US tourist takes scenic route – withguide book published in 1914

7 July 2004

BAD BERNECK – A bewildered elderly American tourist found himself mired in mud in a Bavarian forest – because he used a travel guide that was 90 years out of date, police in Germany said.

A passing farmer used a tractor to tow the 79-year-old man’s rental car back to civilization, where officers were summoned to assist the lost traveller.

He showed them a copy of a travel guide entitled “Beautiful Bayreuth” and published on the eve of World War I in 1914.

“He told us he had read it over and over as a boy and had always wanted to visit the places listed in it,” said a police spokesman in Bad Berneck.

“But owing to the Great Depression and the war and raising a family and working all his life, he said he never got around to actually travelling abroad until now.”

DPA

Subject: German news