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Bavaria and Middle Rhine

agosto - setembro 2022
Uma 22aventura de um dia na Wolpertinger Wanderings Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Half-Timbered Houses and Signs

    8 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ⛅ 68 °F

    Weißgerbergasse is a picturesque street in Nuremberg, famous for it's half-timbered houses. I liked the painted houses of southern Bavaria, but these half timbered houses, to my uncouth and uneducated American mind, really scream "Germany" to me. Too many fairy tales and cartoons, I imagine. I'm sure this is true for other tourists, as Germany has capitalized on our embrace of stereotypes by creating a great marketing strategy, promoting various "roads": the Romantic Road, the Fairytale Road, and indeed, the Half Timbered Road (die Fackwerkstraße) which is actually a 3000 kilometer (that's close to 1900 miles) route through eight federal states including four in the former DDR.

    In addition to these very aesthetically pleasing buildings, many Nuremberg businesses have amazing signs, some of which I'll put in here, some which will appear later. There is a great deal of beauty in the Altstadt: the buildings in general, the details on the buildings, the signage, gardens, statues. It's no wonder I drained all the batteries in the camera.

    (Okay, I threw the '80s one in because I can't resist the '80s).    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    The Streets of Nuremberg I

    8 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ☀️ 68 °F

    As I've said, Nuremberg's Altstadt is extremely beautiful. Included here are random shots of statues, buildings, fountains and our late afternoon snack.

    About that snack. We wanted to try Lebkuchen, Nuremberg's famous and officially protected designation of origin baked good. It's a cookie, but soft. It has a long and storied history, traced back to Franconian monks (those monks did everything: saved the classics, cared for the poor, advanced science and medicine, invented lebkuchen, maultaschen dumplings, made beer--we should be grateful to them) in the 1200s. They were formed on unconsecrated communion wafers, or so the story says, to stop them from sticking to the pan. Today-- they still are, at least in Nuremberg. Some are dipped in chocolate (obviously not back in the Middle Ages, as there was no chocolate in Europe), some glazed, and some just have nuts on top. They're similar to gingerbread, and I had looked at recipes. Too much work, including making your own candied fruit, and containing a slew of spices that back in those days, would have literally paid a king's ransom: all spice, cardamom, coriander, cloves, aniseed, and ginger. They use nut flour in the dough, the type and percent varies by the region and the bakery. In Nuremberg, some of the higher end bakeries use up to 40% nut flour. They're similar to Speculoos cookies, which I have made, but much softer.

    So we went to the Wicklein bakery, mainly because it was right across from the Frauenkirche. You can take classes here, participate in Lebkuchen making and dip your creations, etc. We opted just to get two coffees, and out of the array of choices, went for a traditional lebkuchen, no chocolate, no glaze, just three almonds on top. With our coffee, we got cute little lebkuchen glazed stars. We liked it. It was nothing like the stuff you get in packages in the US. We bought a few prepackaged selections to take home, but they might not make it. We have a long trip ahead of us.

    That's a long "about" on the snack, but I really like food, and have long had an interest in the history of food. As a young student of history, I waondered about what people ate, the socio-cultural and economic issues surrounding food and all that sort of thing. This was strengthened and given some legitimacy in my first semester as a grad student in Early Modern History, when one of my professors assigned Fernand Braudel's "Civilization and Capitalism", all three volumes in one semester. I thought-- ha-- see, this is a serious thing, studying the nitty gritty of consumption.

    As they say, sometimes a little knowledge is a dangerous thing. A little more, and you bore people to tears.

    pictures in order: der schöner Brunnen, detail from sB, Saint George, some bird, detail from bird, from the Toy Museum, not sure, lebkuchen, Melanchthon Denkmal (statue of Lutheran reformer Melanchton), Kaiser Wilhelm I.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Streets of Nuremberg 2

    8 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ☀️ 70 °F

    More pictures, crossing some of the bridges on the Pegnitz River. We went into the courtyard of the Helig Geist Spital-- the Holy Spirit Hospital, which was established for the care of the elderly and needy in the 1330s by Konrad Gross, a wealthy private citizen. Today, there's a restaurant in there, and a nursing home.

    I really did wish I had had the real camera, because most of the pictures weren't all that great.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Bamberg

    9 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ⛅ 59 °F

    Bamberg, a city north of Nuremberg, came highly recommended by strangers and randos on the internet. I gave credence to the suggestions from the folks at both the trip advisor Germany forum and the Rick Steves Germany forum because the Altstadt was named a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1993. Not to mention, the trip advisor regulars seemed to know what they were talking about.

    Bamberg was founded in the Ninth Century. It became an important link between Franconia and the Holy Roman Empire and Slavic people to the east, specifically in Poland and Pomerania. In the reign of Emperor/Saint Heinrich II (973-1024), it became the center of the Holy Roman Empire's Germanic lands. Afterward, in the Thirteenth Century, it's ruling bishop became a Prince Bishop. Bamberg lost its independence in the secularization by the French in 1803, and became part of Bavaria. After World War II, the US Army had several units stationed in and around Bamberg.

    Today in terms of tourism, the city is famous for its half-timbered houses and narrow Medieval street, both things we like very much. On blogs and vlogs, they always like to show the Altes Rathaus, the old town hall, a structure that sticks out into the Regnitz River. The story the tourist board tells goes thusly: once upon a time, the people wanted to build a town hall. The bishop wouldn't give them land. Undaunted, they stuck stilts into the river and built it out over the water. In addition to its unique location, the building is also covered with frescoes, so this is a must see.

    As the seat of a Prince Bishop, you can imagine Bamberg has some significant religious structures. One is the Cathedral of Saints Peter and George, but that gets posts of its own. The other is the Michaelsberg Abbey, founded by the first bishop of Bamberg, Edelhard. It's a huge complex above the city, but unfortunately it's been undergoing extensive renovation and has been closed for years. It was one of the things I wanted to see, and not having access to it cut the visit short.

    Bamberg is also famous for beer. People come from all over Europe to visit the various breweries. These breweries also lend to the fond memories of former American military personnel, several of whom I came across online while doing research, who had a lot of good things to say about the town and especially the beer. We had one brewery in mind that we wanted to visit, the Schlenkerla Brewery, famous for smoked beer.

    So we commence at last, with pictures from the UNESCO World Heritage city of Bamberg.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Little Venice and Schlenkerla Brewery

    9 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ⛅ 63 °F

    Like other places in Europe, Bamberg has a watery section of the town people thought it was a good idea to compare to Venice. It's mentioned on all the blogs, in the books, and on you tube, so we went over there to have a look. It was pretty, I'll say that for it.

    After that, we had to hurry back to the Schlenkerla Brewery, because we wanted to try (again) Bavarian breakfast, weißwurst, pretzel, sweet mustard, and beer. They stopped serving that before lunch and we made it just in time.

    This was our first real German biergarten experience. We walked through the restaurant into the back to an open area complete with the little pebbles on the ground and spreading trees. There was a group of older men there, drinking beer and eating food they had brought, which is an accepted thing in an authentic biergarten. We ordered one traditional breakfast and one local wurst plate with bread. In addition, we both went with whatever dark smoked beer they had.

    This beer-- wow. We both liked it a lot. They smoke the barley with beechwood after germination, and that's what gives it the particular taste. If you're interested in beer and the entire process, they explain it on their website. It was, in my opinion, the most unique and probably the best beer we had on the trip. Then again, I like that girly mixed with lemon-lime soda Radler, so what do I know?

    The link to the Schlenkerla page where they explain their process:

    https://www.schlenkerla.de/rauchbier/prozess/pr…    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Cathedral of Saints Peter and George

    9 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ⛅ 70 °F

    Besides the beer and the monastery, the cathedral was something I wanted to see. Not the cathedral per se, though it was very impressive, but the graves of Heinrich II and Kunigunde, emperor, empress, and both saints. If you remember, we saw Kunigunde's crown back in the Munich Residenz treasury. Heinrich's crown, well we talked about that, and why it's in Vienna...

    The cathedral was begun in 1002. The first version of it, much smaller than those that followed burned down. It was rebuilt, burned again, and finally a larger, Romanesque structure was constructed. In the Seventeenth Century, the entire interior was remodeled in Baroque style, which included removing all the medieval stained glass, painting over the frescoes, and removing the tomb of Heinrich and Kunigunde to the basement crypt. King Ludwig I of Bavaria (not Ludwig who built Neuschwannstein), had it restored closer to what was believed the original Medieval form had been. This is the cathedral we have today.

    A second significant tomb in the cathedral, that of Pope Clement II. Pope Clement's papacy lasted less than a year (1046-1047), but in that time, he established a penchant for reform, and strong support of the German Holy Roman Emperor's territorial claims in Italy. He was buried in Bamberg at his own request, as he had been the bishop there.

    The other tourist drawing item in the cathedral is the Bamberger Reiter, a statue of a young knight on a horse. There's a great deal of debate over who the statue actually is, with no consensus reached. The Knight has been used as a symbol for different movements and ideologies since at least the days of the Romantics.

    We took a lot of pictures here, and still missed significant things, unfortunately.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    Palace Rose Garden, Saint Elizabeth etc

    9 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ⛅ 70 °F

    A few more pictures of the Bamberg Residenz rose garden, and the modern stained glass windows in the parish church of Saint Elizabeth. I have to admit, we got off on a bad foot with the city-- some really aggressive panhandlers that even with our experience in Philly put us off, and a great deal of excessively political graffiti (not far Right, btw). It really impacted our visit, and not in a good way. I think without that, we would have stayed longer, visited the cathedral treasury and maybe the palace, but we were both ready to go after the cathedral.

    Maybe someday we'll get back, because there are still things that would be good to see.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    An Odyssey Through Audi-land

    10 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ☁️ 59 °F

    Another day, another day trip. We originally planned to go to Regensburg, about an hour by train. The city has a lot to recommend it, again, according to people online. However, since I can't leave well enough alone, I did more research. I found this place called Weltenburg Abbey, the oldest monastery brewery in Europe. They also had a beer garden, and a chapel you could visit. To make this destination even more enticing, you could take a boat through the Danube Gorge, a narrow passage of the Danube River also called the Weltenburg Narrows.

    This was too good to pass up. Now the experts online don't recommend to do this by public transit, but I didn't listen. I found a way. Two trains, one bus. We could do it. Herr Hai was all for it. With his recently discovered love of German beer and overdone Baroque churches, how could we go wrong? Plus, we could stop for a couple hours in Regensburg on the way back, because that's where we had to switch trains.

    So this was our plan. We left Nuremberg kind of early. It was drizzling, but we'd hope for the best. Our train to Regensburg left a little late. Then, it stopped on the tracks. We waited. And waited. We were terribly late getting into Regensburg and had missed our connection. This is the Deutsche Bahn Germans complain about online.

    Not only had we missed the connection, but the little train (and it was physically a tiny little train) ran very infrequently. So we waited. Got on when it came, and as we headed out to the little town of Saal an der Donau, we saw big, long freight trains of Audis. Not surprising, as this is the land of Audi, with headquarters in Ingolstadt and plants scattered around the countryside.

    We got to the little town. The station was empty. Looked closed down. The bus stop was around the front, but we had missed the bus and had a while to wait for the next one. The streets were deserted. Like post apocalyptic movie deserted. Everything closed. We walked around, Herr Hai's idea, and as he's the expert on those sorts of movies, along with zombie stuff, I assumed he decided it was better we move around so we weren't eaten.

    It looked like a nice enough place. We took some pictures, went back to the bus stop. It would have been nice if something was open so we could have gotten something to eat. As it was, we had some smooshed granola bars we brought all the way from home, and were stuck with them.

    We got on the bus. The ride was through "real Germany" as opposed to the more "tourist Germany" we had seen. Just people's houses, businesses, schools. When we talked to each other, the few people on the bus looked at us like we were either crazy or lost. Both, we were both.

    We got off in a parking lot in the town of Kelheim. It was by a river though, so we figured it was the right place. The boat didn't leave for a while, but there was no boat in evidence. As the time got closer, people showed up. We bought our tickets, and about ten minutes before time, a boat came up (or down, not sure which way we were going) the Danube.

    It wasn't long until we were aboard and on our way.

    Sometimes, the journey is the adventure. This one, definitely. It would have been better with more snacks.    Leia mais

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  • ViajanteBavaria and Middle Rhine

    The Danube Gorge

    10 de setembro de 2022, Alemanha ⋅ ☁️ 61 °F

    Finally, we were on our way to the Danube Gorge, also known as the Weltenburger Enge. The rain was back, but it wasn't bad. We decided to brave the deck so we'd have a good view of things, even thought they were serving food and drinks in the lounge below. The sun started peeking out now and again, and more people came out, so we made the right choice.

    This area has been settled since the Celts. Apparently, if you hike around here, especially back by the monastery, you can find signs of both the Celtic and Roman settlements that were in the area. All up the Danube, then the Altmühl, then the Main to along the Rhine was the frontier of the Roman Empire. It would be a great trip to travel it-- another UNESCO designated thing. There were some interesting pre-historic finds as well. I wish I had known all this when I was planning the trip, but that would have meant cutting something else out. Too much to see, too little time and money to see it.

    The boat ride was nice. Calm. Pretty. The rain held off as we sailed through the gorge, which is a protected area with a limited number of boats allowed through it. We saw a few people hiking along the banks, a few buildings. Somewhere, there's supposed to be a pirate's cave.

    We came around the bend, and there was the abbey. If you hike it from town, you're on the side opposite, and have to pay the guys with the little boats to take you across. I didn't see anyone doing this, no boats, so it was a good thing we didn't attempt the hike.

    Here are some pictures. It's not narrowest gorge we've been in. It's not the deepest gorge. But it's the Danube's gorge, so that was perfect for us.

    Oh, and to all the Strauss fans out there, the Danube isn't blue. To quote the old Spike Jones and the City Slickers song, "Oh, the Danube isn't blue, it's green."    Leia mais

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