Worms

I'm still not finished posting pictures from my vacation in Germany! Today I am bringing you photos from our day of sightseeing in Worms. First we went to the market square to check out the produce.



In the nearby park (with a huge monument to Martin Luther), Franzi demoed the weird playground equipment that seems to be all over Germany. There's these weird street toys, in many shapes, the skateboard type seen here, or ones with circular platforms, ones with tall poles in the middle of the platforms. They're spring mounted, and you're supposed to stand on them and wiggle them. For whatever reason, they're in lots of plaza and park areas, not in playgrounds. I didn't have the guts to try these ones!



We visited the Jewish Cemetery just outside the old city walls, considered to be the oldest in Europe.



The Dom of Worms is pretty cool! Lots of stained glass, some modern, some ancient. Most of the other parts of the religious complex were destroyed in various wars (up to and including WWII, but most of the damage was done in the 1800's) so the cathedral houses lots of architectural elements rescued from the area.



We took some time to pose with the sculptures outside the cathedral, too!



Then we headed down to the Rhine to have lunch and enjoy the atmosphere. Here's a sculpture of Hagan throwing the Nibelung gold into the river, as the legend goes.



We sat down and had lunch. (There's no such thing as a light lunch in Germany, as far as I can tell...) Esther had a flammkuchen, which is a sort of crispy, sauce-free German pizza, and I had kasespaetzle... Yum!

Freinsheim

More vacation photos... Esther, her Opa (in law), and I spent an hour or two in Freinsheim one afternoon. We went to run an errand, and ended up taking a walk around the town. The town has some segments of its old town walls. The center of the town is actually quite small! Even with Wilfried leading our walk, we made it pretty much all the way around! This sign kind of made me laugh. Herrenstraße is "Men's Street", whatever that adds up to...



This house is a tiny apartment over the street on the inside of the city walls. I thought it was really cute!



On this house, you can see where the wall used to be. It doesn't have to share that wall anymore.



Oh, here's Opa and Esther, enjoying our walk. In the background, one of the remaining towers of the wall, that serves as the entrance to a theater!



And after we had ice cream at the cafe of a toy museum. There seem to be a lot of tiny museums in Germany...

Groceries from Today and Monday

Vacation photograph interruption today...

Today I went to the street market. It was a good day, everything I bought was a Euro or less a piece, including the hair-clips! The only thing I lost in Germany was my largest hair-clip. I bought two different large sizes to try. None of them are ever big enough anyway... I should look online for giant hair-clips! I got zucchinis, fagiolini (green beans), red onions, two of those "cone" cabbages and two melons, both in the tiny size. Usually those melons are 1 kg a piece, this pair was 1 kg total... This way I can eat a whole one for breakfast!



Monday was my regular grocery run. That pineapple is also a tiny one. Also, I caved and bought ketchup. It's spicy ketchup, at least. I have just wanted it for sandwiches. In the back are some bread rolls that you have to oven bake a bit and oranges for juicing. There's also a single can of Coke in there. The off brand just wasn't cutting it for my weekend afternoon indulgence.



Food!

The Natural History Museum

This Sunday, again taking advantage of the Eni free museum summer, I headed to the natural history museum of Milan, which is near Porta Venezia. It's a pretty traditional natural history museum, and very focused on the animals. I could have gone for some more geography and minerals!

There were lots of dead animals, including a lot of great insects. Butterflies are always cool to see.



A lot of the animal specimens are in pretty old, dusty vitrines, and aren't in particularly good shape...



There were some more modern dioramas, with fake foliage and the like.



The dinosaur section was alright, too, with some cool info about dinosaurs that lived in Italy alongside some large replicas and boilerplate. I am glad that I went to the museum, but I don't think I'll be going again or taking out of town guests. Unlike the archaeological museum, that is a place I will take Roman history buffs for sure!

My Weekend Museum Ramblings

This weekend, I took advantage of the Museum Summer and went to the archaeological museum of Milan on Saturday. The museum is housed in the old convent of San Maurizio al Monastero Maggiore. Before heading into the museum, I checked out the church.



Lots of cool frescoes in there, a lot from the 1500's. There's a few photos on my photostream if you click through... This view is of the choir side where the nuns hung out.

The archaeology museum focuses on the local area, with an emphasis on the Romans. Mediolanum was the Roman name of the city, basically the place in the middle. Milan has always been a crossroads, and several later emperors had their seats here. The museum actually sits on part of the old city walls. There are two towers included in the old convent grounds, one is part of the outer walls of the city, and the other, shown below, was part of the start zone of the circus maximus of Mediolanum.



There were tons of cool artifacts, small bronze pieces, mosaic fragments, statue bits, and the like. This is one of the exceptional pieces, a 4th century cup known as the Trivulzio Diatreta Cup. It's all glass.



The museum also features Greek period artifacts, with lots of cups, vases, bowls.



There was also a big Etruscan collection.



There was also a post-Roman barbarian collection, focusing on the Longobards, who this region is named after.

Pfeddersheim

Esther and I went to Pfeddersheim to meet with the extended Finger clan, in the middle of the town's wine festival! Tom's mom grew up in Pfeddersheim, and her dad still lives there. He's retired from the wine business now, but he still lives in the winery building in town! Wilfried took this picture of me and Esther, he's such a charmer. He loves gardening, everything looks great.



The first night we were there was Friday. We all went to a local weingut, Hinter der Kirche, which I think means "behind the church", to have snacks and drink some of the local products! The garden atmosphere was great, and while it was crowded we had a reserved bench, since Opa knows the guy who runs the winery. I think in a town like this you know all the other vintners...



Here's a couple of the bottles I got to sample!

Stacy and Rothenberg ob der Tauber

I was lucky to have the chance to visit another friend while I was in Germany. Stacy and I did undergrad together and were actually project partners in a few classes! She lives in the tiny town of Oberkochen. The closest town with stuff to do is Aalen. Stacy was totally happy to take me to her favorite Thai restaurant to satisfy my cravings! On Wednesday we headed to Rothenberg, a quick train ride away.



The town is famous for its in-tact town walls and little medieval town. You can walk on top of the town walls in a lot of places, and then go into some of the towers! We actually decided against walking around the whole wall since it would take hours and hours.



The place was packed with tourists, actually! We walked into the town square and got a schneeballe, a snowball, the traditional dessert of Rothenberg. It reminded me of the fried pastries with powdered sugar that we have in Italy, just scrunched up. We split one, and it was enough! Rothenberg is actually famous for its Christmas markets, and I could see how these would totally fit in!



Besides wandering around the cute streets, we also went to the Torture Museum. Thankfully it wasn't too gory and had lots of other cool stuff, with awesome calligraphy and wax seals and decorative works. I honestly did not expect to like it as much as I did, Stacy and I had to hustle out to catch our train home, we could easily have spent three hours there.



In the evening we went to the Limes-Thermen baths in Aalen. I don't have a lot of pictures, actually, cos we went straight into the water. Why don't we have more hot spring baths in the US? They're just awesome. Most of the water was pleasantly warm. There were awesome lounger seats in the water with bubbles and various fountains to swim through. Most of the baths were indoor, but they had outdoor parts too! So nice... Stacy should get a membership!



Thanks to Stacy and Gerald for hosting me in their home!

Ingelheim am Rhein

Esther's town is really cute! She actually lives in the sort of old part of town, a block from the old city walls. The whole town is surrounded by vineyards, too.



The old walls surround the Burgkirche and several war memorials.



The church has a small but very interesting cemetery. I loved the monuments from the late 1800's. There were a lot of this column-with-draped-cloth style. The moss growing on this one was an awesome effect, it looked like a movie prop!



We walked up from the church to the vineyards. They aren't really fenced off, you can just stroll on in.



The grapes are not fully ripened yet, I am not sure how soon the harvest will be!



We walked a few of the small streets after our tour of the vines. There are a few of these tiny one person cars I saw in Germany. This three-wheeler is actually one of the larger single person cars I saw! It's still an odd concept, I can imagine owning a smart car with two seats, but not a one seater.



Oh, and this is a window shutter latch holder thing. The head hangs down when not in use, normally. You open the shutter, and the peg lines up along the bottom edge, then you flip up the toggle to hold the shutter in place. Designs that are little busts are common, but I also saw some geometric swirly designs.

Bakery Goodies in Ingelheim

One of the first things Esther and I did when we arrived in her town, Ingelheim, was go to get pastries! The local grocery store had these cool bakery machines, where you push the button and the loaves come out. I am not sure I get the point, as I am pretty sure it's just like a storage hopper for the bread... but they are cool machines.



We went to a bakery to buy real pastries instead. Plums are big in the Rhine part of Germany. This pastry with the plums and streusel was really good, and quite heavy on the plums. They are a little bit sour.

Last Day in Lux

Sunday in Luxembourg we visited the Castle in Vianden. That's it up on the hill back there!



It's actually a pretty great castle to visit. They have a few of the rooms set up with furnishings, and a room dug down to some of the earlier foundations from previous castles. In a quick hour or two you can follow the numbered room tour and really enjoy it.



It is seriously just built on a rock promontory.



That's pretty much the only serious sight in Vianden, it's a small town! After, we stopped in Echternacht on our way back to Germany. On Sunday, there's a big flea market in the town square.



We headed into the Basilica of St. Willibrord, the main sight of the town. It was a pretty cool church, with a mix of period styles. Apparently its most famous feature is the alternating columns and pillars.



I also stopped in at another of the minor sights of the city, the Museum of Rural Architecture. It was one room with some models...



But it really was a charming town!

Back from Germany!

And I have so much to tell you all! But starting tomorrow. Esther and I had to get up at 3am this morning to get me on the plane... and it is still crazy hot in Milan. Until then, enjoy this photo of the really cute buildings by the hotel we stayed at Saturday night in Vianden!

Tours

We spent our afternoon in Luxembourg City on a few tours. First we went to Notre Dame, we had a personal tour from this nice girl Catherine. She's in a program that places students within the EU to give tours in their language. It was a great tour!



After, we took a "professional" tour of the city, a walking tour of the different sights of the city. It was just OK, the group was too big and the guide was giving the tour in two languages. We did get a few facts and see a few things we wouldn't have otherwise, so it wasn't a total waste...



After we did a self guided tour of the Casemates, which are tunnels dug under the city, used for civic defense. There are lots of side tunnels with views over the city, they used to house cannons.



The whole thing was really cool, but we had a little trouble figuring out where to get out of the tunnels!