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Europe 2024

April - June 2024
A 51-day adventure by Desiree and Neil Read more
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  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 23

    22 May: Miniatur Wunderland

    May 22 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    We set off later that night to visit Miniatur Wunderland. 23 years ago, brothers Frederik and Gerrit Braun decided to turn their passion for model-making into a business. They started building intricate model scenes at a scale of 1:187 in one of the historic harbour warehouses at Speicherstadt.

    Since then they have created 13 themed sites with over a million tiny figures, the world’s biggest model railway : over 16,000 metres of track, 1,231 engines, 12,000 wagons , 1403 signals, 541,000 LEDs, controlled by 59 computers. Cost: 45 million Euros!

    It has expanded across four floors and is one of the most visited sites in Germany.

    Displays are site-specific in tiny detail (with human interest and comic details if you look closely).

    I’ve listed the two real-life scenes of Hamburg harbour at the start:
    Elbphilharmonie Concert Hall, and harbour; Speicherstadt historic warehouses (Hamburg has more canals than Venice).

    Then the Wunderland: Monte Carlo Rally (cars actually racing); Rio de Janeiro favelas (slums) and Presidential Palace.

    Disneyland by night; Hamburg city (this display runs into the next room); Speicherdstadt warehouses; Ocean Liner leaving port.

    Absolutely fantastic - a must-see if you ever get to Germany.    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 25

    24 May: A Tale of Two Museums

    May 24 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 22 °C

    Next destination was a drive south to the Ballinstadt Emigration Museum. Albert Ballin, a Hamburg shipping magnate, invented the concept of the cruise ship, with the purpose-built Prinzessin Victoria Luise in 1899. (The sleek white ship in the photo).His HAPAG shipping line was for a time the biggest in the world.

    He also turned Hamburg into “ the emigration centre of the world”. He set up a complex of emigration halls which were home to five million emigrants from all over Europe, seeking new lives in the US, Canada, Australia and even New Zealand (the Bohemian settlement at Puhoi). Rich, successful, favoured by Kaiser Wilhelm II, his empire crumbled with the onset of the First World War, which he had tried hard to avert.

    His world-leading facility was taken over by the German Goverment as a military hospital, his emigration business dried up. In November 1918 his three crack liners Vaterland, Bismarck and Imperator were seized as war reparations (renamed Leviathan, Majestic, and Berengaria). Hearing that his friend and benefactor Kaiser Wilhelm II had abdicated, Ballin took an overdose of sleeping pills.

    Three of the immigration halls have been rebuilt since the 1960s as the Ballinstadt Emigration Museum.
    They show how thousands of people were fed, housed, organised, health checked, had the necessary papers organized, and were shipped to their destinations.

    Memoirs from the people themselves tell what it was like. There are also displays on post-war emigration (Marie-Thérèse was comparing her own family experience as Dutch immigrants in the 1950’s) and
    immigration worldwide (see the Banksy).

    I was very taken with the gift shop’s souvenir soft toy, a fetching rat of great charm, but Neil drew the line and I sadly had to leave Ratty behind.

    Next we drove north almost to Kiel, to the Schleswig-Holstein Open Air Museum at Molfsee. Here are 40 hectares of meadows, gardens, dikes and over 70 historic buildings, farms and mills typical of the region.

    We missed the live activities that happen on the weekends, but the buildings, some over 200 years old, showed what daily life was like in a typical Schleswig-Holstein village.

    There were also sobering exhibits on the plight of the desperate refugees who fled westward from the advancing Russian Army in the last bitter months of 1945.

    Many thanks to our hostess for driving us far beyond the usual Hamburg city tourist sites for these unique experiences.    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 26

    25 May: Rest Day!!

    May 25 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 19 °C

    We had a quiet day today; not a single church, museum or even train!!

    After a relaxed breakfast etc, Des & I went for a walk (~15 minutes) to the local shops. There are two competing supermarkets. We did our shopping at EDEKA - wonderful choice of cheese, including Gruyère from Switzerland. Once we’d finished, Des had to take a nostalgic walk through ALDI which we know from holidays in Melbourne, see photo.

    Drifting back, we ate our bread and cheese in the porch at the back of the house. There is a lovely garden, graced by the actual owner of the property, Louis the cat.

    The garden has a goldfish pond, which today showed a glorious water lily.

    The next night we were going to La Bohème in Lübeck, so I put on our favourite recording of it, and Des & I played Scrabble. I won’t say who won today, but I scored two 7-letters words …

    We had a late dinner on a table out the front of the house, sitting in the sunshine - at 8pm!!

    One of the features of spring in Hamburg: dawn at 0430, and evenings that extend till 2230!    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 27

    26 May: What a day!

    May 26 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 22 °C

    A Wow of a day!

    First up: Lutheran Mass at Sankt Michaelis, Hamburg’s most famous church and city landmark. This baroque masterpiece from 1750, affectionately nick-named “Der Michel” (“Our Mickey”) has survived war, Napoleonic invasion, a disastrous fire in 1906 and damage from Allied bombing in 1944.

    Today’s service was special as it incorporated a baptismal ceremony. To celebrate, there was a Haydn Mass (Missa Brevis of St John of God, always a delight) performed by professional singers and musicians. To top it off, the nimble organist played at three of the church’s four organs, including the Grand Organ of 1962, which at the time was the biggest church organ in the world.

    A moving experience, plus an auditory delight, hearing beautiful music in 3-D sound in a superb church.

    Next we drove 64K to the medieval town of Lübeck , “The Queen of the Baltic”. Lübeck was the leader of the Hansa League, a medieval commercial and defensive network of merchant guilds and market towns. For 400 years Hansa shaped the trade and politics of Northern Europe.

    Its memory still survives in the German airline Lufthansa-“ the Hanseatic League of the Air.”

    Marie-Thérèse’s friend Petra, who lives in the centre of the Old Town (originally a fortified island in the Trave River), acted as our guide.
    On our walk we found two sets of “Stumbling Stones”. These are small bronze plaques set into the footpath commemorating Jewish families living at this address who were taken by the Nazis.

    First stop was lunch at Schiffergeschellschaft (Ship’s Company) restaurant, founded in 1535!
    This is decorated with all sorts of nautical memorabilia. The seats (like pews) have different carved emblems. This was to ensure that crews from different ships and nationalities sat separately and didn’t get into a fight!

    After our delicious meal, Petra started showing us around the picturesque streets. Abruptly the clouds that had been gathering turned into a thunderstorm. Luckily for us , Petra knew the lady on the admission desk at the famous Marienkirche (Church of Our Lady), so we made a run for it over the cobbles and dashed through the door just as rhe storm burst.

    This remarkable church, built from 1265 by the citizens and governing council of this wealthy city, is 102m long, has towers 125m high, has the tallest brick vault in the world at 38.5 m (126 ft) , and covers 4,400 sq metres (47,361 sq ft).

    What makes it more remarkable is that this was the first ever Gothic church built in brick. It was enormously influential, “the mother church of brick Gothic”, and set the standard for 70 other churches in the Baltic region.

    Sadly, Bomber Harris of the RAF was looking for revenge targets in Germany after the Luftwaffe raid on Coventry, and on the night of Palm Sunday 1942, the church was almost completely destroyed by fire, along with most of the city centre.

    The Old Town was built largely of wood and burned well.

    After huge efforts, much of this superb building has been reconstructed, and in 1987 it was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List.

    After a pleasant break at Petra’s charming apartment nearby, we walked over the cobbles to Lübeck’s Opera House for a performance of Puccini’s La Bohème.

    We enjoyed this excellent production, first class voices, good orchestra, deep feeling. It’s an affecting story that had us reaching for our hsnkerchiefs.

    The population of Lübeck is 318,000. Imagine a NZ city not much larger than Wellington staging 21 first-class performances of drama, opera and modern shows a year.

    After this wonderful day I could only finish with “ They drove home tired but happy.”    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 28

    27 May: Around & About Hamburg

    May 27 in Germany ⋅ ⛅ 18 °C

    Today we had a couple of objectives: first I wanted to get to see the firm that makes a travel version of the breathing machine I’ve used at night for years; second, we wanted to visit a riverside restaurant which acknowledges each of the many ships that head into or out of Hamburg port.

    Carrying my bulky F&P machine on our travels has been an absolute pest for both of us, as we knew it would be. I tried to buy the small travel machine in Wellington, but pleasant and helpful though the Wellington agency staff were, they weren’t able to make the ResMed AirMini work for me.

    ResMed’s Hamburg office is in Hafen City on the Elbe river, a car ride and a couple of subways away.

    Between the car and the first subway we visited St Nikolai’s church, built in the shape of a tear. The original Nikolaikirche was one of the five great Lutheran churches in Hamburg. In the 1870s it was the tallest building in the world, but only the tower survived Bomber Harris in WWII. When the new church was built, the surviving fragments of the original stained glass windows were used to create a commemorative wall and rose window.

    When we surfaced from the subway in Hafen City, we were surrounded by huge new buildings under construction, including a six storey Westfield mall. ResMed were great, I bought the machine, and used it successfully for the remainder of our trip. 🙂

    Heading back to the car, we headed for afternoon tea at the Willkommen Höft, a large restaurant & wedding venue on the banks of the Lower Elbe.

    On the way we detoured to the original Altona. This was originally the southernmost city in Denmark, until Bismarck seized the territory of Schleswig in a short, sharp war in 1864 (setting a very bad precedent for later politicians). The stress is on the first syllable, unlike the Melbourne suburb. Marie-Thérèse wanted to show us the magnificent fountain.

    While we were at Wilkommen Höft, a couple of large ships passed us in the river. As they passed, the Hamburg flag on the flagpole was dipped, and the national anthem of the ship’s country of registration was played on huge speakers.

    This practice happens between 8am and 8pm for all ships over 1,000 GT. It was started in 1952 by a retired sea captain.

    Another great day!!    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 29

    28 May: Super Hamburg

    May 28 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    This was a day of superlatives. We started by visiting the amazing Elbphilharmonie. This post-modern concerthall, opened in 2016, is built on a podium of a eight-storey high brick warehouse standing above the harbour. On top of this brick monolith, a creation of rippling glass soars as high again, scalloped at the top like a breaking wave.

    Inside is a state-of-the-art concert hall seating 2,100 people. Look it up on YouTube - especially the opening concert, synchronised with a sound-and-light show on the glass walls outside. It really is a jaw-dropper.

    The public reaches the viewing platform which runs right around the building by riding the longest escalator/travelator in Europe. You then get amazing views of the port and city. This astonishing edifice is known to the locals as “Elphi”.

    Next up was a harbour ferry ride. The port of Hamburg, the second-largest in Europe, is 110km from the sea, up the Elbe River.

    Some statistics:
    Founded: May 7, 1189
    Land area: 43.31 km2 (16.72 sq mi)
    Vessel arrivals: 9,681 (2013)
    Annual revenue: €1.29 billion (2018)
    Employees: 10,000 (2004)
    Annual cargo tonnage: 145.7 million tonnes (2014)

     I didn’t realise what a big deal it was until our ferry ride, which took us half an hour to traverse the main port area, and another half hour to return.

    Cranes, liners, cargo ships of all shapes and sizes, ferries, tugs, dry-docks, historic vessels (lightship, icebreaker, a Russian Tango Class submarine, U-434, now a museum: the Port of Hamburg has them all. And always, on the horizon, is the Elbphilharmonie, towering over the waves like a sailing ship under full canvas.

    After a quick dinner and wardrobe turnaround, we headed back into town (thanks again to Marie-Thérèse our endlessly patient train guide and taxi-driver).

    Our destination was Hamburg’s Laeiszhalle. This handsome neo-Baroque concert hall was a gift to the city by a wealthy Hamburg shipowner and his wife in 1908. Miraculously it survived the horrendous Allied bombing raids that destroyed so much of the inner city.

    Sir Andràs Schiff is one of the ten best pianists in the world today - and he was playing Haydn, and Brahms (born in Hamburg), with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. To hear him playing Brahms’ First Piano Concerto live was a whole new level of musical experience. I still have the melodies running through my head.

    Superb musicianship and interpretation, plus the clearest acoustic I have ever heard. Every note was crystal-clear.

    Absolutely worth coming all the way from New Zealand to see and hear.    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 30

    29 May: COVID!!!

    May 29 in Germany ⋅ 🌧 16 °C

    No, we haven’t got COVID - Phew!

    But Marie-Thérèse’s son had tested positive. To be on the safe side, we agreed with Marie-Thérèse that we should move to a hotel. She knew a hotel in town used by visiting singers, and they had a vacancy.

    So we relocated to the Hotel Vorbach. A stressful morning, and a bit sad, as Marie-Thérèse has been absolutely brilliant, and tireless in getting us to experience the things she loves about living in Hamburg. Thanks heaps Marie-Thérèse, hope we can do the same for you when you’re in NZ next!

    Once we were settled in the room, the three of us went round the corner to Yu Gardens, a Chinese restaurant in a beautiful building apparently modelled on a Ming dynasty garden in Shanghai. We enjoyed an exquisite Chinese meal of Peking duck, spicy beef and a salad with avocado and prawns - yum!!

    Next we walked next door to the museum with the longest name we’ve encountered: “Museum am Rothenbaum, Kulturen und Künste der Welt”, or MARKK. Among the many cultural treasures in this ethnological museum are looted Benin bronzes awaiting return to Nigeria, and - wait for it - a complete 19th century Te Arawa wharenui, named Rauru.

    Rauru (named after the honoured inventor of wood carving) was constructed in Whakarewarewa from 1897 to 1900. It was not a tribal house, but was privately commissioned by a Pākehā hotel keeper Charles Nelson. Hamburg Museum acquired Rauru in 1907.

    Tribal members came to Hamburg from Aotearoa in 2012 and undertook extensive restoration. Rauru is now perfect!

    There were also interesting spirit figures and animal totems from Papua New Guinea, plus a collection of creepy devil masks from the Tyrol region of Austria.
    Locals still dress up in these for traditional parades (see the green mask at the end). You get the feeling that these Krampus figures go back a very long way.    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    Day 31

    30 May: Sauntering in the sun

    May 30 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 20 °C

    The sky was blue, the sun was beckoning, we set out to go wherever our feet would take us.

    We wandered through streets and beside canals, enjoying the shops, scenes, and quirky corners of this beautiful city.

    Down by the waterfront we found the Kontorviertel, the quarter where the great merchant families built their headquarters in the early 1900s, in the latest style, with magnificent archways decorated with monumental bronze figures. These are now UNESCO World Heritage sites.

    Soon the magnificent Elphi was looming above us, with the irregularly shaped panels on the Concert Hall rippling like waves in the sunlight.

    Who knows when we will be back? So we rode the escalator/ travelator again up to the café for a coffee and made the mistake of looking into the gift shop. A Ravensburger jigsaw! All those glass panels! All that sky!

    Neil had to have it. I was seduced by the Elphi snow globe. My excuse was my grand-daughters. Now we really had to buy that extra suitcase.

    We set off again past the Port Fire Brigade Headquarters (great contrast between the sleek modern engine and the elaborate brick building with its fancy cornices, row of stone archways and neat row of red and white pot-plants.(Hansa colours).

    Two high bronze cupolas reared above the surrounding buildings. Aha! A church, thought I. But as we rounded the corner , where a tent city of booths and market stalls was setting up for the next day’s Hamburg Ironman, we realised this was the Hamburg Rathaus, the City Hall. Marie-Thérèse had been very keen for us to see it. Now here it was in front of us, a palace fit for a great trading city in its prime.

    There were no guided tours that day, but we looked around the huge foyer and courtyard with its fountain, each figure holding an emblem of the city’s trade and manufacture. I was pleased we got to see it.

    On the side of the Platz in front was yet another reminder of Hamburg’s Hanseatic past (I counted three in our walk): the historic Stock Exchange , or Hanseatische Wertpapierbörse Hamburg, picked out in gold leaf.

    We were running out of feet by this time (over 11,000 steps) so took a taxi home.

    As we walked to the hotel, there was another Stumbling Stone, for Herbert Frank, born 1884, who lived here, deported in 1943 to Theresienstadt (Terezin), murdered in Auschwitz in 1944. In Germany, the past is never far away.    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    1
    Day 32

    31 May: Shopping Day!

    May 31 in Germany ⋅ ☁️ 18 °C

    Our main target today was to buy a third but smaller suitcase. We want to offload things we had bought (such as a 3-volume biography of Talleyrand in French (!) and a couple of jigsaws) and also clothes etc we packed but hadn’t used.

    We walked to the subway past some lovely houses, but it seemed that outside every second or third house there were small brass plaques set into the footpath. These “stumbling stones” commemorate Jewish folk who were arrested by the Nazis, deported to concentration camps, and then (mostly) murdered. Des counted 14 plaques on one side of the road between the hotel and the subway. Each plaque has its own ghastly story.

    Another thing we noticed everywhere we went in Germany was the EU election advertising in posters around every lamp post. The most common were for a party called VOLT. No one seemed to know who they were, but they ranged from funny (“More ice cream for everyone!”) to bad taste - see the poster in the photo (“Don’t be an …..!)

    In town we first went to the Europa Passage, five storeys of (it seemed) mostly clothing shops. No suitcases.☹️

    We asked the info guy, and he directed us to Karstadt, a department store next door. The first thing we saw as we walked in was a range of suitcases on clearance. Des fell in love with a medium pink number, we bought it, and she has named it “Hansi”, after the Hanseatic League merchants who ran this part of the world for so long.

    After a coffee, Des found Karstadt’s huge womenswear department. Suffice to say, we spent quite a while there, and Des had to be persuaded (not!) to buy a couple of t-shirts and a cashmere jersey.

    There was a sudden downpour as we left Karstadt, and we took shelter in St Peter’s Church. This turned out to be Hamburg’s oldest parish church, founded in 1195. St Peter’s survived WWII with only minor damage.

    Back to Europa for lunch - the whole top floor is a food hall, known as “SkyFOOD”. One of the interesting things here was the number of people with dogs the size of cats. Most don’t seem to be a problem, but I watched one girl talking with her friends while her two mini hounds peed against a pillar in the mall!

    After a tasty Indian meal, back to the subway and home.

    One more night we were to join a six-day river cruise to Berlin!    Read more

  • TravelerEurope 2024
    2
    Day 33

    The Glorious First of June

    June 1 in Germany ⋅ ☀️ 23 °C

    Today is the anniversary of Lord Howe’s victory over the French Revolutionary Navy on 1 June 1794, always known in naval history as The Glorious First of June.

    It was also our last day in Hamburg. We packed our bags (thank goodness we had bought our Hansi) and stowed our luggage.

    Our goal on another beautiful day was to walk down to the Kunsthalle, Hamburg’s famous art gallery.

    We lasted 15 minutes before stopping for a coffee at Stephansplatz. This was a tactical error as the fragrant odours of fresh bread kept wafting from Nur Hier, a tempting bakery across the lane. We decided it was lunchtime. Cue one of the freshest, most crisp salami rolls I have ever tasted, followed by a luscious Erdbeer Kopenhagener (cream pastry with strawberries).

    Google took us down to the top of Alster Lake with fountain playing, boats, and families picnicking on the shore, shaded by bright green leafy canopies from the mature trees lining the path. A wonderful spot for loitering and soaking up the sun.

    Another ten minutes brought us to the majestic Kunsthalle building. Here we spent the next two hours wandering from one room of art treasures to another.

    Hard to choose the stand-outs, but here goes:
    Kaspar David Friedrich: this German Romantic painter of the early nineteenth century painted the immensity and mystery of nature. Most famous is his Wanderer above a sea of fog, from 1817. We were also gripped by Moonlight on the sea shore. 1835-36.

    At first sight it’s hard to see anything happening in this study of gathering darkness and a building storm. But as you look at it, your eye adjusts and you can see patterns of light on the puddles and wet sand, and send the light changing as the moonlight gleams through the clouds.

    Neil was also very taken with The Hut on the Beach 1820.
    A another stunner was a life-size Rodin bronze male nude from 1885. Rodin has the most extraordinary ability to suggest movement . His bodies balance and flex.
    Monet Still Life with Two Apples 1880. Glowing colours and a sense of 4-D. Also Waterloo Bridge 1902.

    From the late Middle Ages: A retable (altar frame) from the first St Petri Church. a Mary and Child from 1470, by the Swabian master, still with traces of the colours it was orginally painted.

    Neil’s final choice: A portrait of Franz Liszt in old age, warts and all. By Franz von Lembach 1884.

    And I couldn’t resist Franz Marc’s Blue Monkeys!

    Time for a taxi back to the hotel to muster our growing family of suitcases ready for the move to CroisiEurope’s Elbe Princesse!    Read more

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