Lederhosen, Dirndl, Calf Warmers & Lamb Teets

Despite being very overcast, set off for a day in Kempten at the 10 day town festival, an annual highlight for the region. Can't think of a similar event in the UK. It's "The" place to be seen, so Lederhosen & Co are commonplace notably amongst the youth.

A large part of the inner city center gardens are courdened off with high gates, large tents erected. During the day, all sorts of stands showing the work of local craftsmen and firms, lots of agricultural based things, a few tractors, no animals, loads of stands selling kitchen and garden gadgets you don't need and which only ever work on the stand and never at home. The open air stage is restricted to Bavarian type things but in the evening is taken over by the youth and various bands.

We found a parking spot fairly close but just as the heavens opened, so spent the first 5 minutes in the car. When we got out, the first shop on the way to the festival was a large sports shop, so we had to go in and equip Elliot with snorkel and eye mask so he can develop his treasure seeking skills.

We survived the showers but the tents were overcrowded due to everyone seeking shelter. Still it was a bit of fun. We found a refuge for children in the form of a Kindergarten for 3-6 y.o. where Charlotte painted a wooden key ring and opposite a "workshop" for the 6-12 y.o.'s where Elliot built a noise inducing machine and engraved a glass. He looked and acted like a pro. I would though love to know what he said to the boy sitting opposite him on the workbench when they had a brief conversation - suspect Irish & Swabian is much the same at that age.

On the way home we tried getting a dog lead for Kate as the German ones are quite different. The local pet shop didn't have the one she wanted so we stopped off at an agricultural merchant type shop in Dietmannsried, getting there 1 minute before closing time. Got a lead (not exactly what we wanted) and grabbed their large catalogue before being locked in/out.

So despite the weather, an interesting day and a bit of Bavarian "lifestyle".

Oh ...the Lamb Teets

Back home, Kate had a look in the catalog and saw spare teets for her favourite lamb feeding bottle which one cannot buy seperately in Ireland. This year her bottle had to do overtime and I said we would get them to her before the 2015 lambing season started.