Schwäbisch Hall und die letzte Nacht in Mannheim

To end it all with a German jewel

Probably very few people have heard of Schwäbisch Hall or even know where it is. Not surprising it is not like places in Germany like Hamburg and Köln for its nightlife or München for its beer or Berlin for its history or Füssen for its palaces, or even as popular as Rothenburg ob der Tauber for its medival gems of architecture.

And so I might probably be crazy to actually go out of Mannheim to visit one last place before I leave. And of all places to Schwäbisch Hall a small town in which there is only 1 platform at the train station and the trains come once every hour from Heilbronn. Despite its lack of touristic elements, is a really must see, especially if one is crazy about colourful half-timbered houses as well as wanting to see the kind of "traditional German village". It is a small town which probably takes only 2 hours to see everything there is to see. But the serenity, the scenery and the lifestyle and peacefulness of the place resembles those you'd see on artists' paintings or like what some people say, the cover of chocolate boxes. And so I present to you Schwäbisch Hall, or better known to the locals as Hall, in these 2 panoramic photos which I made out of combining the different shots.

The River Kocher runs through the town
Marktplatz, with the Rathaus at the centre.

These half-timbered houses look like candy chocolates

The fountain which is interestingly used as a fishtank to store fishes caught from the river before selling them, as well as the St Michael behind at the background. The interior is impressive with a lot of painted statues.

German beer and German food the whole day

My consumption of liquid for the whole day is not water but beer, totalling to 3 litres. As well as eating Pork Knuckles at München for lunch. Probably the last chance to drink all I can, and also the last chance to get cheap beer. And such was the gathering of the remaining people left in Mannheim at night. Drinking beer and smoking shisha. We wanted to go to a third one but then the pub was already closed. Oh well... I am simply not ready to go home yet.

Anyway although this is the last night, I am not done with the blog for sure. There is still more to write about Dresden as well as Baden-Baden which is my favourite place. And I guess I will do it when I return to Singapore.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/29JulySchwBischHall

Regensburg und Passau

A visit to Eastern Bavaria

At the invitation of Elisabeth, I went to Regensburg to stay for 2 days. Of all the Bundesländern in Germany, I would say after this trip that Bavaria is the state in which I have travelled within extensively from Würzburg, Bamberg, Nürnberg, München, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Dachau, Rothenburg ob der Tauber as well as Füssen. The trip to Eastern Bavaria is to round up my visit to the major cities of Bavaria. Unfortuantely I did not have the time to cover Bayeuth or Augsburg, both which I heard were nice places too.

Anyway Regensburg is quite an gem in Bavaria I would say. Most of its structures are left unscarthed and untouched. At Elisabeth's place, she showed me some picture books of the history of Regensburg which she had them since the 1940s (black and white printed, with fonts script that I can barely read because it is too cheem) and we compared them to the photos that I took and 99% of them still looks the same from the past. No wonder that the Regensburg, as a medieval city, has been award the status of the UNESCO heritage site.

The Stone bridge - built in the 10th century, is the major medieval highlight.
Colourful pastel coloured houses
The interior of the St. Emmeram's Basilica, yet another baroque feat by the Asam brothers, the most prominent baroque sculpters of Germany in the 18th century.

Hospitable Guests

When Elisabeth first invited me to stay at her place, she told me over the phone that if I don't mind I could sleep in the top floor in the attic. But this was way much better than what I thought. And she was great company actually because she has also travelled widely within Germany and we were able to conserve over a wide range of places. Breakfast was always interesting because we had Bavarian confectionary which is amazingly great and yet a big portion. Well in the first place Bavarian food is always hearty and in big quantities. She also brought me to visit her chio granddaughter Sophia who was unfortunately sick for the past 2 weeks and was lying in bed when I went into her room. All in all it was a great experience to live at her place.

Albert (who studied economics and still believes personally that politics are a bunch of bullshit), Elisabeth

Passau

An hour train ride away from Regensburg brought me to Passau, which I am quite sure very few people have heard of it, even for exchange students in Germany. However Passau has one of the best universities in Germany, especially in law and economics. Which made me quite surprised, because it is even more beautiful as Heidelberg and one of the most beautiful places in Bavaria.

The biggest church organ in the world with 17774 pipes. Not surprising, this is one of the most common image which appear on Passau postcards

Because Passau is located at the confluence of 3 rivers, the Donau, Inn and Ilz rivers, it is also ofen subjected to floods. Here you see markings over the centuries of the water height.

Across the Donau River is the Veste Oberhaus - a fortress built in 1219 and it is only from the fortress that a view where the 3 rivers merge can be seen, as well as a great view of the Altstadt below:
View of the tip where the 3 rivers meet. Actually it looks like only 2, because the third one is hidden out of sight from the trees at the extreme left.

Along the river Inn, where there is a great garden where the students would lie down.

Easten Bavaria is really value for money I would say. The things on the street are not very expensive, probably due to the fact that they are university towns and hence the cost of living is somewhat kept. They are the gateway to the Bavarian forests and it is probably Bavaria's answer to the Blackforest in Baden-Württemburg. It gives the more laid back and lush view when you compare it with other Bavarian cities such as Nürnberg or München.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/15JulyRegensburg

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/16JulyPassau

Praha (Prag, Prague)

Easily the most beautiful place in Europe

It is a difficult choice to decide if Prague or Interlaken is more beautiful. Both are beautiful in their own styles. However, in terms of architecture, I would say that Prague has a higher wow factor. In terms of nature, its the other way round. However, given Czech Republic's complicated historical background, it is hard to imagine that such a gem exists in Czech.

Anyway I liked Prague so much that I had to go again. And 2 times in 3 weeks. The first time with the 2 of them were pretty rushed, so I did not have time to take all the photos I want and walk at my own pace. This time I re-did of what I did 3 weeks ago, as well as discovering new hideouts and sights which were not listed on the map as well as on most guidebooks. And I got to know this gal from Slovakia on Charles Bridge. And her invitation to go Slovakia and stay at her place...... but I can only do it earliest next year. Was für eine Schade!

The Fred and Ginger Dancing House, finished construction in 1996

Charles Bridge

The main happening and touristic spots in Prague are undoubtly these places - Charles Bridge, the Old Town (with the Astronomical Clock) as well as the Lesser Quarter (together with the Prague castle), which is the district after crossing the bridge.

The Charles Bridge is a historical bridge that started construction in the mid 14th century and was completed about 50 years later. It was important because it linked the old town to the lesser quarter.

From the side of the old town, you can see the Prague castle across the bridge from all angles. At the bridge entrance there is a bridge tower, and you could climb the bridge tower to see the bridge. In the day, the bridge is always crowded at every second with tourists and street artists selling paintings or busking music. Also, there are 30 statues on the Bridge, mostly erected between 1683 and 1715. These statues were statues of saints. However, the statues today are all replicas and the originals are being placed in the national museum as exhibits.

The Charles Bridge is most beautiful during sunset and sunrise. As sunrise during summer is about 4.30am which I would be in bed, waiting for sunset is a more viable option.
The very same scene, Charles Bridge is at its most magical during this time

Old Town Area

A historic town area and the original settlement of the people in Prague. The most important place to be in the Old town area is at the town square:

The white church on the left is the Church of St Nicholas, with the interior shown below. I only went into the inside the second time I was in Prague. The first time I thought I had to pay to enter the church but that was not true. The green statue beside the church is the statue of the religious reformer Jan Hus, whom today is a national hero to the Czech people.

The interior of the Church

The dominant 15th century Tyn Cathedral

The astronomical clock dates back to 1410. It has the ability to show astronomical information such as the position of the sun, moon, constellations. Every hour there would be a short Glockspiel, which is actually not that fantastic but yet draw huge crowds there who wait patiently with their camera ready to film about 15 minutes before every hour. Wenceslas Square - sometimes considered the new town square. The national museum is in the background. The square is a popular place for demonstrations during the course of Czech Republic's rough history, where sometimes it went too far where people would set themselves on fire.

Prague Castle and gardens

Crossing the bridge would being you to the Lesser Quarter where today it seems to be a popular area where all the embassies would locate. Also it is on the same side of the Prague Castle, which is one of the biggest castles in the world. The gardens are also a good place to roam and look at Prague's old town from the other side. There is an area where they'd grow grape wineyards.

I was lucky to actually see a rainbow at sunset at the castle gardens.

Actually the picture above showing the 4 bridges are not taken from the Prague castle. Rather one has to walk further down and then climb up to a garden area, which is acutally quite hidden away but not very far. The view to see the whole city and the major bridges around the old town at a glance is perhaps the best.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/28JunePrague

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/20JulyPrague

Luzern und Zürich

The Golden Panorama Train Ride

The train ride from Interlaken to Luzern, known as the golden panorama for its magnificant views throughout the 2 hour train ride. The train passes through the most beautiful sceneries and the most natural landscapes in the country.

What I always found beautiful was the countryside houses at the foot of the mountains or by the lakes. It really resembles those pictures you would see in children story books.
During the train ride, I was sitting next to these 2 girls who were travelling to Luzern to meet their relative. What caught my attention was the way they dressed up, like the character Heidi, with plaits and wearing traditional Swiss clothing, something which is very rare to come by these days. And soon we were talking with them asking me a lot of... kiddy interesting questions.

Luzern

Like Interlaken, Luzern is also a German speaking region in Switzerland. Lonely Planet said that Luzern is the only place in Switzerland that has a bit of everything, old houses, bridges, churches, a old town wall with watch towers, a river that cuts through the town and some snow capped mountains. And how true it is!

Wasserturm und Kapellebrücke - Watertower (on the left) and the Chapel Bridge: the oldest wooden bridge in Europe, constructed in 1333.

As you walk through the Kapellebrücke, you would see these paintings on the roof of the bridge which tell the story of Luzern. However, some of the paintings were being destroyed together with a majority of the bridge in a 1993 fire. Although the bridge were rebuilt, the damaged paintings were taken down.

Another highlight is to walk along the remaining fortified wall, and climb up the watch towers. From there a top view of the town can be seen, like the picture below. The mountain in the background is the Mt Pilatus, with an elevation of 2132m, overlooking the Luzern.

Like most buildings in the Altstadt in European cities, they are beautifully painted with murals like this: As I walked along the river where all the most expensive eateries are usually stacked along, my attention was turned to this menu. It says. Today: Nasi Goreng - Asian Ricedish with pork and vegetables, for 19 Swiss Franc!!!! And appraently it was quite popular as I head many people asking about the dish, whether it is "scharf" (spicy) or not. If you've been here for a while in Europe you would discover that actually most of the Europeans cannot tahan spicy food.

The Löwendenkmal (Lion Memorial)

This memorial is actually dedicated to the Swiss guards who were killed in 1792 during the period of the French Revolution. On August 10 1792, the Tuileries Palace in Paris were stormed by the Parisian mod in a bid to hunt for the royal family, in particular Marie Antionette. The Swiss guards (who have been mecenaries for centuries) who were at the palace defending were being slaughered while the royal family managed to escape through the gardens. Notice that there is a spear through the lion and it looks as though it is dying.

Luzern, although small a tour of the important sights can be completed in like 2 to 3 hours, is still nonetheless important because of tourism as well as its central location. From Luzern, many other Swiss towns, especially those in the south can be easily reached.

Zürich - zu (too) rich?

Needless to say, this is a German-speaking Canton of Switzerland. Actually many people who have been to Zürich said that Zürich is a city and there's really nothing to see. Even the SEP students who are there complained that its quite boring and the things there are really expensive. I fully agree with them, but since Zürich was along the way back into Germany that evening, I decided to see how boring it is.

The Bahnhofstraße is the street where for the first time I saw so many Swiss banks concentrated together (something like Robinson Road in Raffles Place). And popular rumour says that underneath in the basements of the bank vault stores huge amount of gold and silver, like the UBS bank building below:

Also, this street is lined up with designer brands of anykind you can think of. And prices are damn ex naturally. Even Bata, which has a store along the street, sells shoes for like 150 Francs. And to think they acutally shelf the shoes outside.

The river above leads to the Zürich lake. If you ask me what Switzerland is, I would think its lakes and mountains. Notice under tha red umbrella there are some people sunbathing. These people are all ladies, and they are sunbathing topless. In fact it is a ladies only area, because the entrance reads Frauenbad.

Zürich Lakes

In Germany, one can get tired of seeing Churches, Castles, Palaces and half-timbered houses. In Switzerland I think its the lakes and mountains that may bore a tourist. However because I was there only for 3 days it was still a relatively short time to bore me.

One of the high-class alleys in Zürich. Behind you see a church tower (St Peters) with the biggest clock face in Europe at 8.something metres of diameter. Cannot remember exactly.

That's it for the Schweiz. If I were to return to the Schweiz again, I would definitely want to go to Interlaken once again. By the way the tourism board actually recognises frequent visitors who return to Interlaken over the past 20 years. You'd just need to go to the tourism office and tell them and they will give you some form of recognition. How they verify, I have no idea myself. Anyway, besides Interlaken, I would want to also visit places like Zug, Brienz as well as Lugano. And hopefully meet interesting experiences along the way, like meeting the 2 Heidis. Who knows, they would have grown up by then.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/24JulyLuzern

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/24JulyZRich

Interlaken

Willkommen in meinen Träumen - Willkommen in der Schweiz



Switzerland is one of the most lucky countries in the world. The people are blessed with a high standard of living (high costs too), natural landscapes (70% of Switzerland are mountains), beautiful and CLEAN lakes, fresh cold air and the world's best tap water.

Language wise, there are 4 official languages in Switzerland. The language which most Swiss speak is German (orange coloured regions) which corresponds to about 80% of the population. Next up is French (green), and the southern region of Switzerland speaks generally Italian. The 4th language is known as Romansh, which according to a Swiss guy whom I spoke to, sounded like Latin and has Latin origins.


The first part of the big Europe trip, I was in Lausanne, the west of Switzerland, near Geneva, which was a French speaking region. This time I spent my time in Interlaken, as well as Luzern and Zürich, which were German speaking Cantons. And I thought Lausanne was beautiful until I came to Interlaken.... where I felt that I was living in the times of Heidi, the storybook which we would read as kids.

In fact, Interlaken is one of the top tourist destinations in Switzerland because of the Jungfraujoch, the highest point of the Europe at 3454 metres. Also most tourist would flock here to do winter sports or sports of all kind, or just to spend money. And such was the impression that I got when I walked out of the train station:

Signposts to hotels in all directions.

Contrary to living in a hotel, I had booked a place in a hostel instead. It is a very popular hostel for Americans and for whatever reason I am not sure. And as expected, partying at night is very much on their agenda. Anyway, given my tight budget, I did not join in the booze, but rather I had packed about 2 days of food supplies from Prague and a bottle of wine from Germany to last me through.

The first night was mainly settling down, making my dinner and then waking along the main road in Interlaken, doing window shopping and looking at how rich tourist splurge their money in places like the Casino below:

Actually I was quite dismayed the first night to see so many tourists around. I have expected Interlaken to be touristic but the level of tourism is damn extreme here. I was determined to wake up early the next day and take the hiking routes which would lead me to meet as few tourists as possible.

And so I woke up at 6.30am the next day and went to get my breakfast. Not surprisingly, most of the people who were up early for breakfast were the Asians. Most of the Americans were still dead in bed. And after that, I left the hostel at about 8.10am and began my long walk for the whole day.

Here are some of the morning shots just outside the hostel and a 10 minute walk down in the direction of Widerswil.

It was great to walk like that in the morning because firstly, the air is fresh and the sun is not totally up yet so its not sorching. Secondly you can be sure you will not bump into any tourists but rather locals who walk their dogs or jog. And some of them would stop and talk to you for a while.

My target for that morning was the town of Lauterbrunnen, which was 795 metres high. Actually I was given the transport card which allows me to take the bus to a certain distance, reducing the time and effort needed to reach Lauterbrunnen, 12 km away from Interlaken. Or with the train it takes only 15minutes from Interlaken to reach. But by foot it would take about 2.5 hours. And it was a great idea to actually walk because of the following pictures below:

The train which everyone else would take uphill. Still walking is better because you could stop by and take pictures of all angles whenever you want.

Although there were signs showing the Wanderweg (hiking route), sometimes I strayed off course or cut through fields, in order to have a close look at what some of the Swiss homes are like. And here's one of them. I met this old man who was watering his vegetables in his little garden behind (pic above), as well as stopping by a barn where a guy was sweeping the hay and talked for a while.

At about 11am I finally arrived at Lauterbrunnen, where I was greeted by a row of houses displaying the Swiss architecture. Most of the houses are of course guesthouses, or hotels or anything catering to making money out of tourists.

My attention was then turned to the waterfall in the picture below:

Although not a fantastic waterfall in Switzerland (when they have the Europe largest's waterfall in Schaffhausen - a town bordering Germany), I went close to have a look at it. And they have actually constructed a path, which was acutally quite dangerous to use cos of the elevation, to get as close as possible to the waterfall:

The closest I could get to the waterfallSplendid views of Lauterbrunnen from the "Waterfall" This is really what they mean by Rest in Peace.

After having enough of Lauterbrunnen, it was already afternoon as I made my way down to Interlaken. And here are some of the beautiful flowers that I managed to capture along the hike up and down:

Once on level ground at Interlaken, my next target spot was Bönigen, a municipality about 35 minutes walk from Interlaken Ost Station. The reason why I wanted to go there was because of the Lake Brienz.

On the main street of Interlaken.

Along the way to Bönigen

Lake Brienz
Best waters I have ever seen so far in Europe

Facing Bönigen

I was in luck that day, because there was an event going on at the edge of the lake. And its not some kind of touristic thing (there are no tourists anyway, only locals), but rather like a display of different stalls showing the regional culture.

This stall demonstrates how they used to wash clothes with soap made from ashes. After scrubbing and cleaning the clothes are put in the pot of boiling water with soap. According to the lady, laundry is done only in Spring, Summer and to a lesser extent during Autumn. What is interesting is to look at the type of clothes they wear. For exmple the ladies wear pants in with slits so that they could just squat down and pee in the fields when they were working in the open!
This is a demonstration of a very intricate form of sewing by pulling and crossing different treads with so many "skewers" which looks so complicated that it could not understand how they managed to produce the following butterflies and stars:
And of course, not to be missed, Swiss horns:

The animals you see above are Lamas. According to the explaination, a well trained Lama is one which is a good companion to help to carry goods as well as transportation when treking. And there is also a club which does treking with Lamas in the mountains too. What is further interesting is that the Lamas always seem to be smiling if you look at their faces.
Of course, what is Swiss culture without some tradtional food? Here's Chäsbrätel, which is actually Grilled cheese with Praprika powder on bread. The long queue to get the food

It was a great open air gathering for the locals without the tourists around. Everyone was yanking away in the Swiss German dialects, which in this region is known as the Bernese Oberland dialect. For us Standard German speakers or native German speakers from Germany, its almost impossible to understand. If you thought German was mouthful and the people speak like machine guns and sound low-class and uncouth, then Swiss-German dialects would be even harder to swallow. It sounded more like Dutch than German to me and the vocab is almost incomprehensible. But they write and read in standard German, and they could also talk in standard German as well. When there are standard German speakers, they would be happy to switch to standard German so as to be more accomodating. Its like you know, talking to your Grandmother in Chinese instead of dialect. But the thing is that while most young Singaporeans are losing their dialects, the speaking of Swiss-German dialect can also be heard in kids. This contact with them has got me even more interested to pick up Swiss-German dialects.

The short time spent in Interlaken actually opened my eyes to Swiss-German culture. I calculated that I walked about 40km in one day of hiking. My foot developed blisters and it was very tiring. But it was a great experience, especially when you talk with the locals. The Swiss-Germans are super friendly and chatty without any air of snobbishness at all, not like some other country's people (there is no need to mention which). And although I did not have enough money to accend to the Jungfraujoch with me, I am very sure I will return one day to go up the Jungfraujoch again. The experience with the locals is in my opinion, much more valuable and interesting.

In my next post I will write about the interesting train journey from Interlaken to Luzern where I made friends with 2 Swiss Heidis.

http://picasaweb.google.com/mannheim08a/22July08Interlaken