Back From Bavaria

 Back From Bavaria...Across lower Germany and Austria

Our Road Trip was a complete success.  We found a new area that we want to visit again soon.  Orietta was able to visit with a good friend, finish knitting a sweater, plan and start a new project.  I was able to work on 3 watercolor paintings, and now they are nearly completed.  We had plenty of chances to practice using the drone to make videos.  We need lots of practice to gain confidence in sending it much farther than we can see it.  You end up directing it from your cell phone screen.  Flying it over private property or over a steep rocky cliff makes things a bit tense as we know if the drone falls we will never be able to rescue it.  We did have a crash, which you will see below in one of the clips.  This blog will be mostly about the drone and some videos we took of Bavaria.  In a few days  I want to talk about the foods we tasted, and what we saw.  

 I am fascinated with visiting old castle ruins and on google maps we found many ruined castles where we planned to use the drone to make videos. There were seven near our b&b.   Three looked like good choices with walls and structures intact. but we struggled to get close enough as they were on private property.  The best one we could get within a good three hundred meters. 

All Castles and One Waterfall

 The video shows the ruins above a dairy farmers home.  There was no road or path to get close.  So we just practiced and made several attempts to make a short video.  I edited it later and added music, a cello piece by Bach, which seemed appropriate as he died in 1750.

When we drove some days later to our second stop near Chiemsee, but could not stop, we marked ruins for a return trip with more planned time to drone them.  

We do have a nice drone, the camera lens is quite good, and it can be adjusted while flying to look more up or down.  We are still learning to move the lens smoothly, it is not easy.  The drone controller has two levers which directs the drone to go up or down, go sideways, turn right and left, go forward or backward, and by using both levers at the same time one can perform a curve while going up down or forward.  This is the tricky part.  

The controller holds the cell phone which is showing what the camera is viewing.  When the drone goes way forward or very high, you cannot see it so you must use the cell phone screen.  There is a way to call the drone back and it will land within an arms length of where it took off.  When it is far and not in sight, knowing you can call it back gives some bit of confidence.  We have only flown it afar a few times this way so far.  

Here is a photo of another castle near where we stayed close to Lake Chiemsee, which is near the famous "Disney" castle called Neuschwanstein.  This one below is on our list to visit on our return trip.  

One thing that became evident to me on this trip. We saw a lot of European tourists, most of them did not seem too interested in old castle ruins.  Hiking the forest seemed more important.  We follow a lot of world travellers on Youtube, and the Europeans seem to want to explore volcanos.  Climbing to the rim and looking down is most interesting to them.  I, being from the high desert of New Mexico, had never had the chance to see a castle, and even after living here 17 years, I want to see more.  

You see the drone crash scene, as it goes against this Austrian Farm House.  Superglue to the rescue.

Here is a drone shot in the forest of Austria and a waterfall.  It is made up of several clips that have been edited together.

Just a few miles past the pass to Italy we saw a forest fire.  4 planes and a helicopter were battling the flames.  We hope none of the fire fighters are injured or worse.

  

Music can be added to the clip which makes editing a bit more complicated, but the end product is more interesting to view.  I tried to add several clips with music but google only allows me ones that are smaller than 100 megabites.  I must find another place to share my blogs!  So frustrating.

I have a lot of clips, but you are probably falling asleep if you have gotten this far.  With that, I wish you a peaceful weekend.  Thanks for reading.  Ciao!