A Birthday in Untersiggenthal or was it a visit to Bad Säckingen?
We have just been to Switzerland for A’s (M’s partner) birthday, followed by a meandering through Germany.
The party was held in their garden, the weather was great and the garden looked absolutely lovely all set up for the day. Lots of tables, umbrellas, a couple of barbeques, food, flowers, live music and great people. 
And one of the birthday presents was not an external hard drive as suggested in this picture.
M had set up a volley ball net and the youngsters played volley ball – and one older one did as well. I didn’t see Best Beloved playing volley ball but it seems that he did.
There was a lot of preparation – including creating salads for about 60 people, and there was so much pork to BBQ. All New Zealanders out there can relate well to that. The BBQs were all being used well into the night.
It turns out everyone had been asked to wear a hat – and A and I just had to have new hats – and that was a great experience in itself. The day before the Garden Party we all went from Switzerland to Germany, just across the Rhine, to buy hats at a wonderful hat shop in Bad Säckingen.
New Zealand needs such a wonderful hat shop. There was a hat for everyone, and for every purpose, (hunting, shooting, fishing, garden parties, weddings, summer, winter, fashion, small, large, many colours, many fabrics and many different fibres, terribly English and much much more) and we tried on so many. A and I had wonderful new hats to wear at this birthday garden party – and we were so busy we didn’t take any photos to show the garden, or our hats.
The photo of the boy playing with the water spout on the fountain was taken because he reminded us so much of Tomas – and behind it happened to be the hat shop, still no name but if you find the fountain and you will also find the Hat Shop. It is on the road up from the very old wooden bridge, Holzbrücke, which is the link between Stein in Switzerland, and Bad Säckingen in Germany. We have walked across this bridge many times. I found the video of the bridge on Youtube. It is of a ride through Holzbrücke, which happens to be the longest covered wooden bridge in Europe at 203,7m. It is actually the ride from Germany back to Switzerland.
We did also collect cakes and other bits and pieces for the party while there – so you can see that it wasn’t just a fun hat excursion.
Bad Säckingen seen from the Swiss town of Stein – over the Rhine to Germany. It is a rural town according to Wikipedia – located in the very south of Germany next to the Swiss border and lies on the southern edge of the Black Forest area. It doesn’t seem very rural to us from New Zealand, and it is so beautiful. It has wonderful architecture, history, stories, great urban sculpture, perfect gardens, great cake shops, bars, restaurants, and bargains and every time we have been there – beautiful weather.
Tags: Bad Säckingen, Birthday, celebrations, family, flowers, Garden Party, Germany, Hats, Switzerland, Untersiggenthal, weather
