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Showing posts from May, 2013

Looking at things to drive in

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2CV hub - reminds me of the Tintin books! The other museum- Oh. Sorry, I'll have to start that again. Over Easter, you may recall, I visited the German Phonographic museum in St. Georgen. We also visited another building full of mostly old stuff - but it wasn't a museum. We went to the Autosammlung Steim in Schramberg. This collection has been built up over the years by Dr. Ing Hans-Jochen Steim, with the express intent of being driven. And what a collection it is! Much more compact than equivalents like Sinsheim, it initially comes across as being small and stuffy - but the quality of the cars in there speaks for itself, as do the occasional tell-tale tyre marks along the otherwise pristine floors. Definitely worth a visit, as the (again, smartphone) photos below will attest. As an aside, Herr Dr. Ingenieur Steim was chairman of the Kern-Liebers group of companies. These make such "dull" products as springs and stampings. However, one look at the rang

Looking sideways

Travel often doesn't happen quickly enough, even if you're travelling fast. Often it's a case of losing perspective, losing the perception of speed. We all know it from driving on the Autobahn - our brains trick us into feeling that overtaking lots of cars slowly in a traffic jam is swifter or more effective than cruising along at the same 140 kmh speed. Similarly, sitting in a train with others in a carriage is torture for me - there is no feeling of progress. I had this feeling recently when cycling home from work one pleasant evening (weather-wise, at least: work-wise it had been a crappy day) and suddenly felt that I wasn't proceeding fast enough. It was creating a tension: I wanted to be on my bike, pedalling away my stresses from work - yet, I wanted to be at home straight away, knowing that I would then be in the vortex of kiddy dinner times and puttings to bed. Then I looked sideways. My shadow was fair flying over the fields between Eppelheim and Grenzhof.