Day 1 - Trento
By Arnd
Our starting point was Munich. Departure time: late afternoon, because our car, a bright yellow BMW, still had its first inspection ahead at the Automag dealership...
Cursing, I was on hold for the eighth time. Pressed "1" for the eighth time so that calls could occasionally be recorded for quality assurance purposes. Which obviously doesn't help much. Repeated the license plate number for the eighth time, which Josh and I could now recite by heart. And waited — while we were already sitting in a taxi heading to the Automag, hoping our presence would speed up the process — to be connected to an employee.
Just before we arrived at Landsberger Straße, I was finally connected. The employee couldn't tell me anything and promised a callback. Like his colleagues before him. I hung up frustrated and lo and behold: an SMS from the Automag had come in unnoticed — our BMW was ready!
I hope the inspection was more thorough than the cleaning. The picture above was taken after the cleaning... There is actually less dirt on the car. But clean is something else, right?
Anyway, complaining is always easy. The staff on site were very friendly and we rolled off the Automag lot around 3:30 PM. Off we went heading south. In our "planning" we had only decided that we wanted to go to Italy. And not to Switzerland. So we took the route through Austria over the Brenner Pass.
When we were in South Tyrol, we started thinking about our destination for the day. We drove around Bolzano for a bit but somehow didn't get a good feeling, so I looked up Trento — or Trient in German.
A great decision. A magnificent city in the Adige Valley. Beautiful! Historically known for the Council of Trent, which took place from 1545 to 1563. Architecturally, Baroque and Renaissance are the defining elements and bear witness to the fact that Trento was and still is a prosperous city and region.
Via the Booking app, I found a somewhat quirky-looking hotel right in the old town. The Boutique Exclusive B&B Trento. My room had a steam bath and a kind of forest theme — we paid between 120 and 160 euros per night per room including breakfast. There was no minibar. My skull was spared from splinters — the tree trunk slices at the headboard turned out to be photo wallpaper.
We were supposed to arrive before 8 PM to check in, so we ignored this sign and parked in front of the university's law faculty, which is right behind it.
Just a side note: Do you understand this sign? Cyclists, wheelchair users, and hockey players? We barely made it to the hotel in time. The friendly guy at reception told me we should park in a different lot. But it was quite far away, so we decided to go eat first.
We were recommended — perhaps because we're German — a restaurant called Forsterbräu Trento.
A kind of Italian Hofbräuhaus in southern South Tyrol. With sausages, beer (lager, bock, pilsner...), pretzels, and Wiener Schnitzel. A genuinely cozy and rustic concept restaurant thanks to its interior design, which greeted us very warmly with a small complimentary pilsner.
Unfortunately, only the beer was really good. The food was edible. The sausage platter didn't taste great to me, the Weisswurst had a strange consistency, and the Wiener Schnitzel met the minimum requirements for a piece of breaded meat. The pretzel was the culinary highlight. For dessert I had a tiramisu that only vaguely resembled its namesake. Josh had a crème brûlée that was cold. Which its generous portion size couldn't compensate for.
Not only the Krapfen — I had just enjoyed them in much better quality in Merano. Truly worlds better at "Leiter am Waal", a tip from my mother-in-law, who really knows her way around good food! I can only warmly recommend it if you ever find yourselves in the area!
So the verdict on Forsterbräu: everything edible. But not much more. The overwhelmingly positive reviews on Tripadvisor were not something we could relate to. Service was super friendly and attentive, though.
We were then too lazy and a bit too tipsy to move the car, so we hoped to find it in the same spot the next morning...
After breakfast in the windowless basement of the hotel, we checked out and discovered that the large square in front of the Civic Tower (Torre Civica) was packed. Protesters were chanting in unison that the war should stop. "STOP WAR" and "PUTIN GO HOME" were demands we immediately supported. And since the demonstration passed right by the law faculty, there was no way to get the car out anyway.
Terrible times: In Ukraine, an ice-cold dictator is destroying human lives. And in Germany, we're debating gender-inclusive language... Or driving around aimlessly like we are... Let's hope it all ends well!
Find out how the trip continues tomorrow here: Blog Post.