Untitled Page 265

15.3.60
Hi Sweetheart -
I'm sitting right now (4pm) in the common room of the Hamburg; it is a beautiful new
building (sleeps 400 !!) on a hill overlooking the harbor. I suppose I should be out
sightseeing now, but I've got that "don't care if I never see another famous old church"
feeling, and would rather stay here, rest, write to you, my love, daydream about my
flight home in June and about times after that. Might even read a little Economics
(I've got a book along, have 50 pages read, trying to finish the whole thing, get ahead on
next quarter) and plan to take a leisurely shower before going to bed. So it's kind of
a day off from traveling, and I'm glad to have it.

We left Rothenburg yesterday morning about 8 AM, and rode along the Tauber river
to Creglingen. It was a truly beautiful valley, with green cultivated hills sloping up
on each side from the river, which runs quietly through the center. There are
several small villages, still very natural, peasantlike, with women leading cows
through the streets, old houses with barns beneath the living quarters (there are
many of these in Beutelsbach too), etc. We ate breakfast on the bank of the river (which
is about 20-30 feet wide mostly, not terribly huge, and runs very slowly, mirror smooth)
and watched farmers plowing their land above, and a school of ducks swim by before
us.

At Creglingen we boarded a train for Würzburg; it was an old-timer with wooden
seats, etc. and made its way slowly, leisurely northward - we sat and looked out the
window, saw almost as much of the scenery as we could have from our bikes. The train
was all but empty, so the conductor had time to drop by and talk, find out where we're
from, etc. He said we're the first bike travellers of the season, and I guess he's right. But
so far we've had beautiful sunny weather (except for morning fog).

In Würzburg we had only time for a quick 2 hour ride around town. Saw a couple
of churches, went past the old university (badly bombed out - there was still much rubble and
much new construction everywhere in the city), spent most of our time up at the Marienburg
castle, on a bluff looking out over the city. Then back to the train, load up again, off on
a long ride to Hannover. We sat in a compartment with three young Germans and
an older man. I sort of half read econ and half listened in on the conversations - could under
stand most of what they said.

We arrived in Hannover about 8.20, loaded up the bikes as usual (we're getting pretty
good at this by now) and rode to the youth hostel, had a light snack and went to bed at
10pm. Up this morning to catch an 8:25 train to Hamburg, which we missed because
I realized as we settled ourselves in our seats that my camera was still back at the hostel.
So after a ride back for it, we caught an hour later train and got here at 12:15. Ate
lunch and went to American Express to see about mail (none for me [drawing of three tears], so we left
Amsterdam as forwarding address)

Now you're caught up on the news and here I sit looking out on the harbor. It's bigger
by far than any other I've seen - with huge dock loading cranes as thick as TV
antennae at home, big ships and little going every which way, big toots and little cutting
the air. Even though the sky is blue there's a thick haze over the town from all the industry --
they have thier smog problem too, though it's not hard on the eyes as in L.A.

Well sweetheart, the same feeling I mentioned a few days ago is still with me, and I guess
will be for the rest of the trip. I feel so alone, for no good reason (even seeing Europe is not seemingly