More of Hamburg, Wedel and Lueneburg

I’ve got to inform any readers I have, that for the last two to three weeks here in Hamburg I’ve been working my butt off. We have, in between times managed a trip to Lueneburg last weekend and met Gunhild’s lovely friends Sabine and her partner Ulrich who went out of their way to show us their gorgeous medieval town

They were wonderful guides, and Urlich was particularly entertaining with his historical knowledge brought to life with his storytelling skills. Sabine with her architectural knowledge was able to fill us with anecdotes about some of the more interesting buildings as well as those she’d worked on. The day began by the river with a coffee. We walked through the town and up towards the old salt mine.  We bought tickets for a tour of the town hall or Rathaus. This was all in German but Sabine was very helpful in translating what was being relayed to us. You could almost work out what the guide was saying as she was very animated in her descriptions. 

Before we left town, we took a ride with Sabine and Urlich out to their home and tasted plum cake on their front porch.  The day ended with a ride up to the top of the old water tower and we got a great view of the city. We were able to recognise places we walked. The day ended very quickly as we’d arranged to meet Anja and her Mum back in town at 6. It would have been nice to stay for tea, but Anja had kindly driven us up and was now waiting to take us home. Our final stop at the end of a busy day, was the beach bar in Wedel. As the sun went down we watch the last of big ships create waves on the shore and we ate delicious salads and drank beer.

 

On Thursday Anja and Dirk had bought us tickets to Miniature Wonderland in Hamburg. As the tickets were not valid until the evening, we decided (since it was a sunny day) to head into town early and maybe see the Planten and Bloomen Gardens without a cold wind. We’d attempted it the week before but we’d given up and headed indoors to the museum. We were much more happy this time to wander, and enjoy the sunshine. There are some lovely sections including a Japanese Garden and in the glasshouse, we even got close to a red squirrel that had somehow broken its way in.

We tried shopping for a while but it wasn’t altogether inspiring, so we decided on just wandering slowly towards Miniature Wonderland. I took a heap more photos as we ended up in the part of Hamburg we’d wanted to return to with more modern architecture next to some of the much older warehouses. Anja and Dirk met us at 6.What a surprise Wonderland ended up being. It’s a mind boggling three storeys of model makers bliss. There was plenty for all of us to get engrossed in- the model stadium, theatre, the rock concert, the ski resort, the queue for outside toilet, the penguins waiting for a train, the traffic jams, the miniature airport with planes coming and going and even the arrival of a cruise ship! I couldn’t possibly include everything as it would take too long..but if you ever are in Hamburg you need to see it.

Yesterday Anja took us for a lovely walk through the forest park near Wedel where she used to ride ponies as a child. There were small children still on ponies being led by various family members who we passed as we walked and talked. Later she took us for a tour of her impressive office then home to her house for a traditional Northern German meal of boiled bacon, beans, potatoes and pears. We followed this up with a tasty chocolate pudding which Anja’s Mum had made. Dirk then invited us around for a wine tasting at his house with neighbours Oliver and Suzanne.   We sampled two sparkling wines- a white and rose, four reds and then decided to leave the two whites for another evening. He’d also put on a marvellous spread of nibbles- cheeses, chocolates, pretzels and sausages and then generously presented us with a bottle of the nicest wine of the night - a Pinot Noir.

This morning Anja picked us up at 6.30am so we could visit what she described as The Fish Market. It is a fish market but it is also a lot more than this. It’s a market selling everything from live rabbits to handbags, beer to fresh fruit baskets, clothes to souvenirs, and it’s huge. We needed to be there early as by 8.30am one could hardly move through it. We took some light relief in the large concert hall where a live band played some familiar hits we knew…so we swung along a bit with those who were still awake from last night’s revelling.

We’re starting to think about coming home, finalising tickets and working out what luggage we need to leave behind. I’ve already managed to lose the lovely scarf I bought in Tours but we did find another one at the market this morning. Another reminder it’s nearly time to head home, is it’s turning to scarf weather here.

Living out of Hamburg

 

We've been having a great time just stopping for a while. I have been focusing on writing my report and resource for teachers. I have nice desk and a window past which very little happens; although you cannot help but notice the sound of the constant stream of traffic. We've been informed that we are living on one of Hamburg's exit points; and it sounds like it.

                        We've been fortunate enough to have an excellent guide, Anja, who has left a very large folder of information with maps and guidance on how to get around. On our first day we were greeted with this as well as baskets of food, chocolates galore, a fridge full of treats and two bicycles we have full use of whenever we want to bike to Holm or Wedel (or nearest towns). We were orientated to Wedel and Hamburg last Sunday with a guided tour courtesy of Dirk, Anja's brother.  The highlights of this tour included a trip under the River Elbe to see the ports and visit the first (there are now three) tunnel built under the river.


We also got to appreciate for the very first time some of Hamburg's architecture and it's canals. Apparently Hamburg has more bridges than Venice.

The yet-to-be-completed home of Hamburg Philharmonic

- now four years in the making. 

Watch this red brick on the older bulding..This is part of the surviving town pre WWII.

On Friday last week I took a day off, and worked on Saturday instead. We negotiate the transport system into Hamburg, froze on our walk through the Botanic Gardens and settled for a look through the Hamburg Museum to take in more of its history. We got fascinated by the ship models there and also by the fact that in in the mid 19th Century 10% of the town was destroyed by a massive fire.

Admiring the ship models.
 
Just noticed the water squirting out of S's arm! ...but the gardens (despite the cold) were well worth a walk through.

Berlin

On our ride into Berlin on the train it was interesting to witness apartment block after apartment block in 1950s-60s style and realise this is a city rebuilt at a particular time in history. Everything on this train line was very similar and it wasn’t until later we realised this was the old east Berlin we were riding through. It’s difficult to know today where the line was but you do notice at times which part of Berlin you are in. Our Hotel, for example is part of the old East. It’s a grand old lady from a period where bathrooms are still made in small white and green tiles and bedrooms were separate (a room with a bath meant hand basin); the lift will only accommodate four at a time and the waiters  wear kitchen-type aprons and have difficulty understanding your questions. On our first night we walked Kurfursten damm window shopping and looking at the differing architecture. It was a safe street to walk with people out and about, high end fashion in the windows and the weather was warm. We chose an Italian meal out, just a block from our hotel. We have discovered over the last three days that Berlin is full of restaurants with varying prices. For the remainder of or meals we took the advice of Trip Adviser. One of the best finds was a Chinese Restaurant for lunch, where we were served a “business lunch special” where we ate a two course meal for around seven euro each. The food was fresh and very tasty and we even managed to catch our emails with free wifi.

We visited three museums. Our first call was “The story of Berlin,” an interactive and clearly labelled museum displaying of the history of Berlin. There’s a lot to be learned about the place and we took it all in piece by piece. It covered lots including the rise and fall of monarchy and governments, the history of medicine, arts and culture, housing and architecture, the place of religion and inevitably the rise and fall  and rise again of Berlin in World War Two and the years after.  It was a good place to start as our next plan was to take a hop on hop off tour of the city where a lot of what was learned could be identified and looked at more closely. One of the strangest experiences in The Story of Berlin Museum was an escorted tour of the still operating emergency bunker in the basement. This is converted carpark with an airlock door for decontamination, security check and control of numbers. It houses only 3,600 people who would have to make do with stretchers in very a very confined space. This bunker was built in the 1970s when Berliners were very afraid of not only the East/ West divide, but Americans as well. Berlin keeps 20 bunker operable today as disasters like Fukishima keep the threat of “anything can happen” alive.

We took the tour bus to Checkpoint Charlie and what remains of the Berlin wall next to the now demolished Nazi Headquaters.Checkpoint Charlie was a disappointment for its crass commercialism, people trying to sell you rubbish and people asking you if you spoke English and trying to get what they can out of you. We spent more time around what remains of the Berlin Wall beside the now demolished Nazi headquarters. The bus tour with 20 stops took us as far as bus stop 16 where it was announced that I was 6pm and all buses would be stopping. Fortunately we were at  Berlin HBH, the train station, so it wasn’t a problem really. Well…a slight problem as it was so huge and quite difficult to work out where to go. We worked it out by taking our time, and all was sorted. What wasn’t so good was the credit card had gone missing as well as the cord to the computer, so we spent a number of hours hunting through luggage and not having a lot of success.

The following morning after a panic over a lost credit card had abated (found in a discreet zip and not stolen), we took ride on the bus to look at the shops. We rode to the top of a very beautiful department store which was old but had a glass elevator running through the middle of it. We tried to find a replacement cord to the computer but it’s too new. We contacted our last accommodation in Paris to see if it had been found there. We gave up looking for a while and decided to visit the Bauhus Museum instead. This was a good move and we had an enjoyable couple of hours there. Did you know that today Berlin has four universities and three art universities? It’s good to see that today the arts are alive and well here. Love it.

 We walked towards the tall Victory column not far, we discovered, from where the German president hosts international visitors. Besides being sobered by the bullet holes, the view from the top of this tower is worth the walk up the 70 steps to the mosaic on the column itself and up 226 steps to the top. Situated in the centre of a very wide roundabout in the centre of a park, you’re able to see the city from every angle.

We found our bus again from here, and continued back to the stop close to the hotel.  We also found the missing cord to the computer in a bag within a bag within a bag so all was well. We rested up for a few hours, then headed out to sample a bit of night life. The woman at reception must have thought were a bit stupid, as she directed us to a very dingy part of town with very little evidence of a night life at all. So we walked back towards Hackescher Markt and found an Irish pub with music and later a nice tapas bar for food and wine. It was, from there, an easy ride home.

In the morning we packed up, caught up on a bit of news, and found our way on the M49 to ZOB where the Berliner Bus would take us to Hamburg. This is a little advertised bus line which extends its run all the way to London and deep into the East as well. We’d picked up tickets about four months ago for nine euro each. One of our better bargins, I think. We scored a seat upstairs  at the very front of the bus where we had an unrestricted view. Our friendly neighbour next to us pointed out the old Russian army barracks, told us stories of escape through the Hungarian border to the West, and being present at the fall of the Berlin Wall. He then told us he wanted to come to New Zealand before he fell asleep for the remainder of the journey.

Paris

We’ve had a very relaxing day in Paris doing what each of us wanted to do. This included walking the parks in late summer (the trees are now starting to turn), and allowing the day to unfold. 

                                                         

We could have gone back to places we went to nearly four years ago- Musee d’Orsay, or the lovely l’Orangerie. Instead we walked and fell upon le Petit Palace (opposite le Grande Palace) and spent an hour or two wandering for free through the galleries. Here we could still see Monet, Seurat, Renior, Pissaro, and others but what was interesting to us was to find out more of the sculptor Dalou who was responsible in the 19^th century for many of the monumental sculptures around Paris  We were also very captured by the interior and exterior of the building itself. There were rooms in it for Louis XIV.  In the centre is a gardened courtyard and café where we ate our lunch.

Afterwards we walked in the direction of the massive army headquarters, and around the back, the army museum which houses Napoleon’s tomb among others. Napoleon gets centre tomb spot with a high gold dome above him which you can see for miles across Paris. It was this that attracted us in this direction in the first place. We didn’t go through more of the museum, but sat in the gardens for a while which are also available for les Invalides who live within these massive grounds. The cool winds had abated today and it was very hot. Sitting in the shade and watching the world go by was very much appreciated. When we had regained our energy, we took a walk in the direction of Tour Eiffel. Even though we had climbed it in the winter, S was keen to fully understand where the new building of Paris was situated. We queued for what seemed a lot less time than last time, and took a lift right to the top for €14 each. We spent quite some time taking pictures of this massive city and enjoying the views and sunshine.

Once back on Terra ferma, we decided to find the metro and hunt down our last and very favourite hotel- Hotel Dehly. We knew this hotel was closed for renovations, but we also remembered that there was a nice Italian restaurant next door. We found it and settled to a meal in the warm evening air.  Afterwards, we hung around la Sienne and looked over towards Notre Dame for a while then headed for our studio flat to get organised for the flight to Berlin.

We were impressed with the rail system which took us right to the airport doors. So easy. So straightforward.

In the morning the trip to the airport was relatively straight forward. The ticket machines sell tickets all the way to Orley Sud where we were headed. Surprisingly, we only needed to negotiate one staircase with our bags and that was because a lift wasn’t working.

Checking into Easyjet was easy as pie.  The people were courteous and didn’t behave as if they were luggage police trying to catch us out.  Ryanair caused us so much grief with their highly unreasonable charges just for not ticking a box when booking our fares. We are still gritting our teeth over that nasty experience and advise anyone looking for cheap fares around Europe to avoid them.  In contrast, dimensions for luggage with Easyjet were fair, booking online was clear and straightforward, staff didn’t walk up and down inspecting people’s bags and they didn’t expect passengers to stand in multiple queues for ages. Much more civilised.

We have now checked into our hotel in Berlin and look forward to the next two days exploring the city. This will be a last tourist run before my real work begins.

Sur la Loire

Last Friday Mary set off on the train via Lyon for Montpellier and we took a much shorter ride to Amboise. We rolled our bags across the Loire to the very easy-to-find hotel and settled into our dwelling. We’d heard that our friends Steve and Glenda were out exploring the town so we decided to go for a walk to try to find them. It was full of tourists hanging out in the cafes and organising themselves into groups to make their way up to the town’s obvious attraction Chateau d’Amboise.  Unsuccessful in trying to find our friends in town, we headed back to our accommodation and found them. 

Our decision was to join the throngs and go and look around the chateau. Because I hadn’t done any reading about the place it was a very nice surprise, when looking through the chapel in the chateau grounds, to stumble upon the grave of Leonardo da Vinci. He had spent his final years in Amboise, and on Sunday, we spent the afternoon exploring the home he shared with the sister of Duke Francois. Francois grew up in Amboise before becoming King in 1515. He was fascinated with the arts so invited Leonardo to the town and home where he had grown up, Chateau du Clos Luce. Surrounding Clos Luce is a children’s park with playground equipment based on Leonardo’s ideas. Very cool.

Saturday we shared Steve and Glenda’s car and had a good look around two very famous Chateau –Chambord and Blois. Chambord was built by Francois as a hunting lodge with 77 staircases, 282 fireplaces and 426 rooms. The biggest surprise was walking out onto the top terrace and seeing the turrets close up. 

You’d get an idea with what we confronted with by looking at the photo of the chateau.  Although Francois reigned for 32 years, it was his sons Henry 11 and Louis XVI who made most use of it. (Francois spent just 72 days there).

It was great then, to visit this sparingly furnished chateau first. Blois was a major contrast being decorated in the flamboyant Renaissance style and giving a far more once lived in feel. The walls were decorated not only with paintings, but wallpaper made from woven cloth possibly made in Tillerg as the patterns were very similar to what we’d seen a few weeks ago with Cathy.

Saturday evening we had tickets to a show back at Amboise castle. Run completely by locals and entirely in French it told the story of Amboise including the arrival of the young Duke Francois, his ultimate coronation, and the arrival of Leonardo. Groups of adults danced, and children aged from what looked like barely three did acrobatic tricks. There were horses who also did tricks and fireworks and the lighting display was impressive as it used the castle as a giant screen.

In the morning we set off for Cheverny Chateau on quieter roads; first along the edge of the Loire, then through forests and small villages. We finally came to a larger village where we were directed by signage to a carpark. We walked through the very pretty town and in through a gate where we finally spotted the chateau set in a huge park used for hunting. In one area we found a cage full of barking hunting dogs, and in another a paddock of horses. The gardens were also very pleasant to wander through. The chateau itself is only partly open due to the fact the family (now in its sixth century) still live there and it is used as accommodation if you are prepared to pay the price.

The first room you walk into is the dining room with 34 wooden panels illustrating the story of Don Quixote. Gold leaf was also very evident around the fireplace and this is repeated throughout the house that we saw.

For the second time, we’d taken a picnic and Glenda and I spotted a perfect place to eat our food in the shade. In the afternoon Steve drove us back to Amboise and we walked to Chateau du Clos Luce. In the evening we found a really nice hotel to eat our meal. We spent a very pleasant final evening with our friends drinking wine and reminiscing on all those places we’d been in the last three days.

In the morning we reconvened for a quick breakfast and soon we were on our way to Blois and then on the train to Paris. The four of us said our farewells at Gare Austerlitz. Steve and Glenda were catching a taxi to another station to ride on to Strasburg; S and I were negotiating the metro system to Montmartre.

We are now settled in a small studio for the next two days and last night took a walk up to Sacre Couer and saw the final stages of the sunset.