Bavaria Again -
This time the northern section
July 18 - 25
There's another page for the Goebel/Hummel factory and, as usual, one about breweries.
Heading back into Bavaria we stopped at a small walled town, Rothenberg ob de Tauber, and walked a bit on a very hot day. The official reason was to see a "kriminal museen" but it turned out to be just too cheesy to even enter. Neat town though.
A huge Rathaus.
Maybe some kind of Passion Flower.
A quilt on display, one of a half dozen, at a real quilt store.
The store sadly was closed that Saturday but Terry did get to at least see bolts
of fabric.
Just north, we stopped for lunch at the Landwehr brewery and they had a display of hair heirlooms made by the owner's ancestors.
Schmuck aus Haaren
angergertigt um 1870 von Barbara und Babette Stoll. Frau und Tochter
des Herra Georg Stall. Vorbesitzer dieses Gasthofs und der Brauerei.
Further down the road, Uehifeld, besides having a small brewery, has a small Carhenge with one old Bug. We dare you to find this in the tourist guides.
The old city gate in Uehifeld is too small now but is still used for most
traffic into town.
We saw a truck plow through the wrong side at speed
without much warning to oncoming traffic.
Just past that, Poppenwind.
North of Bamberg is Rodental, famous as the home of Goebel, makers of Hummels, and also as the birthplace of Consort Prince Albert, beloved of Queen Victoria.
Rosenau Palace was constructed from 1808 to 1817 as a summer place for Duke Ernst I of Sachsen-Coberg-Gotha (the Sax-Cobergs). It was designed as a romantic knight's castle long after chivalry was gone and became a favorite of many of the royal families of Europe who became consolidated by Victoria's brood. Albert was born there; Victoria summered there many times; and various members of the family lived there at times after monarchies were abolished in Russia, Greece, etc.
After WWII it became a refugee camp and then, until the 1970s it was a old-folks home. Since 1976 the Bavarian Palace Department has redecorated the interior but most of the furniture has gone bye-bye.
A Biedermeier desk.
We spent 5 days based in Bamberg, 2 wandering the countryside, 2 wandering the city, and one cold wet day reading and watching the Tour de France.
Bamberg's a nice town with a large old city center and tons of ancient buildings - many dating back to the 15th century. The road system also dates from the 15th century. It's impossible to navigate with many streets becoming dead ends and narrow 1-lane streets acting as major thoroughfares with city busses barely fitting between houses. It all moves at a snail's pace as cars wait for bus pickups, pedestrians, long red lights, and tourists vainly reading maps.
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St. Michael's Monastery.
Rear view.
The Alt Rathaus which is built right in the middle of the river.
A bit of whimsy. A leg and scroll attached to the painting on the Alt Rathaus.
The huge Dom up the hill.
The Dom is built of sandstone, as are many of the statues around it.
This lion has been eroded away. Many of the old statues are preserved
in a separate museum next to the Dom.
The New Palace next to the Dom. It replaced the old palace in 1753 after a fire.
A few rooms are open to the public. The city library occupies most of the
structure.
One of the rooms. They have all been completely repaneled and repainted
recently.
A rose garden sits out back of the New Palace.
We weren't kidding about the traffic.
The Schloss und Park Fantaisie in Donndorf is mainly a garden anymore. It was built by the Duchess Elisabeth Friedericke Sophie von Wurttemberg back in 1763. She was the daughter of Frederick the Great so money, of course, wasn't a problem. The building is comparatively small for a country estate of the time but the gardens were, and still are, first rate.
Today the house holds a spell-binding museum about gardening on the grand scale of the time. It shows Baroque, Renaissance, Country, Romantic, and even Medieval garden styles. Schloss Nymphenberg and Englischergarten in Munich, plus the garden at Heidelberg Castle were specific examples which made it even more interesting. Sadly no photography and the book is in German.
The grounds at Fantaisie are a collection of all these styles so we could walk around and see the museum's lessons in action.
There is a textile museum sponsored by the 5 fabric companies in Helmbrechts, near Kulmbach. This summer there is a quilt display, many of which were done by local club members. Here's some pictures.
The plaque part of this 2-piece round robin quilt display has notes from each of
the quilters
printed on cloth and appliqued to the same backing.
This is also a round-robin quilt. This time all using the same fabric.
This display of a 16-patch round robin has a mantle block
and they are all supported by monofilament thread.
Here Terry is adding a few centimeters to the worlds longest weave.
In the 8 years this museum has been open each visitor adds a few shuttles to the
total
which is now over 3700 meters long.
Schloss Frankenburg was having a wine festival when we passed and we figured it was a good place to grab some food (hehehe).
We met three wonderful women from the village (Lydia, Erika, and Ilse)
and played the "It's my turn to buy" game the entire afternoon.
Didn't take Terry 3 minutes to fall asleep that night.
Kulmbach is
a busy but small industrial town with small neighborhoods of populations
separated by ethnicity. The small downtown area is nice as the others we've seen
and there's lots of nice old buildings and houses.
Actually we found the food here to be the most disappointing in all of
Bavaria. So we'll move on north.
Above Kulmbach, the Plessenburg residence is a large fortress now owned by Bavaria and used by the city for many celebrations. One night we were in town the big square had an ABBA clone band going far into the night.
The highlight of Plessenburg is the guided tour of the museum - about 12 rooms full of the history of the ruling family.
July 17th was a red letter day. Terry got ice in her water and one cube actually lasted long enough to get the lemon out of the glass.
