Day 3. Tuesday, 23 June, 2026. Another day of Motorways

From Dillenburg to near Gera

We were a lot later leaving this morning, not waking, or getting up so early. Stopping in the town of Dillenburg for some quick photos, we were soon back on the motorway heading for Erfurt.

Quick photo stop in Dillenburg

Today’s driving was pretty tedious. Apart from all the trucks, there were numerous road works. Not serious hold ups, but many lane closures, some for miles, slowing traffic down. On one occasion we were channeled into the outside lane and were unable to take the exit we wanted. There had been no clear signage to warn us to keep to the inside lane.

Coming off at the next junction, it was actually quite pleasant to do a short detour via a couple of villages before rejoining the motorway.

The scenery hasn’t been very inspiring. Hilly and forested for most of the day, although late this afternoon it has become flatter with more cultivation of crops. The only interesting feature I noticed was two ruined castles on opposite hills facing each other across a wide valley.

One of the opposing castles.

An odd campsite

We are now at an odd campsite near Gera, which is located between Erfurt and Dresden. I say odd, because when we arrived the reception, bar, cafe area was all locked up, but there were a few caravans scattered around a field. There was a notice asking you to call a number if there was no one in attendance. Rather than do this, as I couldn’t remember the code for Germany and was too lazy to look it up, we decided to park ourselves, in the expectation someone would come along and ask us for payment. Within minutes a rather angry and unwelcoming lady came along and asked us why we hadn’t called her. We pretended we couldn’t understand German, so didn’t understand the notice. She calmed down, we paid her the requested EUR25 and asked if the bar would be open later. I was looking forward to sitting down with a glass of rose. Her response was “it will be open on Thursday” !!

After we had organised ourselves and put up the tent, we were talking to a Dutch lady camping nearby. She informed us there was a nice swimming pool. Later when I went to look for and inspect the pool, I found there was another very large campsite right next door to us. I don’t know if they are competing or if we are like an overflow camp or what? The pool was an odd little pool stuck in between the ladies and men’s ablution blocks. It was spotlessly clean but required climbing a step ladder to get in and out. We decided not to bother with a swim.

Tomorrow’s Plans

Tomorrow we will head to Dresden first and then onwards to Poland and Wroclaw, which is a bit over 400Kms. Whether we make it that far will depend on how quickly we get going in the morning 😊

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