Tuesday 7 OctoberHi everyone! Gawd, we haven't blogged in ages so will have to think back a couple of weeks…Think we left off last time where we'd just been into St Johann on the bus job hunting and everything was shut. So the next day we drove to a campsite that was just on the outskirts of town so no more 18 euros busrides back and forth with grumpy bus drivers. It was a nice campsite on a working farm with real milka cows with bells round their necks. If we find work that doesn't include accommodation then it looks like this'll be our best bet for somewhere to stay in the van as it's only a couple of minutes walk from the town centre - we'll just have to strike a deal with the owners for long term rates as it was quite expensive. That night we went again to Bunnys Pub on bikes which was at least open if not a little dead. So we bit the bullet and got drunk. Got talking to the Austrian barmaid and it turns out that 'Pauly' has left and is back in Australia running his own company out there - doh. The barmaid was friendly enough though and told us that there is plenty of work about but not until December, also advised us to try the tourist info for any tips. So after a very wobbly bike ride back to the van that night, we headed back into town the following day to the tourist info. They weren't that helpful. The 'English' pub we'd seen called The Old Dog opened at 4pm so we headed there. It was quite authentic inside - reminded us of a mini version of the Crosby - even seemed to have the same carpets (with genuine cigarette burns as it's still legal to smoke in public places). Anyway, it was owned by a Austrian - no English folk in sight. But he did speak English and was friendly enough - same story again though - come back in December and we'll have our pick of jobs. He reckons there's over 10000 visitors to the town just over the winter season, and it's not that big a town. He seemed like he would have some work for us if we came back 15-20 December (think it helped that we were British…), so we sat and drank more beer for a while before making another wobbly journey back to the van. The next day we had some decision making to do. The thing is, the money that we have left will not last us until December due to the van eating up so much of it. So the decision we made is to eat into our emergency savings for when we got back home, and by adjusting our weekly budget and doing less miles per week we can last into December (with one month's living expenses incase we don't get paid for a month) with the aim of earning our savings back plus enough to do another few month's touring next year as we still haven't seen everything we want to see. So the new budget means that we are going to slowly tour Germany until December using their 'stellplatze' as much as possible - these are like the French aires which are basically free or very cheap stopover areas.Friday 26th we crossed the border into Germany and headed to a campsite in our ACSI book which are discounted campsites set at a price per night. The area was Bischofsweisen which is right in the South East of Germany. It is a very beautiful mountainous area, quite high up. We got a spot on the campsite right next to a stream which reminded us of camping at Aysgarth. That first night we were sat outside about 8:30pm, it was dark, and this animal appeared out of the darkness along the stream and paused right next to our van about 3m away from us, Andy thought it was a cat and Kylie thought it was a dog, but it was a fox!! First time either of us had seen one in the wild that wasn't road kill. It bobbed around the stream for a bit then carried on down the campsite - typically we didn't have the camera on us so didn't get a photograph but it was a cool moment. Took a very long walk the next day into Berchtesgaden and had boiled veal sausages for lunch which were surprisingly yummy and tasted a lot nicer than they looked! On the Monday we decided on a bike ride, biked into the nearest village and got a walking route from the tourist info which we thought would be suitable for bikes too. Oh how wrong were we. We ended up carting the bikes up a mountain which would have been super steep just walking let alone pushing bikes up there too, then the route just wound through really narrow mountain paths for the next 3 hours!! Andy was happy that he got to use his mountain bike for its true purpose for a bit, and the views were worth it but it weren't half tiring.On the Wednesday we decided to treat ourselves to a day out and got the bus to Konnigssee which is a big lake (Germany's highest - 602m above sea level - and cleanest lake). When we got there we got a boat trip out to a stop off along the lake. The lake was surrounded by mountains and we were in the clouds so it looked really magical and we were on the water for a fair while as the lake is 8km long. The stop off was to a place that cannot be reached by road so real wilderness stuff - we'd read there was an 'ice chapel' which is a glacier high in the mountains creating an enormous 'ice vault' which doesn't even melt in mid-summer. We decided to make the hike and what a hike it was - took us about 3 hours and half way there the path ran out and it was just a case of hiking over rocks to get there. And it was worth it. It was an amazing thing to see - one of those things you think you'd only ever get to see on TV. We got some photos of it from far away and also stood in the entrance but we didn't dare enter the vault as there were warnings of likely cave-ins and we didn't fancy getting buried in ice. We found it strange that the place wasn't more commercialised - we saw a few people on the walk that led there but we were the only people at the glacier, and we'd only read about it by chance. In a way that made it more special to see it. A few times on the path-less hike we'd thought about going back as it got quite difficult but we were so glad that we'd carried on as it was so worth seeing close up. The boat trip carried on to the other side of the lake where we took a (easier) walk to another lake which was very mirror-like and clear - very picture-postcard type views and nice being somewhere where no roads lead to. That night we met a bloke called Brian who was from the Orkney Islands and touring on a Harley Roadking. Not getting to meet many British at all on our travels so chatted to him for a bit.Set off again last Friday to a campsite in Tittmoning a bit further North - wondered why everything was closed while we were travelling and yet again we'd managed to miss the fact that it was a bank holiday! It was a cold day today and when we got to the campsite the owners were out and we couldn't hook up to the electricity to get our heater going - brrrr. Went for a few walks in the woods and countryside and watched lots of eagles flying around - something else we though we'd never see in the wild - these things were huge - wingspans longer than our arm spans. Moved on yesterday (Monday) and had our first tyre blow out! Considering we were doing 50mph the van handled it well as we hardly noticed it had happened until we slowed down. Andy did a fab job of changing the wheel for the spare and we were on our way again. Last night we camped on a stellplatz outside some tennis courts in a small town called Lalling, a free stop to help our budget! A nice little town with Germany's only 'feng shui' park which was nice to walk around. (And free). Tonight we're going to try a stellplatz on a farm, then head over to Zwiesel tomorrow for a few days on a campsite. Then we want to see Nuremburg. Hopefully it won't be as long before we blog again! Hope everyone is still well and happy, love Andy n Ky xxxWednesday 8 OctoberFinally got online!! We've splashed out and bought a 30day hotspot card so, if we can find plenty of hotspots, we'll be online more often. Tried a stellplatz on a farm last night - it was cool! Just got the address from the camperstop book, drove up to the farm in a little village, knocked on the door and asked to park up in their field! We were surrounded by geese (Andy was certain they had something against him), turkeys, hens with baby chicks, cockrels, a dog, 3 horses, a baby cow and a goat. Most of which were sharing the same field as us. The lady just left the farmhouse door open and we were able to use her shower and she got out an extension lead so we even had electricity. Today we drove to Zwiesel and got set up on the campsite here which is very bog-like and took quite a few wheelspins so I guess they've had quite a bit of rain. Wouldn't know it today though as we were sat outside in t-shirts in lovely sunshine. Which made a nice change. Enjoy the photos, still having problems with the videos so don't know if they'll upload properly.Look out for us on MSN over the next four weeks!Bye for now xx J