Urban Germany: Well-oiled engine of the European Union

I woke up the other morning in the back of a Volkswagen camper van, trying to remember where exactly I was, hoping for something more definitive than just halfway between where we were heading and where we had already been. So I blinked hard and scanned my surroundings. I saw then that I was in fact halfway between the blue jeans I’d worn the day(s) before and an empty half-liter bottle of hefeweizen.

There is no personal vehicle on the road more ideal for sleeping than the Volkwagen California (aka the VW Eurovan). Like a Swiss Army Knife on wheels, this paragon of mobile utility comes with fridge, stove, heater, an abundance of cubbies, plenty of curtains for the numerous windows, and two twin mattresses that unfold from the back seat and an overhead cabin.

Even so, the space can start to feel pretty cramped once you fill it with four people’s clothing, groceries and personal items (such as legos, reading materials, and fermentation experiments), and four people who are intent on lying down. Still, we do it, and we continue to do it. Since June, we’ve put 15,000 km on the engine. And normally we work for our accommodations, but we’ve endured at least 15, maybe 20 nights of car camping in our all-purpose bus.

Once I pulled back a corner of curtain, I was able to peek out the window and jog my memory. Yes, there I lay, halfway between the roadside Burger King and a fleet of Polish transport trucks, somewhere on the outermost outskirts of Stuttgart, Baden-Wurtemburg.

It’s fair to say that the 10 months of menial manual labor have taken their toll on our bodies. Various sensations in my hands and neck and lower back remind me each morning of the shoveling, heaving, shlepping, scrubbing and lopping I’ve done. So for the moment we are relying on the precious hospitality of friends and family, or else camping in unremarkable truck stops along Germany’s renowned Autobahn.

Gradually we reconfigured our bus, and eventually we made our way through the morning traffic to arrive in the manufacturing metropolis of Stuttgart. As one of the largest cities we’ve had to navigate on this trip, it should come as no surprise that we would encounter some of the worst congestion and busiest construction zones we’ve seen in years. And being the headquarters to both Mercedes Benz and Porsche, it would be disingenuous to say that Stuttgart feels like the city where we’ve always belonged.

Don’t get me wrong. I love my German engineering just as much as the next guy who sleeps in a van. I’m just saying that this bustling burg is unlikely to earn the distinction of becoming our final parking place.

Nevertheless, we were nimble enough to wriggle our way into a parking spot of dubious lawfulness, adjacent to one of the city’s grandest green spaces. From the regal hilltop rose garden we took in a panoramic overview of the resplendent factories and domineering high rises. And judging from the innumerable construction sites that stretch beyond every horizon, I’m predicting that Stuttgart is the city of the future, and always will be.

Read on: For more enchanting stories about our adventures in Germany, check out the following articles:

• The best of Thuringia
• Turning leaves in the Fatherland
• Philosophizing in Weimar