Burg Prunn

On April 18, 2013May 30, 2020 By StevenIn Life In Germany13 Comments

One of the things that you learn while living in Germany is that castles are to Germany what Waffle House, Coca-Cola, and the name Peachtree are to Atlanta. There are castles everywhere over here. Some of them aren’t all that stereotypically castle-ish. For example, there’s Prunn Castle.

Burg (Castle) Prunn sits on the edge of a hill, so the view from the castle wall is nothing short of spectacular. There’s literary historical significance to this castle, also. The “Prunner Codex“, the fourth oldest complete manuscript of the high German heroic epic, the Nibelungenlied, was discovered in this castle.

The castle goes back to the 11th century, and there are clearly two parts to the castle. The central tower, and the buildings which were constructed around the tower later on.

There is a small courtyard near the main entrance to the castle. Unfortunately, pictures are not permitted inside the castle, so I can only show you the outside walls. The inside was cold, but fascinating. The entire structure has even been immortalized in Lego.

Have you been to Burg Prunn? What’s your favorite castle?

A Perfect Day

On March 4, 2013November 15, 2017 By StevenIn Life At Home12 Comments

I travelled into Munich on Saturday afternoon. Compared to last weekend’s total bust of an Ingolstadt day trip, this weekend’s trip resulted an absolutely perfect day. It helps that I had a specific goal in mind. I had acquired a ticket to see Dinosaurier: Im Reich Der Giganten. I gave myself a little bit of padding time before and after the show, and that extra time is where the day became really successful.

It also helps that Munich is a vibrant and amazing city, with a lot of really cool stuff going on. There’s so much cool stuff in Munich that even after repeated trips to the city, I’m still ticking things off my “Ooh, I’ve gotta see that sometime!” list.

I went a little bit early today with the intent of finally getting to see the Ruhmeshalle. I had already seen Walhalla and the Befreiungshalle (“Hall of Liberation”). This is a sort of companion piece to the both of them, since they were all originally commissioned by King Ludwig I of Bavaria. I did make it to the Ruhmeshalle, but I could’t go inside because it was closed up- probably because most of the stairs were still iced over. At least I got to see it, along with the statue of Bavaria in front. I’ll have to go back there some other time, when it’s a little bit less icy.

Because I took a detour to an area of Munich I hadn’t seen on my way to the Ruhmeshalle, I got to see several other interesting things. First of all, there’s this wacky staircase at the KPMG Building:

Secondly, I got to see a random giant snail. I have no idea whatsoever what this snail’s deal is, but I assume he’s related to the Deutsches Museum Verkehrszentrum, a part of the Deutsches Museum near Theresienwiese. It’s a giant glass building filled with trains and planes and automobiles. And at least one helicopter. I really need to go back there sometime- I love things that go zoom. Anyway, here’s the snail. Doesn’t he look happy?

After my detour into giant snail and unpossible staircase-land, I went on to the dinosaurs that were my reason for going to Munich. If you go to the Dinosaurier Live site, you can see some cool promotional video of the show. My seats were way up in “sherpa guides and oxygen tanks” territory, but I still took a few pictures. Click for bigger. (And a quick side note- remember the brontosaurus? I miss that big guy.)

I debated whether or not to include video clips, but the way they animate the dinosaurs is really quite amazing, so here’s two short clips.

By the time I came out of the Olympiahalle, the overcast day had given way to sunny and gorgeous, because springtime is banging at the door here. My walk back to the U-Bahn took me right past the Olympiaturm, another place on my “I want to go there” list. Since the skies had cleared up, and I had an hour to the next train back to Regensburg, I decided to hop in for a look-see. There’s a restaurant up at the top of the Olympiaturm, and I’d like to eat there some time in the future. I love restaurants in tall places. (I’ve been to restaurants in the Skylon in Niagara Falls, the CN Tower in Toronto, and a few other super-tall places. My love of dining in the sky knows no bounds.) This is the Olympiaturm.

Since the weather had cleared,the views from the top were amazing. It still wasn’t clear enough for me to see the Zugspitze, but I’m ok with waiting until May to see that for myself. In this picture, you can see the BMW complex. You can also see the shadow of the Olympiaturm, which cracks me up.

At the foot of the Olympiaturm, there is a pond. And in that pond, the forces of Springtime were amassing. And eating pretzels from all the passersby. Ever seen a mallard duck trying to chew up a piece of pretzel? It’s high comedy. Aside from that, it was really quite lovely, though. A perfect end to a pretty amazing day.

To top it all off, when my train left Munich, we passed an open field where four small deer were playing in the snow. Seriously- a perfect day.

Tell me about the last time you had a perfect day.

Wurst Wurst In Regensburg

On October 29, 2012May 30, 2020 By StevenIn Life In Germany3 Comments

The weekend before last,I finally got around to trying the historic Wurstkuchl. Founded over 500 years ago, the Wurstkuchl is generally regarded as the oldest fast food restaurant in the world.

The restaurant is right on the banks of the Donau river, right next to the Steinerne Brücke (Stone Bridge). There is a small seated area outside, and an even smaller seating area inside. In between, there’s a tiny doorway right next to the grill where you can get some food “mitnehmen” (to go.)

I tried their standard takeaway, which is a Bratwurstkipferl, a small curved sausage, on a semmel (bread roll), with a helping of sauerkraut and the Wurstkuchl’s famous sweet mustard. The mustard is a family recipe passed down for generations, and they still produce it themselves. In keeping with modern times, however, you can now order their mustard through the Wurstkuchl’s online store. That’s progress!

I didn’t have the foresight to take a picture of my Bratwurst, but I did take a picture of the Wurstkuchl itself. The place is pretty much always busy, because a lot of tour groups stop in for lunch.

Oh, and the subject line of this post, “Wurst wurst in Regensburg?” Don’t believe it for a second; It was delicious. I just used “wurst wurst” for the subject because I like the way it sounds.

Short Trip To Vienna

On October 8, 2012January 26, 2020 By StevenIn International Travel - Europe4 Comments

I went to Vienna for several days. For once, I wasn’t there to attend a concert. Instead, I was there to help Jenny with her competition in the Vienna Photomarathon. The Photomarathon was only one day long, however, so we had plenty of time to do some sightseeing. Here’s a couple of things I really liked in Vienna.

Spanische Hofreitschule – The world famous Vienna Spanish Riding School, where the Lippizaner stallions have been trained since the main riding hall was built in 1729. I took these photographs roughly ninety seconds before I found out that photraphy is strictly forbidden in the riding hall. Oops!

Zentralfriedhof – This is Vienna’s Central Cemetery, established in 1863. This cemetary is enormous- 2.4 square kilometers in size. It’s so large that it has three separate gates. It’s so sprawling that there is a separate city bus line that runs entirely inside the cemetery!

There are many notable interments here- I found the graves of Beethoven, Strauss, and Brahms, but I did not see the grave of Antonio Salieri or Falco.

The Wiener Riesenrad- The Vienna Giant Ferris Wheel, located in the Prater, is a 212 foot tall ferris wheel which was originally built in 1897. The Riesenrad originally had 30 gondolas before the bombing during World War II destroyed most of them. It was rebuilt with only fifteen, and has become a very well known landmark, even appearing in a James Bond movie in the late 1980s.

Shmetterlinghaus- Compared to Butterfly World in South Florida, Vienna’s Schmetterlinghaus is tiny, but it was still nice. This attraction is located just a few minutes walk from the State Opera Theatre.

Statues, Statues, Statues! While in Vienna, we saw statues of Mozart, Goethe, Gutenberg, and countless others. Here’s two of my favorites.

For the rest of these pictures, I’ve decided to try a WordPress gallery- if you click on any of the images, it will bring it up larger with some additional commentary, and then you can scroll through the rest of the gallery with your right and left arrows. (Escape key to get back out of the gallery.) Ain’t technology grand?

The Donauturm is a tv tower with an observation level, a revolving restaurant, and a bungee jump.

This was part of the view from the Donauturm.

Leonard Bernstein’s tux in the very cool Haus Der Musik.

The Holocaust memorial in Judenplatz doesn’t look very much like a memorial, until you read the inscriptions on the stones around the base. There’s also a museum nearby with an excavation of a medieval synagogue.

St. Charles Church, or Karlskirche.

Stephansdom, the large church in Stephansplatz.

This is an art piece representing an explosion. I thought it was kind of neat.

Regensburg’s Greatest Mystery (That I’m Aware Of)

On September 10, 2012May 30, 2020 By StevenIn Life In Germany5 Comments

After I’d been in Regensburg for a month or two, I started to notice certain signs. I don’t know what precisely they represent or who put them up, and nobody I’ve asked (including the desk clerk at the local tourism office) seems to know. They look like this.

They’re on historical buildings, storefronts, restaurants, and gates to open green areas. I’ve seen them on hotels, churches, museums, and in one case, on a wall adjacent to a courtyard.

I figured out pretty quickly that the shape in the large square is the outline of the building or park the sign is attached to. The other shapes are obviously other buildings or parks. Sometimes, only the right half of the sign appears, but usually they appear like this.

There are different color groupings. Blue and yellow. Red and yellow. Pink and blue. Pink and a sort of sea-foam green. I think each color grouping is a collection, a set containing one type of landmark, but I don’t know that for certain.

I’ve taken pictures of more than two dozen of them. I’ve tried dozens of Google searches to find out precisely what they mean, but so far I haven’t found the right combination of search terms to solve the mystery.

I thought for a time that perhaps they were from the UNESCO World Heritage Centre since Regensburg is a World Heritage city, but there’s no mention of them on the UNESCO Website.

In my more frustrated moments, I like to think that they’re actually a dialing address for a Stargate, but I haven’t seen a DHD since I got to Germany.

I probably won’t figure out the mystery of the signs until it’s time to move back to the US.