Freiberg
Freiberg im Breisgau (an important distinction: there are two Freibergs in Germany) is a University town, in the black forest, which seems to be famous for some funny gargoyles, and these skinny little canals that run all through town. We jumped off the train, headed up a street, through a small square, and found our room above a cafe.
Cool room, it is the biggest of the trip so far, with windows around two sides, room for a sofa, table and two chairs, a view over the cafe and canal (there is an alligator in the canal), and the food in the cafe below us is good. Score!
The alligator is stone.
The little canals, or Bächle, wind all through town, up and down every street and through the little squares (Platz). They were used to provide water to fight fires, water animals, and now provide a sort of natural air conditioning and are a tourist draw. They are constantly filled with water, and legend says that if you accidentally fall or step into a Bächle, you will marry a Freiburger. So of course what did Gail do?
She spent the rest of the day looking for a wedding dress.
The huge, red sandstone Münster (Cathedral) is in the Münsterplatz (where else?) in the center of town. It is so big that you cannot really get a photo of it all from inside the square; it was built about 1200 and took 300 years or so to complete.
Do I sound like a travel guide? I don't mean to; these are the kinds of small facts that blow me away.
Can you imagine starting a project today that will be completed 300 years from now (hopefully) by your great great grandchildren? Maybe I need to add another "great" to that. And that is assuming they are even interested in carrying on the work! Hell the US has been a country now for only 237 years.
side note* And we are so arrogant to slam the European ways of doing things... we need to see if we can even survive as a country for a short period of... oh, say 800 years before we start telling others how to run their countries, I think.
Outside the cathedral doors are a series of geometric carvings in the stone. I read these were measuring standards: how big around is a loaf of bread, how long is a foot (or rod or whatever they used to measure length) how thick is a standard wooden beam, and so on.
Anyway, I wandered around with my head back, searching for the funny statues and gargoyles, and was rewarded (see the photos).
We also looked down as we walked, and found many decorative stone inserts in the pavement, business signs set in stone (see photos). Hell, even the manhole covers are interesting here (once again... see photos).
Then we found a sobering sight: the Stolpersteine (stumbling blocks) which are are small, cobblestone-sized brass "stones" or plaques, set in the pavement in front of homes or businesses, for an individual victim of the Nazis. Gunter Demnig is the creater of this memorial, which has spread throughout Europe. These were the first we had seen.
As a side note, we were to see these throughout Germany, Benelux, and Poland, and the following year in many countries.
We walked over to the upper part of town to have a drink of Schnapps, because this area is supposed to be famous for its flavored schnapps. We tried two different kinds, but to me they tasted the same, kind of like harsh vodka.
We walked back to the Münsterplatz for a glass of wine and a beer, and moments after we were served the cathedral bells just started up.
The bells in Europe are one of the truly great experiences in life. Every town and city has several cathedrals; often I wonder just exactly how many churches per block are required? Anyway, at various random times throughout the day, the bells start to go crazy. I don't mean marking time at the top, quarter, bottom or three-quarters hour, I mean any old time, say 5:25PM the bells just all start ringing for some reason. It seems to vary from place to place, and it is just a lucky thing to be close when it happens.
Well, I had my beer and the bells started up. The smallest, highest pitched rang first, followed by a second layer of slightly larger and deeper bells. Soon, conversation at the cafe halted, and the waitress quit taking orders. The volume was deafening. Just when you thought it couldn't get any louder or deeper in sound, a new layer came peeling to life, bass notes so deep they compressed your chest with every BONG! This kept up for over five minutes. I know this, because about a minute into it I started filming and gave up after five minutes! This is probably one of the three best, most memorable, thundering bell "concerts" I have heard.
After the thunder, the bells just are kind of left swinging until they stop, so the largest come down fist, followed by the mid notes, and the highest, smallest bells randomly clank to a stop. When it ends, the silence is deafening.
After drinks,we hiked up a hill over the town for good sunset views, returned for dinner, wandered the streets at night and called it a day.
baden-baden
Friedrichsbad. The Roman-Irish Bath House. We went down for breakfast, and caught a quick train to the famous German spa town of Baden-Baden (Bath-Bath), where many many Europeans go to to rejuvenate. It is even covered under their health insurance: stress relief. What is wrong with us Americans and our health care system?!?!?
Anyway they have huge spas there.
Sure, we did other stuff in Baden-Baden, but we really came for the baths.
OK, other stuff we did there:
Got to the Hotel am Markt after taking the local shuttle bus from the train station, which is about 3KM out of town.
Had our hotel host reserve an afternoon bath at Friedrichsbad, the Roman-Irish Bath House next door.
Walked the town while waiting for the bath. Walked the famous Lichtentaler Allee, a 2KM long park from about 1650, passing time waiting for the spa. People watching downtown: there are a lot of kid-friendly areas and public toys for them to play on, and lots of fountains and public benches. Waiting for the spa time.
Important thing we did: reserved a late evening table in the courtyard at Weinstube im Baldreit, just up and around from our hotel.
Well, finally it was our reserved time to go to the baths. Let me preface this by telling you I am in no way a spa person. I enjoy sitting in a hot spring out in the mountains, but to pay for a spa? Waste of money and time. What follows now is the best €30 I have spent in my life.
We had five hours until dinner, at 10PM, plenty of time, or so I thought... Later I would wish for a second day here.
We walked into the Friedrichsbad bath house. It has 17 different "stations" you go through: shower, warm then hot air (68° C or 154°F) hot pools, cold pools, steam rooms, whirlpool, bubbly pool, cold plunge pool, and best of all: the brush massage and cream massage, before the final "relaxation" room.
This is all housed under an elegant, high domed Roman type building.
It is all natural, you know, natural in the geothermal way and also in the very natural naked way. The co-ed natural naked way. You lose any sense of inhibition the second you hit the first shower.
Seriously.
If that is the thing that is keeping you from trying this, sorry to be blunt, but grow up. You are missing the joyful stuff of life.
So, you shower and start through. After getting really really hot and then cooling off, you get a brush massage from a beautiful, tall, Scandinavian goddess with long blond hair in a ponytail... The only question is the brush: "Hart, mittel, odor weich?" (Hard, medium or soft?) Not having done this before, I chose mittel and lay down, fully unclothed, on my stomach. Well, I was scrubbed. And rubbed. Flipped over! and scrubbed more. Flipped back over and more scrubbing (with kind of a soapy warm water) then suddenly, just as I was blissfully becoming unconscious, WHACK! She smacks my butt with her bare hand and yells, "Nachste!"
I was sorry to leave.
As Gail got her brush massage I continued on: More hot, hotter, cold cold, hot... then the cream massage.
Now it is Gail's turn to get even with me, as we took turns receiving the cream massage from tall, dark, handsome Fritz! I gotta say, however, it was a great massage, front and back, with the unexpected SWAT! on the butt when you are at the most relaxed.
I scampered off the table and back into the spa.
Now we split: Gail straight to the relaxation room, me back for another round of the hottest hot then a jump into the coldest cold.
Repeat.
When I'd had enough, I went to the relaxation room. They lay you down on a table, and wrap you up like a cocoon in blankets. You literally cannot move. The room is dark, yellow and silent except... you can barely hear the church bells outside.
I was soon fast asleep.
I woke up when the church bells were chiming nine, and realized we had to make it to dinner in an hour. But... I couldn't move, and everyone around me was sleeping.
The matron led in another client, and after wrapping him was walking out when I managed a quiet psst that she heard. "Aus, bitte." and I was unwrapped, woke Gail, and we tiptoed out, dressed and headed to our room.
As much as I loved the spa, I loved the dinner.
Nicole is the wife and waitress, her husband is the chef, and this was the best meal we have had so far on the trip! We left the wine pairing up to her, and one particularly great thing was the grilled foie gras in a plum brandy... the dessert was diving, the dessert wine spectacular, and in a country where you do not tip, we tipped both her and her husband.
We finished the meal around midnight, stumbled back through the downtown, and slept very very soundly.