning (7AM) and went for a run along the river in Heidelberg. It was a great run. The weather was perfect - sunny but not too warm, and the trail was in great condition and right along the river. I did 5 miles just looping out and back. All felt good and my time was <11min miles on average. Still a bit worried for the Medoc marathon and being able to finish it. Then I went back and met up with my dad & brother for breakfast. I enjoyed a bit too much of the bread and nutella :)

After breaktfast we packed up and headed out. We then had the aforementioned driving experience. And then the intention was to follow the river instead of heading right over to Stuttgart. This provided a much more scenic route for us and a bit longer but relaxing drive. We drove through a number of small towns and were somewhat trying to find a castle my dad had been talking about. Supposedly there was some knigh who lost his arm and had one made up of metal. And this arm is on display in his old castle. But dad couldn't recall any other info about it and couldn't find the details in his books. So we tried but no luck. We did find another neat castle though up in the hills. We went up there and found a neat little restaurant with an amazing view. We had a nice lunch there and then got back on the road to Stuttgart.

When we got in we decided to go to the Mercedes museum first, instead of the hotel. We were worried it would close at 6 and it was already 4:30. Luckily they were open until 9 tonigh. That was a good thing since we were there for over 2 hours. There are some neat displays not only of the cars but also just of technology, the history of the businesses that made up Mercedes Benz, and just general goings on in the world. Of course there were very rare and cool cars too. I took so many pics my camera battery died. I will have to post them up soon.