Füssen and Environs

Can I crystalize our last few days in Germany into, say, seventeen syllables?

Lovely Alps in view
Mad king's castle fantasy
Beer, pork, beer, pork, pork

 Also, some pictures:

Beer and Brats

Yes friends, we drank plenty of beer as we meandered down the Romantic Road towards Füssen. Not when meandering via das auto, of course, but meandering from meal to meal. Being more of a wine person, it's interesting how quickly I embrace beer when in brew region, like Spain or Germany (and from time to time, Dublin City Centre).

Bill and I were already fans of Hefeweizen, a wheat beer (especially Live Oak HefeWeizen brewed in Austin!), so we were naturally inclined toward Bavaria's Weissbier. As we also prefer darker beers, we were extremely happy to find a Weissbier Dunkel in every establishment. Of course Franconia in Bavaria is a wine region, so we were not completely beer-centric.

Before heading on our trip, a co-worker warned me that Germany was beautiful but the food was awful. "All that pork," she said. I just nodded and thought two thoughts: 1) An Irish person complaining about the preponderance of pork. Ha! and 2) Mmm....Pork.  And we did eat pork. Pork roast and sausages and schnitzels and bacon. A common meal is Nürnberger bratwursts, small sausages--typically six or so served with sauerkraut, mustard and brown bread. What more could you possibly want on a plate?

I also tried currywurst, a national favorite. I'm afraid I was not taste tingled by this sausage covered in ketchup and curry powder. Perhaps I did not sample the finest currywurst available, so I'll keep an open mind, but really, even speaking as an American, ketchup needs a lot of doctoring to truly become food.

Wandering in Dinkelsbühl

The historical center within Dinkelsbühl's fully intact medieval wall is as charming as you can imagine. The streets are cobbled, each building painted a different muted hue. The roofs are steep. It is the distillation of quaint. A triple shot quaint-spresso. So, I did wonder if business owners chafe at using the same old-fashioned  script for every shop sign and if homeowners grow weary of maintaining shutters and window boxes. But when we wandered into the Appelberg's shop we heard glowing reports of life in Dinkelsbühl. "We are not a museum town. This is a real community," Arthur told us. He is a former engineer who moved with his wife to Dinkelsbühl sixteen years ago. He is a painter and print maker;  she is a potter and together they run a small inn. I loved Arthur's work and we bought several prints. His paintings beautifully capture the iconic towers of the town wall, but are etched with small details of faces and smaller scenes--illustrating the stories that are still being lived out in this storybook town. 

Dinkelsbühl's towers are lovely. We loved wandering through the streets along the inner perimeter, and outside the wall along paths lined with yellow-leafed trees.

Wednesday morning a market sprung up in front of St. George's church. It was gone by noon. We were most impressed that panels in the stone sidewalk open up to reveal electrical outlets for the various stands. Old meets new! Yes!

Deutsches Haus and St. George's Church

We arrived in Dinkelsbühl right after dark (November 9) and ate dinner at our hotel. The Deutsches Haus is a family-owned hotel built as a residence in the 15th century. The hotel's richly decorated half-timbered facade exemplifies late Renaissance architecture in Southern Germany. 

The interior is full of dark wood and richly painted murals of crests and ribbons and woodland creatures. The restaurant has wooden chandeliers carved with jolly figures gathered around a table, hoisting a pint.

At breakfast, we had cute napkins.

Across the cobbled street from the hotel is St. George's Church. St. George and his skewered dragon are frequently spotted around Europe as he was widely celebrated as a Christian Martyr and is the patron saint of many countries including England, Greece, Ethiopia and Palestine. Dinkelsbühl's church represents construction spanning the 12th-16th centuries. Decoration in the church, including the flower arrangements, incorporates stalks of wheat, as Dinkelsbühl means "wheat hill."

The church was dim and cold when we visited, making the soaring baroque ceiling, imposing pipe organ, intricate tabernacle and carved wooden pews a bit dulled and wintry.

We found an inscription on the exterior of the church dated 1492, reminding us of how many structures were already in place when Columbus sailed the ocean blue. The US is such a young country. [Similar to a conversation I had recently with a young woman about The New Yorker, and I realized I've had a subscription to that magazine longer than she's been alive.]

I don't know what these carvings represent, but I like them.

Schloss Weikersheim

Leaving Würzburg on Monday, November 9, we headed south on the Romantische Straße, the Romantic Road, a swath through historical towns and villages that typify Bavaria. We stopped to visit Schloss Weikersheim, the princely residence of the Hohenlohe family.

November is not peak tourism season in Germany. We saw relatively few tourists, and very few English-speaking ones, until the end of our trip at the Neuschwanstein and Hohenschwangau Castles. And on occasion, we had palaces all to ourselves, like in Weikersheim. We had to ring a bell to be admitted to the castle, and were the only participants on the guided tour. Built in the 12th Century, much of the castle was renovated in the 18th C to reflect the French decor and architecture, which was much in fashion. The Baroque influence is very apparent in the gardens which reminded us of châteaux in the Loire Valley.


We left the castle ready for a late lunch around 3:00, only to find all cafes closed down. We stopped hopefully at a hotel and asked if their restaurant was open. "For you, it is," they said and graciously set a table for us in the deserted dining room. All they could offer was soup, which we gladly accepted. They were lovely soups. Thank you Laurentius Cafe and Restaurant for keeping us warm and well fed.

More Würzburg

Sunday November 8 was our second day in Würzburg, Germany. A gray day, but not horribly cold. We walked along the River Main, enjoying the scenic spot at the 18th C Alter Kranen (Old Crane--used to load boats on the river), with views of the Marienberg fortress and the Old Main Bridge.

We proceeded to The Residence, a Baroque palace of the Prince-Bishops of Würzburg. The construction and decoration of the palace, beginning in 1720, spanned five Prince-Bishops with varying priorities for completion of the palace, which occurred finally in 1781. Napoleon apparently called the Residence "the nicest parsonage in Europe." The residence was heavily damaged in a bombing raid in March 1945, an event obliquely referred to on info placards as "the fire." Restoration of the palace began soon after the war and lasted until the 1980s. The palace rooms range from grand to spectacular with Bossi's intricate stucco of the White Hall, the gilded Imperial Hall with striking murals whose characters seem to step into the room, and the beautiful frescoed ceilings of the staircase landing. In addition to the grandiose ornamentation, I particularly loved the lovely patterns in the parquet flooring in many of the apartments.

After touring the residence and grounds we walked back to the Marktplatz and popped into Café Schönborn for lunch. We then visited Würzburg Cathedral, a Romanesque cathedral dedicated in 1188.

For dinner we decided to stick close to our hotel, visiting a cafe/bar two doors down. Bill had read Pleicher Hof was a college hangout, and indeed I believe the combined age at our table equaled all the other customers. Pleicher Hof's website had said that a viewing party for Polizeiruf 110 would start at 8:15, and sure enough at 8:15 every table had filled and the room fell silent as the show began. We had no choice but to watch this police procedural in German, and wait for our schnitzel, which was the only item still available from the menu. We gathered that there had been a murder, which somehow involved a young cop. And a hedgehog. The case led an older, one-armed detective to quit the force, and then it was Christmas. Our schnitzel expectations were low, but unfounded--our dinners were delicious. I had jaegerschnitzel with spaetzle. A terrific plate of food, and a fun evening.

Würzburg

We left Dublin early on Saturday, November 7, arriving in Frankfurt at 10:00 AM. We hopped in the car and drove through the misty, russet and yellow countryside to Würzburg. After checking into our hotel we walked to the market square where we immediately sought out a bratwurst stand. And there would be many more brats in the following days. Yes, we came for the sausage.

We spent the afternoon wandering the market, drinking Glühwein, buying baked goods and photographing ourselves in front of interesting-looking buildings. There was a moment or two of line dancing, but not as much as Dad would have preferred.

That evening we dined at a huge but cozy, candle-lit restaurant called Das Backöfele. The standout dish for me was scallops with pumpkin risotto and Bill loved his pumpkin soup. (The pumpkin oil reminded him of Slovenia.) A great first day.