5/9/14 day 32: Neuruppin, Germany

Imagine there's no heaven... Is inscribed in the ceiling around the large circular opening to the sky above the salt pool in the spa of the See Hotel Fontane, our hotel and venue for the evening. The idea is to float naked and motionless, completely relaxing your every muscle and letting the salinity of the water buoy you. Tilt your head back in the water and hear the calming instrumental music they pipe in. Open your eyes and watch birds fly by the huge oculus. Let the wind slowly pull you across the water. Spinning. Track the low grey clowds as they pass through your peep hole to the heavens. Or close your eyes and focus on nothing. Float. And imagine. And dream.

And hope your band mates don't come in and see your Wiener schnitzel...

Ah, screw it. Let them see. Let them all see.

Had a great, late morning. Breakfast at 10:30 with the crew. I think we all needed the rest, maybe me the most. Driving is wearing me out, although last night was a short jaunt from Berlin to Neuruppin (45 min). I still drove 3+ hrs that day from Czech.

Breakfast is fairly epic at the See Hotel. Really nice spread with some fine additions including fresh squeezed celery juice and an omelette bar, which I sadly arrived to late to enjoy.

After breakfast came the spa. A couple different saunas, steam room, herbal steam room, a number of various showers (including my favorite which is just a bucket of cold water attached to a rope. You can reenact that scene in flash dance if you want. Totally same vibe). Then came the floating. And no, no band mates showed up. The band that saunas naked together stays together, or something like that.

After an hour and a half of that, Jeff and I took a walk into town. No real destination in mind. We jumped into a cafe when it started raining and enjoyed some free wifi. Neuruppin is investing in some remodel which is nice. It's a very quant little town with beautiful old buildings and wobbly cobblestone passageways.

(This is part of my Blue Door series)

(This house is like an MC Esher drawing)

(Another blue door)

(Curry Wurst was the right call)

After a short nap, we met in the main restaurant for their Chinese Buffet. It was good. Better than your average Chinese buffet, I'd say. 

The hotel sets up a stage and lights in the lobby and lines up comfy chairs. We ended up having a nice little crowd including some VIPs from London (thanks Mark and Hannah). 

(From last year, signing the wall of fame)

Set went well and after we all had a beer in the bar and tried to soak in all the goodness of the tour. Tmrw night is our last show and it's usually a very early night to pack and get ready and go over all the Acounting. So tonight we tried to just enjoy our last evening knowing Saturday is going to be a long drive.

(Photo Mark Liddington)

We love playing here. We love relaxing here. I'm so grateful for this stop on the tour. Night.