Back to Germany

Today we left Strasbourg and headed for Germany and the Mosel River. We stopped at Saint Avold, France and the American WWII Cemetery. When we arrived we heard a 4 gun salute and then taps being played so we asked about it. They were being played because a WWII vet had come to see the grave of an old crew mate. Inside we found Sgt Fred Shawcross who was a WWII B-24 nose gunner. He was there with his whole family including grown granddaughters. Granddad wanted to see his friend's grave. His B-24 crew had finished their rotation without a loss and were rotating home. The navigator volunteered to stay on as the lead navigator for a new Squadron and was shot down. Fred is lively and just chatted on and on with us. His family obviously cherish him also. They were filming his whole time there. By the way, the cemetery at St. Avold has over 10,000 markers and is the largest WWII cemetery in Europe.

We headed North toward the Mosel through some really great country side on a winding country road Mary found for us. Soon we were in wine country and we had to stop to see the harvesting of the grapes on hillsides that look like they go straight up from the river's edge. We found our hotel some 10 km South of Cochem in the village of Beiltstein. Don't worry, we almost couldn't find it on our map either.

At dinner tonight we sat with a couple from Poulsbo, WA. It really is a small world. They are traveling for a year! We had a great time talking with them and sharing travel places, ideas, etc. Charlie is just going, "Oh no, Mary is going to want to be gone even longer next time.!" The women were talking about how we do miss the grand kids though!