EUROPE 2015 ISSUE III

Castles on the Rhine

A two week, organised river cruise is like nothing we have done before.  The best part, you can unpack and live in your own space for two full weeks.  The downside, you’re not in control of the where and when of your adventures.  It’s just the smallest bit unsatisfying.  Perhaps it is because our time is so short in each location, or that the history of this area is so convoluted and intertwined, never mind totally unfamiliar to me.  It may be the language barrier, although for the most part our tour guides have had excellent English.   Guess the biggest frustration has been our tours.  They need to appeal to everyone and as a consequence they have been more than a little superficial and lacking in detail about life in this part of the world.  

The focus has been on the age of the buildings, what style of church are we viewing or who lived here.  No real discussion of the politics and or economics of where we are.  Just what it is, is hard to say, but it may be just the sameness of all these tiny river communities (not in a bad way) or the fact that one super exuberant Baroque, Catholic Church begins to look much like another.  

But I get ahead of myself, there’s still the trip down the middle Rhine with it castles and the Lorelei rock where sailors were lured to their death by the siren song of a young girl.  We probably sailed past some of the more dramatic

structures while we slept but once we enter the gorge there are nonstop ruins of castles and fortresses for miles.    The mountains, they are too steep to be called hills, come down to the river’s edge with acres of vineyard terraced in to their sides.  It is green and lush, but not nearly as lush as the Austrian countryside to come.  The towns, or perhaps villages would be a better description, seem barely more than a street deep, and cling to the edge of the river.  Each has its requisite onion domed Catholic Church and fortress/castle looming on the heights. How they actually built anything on some of those peaks and slopes is a mystery to me, but they did.

Some of the towns on the north or is it east side of the river,  seem to have roads accessing more development back behind them. On the other hand, the opposite bank seems trapped between the river and the mountains.  A narrow band of development fronts the river, with terraces of grapes further up the slope.  In some areas a train line shares the limited flat space and there seems to be a roadway that runs along the bank. There are no bridges on this stretch of the Rhine, do you think they had tourists and cruise ships in mind?  So you want to cross the river to visit a friend or do a bit of shopping . . .  Never 

fear, you will find small car ferries that ply their way across the river carrying everything from small delivery trucks to mopeds and I assume pedestrians.  There is no opportunity to moor at any of these little settlements so we don't learn much more.

From here it is a progression of medieval cities, Miltenberg,

Wurzburg, Bamberg, Nuremberg, Regensburg, Passau . . . and a succession of baroque churches and quaint town squares, ornate city halls and decimated Jewish communities. The sausages change as we move down the rivers . . . . smoky, spicy, brown, white. Not to be forgotten, the mustards change as well. They do of course have to go with changing sausage which means they have gone from sweet and spicy to a hot Dijon style to plain old American style. 
Sausages change, mustards change and the beers change as well.  Guess that should be no great surprise, if I just think about all of our micro-breweries at home.  Here each city seems to have its own speciality and at least one major brewery that serves that particular city.  Our strangest experience was the smoky beer in Wurzburg, I think.  Having decided we needed to taste it we went looking for one of the two pubs purported to have it.  It was a cute little place all dark wood and Bavarian costumes on the staff (they really wear that stuff . . . dirndl skirts and

lederhosen, I mean) and plenty of folks with big pint mugs of beer sitting in the sunshine.  The smoke flavor comes from roasting the hops, which we were told was typical of all beers early on.  The atmosphere was delightful, what’s to complain about, vacation, sunshine and an ice cold beer. . . oh so very wrong.  Beer is supposed to taste like beer, not a barbecued sausage!!!  Wrong, wrong, wrong. 

Octoberfest

When it comes to beer the "Star of David" hanging outside the establishment is a good thing.  You see them suspended

from the sign and they purport to be the official symbol of the brewers guild which goes back to the early 1500s.  The symbol itself is older, dating in to the late 1300s.  There are six points to the star and six parts to brewing beer . . . water, hops (preferably not roasted) grain, malt, yeast and the brewer.  
As days pile up one city fades in to the next, and we have taken to referring to them as Berg-Burg.  “Remember that place where the city hall was on the island with all the bright colored buildings, or the place where we bought Lebkuchen and ate chopped pork sandwiches.”   You might have an opportunity to get it right, assuming of course you can remember a few specifics of each community.  Using the German language you can back in to it, if there is a mountainside it is probably something-bErg; while if there is a fortress/castle it is most likely something-else-bUrg.

Next stop Nuremberg (I see no mountains), a city on the Rhine-Maine-Danube Canal, in the German state of Bavaria and the administrative region of Franconia.  All these descriptors seem of utmost importance to the Germans, to me they are just more words to fill up the page of my blog.  We opted for the optional tour to the “documentation center” and some of the infrastructure left over from the Second World War.  The documentation center is really a museum showing the rise of Hitler and his impact on European history and of course the various Jewish populations that fell under his control.  Given that it is in Germany and designed as an educational facility they have done some outstanding work at making it accessible to English speakers. 

Nuremberg held great significance during the Hitler’s regime.  Because of the city's position in the center of Germany, the Nazi Party chose it as the site of huge Nazi Party conventions – the Nuremberg Rallies. The rallies were held from 1927 until 1938. After Adolf Hitler’s rise to power in 1933 the Nuremberg rallies became huge Nazi propaganda events. Most of the films of goose stepping Nazis and the straight armed salutes were staged (quite literally) and filmed here as intimidation devices.  We saw a number of ruins that were constructed solely for these assemblies, many of which were never finished. The saving grace they are now used as venues for car racing and rock concerts. 

 

EUROPE 2015 ISSUE II

Kinderdijk Mill

We are in the midst of a “Grand European Adventure” along with our friends and neighbors Carol and Frank Sobtka.  It all started as a bit of a joke when I asked them what exotic place we should visit this summer.  Carol’s response, “you pick” and we left it there.  Well the next day what should arrive in my mailbox but the Viking River Cruise catalogue.  How I got on their mailing list in the first place I have no idea, but generally I just toss it in the rubbish bin.  This time I took a look at it and flippantly suggested we do their “Grand European Tour”, five countries, fifteen days, Amsterdam to Budapest, on the Rhine, Maine and Danube.  Carol called my bluff and here we are, almost two weeks in, sitting in the town of Passau on the German Austrian border.  

Tile Work Amsterdam

Now here is where I get extremely embarrassed by our extravagance.  Not only are we spending three extra days in Amsterdam and three in Budapest, we will spend a week in Switzerland and are meeting yet another couple, Carolyn and Jim Tabor in Paris for a week.  That makes six of us sharing an apartment in the Marais.  After that it is off to the UK to spend two weeks with Mick’s Dad and finally home in mid-October, just in time for Halloween and our annual pumpkin carving party.

So what is life on a riverboat like?  It’s a lot like being spoiled rotten.  Thank goodness there isn’t the excess that you find on ocean cruises.  There are three square meals a day, but not around the clock.  The portions are adequate but not excessive and there is always a choice between three appetizers, three entrees and three deserts.  The night they were doing a special, because mushrooms were in season, I heard that at least one patron, who did not like mushrooms, ordered three deserts!  I’m just sorry I didn’t think of it first. 

 

KINDERDIJK

Our first stop out of Amsterdam is Kinderdijk, a UNESCO World Heritage site.  No lazing about this morning, after sailing through the night we dock in Kinderdijk (pronounced kinder dike) some time shortly after 6 a.m. and our tour is scheduled for 8:30.  It’s off for a quick breakfast and I think I have just died and gone to heaven . . .apart from your typical eggs, bacon and eggs there is an enormous plate of smoked salmon, with all the trimmings as well as sliced meats and cheeses.  Life is good.

Because we are quite literally moored across the street from the site, we are out on a guided tour before the place opens for business.  As a consequence the option of riding a bike or a cruise along the dike is not available.  Holland is a low lying land that was mostly swamp and marsh until these ingenious peoples drained the land, installed dikes and took to agriculture.  This is not a one-time thing but an ongoing way of life.  If ignored the sea and rivers would invade again and the polders would revert to swamps.   At Kinderdijk it all started with two canals that were used to drain the polders and direct the excess water to the river.  By 1740 this system became inadequate and they built a series of mills to pump the water out of the canals in to storage reservoirs and then ultimately in to the river.  

There are still over 1000 windmills in Holland that have been preserved.  They are all still operational and each has a miller, who lives onsite, must be able to operate the mills as a back up to the more modern diesel and electrical powered pumps that serve the same purpose.  

This excursion doesn’t last nearly long enough and by 11 a.m. we are back on board and cruising down the Rhine on our way to Cologne (Koln).  

Mealtimes are a big part of this cruising business, one seating only and no reserved spaces.  Once the daily briefing is finished on the upper level there is a mad rush, well as mad a rush as can be expected when the majority of those involved are of retirement age and greater.  There are those who stake out the window seat to ensure a good view.  Then there are those traveling together who must have a table for six and, NO, you are NOT welcome to sit here.  You never know who you might be sitting with, it could be an endangered species biologist from Moscow, Idaho or space technologies engineers from the Silicon Valley.  Politics run the gamut and there was the day when I had to apologize to the gentleman next to me when his fairly conservative viewpoints ran afoul of a pair of Canadians and our more liberal positions.  He was gracious but they did leave the table rather early.  

Monday, it must be Cologne.  Cologne was bombed during the war and as a

Cologne Cathedral

consequence has little of historical value to offer, at least in the city center.  I will borrow an image from the internet since even with a wide angle lens I cannot get an image worth posting.   We had a guided tour by a gentleman with the most amazing whiskers who shared his thoughts on being German given there was so little else to talk about.  He also bought several open faced sandwiches to share with.  It was a dish of highly seasoned raw pork topped with raw onions.  I am happy to report that nearly everyone took some to taste and although it was not a great hit at least we redeemed ourselves by being willing.  All that was missing was a glass of beer, which we remedied that evening with a pub crawl.

Kolsch Beer

Another borrowed picture, carrying a camera when drinking is probably not a wise move.  This is the traditional way to serve Kolsch beer, the beer of Cologne.  The glass are about 4 oz and the beer very hoppie.  It is meant to be drunk cold, as a consequence, small portions. But small portions does not ensure small quantities being consumed.  Once your glass is empty you can expect another to surreptitiously take its place.  The proper way to indicate you have had enough is to place the cardboard beer mat over the top of your glass.  If you wish to tip your server, you "buy" them a beer.  You can see there are probably 12 glasses in the serving "tray.  The server has essentially purchased all of these beers even before he knows he has a customer to consume them.  So when buying him a beer he has the choice of whether to consume it (which they sometimes do . . . delivering beer is a thirst business) oe sell it to the next customer.  

Next stop Koblenz and the Marksburg castle and the Ehrenbreitstein Fortress.  

View from Ehrenbreitstein Fortress

It was grey and foggy and ultimately it poured down rain.  That is our ship moored below and we took a gondola up to the fortress.

Marksburg Castle