Leipzig and Luther Sites

May 9-12, 2017

Leipzig and Luther Sites

Tomorrow we head to Prague, so I want to get caught up on the blog tonight. This will be about all things Leipzig and surroundings.

The last few days we have taken day trips via train to some towns associated with Luther, namely, Erfurt, Eisleben and Eisenach. We enjoy traveling by train in Europe because they are much nicer than the trains in the USA, and most of the population gets around by train. The towns we wanted to travel to aren’t huge so we took the regional trains which take longer due to stopping at every little burg. We thought that we might want to see about taking a faster train but when finding out the cost, €190 vs €32, we stuck with our initial plan. As a side note, we have seen numerous plots of ground along the train tracks that families have turned into gardens with small dwellings of various types. From what we have gathered they are usually people from the city who live in apartments and aren’t privileged to have a garden but are happy to have their own piece of paradise.

Erfurt is a charming medieval town where Luther was ordained as a priest, and was a monk for a time at the Augustinian Monastery and studied at the University of Erfurt. After climbing many steps we visited the Cathedral where Luther was ordained, and St. Severus church which is right next door. We then found the monastery and were treated to seeing some beautiful stain-glass windows dating back to the 1300s, and to the organist practicing on the pipe organ.

We then had to hurry and catch our next train to Eisleben, where Luther was born and baptized, and died. When we arrived, we walked quite a distance downhill (what goes down, must come up) to the museum. After touring the museum and checking on the nearby church, we started our trek up the hill to the station. It was a lot of work for a short visit.

Yesterday it was another day of being outside of Leipzig. We traveled to Eisenach to see Wartburg Castle, where Luther was hidden for about 10 months. While there he worked on translating the New Testament from Greek into German. This town also has some medieval buildings and is quite picturesque, with beautiful homes situated on the hills overlooking the town.

The crown jewel, of course, is the castle, which we walked to, climbing some very steep hills. It took all my will-power to make it up to the top, but I managed with Roger’s encouragement. We toured the castle and a Luther exhibition that is being presented there this summer, both interesting. We then walked down and took the train back to Leipzig.

Today, as well as our first day here, we spent walking around and visiting the tourist sights of Leipzig. This city is located in what was East Germany, so architecturally Leipzig is not as interesting as some other German cities, but this past generation has put a lot of effort into refurbishing it and bringing it back to its former life. One thing it has going for it is its strong history of music, art and culture. The University of Leipzig has played a major part in the cultural life of this city to this day.

 

We visited St. Thomas Church, where Bach was the choirmaster and the Bach Museum where we learned about all things Bach.

We made visits to the Stasi Museum, which dealt with the activities of the Security Police in what was East Germany and the methods they used to spy on people. That museum is located in the headquarters of what was the Security Police. Creepy.

We also visited the Contemporary History Forum which tells the story of East and West Germany, 1945-1990. It focused mainly on the East but there were some displays of the West to provide contrast. Interesting.

Today we walked through part of the U. of Leipzig and saw one of the largest classrooms that I have ever seen. It must have seated 500. Roger was impressed and thought of all the papers that came with that. I told him that the Prof probably has more than one TA to help with the grading. Just saying. Anyway, what we saw of the school, was very contemporary and impressive.

Tonight, we found a sushi restaurant, and enjoyed some great Japanese food. We aren’t huge fans of German food and have kind of reached our limit of brats, wieners and pretzels, so it was good to have something different.

Tomorrow we are taking a new form of travel, the Flixbus, to Prague. We’ll see how this goes to see if we do it again.














 

Hamburg to Wittenberg

May 3-8, 2017

Hamburg to Wittenberg

 

Other than a few pictures on Facebook, I’m going to try and get the blog going again. I might play a little catch-up, so we will see how this works.

We left the Fort and drove to Bensenville, IL, right near O’Hare, and parked our car at our friend, June Harrison’s, retirement home. We visited with her and reminisced about our time in Chicago when she was our neighbor. She has become a dear friend over the years and we treasure any time we can spend with her. We then “Ubered” over to O’Hare.

 We arrived in Amsterdam only 30 minutes later than our originally scheduled time, even though we flew through Minneapolis instead of Detroit. We then caught our train to Hamburg and arrived at our Airbnb around 8:30 pm on Thursday and went straight to bed . . . tired travelers.

We spent the next few days, despite the cold and rain, seeing the sights of Hamburg and Lubeck, a town a train ride away, which has well-preserved old buildings. In Hamburg, we walked around the harbor area on the Elbe River which can accommodate ocean-going ships. The area of the old warehouses has been rehabbed and it has become a gentrified part of the city.

We also spent some time at the Miniatur Wunderland, which had huge displays of miniature trains, planes and displays of various parts of the world, including America. Of course, Las Vegas and the Grand Canyon area were the USA representations. It is a marvel that families of all ages would enjoy.

On Saturday, we took the train to Berlin and have spent the days walking around the city, seeing many of the famous sights, such as the Reichstag, Brandenburg Gate, Checkpoint Charlie and several memorials to Jewish and Gypsy Holocaust victims and to those who tried to escape from East Berlin.

 Sunday we spent several hours walking along a preserved section of the Berlin Wall with numerous well-done explanations of life in Berlin at that time in its history. This has all been a very sobering time for us. The evil that has existed in human hearts continues to this day.

We also met up with a former Taylor student, Kate Doiron, and attended church with her at the Berlin Cathedral, which is a Lutheran church. It is a very ornate building with the Reformers looking onto the congregation from above during the service. The organ was majestic. We sat in the English translation area, which helps with understanding, obviously. A mother and her child from Mongolia were baptized. After church we went with Kate to Barcomi’s Deli for lunch.

Later, we took the train to see the Kaiser Wilhelm Memorial Church, which was bombed during the war but was partially preserved including the front and steeple, minus the very top. A very simple and contemporary church has been erected right next door to it and is a stark contrast to the old church.

A highlight of our day was the ability to Facetime with all our children who were at our house celebrating Braden’s first communion and Max’s confirmation. Oh, the hazards of travelling in May. We might have to rethink this time of the year if we plan to do spring traveling again. We are missing too much.

Today, in honor of the 500^th year of the Reformation, we headed to Wittenberg to check out Luther sites. It is a just few hours train/bus ride from Berlin. We visited the Castle Church, where Luther and his buddy, Melanchthon, are buried and where tradition says he posted his 95 theses.

We then headed over to St. Mary’s church where Luther was married, where his children were baptized and where he preached over 2,000 sermons. His hymn, “A Mighty Fortress,” was also first sung there. Sadly, we left without hearing an organ concert since none was scheduled for today.

We also made a quick visit to the Luther House, which is now a museum, formerly a monastery where he lived as a monk, and then as a married man.

The town is gearing up for this summer tourist season in celebration of the Reformation. There was

construction and rehabbing everywhere.

Tomorrow, we head to Leipzig.

 

Winding Down

November 1, 2016

Winding Down

We leave tomorrow morning to fly back home, so I want to get one last blog post up tonight.

Sunday, we filled up again on art, starting by going to the Louvre. That place is gigantic, extremely elaborate and would take days to tour it thoroughly. We did the “find the pictures and sculptures we want to see” version, so it took us less than a day. Obviously, the Mona Lisa was the picture to see (if you could get past the crowd), and  the Venus de Milo statue, were at the top of the list.

After the Louvre, we headed over to the Rodin Museum, which is a much more manageable size and is in a beautiful setting of a former mansion where he lived at one time and surrounded by gardens, which were filled by some of his many statues, the most famous of which is The Thinker. It was much more relaxing than the Louvre.

Next, we visited Napoleon’s grave and the Cathedral of Saint-Louis Des Invalides, which are right next to each other. They are both very majestic and Napoleon’s tomb is massive. I guess it fits his personality. Large! Anyway, it was interesting.

By this time, we were ready to stop touring for the day and headed back to our Airbnb. Later, we started walking the neighborhood and discovered a little Asian restaurant, where you go in and buy the food by weight. We were hungry for noodles, so we had chicken soup with noodles and another noodle dish. The food was very good and inexpensive. You might wonder why we would be eating Asian in Paris, because French meals are expensive and we aren’t big of fans of French cooking . . . a lot of rich sauces. It comes down to a matter of taste and our pocketbook.

Monday, we started off by visiting the Arc de Triomphe and Champs-Elysees. We climbed to the top and viewed the city on a beautiful and clear fall day. After getting back down to street-level, we walked down the Champs-Elysees, where many of the wealthy people of the world spend time and money. We sat and people-watched and saw people of all shapes and sizes, colors and levels of beauty and fashion. It was interesting and humbling to remember that Jesus died for all of them.

We continued our walk past the Grand Palace and the Petit Palace and then took the Metro to the Pantheon where we saw the graves of Victor Hugo, Voltaire, Rousseau, the Curries, and Alexander Dumas, as well as, the Foucault pendulum, which demonstrates the rotation of the earth. While walking, we stopped and got a €2 chocolate cone at McDonalds. I should mention that when McDonalds wanted to open a store on the Champs Elysees, it was viewed with horror. Now, it is the busiest McD’s in the world. In their stores here, everyone orders via touchscreen and pays per credit card via the screen or goes to a special line for cash. You then go up to the counter to pick up your order. Every McDonalds that we have seen, has been very busy. Maybe it’s the fries. People over here love their “frites”. . . with mayo and ketchup or various other sauces. Go figure. Other than buying a drink one other time, we have stayed out of any American restaurants.

We ended the day, with a visit to the Jardin du Luxembourg. The setting was beautiful, right in the middle of the city and people were out by the thousands, sitting in chairs, picnicking, talking and enjoying each other’s company. In a large city like Paris, people take advantage of any window they have to be outside and experience nature on a beautiful day. It helps when the next day is a holiday.

Today, is All Saints Day, which is a national holiday in France. We started off the day by visiting the largest cemetery in Paris. It’s huge! We walked through parts of it looking for the graves of Chopin (pictured), Jim Morrison, Oscar Wilde and Maria Callas. All the people were out, placing flowers at many of the graves. They even have a section called Jardin du Souvenir (Garden of Remembrance), where people were throwing flowers onto the grass in remembrance of those gone before. The graves are large concrete structures of varying sizes and placed very close together. It was started in 1804. We were glad that we got to see that side of French culture.

After the cemetery, we went to the Basilique du Sacre-Coeur which is a church on top of one of the highest points in Paris. It provides a great view of the city, but was a bit hazy today, even though it was a lovely day. The place was flooded with people relaxing and enjoying their day off. We took the funicular to the top and walked down and continued down the street to the Moulin Rouge, which is in a not so nice part of the city. After a photo, we picked up a few things for breakfast and headed back to our neighborhood to pack and get ready to fly out tomorrow morning. It has been a wonderful adventure and we are so grateful that we have been able to spend the time together doing something that we love. See you stateside and thanks for following along.