Friday night was good, the curry turned out ok and the Rioja was indeed fine. We tried some Dunkel Bier mit Hefe in a pub later - that's dark beer with yeast. My verdict: dark beer good, yeast not necessary.

On Saturday I went on a trip to see the Rhine with Eduardo and two more Spaniards, Ignacio and Marivi. We cycled over a big road bridge, and were quite disappointed not to arrive in France. It turns out the border only reverts to the river a bit further south. We were still about 7km from France, I think I'll try and get there another time. So, we rode south along the east bank of the Rhine, stopping for a little lunch, before making our way back through some leafy suburbs of Karlsruhe. It was only 4 hours, but it seemed like we'd been away all day. It's great to have a bike in this town.

I took some pictures on the trip. I'll put them on the web tomorrow.

This Sunday was the first on I've spent in Karlsruhe, I've been away for all the previous ones in Berlin or in the Schwarzwald. In Germany, everything is closed on a Sunday, so how do they sell Sunday papers here? I eventually bought a paper from the 24 hour garage round the corner. I also got some fresh Brötchen from a bakery that was about to close at midday. You don't want to be caught short of Brötchen in this country. Walking home with a paper and some fresh bread rolls, I felt the satisfaction of knowing I had accomplished about all a man could accomplish on a Sunday in Germany.

What everybody here does on Sunday in lieu of commercial activities is to go to the parks. I took the bike out again to explore the northern part of Karlsruhe, which is a big forest where Karl (yes that Karl) used to go hunting. It's lovely, especially with the leaves turning colour. I also rode past a quite serious Sunday league football game, a Mexican restaurant conveniently situated in the middle of the woods, a waterworks and a canal. Pictures of some of these tomorrow. n the way home, the Schloss gardens were as busy as the main shopping street on Saturday, but with a rather more relaxed atmosphere. There's a real feeling of Sunday being a different kind of day here that we don't really have in the UK any more, at least not in towns the size of Karlsruhe. People say "Schön Sonntag" to each other, i.e have a nice Sunday. It's quite cool. It's also a good excuse to eat take-away, since you can't buy anything to cook. I had another excellent kebab from the shop downstairs.

First German class tonight. Hope the other Fremdspracheranfängers are a decent bunch.