Sunday, August 30, 2015

Rural France, another world......


Or is it? After recuperating in Brussels, after the Grand Prix in Spa, we left for France and started with a couple of nights at Charleville, which is just over the border with Belgium and on the opposite side of the Ardennes to Spa, where we saw the F1 last week.

Charleville owes its name to Charles I Gonzague (1580-1637), Duke of Nevers, who decided in 1606 to found a new capital for his principality of Arches. For this purpose, he commissioned the architect Clément II Métezeau, to do the job and as a result the main square and buildings at the town centre provide a wealth of 17th century buildings that are relatively unspoiled. There was the usual bullet and artillery pockmarks in the town square, where there was some heavy fighting in November 1918. The town was liberated 2 days before the end of WWI.

 
I wonder if Charle Gonzague would have approved of his town hall being emblazoned with the motto "Liberte, Egalite, Fraternite"? Probably not, as he would have in all likelihood, have been guillotined by the people who originated these sentiments, had he still been alive. Iris was particularly pleased to see a good old left-wing slogan there.
 
Although it's not shown here, there were lots of open air cafes and restaurants around the square, which we took advantage of. Plus there were some very nice patisseries tempting us into 3000 calorie buns and cakes, (that's each cake by the way).
 
A nice surprise in the town square was this old fashioned carousel. It wasn't particularly busy and pretty much as soon as someone showed up who was a fare paying passenger, off it went.
 
 
 Iris looking longingly at the carousel, (she didn't pluck up the courage to leap aboard).
 
A closer look at the carousel and I
 
Charleville sits on the river Meuse that is still navigable by some fairly large boats at this point.

We were camped just behind the trees to the right of these boats and despite its rural appearance the town centre is only 5 minutes walk in the other direction.

Puppetry is an important part of the cultural life of Charleville, which calls itself the "World Capital of Puppetry Arts". The town also holds the International Puppetry Institute, (L'Institut International de la Marionnette), which is housed in a historic building featuring a giant automaton of a puppeteer who performs a puppet show every hour, on the hour. We witnessed this puppet show at 1pm on the 26th August 2015. A day that will live in our memories for about as long as it takes to read this line.

The giant marionette has about as many moving parts as the Auckland Farmer's building Christmas Santa, (i.e.one). It looks quite scary though as it performs its hourly show and a recorded voice, (very deep), burbles some nonsense in French designed to scare children. I will rest easy now that I have witnessed the world's biggest marionette/automaton performing.

The Giant Marionette master. It's head moves slightly from side to side at all times and then on the hour its jaw moves as it speaks! The name of the Institut International de la Marionnette is emblazoned on the outside of the building and little puppets and marionettes were on sale in all of the local tat shops.
 
 
 
The mystery of the marionnette was revealed as the red doors open! A hidden pair of hands manipulating 4 blokes on a horse, could this be apocalyptic? The really exciting bit was that one finger and one of the horse's legs actually moved. How I wish I had the camera in movie mode!

The poet Arthur Rimbaud, (1854–1891) was born in Charleville. The Rimbaud museum is located in an old water mill, (Le Vieux Moulin), to the north of the town, right next to where we were camping. Apparently, Rimbaud was something of a poetic prodigy and most of his works were done in his teens and early 20's.

Rimbaud was a contempory of Paul Verlaine, (les sanglots longue, des violins de l'automne). The two of them became friends but had a somewhat tempestuous relationship and Verlaine was moved to shoot Rimbaud at one stage, (in the arm), and did 2 years inside for it! Rimbaud died prematurely of what was probably bone cancer, in his mid 30's.

We weren't sufficiently interested as to visit the Rimbaud museum but the old mill has been beautifully restored and we passed by it several times as we walked into town to get drunk our daily supplies.

After our time in Charleville we decided to head for Dijon and set out to head South via Reims and Chalons in champagne country.

Approaching Reims, we passed a small village where there were signs, (on the side of the Motorway, just before the village turn-off), advertising, (in English), a "Ball Trap" that was due to take place on the 5th of September next. Although my curiousity was aroused, I was secretly glad that we were extremely unlikely to be around to attend the event!

This tendency to use English expressions for various things is commonplace all over the continent. One good example, was in a product that Iris bought in Brussels and has a French brand name, a description of its properties in English and a  "Made in Germany" slogan, all on a small packet.

By the time we got close to Reims the weather had turned pretty foul so we decided to stay the night at a country campsite south of Reims but as the French had built a new road, our satnav Maud decided to get us hopelessly lost. We had followed the old road for about 2km but it then ended in a cul-de-sac, (a French expression that is only meaningful in England - how's that ?) We then tried to find an alternative route but then after driving down increasingly narrow lanes, we had just decided to retrace our steps to the new road, when a white van that had followed us, stopped alongside.

A young black lad wound his window down and asked, "vous etes perdu"? Which of course we were. It turned out that he had exactly the same satnav problems as us but he offered to help us back to the right location using his (alternative) cellphone satnav. This also took us in circles for a while but we ended up only about 500m from our destination at which point he admitted defeat. The main problem was that there was a canal, with no bridges in sight and a no-entry road, between us and the destination. We had another short discussion and decided that the best thing was to go back to the start of the new road and see if the satnavs would reset, which they duly did. I thanked the young lad heartily for his help and trouble. It was really great to have a complete stranger go out of his way (literally) to help us.

Five minutes after resuming on the new road we were at destination. It was a day of atrocious weather with heavy rain but no wind to disperse it. However, the site had a brilliant wifi, supplied free by the local tourist board and we caught up with all correspondence and the likes.

The rain continued the next day so we set off for destinations unknown. We dithered between heading for Orleans or Troyes for a while but Troyes, being the nearer, won out. It was a good decision as you might find out in our next post.

Thursday, August 27, 2015

The Strange World of F1....


On Thursday last, J and J left for Spa to watch her favourite sport - Formula 1 car racing at the Belgian Grand Prix. It's about a 2 hour drive from Brussels to the vicinity of the circuit of Spa-Francorchamps that is located in the Ardennes forest that covers (roughly) an area of about 80 by 50 kilometres of low, hilly country in Belgium and across the border in France.

Our stay had been booked long before, at a camp site named "Spa D'Or" which was about 15 km as the crow flies from the circuit. Our first disappointment was that there were no easy links between the camp and the racetrack so we set off to walk to the nearest bus stop. About 2.5 km later we arrived at a bus stop in the village of Tiege and discovered that there was a bus in about 30 minutes time. This gave us a little time to browse in Tiege and get a drink from the local shop.



Tiege, as you can see from this picture, is one of the few places left in the westernised world where drink driving is actively encouraged! Still, the sign was on a liquor warehouse, so there could be an ulterior motive. Apart from the obvious flaws in the philosophy of drink driving, it does my heart good to see someone being a little rebellious.

On Thursday afternoon there was an open day at the racetrack and the "stars" of Formula 1 made brief appearances for their adoring fans. There were tens of thousands who turned up for this freebie and the crush in and around the pitlane was immense. The stewards didn't help and even tried to stop people walking on the thin strip of grass between the main straight and the collision barriers. Fortunately they were ignored.

In the pits we managed to see some cars being serviced for the race, (are you getting excited now) and we also saw drivers Vettel, Rosberg, a Swede of some notoriety, (that's a Swedish racing driver, not a variety of Turnip) and some other people who were signing autographs but we had no idea who they were.

A pensive Nico Rosberg. That could be Novak Djokovic with him?
 

I managed to see Lewis Hamilton at very close quarters but as soon as I threatened to give him a kiss, he went in the opposite direction. Actually, I was about to take a photo, when a host of raving lunatics jumped on the fence and tried to accost him. I did manage the following close up of some of his body parts though.
 
Yes, hero worshippers, the brown arm in the upper left of the picture, is Lewis Hamiltons! Just don't expect me to get a DNA sample as evidence.

Although Hamilton and Rosberg are "Team Mates", they are not very close. Indeed, I think they would happily knife each other if they got the chance. The contrast in their personalities is also very marked. When Nico Rosberg's arrival in the pits was announced, he walked in, approached to within about 5 metres of the barriers, gave a sheepish grin to a smattering of applause and then.... yes, buggered off.

When Hamilton showed up, it was as though the Beatles had arrived, (for those of you with very long memories). He is amazingly popular but at the same time he's a very natural person and seems to have an unspoilt attitude and manner. He spent about 10 minutes signing whatever items were thrust at him over the fences, as well as talking to quite a few adorants before leaving to ringing cheers.

On Friday, the first day proper of the GP, (for non-followers, there are 3 days of each GP to endure), consists of two 90-minute practice sessions for the Formula 1 cars plus assorted practice sessions
for other, lesser categories of car.

Practice gets really exciting at times, because apart from going round and round 'til someone in their garage radios them and tells them to stop, occasionally they crash. One driver in particular, crashes so regularly, that someone, (a very sad person with no-life), has set up a web-site that tells you how long it has been since Pasta, (that might be Pastor) Maldonado has last crashed. And sure enough Pasta did not disappoint, leaving large chunks of his car spread around the circuit at that point. Fortunately, he was unharmed and lives to crash another day.
 
Pastor's Pit with a profusion of spare bits for when he crashes!

I shouldn't really get too flippant about these crashes because they really are high speed in most cases. The speeds get up to 330kmh at Spa and frequently crashes or gear failures happen at over 200kmh. Two of these failures happened over the weekend, when tyres disintegrated on Rosberg's and Vettel's cars respectively. Rosberg was doing 300kmh and he was very, very lucky not to be hurt or his car damaged, as he had virtually no warning. It takes a lot of bottle to get straight back in and on with it after that sort of thing.

The most exciting part of the race weekend was in the grid qualifying sessions, where there was a bit of a struggle between Hamilton and Rosberg before Hamilton won pole position. We watched the qualifying from a position above the "chicane", which on this racetrack is a double 90 degree turn at the end of the fastest section of the circuit. At this point the cars slow from 300+kmh to about 70kmh in about 150 metres.

On the race day, the three J's (John, Julien and J) watched from a section where the cars travel downhill for about 600 metres before a sharp left hand turn. We had a good view over this section, although we had to arrive at the circuit at 0730 to get a decent spot, (bearing in mind the race doesn't start 'til 1400). It is quite a steep downhill section and the cars are hurled into the downhill corner at full throttle with a couple of brief changes down right at the last moment.
 Our view to the left.....
 

...and to the right with Lewis flashing past in the lead.
 

The race itself was rather a procession with Hamilton leading comfortably from start to finish. The biggest cheer was close to the end of the race when Vettel's tyre blew out, ending his race and promoting Sebastian Grosjean to third place.

At the race presentation the person introducing the drivers started with Grosjean - big cheer! Then Rosberg - virtual silence! Followed by Hamilton - bedlam of cheers! It was almost, (but not quite), enough to make you feel sorry for Rosberg.
 
Going back to the first day's practice, J and J had to rise early and catch a bus to the circuit, (Julien didn't arrive from Luxembourg with his car until late that evening). We got to the circuit without too much trouble but still had a walk of about 5km to get to our selected vantage point. We also walked at least the same distance just scouting out good places to watch on subsequent days on what was a very hot,  (30 degrees plus), day. After the day's session ended we decided to take a "short cut" to get the bus back to the campsite but got bad directions from someone in a campsite and ended up walking at least 5km in the wrong direction.
 
During our wanderings we came across a direction sign to the "US Memorial" in Malmedy, a nearby village about 2km away. We didn't divert to the memorial as by this time we were heading in the right direction for the bus stop. However, I looked up the memorial on Wikipedia and discovered that it was a memorial to a hundred and twenty US infantry captured during the Battle of the Bulge who were machine-gunned by the SS at this place. For good measure, the SS also slaughtered 90-odd local villagers from Stavelot, that is a stone's throw from Malmedy.
 
About 30 US soldiers survived by doing a runner or playing dead and as a result of their experience, (and of course the murders), the US Army issued an order that no more SS were to be taken alive, (although they denied this was ever an official order). There were many tit-for-tat killings as a result though.

Several years after the war, the SS Commander of the whole operation, was discovered living in France. He had served about 10 years in jail for war crimes and refused to move from his new residence. He was found dead in his burned out house. He'd been shot in the chest, apparently by communist ex-resistance members but no one was ever prosecuted.
 
Anyway, after the GP was over, Julien dropped us at our campsite to collect the motorhome and he went back to Luxembourg and us to Brussels. It took us about 2.5 hours to get the 15 km to Tiege as most of the roads round the Ardennes are very narrow and not suited to heavy vehicles or traffic. Then another 3 hours to get to Brussels.

Somewhat ironically I read that one of the main reasons for the Nazi defeat in the Battle of the Bulge was that their heavy tanks couldn't get through these very same roads. Plus ca change, n'est-ce-pas?
 
To finish on a lighter note, I took a snap of these little charmers in one of the hedgerows next to our camp. I'd completely forgotten what these things were until I blundered through a patch of them when I  was fishing and received a nice painful rash from them.
 
 

 
The European Stinging Nettle. Guaranteed to give you a nasty surprise every time. The sting is caused by little spines on the underside of the leaves that contain strong sulphuric acid. When to brush against them the spines break and dowse you in a small amount of acid.
 
However, if you harvest them carefully, they can be used to brew a type of beer or to bake into bread. Get out there and do it!

Monday, August 24, 2015

Brussels and Spa...


After Luxembourg, first stop Brussels where summer is sprouting out all over according to the subway signs ("Summer c'est tous nous" or is it nous tous?). Or it would be if the temperature creeps above 16 degrees.

The approach to the city centre.

We had a slight hitch as our first choice campsite was full and the second choice, (very distinctly second rate), was miles out of town but we snared the last remaining pitch and headed for town to have dinner with J and to watch the football in an Irish Bar.

Liverpool sneaked a win and we finished 5th in a pub quiz that was going on at the same time. Not a bad effort seeing as there were only 3 of us. We also managed to get home in the middle of the night without too many probs, thanks to the Metro and a handy taxi.

The next day we were off to Waterloo. June 18th 2015 was the 200th anniversary of this famous battle and I had been told to expect some special displays and expositions. All I can say is that the 5 "attractions" that are listed in the blurb are anything but. I plumped for the slightly cheaper option of "3 attractions" as the other two are some miles away from the battlefield and consisted of a "Wellington Museum" and something else that was so unremarkable that I've forgotten it. Iris decided that a rest in ther motorhome was more preferable than the museum.

The 3 attractions, (18 Euros, thank you very much), consisted of a third rate museum/display of the events around the battle, a wall mural "panorama" of the battlefield showing a 360 degree view of the battle at its zenith and finally the opportunity to scale the Lion Memorial that overlooks the battlefield.

 
The inscription on this peculiar exhibit reads; "Believe me, nothing except a battle lost, can be half so melancholy, as a battle won". Thus spake Arthur Wellesley.
 
I would honestly say that nothing could illustrate this quotation better, than a full-size, upside down, stuffed horse!
 
There was little else in the museum's display to fire the imagination but the various exhibits did illustrate the issue that Napoleon was considered to be an upstart and opportunist by all of the established "noble" houses throughout Europe. There had been many alliances raised by these crowned heads and their cronies and until his Russian campaign, Napoleon had seen them all off. The British navy was all that prevented his world domination.
 
There were portraits of most of the crowned heads of Europe scattered about the museum plus others of their hangers on and advisors. I would best sum them up as rather an inbred, ugly looking bunch wearing wigs.
 
 
This was the only really interesting exhibit in the museum. A body that had been found about 20 years ago and identified from the artifacts and paraphernalia in proximity to the site. He turned out to almost certainly be one of Wellington's Hanoverian Regiment. He was only about 160 cm tall, (about 5' 4'' in old money), and apparently this was about average height in the early 19th century.
Interesting though that he wasn't re-intered with the gravestone "Known unto God", as is the current fashion.
 
After leaving the museum and heading towards the Lion Memorial I bumped into Iris who was having a bit of a walkabout. As the entrance to this part of the memorial was hidden from the front desk we sneaked in by using my pass and us both going through the turnstile together - score!
 
The climb up the Lion Memorial is much much harder than it looks from a distance and there are about 350 steps to mount. Don't worry though there's Oxygen at the top, (i.e. in the rarified atmosphere).
The monument was originally constructed to commemorate the spot where William II of Orange was wounded in the battle but has now come to symbolise the whole event.
 
The Lion Memorial from behind the building holding the panorama (which is painted on the inside walls from floor to ceiling).
 
 
And the view from the top of the memorial. The landscape is a lot flatter thatn I'd imagined from reading accounts of the battle and it didn't seem that the slight rise occupied by Wellington and the main part of the troops would give any great advantage.
Hougoumont, where a detachment of Wellington's troops caused so much trouble for Napoleon, is hidden in the woods at about 2 o' clock. Most of Wellington's army was slightly to the rear of this position with Napoleon about 2 km away in the middle distance.
 
 
 Directly to the left of the Memorial and about a kilometre away, is the farmhouse of La Haye-Sainte, the other key defensive position for Wellington.
 
And then back to Brussels for a few days' rest before heading for Spa, (no not a spa, but the Spa), for the Belgian Grand Prix. We were lucky enough to get into a city centre site for a couple of nights  where we discovered Dyson's latest public hygiene innovation in the toilets:
 

 
This device, (when used by an expert), delivers water through the centre spout and allows you to wash your hands provided that you rotate them exactly under the correct sensor. After washing you then move your hands to the left and right where 2 more sensors deliver the usual blast of warm air to dry them.
 
Unfortunately, this device is not accompanied by warning signs or instructions in its use. These need to tell you that moving your hands more than about 5mm in any direction during the washing or drying operations, will result in water being delivered to the cupped hands or cunningly designed washing bowl and then re-directed by a force 15 hurricane to somewhere and anywhere in the bathroom. And, when I say anywhere, this will inevitably be over some part of your person, usually including your groin area, thus giving the impression that your visit to the toilet was somewhat accidental. 
 
Oh, and just by way of a gentle warning, DO NOT try to dry your recently moistened groin area with a Dyson airblade!
 
Our time in Brussels took in the city centre and "Grote Markt" or main square. This has several impressive 16th century buildings and these are inundated by a host of cafes and eateries.
 
 
A bit further down the street from the Grote Markt was the Church of Saint Niklaas - the original Santa Claus who is beloved in the Low Countries. I was expecting to find an elves grotto and reindeer and things but alas, it was just your regular Roman catholic church, with all the usual trappings. One thing that we hadn't come across before, was a profusion of votive candles at various places in the building, and these raised the temperature to about 40 celsius inside the church. Perhaps they were from people making their Christmas wishes.
 
 
 
This shrine, inside St. Niklaas, was to 17 priests and monks killed in the anti-catholic uprisings in the 17th century. Coincidentally, I had started reading a book about the same events two days beforehand. William of Orange, later William IV of Britain was in power, in this area, at this time.
 
After lunch near the Gross Markt, we spent the afternoon at the local museum, (only 5 minutes walk from Jo's flat). There are 5 different museums in the same building and a very charming woman took several minutes of her time to advise us of the best parts to visit. At the end of a long day we could only manage a fraction of the total though.
 
 
The museums!
 
We had a quiet dinner with Jo in a nearby Tapas restaurant, that was notable only for its mediocrity of food and service. The staff had all been trained to the same level as Manuel in Fawlty Towers, (just to give you an idea of their competence). 
 
At least it was genuinely ethnic, with the waiters and chef all being Spanish. (We came to this conclusion after unsuccessfully trying French, English and sign language before we discovered that they knew the word "Sangria").
 
Unfortunately, we were not allowed to beat the staff in the time honoured fashion practiced by Basil! I did punish them severely by not leaving a tip.
 
OK, that's it for this post. Next stop Spa!

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

9 Countries in a Day.....


Well not quite but during our travels today we went from Luxe to France to Luxe to Germany to France to Germany to Luxe to France to Luxe and all before afternoon tea time. It wasn't even confusing as most of the time we were just following the main roads to a restored French chateau for a day out. The borders weren't even marked so I had to rely on Julien's word for which country we were in, although the road signs did change occasionally to the local language.

Julien is a big fan of castles and this one had an exhibition comparing Samurai's armour and their way of life with that of medieval european knights. I found it a little ironic to be viewing the Samurai clothing, armour, weaponry and descriptions of "Bushido" a day or two after the 70th anniversary of VJ day. Particularly in light of how the philosophy and attitudes of Bushido had been displayed towards prisoners of war and the Chinese and Korean populations, (amongst others). This display, coupled with Prime Minister Abe's non-apology for the Japanese behaviour during those times, (as reported in the Guardian), left me feeling a bit uncharitable towards them. It also reminded my inner self, (again), of how difficult it is to move away from childhood and adolescent attitudes and prejudices that are instilled about our one time "enemies". I've also worked with people who had personal experience of Japanese treatment during this period and there was little forgiveness there.

Suffice to say then, that I didn't pay a lot of attention to the samurai masks and swords, as I was too much concerned by the fact that the swords were often used for WW2 atrocities.

Enough of that, the chateau itself had been restored beautifully with the help of big grants from the EU and other governments. The original chateau was started in about 1050 AD and was in its heyday in the 14th and 15th centuries, after which it fell gradually into disrepair.

 
This pic above shows the chateau after 10 years' of restoration work. Wonder what year zero was like?


This is what it looks like now, with a view of the courtyard and "Ladies' Tower", (no explanation was offered of why this was so called). The really great thing about the restorations was that the archaeologists had to work out how the timber frames and roofing etc. had been constructed and had no idea of how medieval tradesmen actually built things so they had to work backwards from fragments of wood, stone, slate etc. and then had to re-learn the medieval building skills so as to rebuild it authentically.

There were lots of little models and demonstrations of exactly how this had been done and the workmanship and skills that they had developed were remarkable, not least as the methods were so time and labour consuming.

During the journey to the chateau we passed through some fairly dangerous territory  but we never had to send for the cavalry. The village was actually spelled Apache on some of the signs.


On the return journey we stopped at a small town on the Moselle to buy a couple of bottles of wine for dinner. The Moselle isn't a huge river at this point but has some pretty large boats cruising up and down. We saw one very big freighter and a couple of fairly substantial pleasure cruisers, one of which was complete with ballroom chandeliers and brass band playing as it left the wharf, hopefully the brass band would keep playing if it should ever sink.


The Moselle floods occasionally and the town where we bought our wine suffers accordingly. As we walked through the main street we came across a water height rule that was about 2.5 metres high by the side of the street . The marks above this rule are the last two really big floods in 1947 and 1988. The '47 flood must have been quite something.
There wouldn't have been much schooling going on in 1948!

After our day trip out we met with Julien's family, (Mum, Grandma and Brother Max) and had before dinner drinkies and snacks at Chez Jules before travelling out to a country restaurant for dinner. The restaurant was interestingly sited in the charmingly named suburb of Focken-Hiel!
I shall always remember this place, (for all the right scatological reasons of course).


We had a lovely dinner, in a traditional French restaurant, enjoyed by all. As usual the poly-lingual Luxembourgers put us to shame as they switched effortlessly from French to German to English and Luxembourgish. The waiter and waitress in the restaurant had about as much English as we had French though so there were at least two people that we didn't feel inferior to, (linguistically that is). Julien's Mum did tell Iris during the course of the evening that Jo's French was impeccable and accentless, so score 1 for the Kiwis!

After dinner, it was back to the campsite and a departure the following morning for Belgium, picking Jo up on the way to take her back to Brussels. We set out on time but struck major problems with Satnav Maud. After I missed a turn, she decided to exact revenge by taking us through Luxembourg City, as a short cut. Unfortunately, there were road works at a critical turn and she then insisted on taking us on a never ending series of loops and U-turns. It ended up taking us nearly 90 minutes for a 15 minute journey, that culminated in arriving at Julien's place from the North instead of the South. I have since discovered that the Nazis conquered Luxembourg quicker than it took us to cross the city.

So it was on to Brussels but not before a stop to fill the tank with the cheapest diesel in Europe, (thanks to Luxe's low taxes and banking fiddles).

Sunday, August 16, 2015

Life in de Luxe Lane...


After resting up for 2 days at the village of Aumuhle near Mainz in Germany, we drove the short distance to Luxembourg to meet up with Jo and Julien (J & J). For the first time in our German travels we were on a road that was largely non-motorway and the German drivers' road safety skills were a revelation, (being totally non-existent).
For fair periods we were in queues behind heavy vehicles, with passing lanes only every 5-10 km or so. But that doesn't stop your average Kraut. They would literally overtake whenever they felt like and we watched horrifed as they did so approaching blind corners, crests of hills and in the face of oncoming vehicles. It was a miracle they didn't kill themselves or some other poor wretch.

One other gripe with continental travels through Germany and now Luxembourg has been the swarms of wasps that are attracted to the scent of humans, particularly if they are consuming any sweet food or drinks. We walked to a cafe near Aumuhle for brekky and were swamped with wasps but quickly ate and drank and left to walk home. On the way, we passed huge areas of wasp nests in the road verges and wondered if they can possibly be controlled.

The problem isn't as bad in Luxe but is still quite annoying.

As shown when one of our friends dropped in for a cocktail. (Iris is so used to them that it was fished out and the drink consumed as though nothing had happened).

An interesting feature that we noted on the motorway in Luxembourg was "Wild Brucke" or Wild Bridge. These are bridges across the motorway in forested areas to allow wild animals to cross at certain points without the obvious risks from the traffic (and vice versa). The bridges are densely covered by trees and shrubs and allow the animals to remain concealed as they cross, what a neat idea!

Once we got into the vicinity of the capital it was quite easy to find the suburb we were looking for but finding our campsite was quite a trial for our Satnav, (Maud), who continually tried to direct us down a blocked lane and thereafter in circles back to the same spot. At one point we stopped by a 15th century roadside shrine and went walkabout looking for the (at that place) non-existent site, which according to Maud was right there.


Shrine but no campsite!
 
However, I think Iris must have offered a prayer during our brief stay, for shortly afterwards we found road signs, (about 2 km away), directing us to the local camp, which we found on our second lap of the village. The site is the best we have stayed at so far. It is modern, spotless, has great wifi, showers are free, the pitches are huge with private hedges and it's only 16 Euros a night. We might stay here for ever.

We made arrangements to meet up with J & J and caught the bus into Luxe and had time for a drink and some people watching in the main square before dinner. Highlights of the people watching included a very boorish woman who decided that she would film a homeless man sleeping in a doorway and who thought it was a huge joke when he got angry with her. May several wasps fly up her skirts!

We then went into the local restaurant quarter for dinner, where there are a large number of restaurants to choose from.

The "Table of Pain" was not for us however.

The restaurant that we picked had a very eclectic menu but despite the range of available dishes we all ended up with our own choice of "flambe" which is a local type of pizza, on very thin crust, with toppings of your choice.
I was a bit cheesed off because I thought flambe was something that they set fire to at your table, but no such luck. The good thing about all the different choices was that we could swap pieces and try all the dishes though. The meal was rounded off with apple pie and ice cream and then we went back to the camp for hot chocolate with Baileys. J & J had left their car outside the camp gates (luckily) as when they came to leave the front gates had been closed and the pedestrian exit was also closed. Fortunately the catch wasn't locked so they didn't have to climb the 6 foot gates.

The next day J & J returned to show us round Luxembourg City. Julien lives about 15 minutes away and as a native Luxembourger could show us the best bits as it were. Although the city is quite small it has a long and interesting history and is now ruled by a "Grand Duchess" who lives in a palace that is in the centre of the city, with no apparent security or protection, except for a single guard who seems to pick whether he stands at the front or back of the palace. (He was at the back door when we walked by). He also appeared to be very short sighted, judging by the thickness of his glasses' lenses.

The Luxembourg Parliament building is attached to the palace building, presumably so that the Grand Duchess can keep an eye on them.
Parliament behind the flags with the palace to the rear of this photo.

The city now includes a lot of European Union facilities and buildings and we had a quick visit round some of these including the place where Jo used to work when she was working for the EU.
Jo's old home away from home!
 
 The EU centre is in a very modern part of the city but Jo's building backed onto a park that included the fortress of "Trois Glands". This was designed by a French fortress builder called Vaubin who, (in the 17th century or thereabouts), was the most sought after fortress builder in Western Europe, (fashions never change do they?)
 
We'd seen signs on the motorway, when driving in from Germany, about visiting "Trois Glands" and I thought at the time it was something advertising a place you might go for body enhancement or the likes. But it turns out to be no more than a reference to acorns. (Glands = Acorns in French apparently).
 
 
JJ&I in front of les Trois Glands, one golden acorn on each tower.
 
 After leaving this district Julien took us for a brief drive through the area where he said the "Tax Cheats" lived, where there are large numbers of so called tax consulting companies located, plus the EU headquarters of companies like Twitter and Google. Luxembourg is a country where local tax laws allow companies like Twitter, Google, Amazon etc. to shuffle their revenues from the various EU states to minimise paying their taxes, (if they pay them at all). It was a typical city area a bit like Canary Wharf in London, with the usual bland city buildings and boulevards. I did spot a McDonalds McCafe tucked away in the ground floor of one of the flash skyscrapers though.
 
We then moved back to the old city areas and enjoyed some of the parks and green areas that are plentiful.
 
 

This chap was tucked away behind the EU buildings and for some reason, has a crown that is far too big for his head, perched loftily above his fancy wig. The plaque, that was attached to the bronze, described him as "Fernando Sanchez Castillo, Bird Feeder".
Well, if that's all you have to do to be immortalised in bronze in Luxembourg, I'm going to buy some bird seed.
 
A bit further through our sojourn, we came across this fine example of the sheep family. New Zealanders take note of the latest advances in Ovine Opthalmology and get your sheep's eyesight checked. Now!
 
 
Before you enquire further, I have absolutely no idea what this carved head represented or why it was there! It could of course be a Mormon sheep seeing as the glasses are made of stone.
 
We continued our stroll, (or had it become a trek by now), across the city, going up hill and down dale. The city is built on two sides of a gorge and unfortunately for strollers, what goes down must come back up the other side. What is really nice, is that a lot of the old town and riverside areas have been preserved in the middle of the modern city.
 
 
 
A view across the gorge and an old Abbey, that is de-consecrated and used for other things now. The bridge in the centre is about 600 years old and is still in use as a footbridge, (as we found out when we walked down, across and up the other side.
 
We had time for a family pose overlooking the old town:
 
 
Before a quick visit to the cathedral:
 
 
 
Before finishing our tour at the national war memorial. People don't usually think of Luxembourg as a significant combattant in either of the world wars but of course they were overrun by Germany in both and the coutry's neutrality ignored.
 
Thousands of Luxembourgers overseas signed up to serve with foreign armies. About 4000 Luxembourgish nationals served in the French army in WW1, of whom over 2,000 died. The Luxembourgish volunteers are commemorated by the 'Golden Lady'  memorial which was unveiled in Luxembourg City in 1923.

The original memorial was destroyed on 20 October 1940, during the Nazi occupation as it had symbolised the rejection of German identity and active resistance against germanisation of Luxembourg. Pre-WW1 Luxembourg had been closely aligned with Germany and on several occasions almost became a province of Germany.

After World War II, it was gradually rebuilt, culminating in its second unveiling, on 23 June 1985. The plaque on the memorial makes specific reference to the men who served in the French Foreign Legion during the first world war.




Shortly after we visited the memorial, the rain set in. Not heavy but a very wetting drizzle, so we adjourned to the camp while J & J went home to make us dinner. They picked us up at our site at about 6pm and we went off to Julien's flat on the other side of the country. We passed signs warning us that we were about to cross into Belgium but detoured east at this point to avoid an international incident. Despite having crossed almost the entire country the journey only took about 14 minutes. We had a lovely meal in Julien's new apartment that was a really nice, architect designed place overlooking the Luxembourg countryside. 
 
Today we plan to visit a place, (I don't know where it is) where 4 countries converge (Germany, France, Luxembourg and Belgium). Hopefully, there will be a picture of me with a limb in each country at the same time, (still attached to my body of course). But that will be another story.

Tuesday, August 11, 2015

Deutschland Unter Alles....


After a pretty non-descript journey to South Sweden where we suffered a night a Trelleborg, we boarded a ferry across the Baltic sea for a 6.5 hour trip to Rostock in North Germany. The Baltic Sea must be one of the most boring places on earth. There are no waves, things to see or even a bit of swell to rock the boat. We did pass one (Danish) island that was appropriately named Borre, (pronounced Borer), and it had white cliffs that could have shamed Dover.

The White Cliffs of Borre!
 
After this stunningly exciting island, we had virtually nothing to occupy ourselves with for the next 4 hours, although Iris did discover and purchase a large goody!
 
As this item is clearly marked "Not Choklad", we had no qualms about eating the entire block in one sitting.
 
So the bore cruise continued and although we passed a couple of smaller vessels to break the monotony, very little else happened until we were near Rostock. It then soon became apparent that there was some kind of "tall ships" regatta going on and we counted over forty, 2 or 3 masted sailing vessels of various vintages.
 
 
This was the first of the many sailing vessels that we came across. A 36 gun, French flagged, frigate. Part of me was admiring the lovely 18th century ship, whilst the other part was hoping a British man o' war would glide alongside and put a broadside through her.
 
Here's a view of the regatta and some of the other sailing ships.
 
 
A clipper, two-masted barque and a schooner as we were entering the port.
 
After disembarking in Rostock we set out on the road to Berlin. It was a quiet drive, being weekend and most traffic was heading out of Berlin in the opposite direction to us. Unfortunately, we had decided to stay at a campsite at a place called Malchow, about 2 hours north of the capital. It was called Malchow "Naturcamp". Unfortunately it contained no nature or naturists but was a latter day model of Stalag Luft 9, by a lake. Luckily, they let us escape the next morning provided that we paid the bill and it was but a small price to pay. (Well it wasn't actually, it was close to extortion).
 
So, on the Sunday we had a pleasant drive to Berlin and found an excellent campsite in the Berlin suburb of Kopenick. The amenities were quite basic but it was very close to the railway into Berlin and had a very nice bar within staggering distance of our campervan.
 
After settling in to the camp we got directions to the tram and after the first one that passed ignored us completely, the second driver gave us directions and was very helpful. We got on the tram, bought tickets, sat down comfortably, and then after about 150 metres got off again. We had reached the station for Berlin, hurrah! Fortunately, our tickets were transferable to the train.
 
We headed (by train) into Alexanderplatz, which was one of the focal points of the revolution when the Berlin wall finally fell. On Sundays it is a big open market and people from all over Germany set out their stalls in much the same way as in other metropolises. That is, they sell fast food and assorted Tat for whatever inflated price they can get. We did buy our lunch there and it was a reasonable vegetarian "wrap" of some middle eastern nature. We then wandered around looking at empty shops, (the malls were open but the shops were closed), until the furnace-like heat got too much and we decided to head back to Kopenick.
The big ball in the sky is at Alexanderplatz.
 
 
We managed our return trip successfully and avoided paying 5 euros for return tickets. Iris had done a swift calculation and decided that as our inward bound tickets were a bit expensive, we shouldn't pay the return bit. We got off the train at Kopenick and literally blundered into a bar across the road where we were able to slake our thirst. As I mentioned earlier, the temperature was in the high 30's so the Berlin Pilsener (for Iris) and a Pina Colada for me went down very nicely. (I may have got those drinks mixed up).
 
A double bonus was that the bar had the English Premier League, Stoke City vs Liverpool showing, and despite my objections, Iris insisted that we watch it. 4 glasses of beer later we had a 1-0 win for the mighty reds, (or blacks, as it happened to be their away strip). We also had a reasonably priced meal to dissipate the alcohol.
 
The next day it was back to Berlin stifling heat. We strolled along the river for a way and then visited the Berliner Dom or cathedral. The church doesn't belong to any of the established christian orders, (e.g. catholic or lutheran etc.) but is an evangelical outfit of some description. It was badly damaged during the second world war, along with the rest of Berlin, but has been restored. The building consists of a fairly small church surmounted by an enormous dome. It is well worth the entry fee.
 
 
Inside the dome.
 
We also visited the crypt of this church and the most notable inmate was Frederick the Great, who shuffled off this mortal coil in about 1688, followed by his missus the year after. There were innumerable other "nobles and royals" in caskets, sarcophagi, tins, (well one of them looked like a big tin), and assorted boxes. A couple of the boxes were so big the occupants must have been approaching the size of a hippo, or at the very least a small moose.
 
 
Friedrich der Grosse. I prefer the English interpretation as Gross!
 
We left Berlin this morning, heading for Luxembourg where we will meet up with Jo and Julien later in the week. Our stop this afternoon was at Gottingen, a  town where the local university was founded by George the Second, in his capacity as Elector of Hanover (which is fairly close to Gottingen). 
 
Gottingen in the late 19th and early 20th centuries was one of the world's leading scientific and mathematical universities and rivalled Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard and Yale in terms of its academic achievements and reputation.
 
In 1933 however, a certain Adolf came along and decided that as a fair proportion of the academic staff was Jewish, they should be replaced by people who thought proper, like him! And just like the rest of Germany, it has never been the same since.
 
We walked into the town to have a look see and were amazed by the number of late medieval buildings that were still extant. The town was virtually undamaged by bombing and with traffic banned from the centre, it is a really charming place to wander around, (despite the usual chain stores and similar blots on the landscape).
 
There were a number of plaques on various buildings through the town that named the academician who had resided there and when.

The only one that I recognised was Gauss, who (to me) was known for his pioneering work in electromagnetism. It turns out that he was also a gifted mathematician and strong in many other sciences too.
 
 
There were lots of mansions like this on the walk into town too.
 
There was also some interesting graffiti. Joe Stalin (I think) with some uncomplementary remarks.
 
We then stopped in at the P-Cafe for a quick hit before heading into the centre. (For those non-NZ readers, P is Crystal Meth).
 
 
 This was just about the pick of the buildings with carved and gilded wood, circa 1540.
 
 
 
 This little birdie, (I can't make up my mind whether it's a falcon or an owl), is the door handle on a really massive door to the main church. You can see the small keyhole just below the perch.
 
 
The town square and in the background the town hall or Rathaus, as these are named in Germany and the Scandinavian countries. I just love the idea of a gathering place for politicians being called a Rat House and think it should be adopted worldwide.
 
 
And finally, another fine medieval carving. Gottingen's answer to Paddington Bear, although without the hat and wellies.