Breakfast was at 8AM and at that stage the car was telling me the temperature was 19C. I know because I went and installed my own GPS just because I wanted one that I was happier to use.

We went to the Hamfest as we missed the turn off to downtown Friedrichshafen. (The GPS told us to turn left into a No Entry road.) At the Hamfest, Lynette was happy enough to sit in the car and catch up with her diary and reading while I spent the day inside.

Entry was easy, as I had already paid for the ticket over the internet so just needed to pick up the tag itself. That jumped a heap of others in the queue.  Inside, there were three halls set up. The largest held all the commercial vendors, exhibits and radio clubs from all over. The two furtherest clubs were from Thailand and Japan.

The other two halls held the flea market and were each about 110 metres long and one had 14 rows of tables and the other 16 rows. Walking the front of each row was good exercise, about 5km for the total trip, all on hard concrete. The main hall was about twice as long as the smaller halls.

I started in the flea market, the two smaller halls. Literally there was everything there, except the kitchen sink and I may have missed that as I saw a kid's pedal car there. Ton and tons (literally) of test equipment, some PC stuff, components by the truckful, especially high voltage heavy duty items, probably form the Iron Curtain countries. Lots of ex-miltary stuff that we just don't see in NZ, whether it be UK, US or Russian origin.

I put my card on the QSL wall. It's a great idea for the organisers to see where people have come from and for everyone else to see who has visited. I think it would be a good idea to do occasionally at some of our NZ junk sales.

In the main hall, I wandered around and met a few people. There was a gypsy caravan there, which Lynette would have liked, where the guy had set it up with his radio in part of it. I have strict instructions to talk to him tomorrow and see if he travels around with a horse towing it.

A number of people chatted to me. A couple of guys had been to NZ and enjoyed it greatly and a lady is going next week to have a three week ride on a Harley Davidson motorcycle, up and down the country. I met one person who had worked me and also a German engineer from whom I had purchased a piece of kit, ten years ago. He was rapt that I remembered him and contacted him.

Lynette and I had lunch at a food stall and then I went back inside while she continued. It was actually cooler outside (26C) than inside, despite the inside having air conditioning. It was just all those bodies. Speaking of bodies, I have no idea how many turned up, but I thought there were more people there than at Dayton, Ohio (the world's largest hamfest), on a Friday. It may be an illusion, because Dayton is spread out over a greater area.

The afternoon prowl, took me until 4:30PM, by which time I had had enough for one day. I caught up with Lynette. She checked on the buses at the Hamfest and they will take her to town tomorrow.

We headed away from the Hamfest and programmmed in the B&B. We planned to try to go downtown to Friedrichshafen, but missed a turn and got on the road back to the B&B. At 5PM, it was jammed, literally, so we inched along and took the first exit. We found a car park near the Friedrichshafen train station and tried to get in.

At the car park entry, I pushed the lit green button and nothing happened, other than the light went out. I tried again and then pushed the only other button on the parking thingy. A lady sounded a bit confused, when I told her in English that I had pushed the button and the barrier didn't go up. She turned on the light on the button switch and I pushed it again and the light went out but the barrier still stayed down. She sounded even more frustrated with me, then the driver behind me came up and pulled a plastic token, the size of an old 20 cent piece, out of the machine, and the barrier magically went up. When we had parked and were walking out, we found a meter that read your plastic coin and took money from you. When you put it in the exit machine, it will let you out. Clever people these Germans! Saves all the rubbish of tickets etc.

The first call in the town was to find a pair of jandals for me, to replace the one the leprechaun has borrowed. Then we walked along the lake, took pictures of the boats and ferries. It looks like they have a roll on, roll off vehicle ferry between Germany and Switzerland. Then we had a pleasant meal and returned to the B&B.

It's just started to rain (at 10PM), with a little thunder, so maybe we should have bought a pair of gumboots instead of jandals.

The gypsy caravan, mounted on a trailer

That's not fruit drink they have in the bottle.

Hordes in the flea market area.

Lots of green paint on this equipment

See if you can see ZL1LC

I thought the Irish only flew kites not balloons.

Count the number of different national flags here.

Just a small portion of the car park.

Part of the main hall.

An Egima machine on display.  There was another for sale for Euros 33,000.  Not sue if it sold.

The Italians know when it's time to relax.

Along the Friedrichshafen waterfront.

A catamaran ferry.

A conventional ferry with Switzerland in the background.