Thursday, 6:20 pm: Hello from Germany. Seemingly we survived our trans-Atlantic flight in good working order. After arriving in Zürich, on time, and picking up our rental car we blasted northward into Germany on the Swiss and German autobahns. We stayed three days with friends in a small town near Augsburg. We used to live in Augsburg in the mid-1980s.

Because of the very warm spring, spargel (asparagus) season came several weeks early. So we dined out in many family owned small restaurants featuring white spargel on the menu. And of course many liters of fine Bavarian beer accompanied what we ate.

Yesterday afternoon we arrived in Berlin. The autobahn is great! I thought I was driving fast at 140 km/h (about 84 mph) but Mercedes, BMWs and Audis few past us in dazzling blurs leaving us in their dust – if the autobahns had dust.

We are staying in Berlin-Marzahn a suburb in the former East Berlin of the German Democratic Republic. Of course it is all unified now and Berlin is Berlin and Schnapps ist Schnapps. Really it goes; Dienst ist Dienst und Schnapps ist Schnapps. Another old time saying I’ve learned in the past few days.

Onto Berlin weather: Since I have no weather station at hand, I’ll just describe it as very warm and sunny. More later from the old country.