Trip Back to Germany - Day 2 (Regensburg)

 Our second day in Germany was Todd's ACTUAL birthday so I asked him what he wanted to do for the day and he said, "Go to Regensburg!"  So we went!

And we certainly were NOT going to drive. So we walked a couple of blocks to the Weiden train station and took the train down. So easy in Germany!

Flowers are planted and blooming in Regensburg! Sehr schön!

We walked from the train station to the old town area, past St. Peter's Cathedral (or the Regensburg Cathedral, if you will), which I feel is always under construction.

There is a statue just south of the Regensburg Cathedral of Ludwig I, who renovated the Cathedral in the neo-Gothic style between 1828 and 1840. I mean, he's not my boy Ludwig II, but he WAS his grandfather, so I guess that's ok.

Finally, we arrived at our intended destination - the Wurstküche! History shows that there was a small office here when the Old Stone Bridge was constructed between 1135-1146, but when construction was complete, the building transformed into a small kitchen to feed hungry construction workers who walked over from the under-construction Regensburg Cathedral. Although this building dates back to the 1600s, there is architectural evidence that a structure was here that dates back to the 1100s.

Look!  Not just a cute kid, but a Wasserhöhe!  I think this is the highest one I saw on this side of the Danube.  The Schricker-Meier family made a mark on the wall (the Schricker-Meier family currently owns the Wurstküche) commemorating this flood back on March 27, 1988.

And look!  Not only a kid who approves of his lunch, but ANOTHER Wasserhöhe - this one from January 15, 2011!  I like how they made that one into a little holy water dipper.  

Back in the day, prior to the Schricker family ownership, this restaurant served boiled meat (blech) but since 1806, they've served "finer sausages."  Fine, indeed!

Oh we're doing this again, huh?  If you can see the people behind us - you can either sit down and have wait staff service like we did, or you can get in line and grab a little roll with these sausages in it like they are doing.  They ONLY serve the little sausage sandwiches in this line, and you can't just sit down and eat it (there are standing tables though). It's basically take-away!  But if you choose to sit down and have the wait staff service, they do serve you a basket of bread and you can make your own little sausage sandwich if you want. (I definitely did this!)

The Historic Wurstküche is obviously VERY close to the Danube and there isn't any kind of flood protection, hence why they've had many floods.

This building next to the Wurstküche was only built (!!) right before the Pilgrims landed in Plymouth.  Built between 1616-1620, it was a Salt Warehouse for a long time.  Although it had a pretty extensive renovation in the late 1980s and early 1990s, you can still see the cracks in the walls near the river facing side of the structure.  Grant declared this was an "Aiden building" because apparently our neighbor Aiden builds Lego structures with this sort of steep roof pitch!

We stood down by the Danube for a bit and these two very loud ducks came right up to us, looking for some snacks that we didn't have.

And THEN, we went to Bäckerei Schifferl for a little birthday treat for Todd - and all three of us weirdly chose the Apfeltasche (or "apple bag") which was awesome.

Todd and I both also had a yummy cappuccino! Gotta stay awake somehow when you're fighting jet lag.

Look at these Krapfen! I wanted one of each!

The main event of the day was our hour long Danube cruise around Regensburg.  We thought it might rain, but I'm glad it didn't, because Todd didn't fit in the lower level of the boat!

The birthday boy, ready to cruise.  He looks pretty darn good for 51, doesn't he??

I took this picture of Todd and Grant using the 0.5 feature on my phone so that I could capture the Wurstküche and the Salt Warehouse (or the "Aiden Building!) behind Grant, but it just made Grant's hand look excessively long, and we laughed about this for a long time.  He also has his eyes closed!

Let's cruise the Danube in Regensburg! Although we had done some other Danube cruises near Regensburg (down to the Weltenburg Abbey in Kelheim and another one up to Walhalla), we had never done this particular cruise.

We even got a few peaks of sunshine as we took off toward the Eiserne Brücke.

We rode past the Goldener Waller, aka - the Golden Catfish, which was an incredibly expensive piece of art that is gilded in 23.75 carat gold that sits right in front of the Bavarian History Museum.

We passed a couple of Viking ships docked in Regensburg, too. We even waved to some of the people that were in the dining room!

Ahhhh yes. Here we go again. As our friend Kern would say (and probably did say when Todd sent this to him), "Wow, it's too bad Colleen couldn't join you and Grant on the boat ride!"

Grant drank his body weight in Fanta on this trip.

I like that things were starting to bloom and the green was emerging across Germany!

But it IS mid April, which definitely isn't the high season (lucky for us) so we had the whole top floor of the boat to ourselves!

Because most boats cannot fit under the Old Stone Bridge, there is a lock for larger ships to make their way down the Danube.  This one is right at the confluence of the Danube with the River Regen. There are a total of 22 lock systems on the Danube (or on the Main-Danube Canal) and this is one of them!

My buddy on a boat in Regensburg. And Todd's head popping out of the top of that topiary. 

High water mark! High water mark! 100 year floods were here - that's an insane amount of water!

After the boat ride, we decided to go explore the "other side" of the Old Stone Bridge.  Here are my boys in front of the Brückturm, or the bridge tower.

Here we are on the Old Stone Bridge once again!

We crossed the Danube and looked back toward the Regensburg Cathedral.  I am trying to imagine where the water was during all of these floods!?

The backwater areas on the side of the Danube are decidedly less active than the main river.

I may have some issue with the trees that are growing out of the banks of the river.

This is SUCH a funny picture of the three of us on the Old Stone Bridge.  The best part is that Grant is taller than me in real life, but he looks miniature here.

I love this side of the Old Stone Bridge for it's colorful buildings along Stadtamhof.

This unassuming building is the reason we crossed the river in the first place though.  Believe it or not, this was actually a concentration camp during World War II. It was a subcamp of Flossenburg (which we have visited) that was only in operation for little over a month in March/April of 1945 in which prisoners had to repair the nearby railways and railway stations that were bombed, or had to do forced labor in the nearby Messerschmitt AG factory (where they made World War II aircraft.) It was, not surprisingly, overcrowded, unhygienic, and the prisoners were fed very little.

Not far from the Colosseum (but across the street) is a memorial to the camp which reads, 

"NEVER AGAIN. THE MEMORY OF THE VICTIMS OF THE FLOSSENBÜRG CONCENTRATION CAMP, REGENSBURG SUBCAMP IN STADTAMHOF,

FROM MARCH 19 TO APRIL 23, 1945, 400 PRISONERS, MANY OF JEWISH FAITH,

FROM MANY COUNTRIES IN EUROPE. –  HUMAN DIGNITY IS INVIOLABLE." 

Of course, no one really knows how many people died in the less than five weeks that this camp was open, but most say that it was around 40-70 men (of the roughly 450 that were kept prisoner here).

It's always so difficult to move on from seeing something like that, but we continued our trek up Stadtamhof.

Grant kept pointing out these delightful manhole covers of Regensburg!

And hey, here's another! Bayern!

We eventually made our way up to the Protzenweiherbrücke which is another lock on the Danube.

Todd: "I like that building!"  Me too!

We eventually arrived at this little pathway that led us up to Dreifaltigkeitskirche (or the Holy Trinity Church). They have the stations of the cross along this path that lead to the Catholic church.

The first stone of this church was laid in 1713 when the citizens of this area (north of the Danube) wanted to build a church in order for the residents to be spared from the Plague. 

The interior is beautiful, and somewhat simple. The main altar has four columns which was donated in 1713 by the Stadtamhof brewer Johann Georg Christoph Höchtl. The stations of the cross on either side of the picture above are from 1934.

Interestingly, a church that was built so that the local residents could be spared from the Plague had to close for COVID.  This was a sign that was put out in the early days of COVID that read, "Connecting Conversations - Keeping in touch, you are not alone."

Some say the best views of Regensburg are up here - and they're probably not wrong!

We continued along the path on the hill near the Dreifaltigkeitskirche and came upon some bee hives!

Obviously, Todd was the only one who wanted to get close! Natalie, had she been with us, probably would have run screaming in the other direction! But look how cool this is!

We eventually made our way back down the hill so we could head back to the old town area.  See that big church? We need to get over there!

Wait... the Walhalla of Whiskey? What? Is this a thing?  A Whiskey heaven of sorts? Is this where I go when my time is up?

Well, maybe not. But I'll probably go wherever this guy is.  And he'll probably put a beer mug in front of my face.

Oh there I am. We stopped at the edge of the Old Stone Bridge during a rain shower for a beer...

... and some Eis! And a Fanta, of course! (Side discussion: How awful are these paper napkins??)

Eventually the sun came out, and this guy (can you see him?) was playing us some tunes on the cello - everything from the Titanic theme song to Lionel Richie. 

After our snack break, we crossed the bridge again as the sun came out.

But that's a beautiful scene though, no? 

I couldn't decide between the picture above this one, or this one! How beautiful is this?

We walked back across the Old Stone Bridge so that we could see the Cathedral before dinner.

And we needed to see the Goliathhaus too - which dates back to the year 1260.  The painting "only" dates back to 1573. There's a Michelin rated restaurant on the top floor here!

Grant and I stopped on our way to the Cathedral to check out this Stolpersteine because his Language Arts class is currently studying the Holocaust. Not only did he see (ugh, another) concentration camp today, but he also got to see some of these very important Stolpersteine blocks. Dr. Johann Meier was a Catholic priest who was hung in the Dachauplatz in Regensburg for requesting a peaceful handover of the city - just 3 days before the SS fled and the Americans liberated the city.

We decided to do a quick look inside the Regensburg Cathedral because we had already been there a couple of times.  It's a very dark Cathedral that has physically been around since 1275, although a church has been in this vicinity since 788! It's undergone many transformations with large sections of the church being added over the course of several centuries. The two spires only went up in the 1860s, thanks to Ludwig I, and those were the last big addition to complete the Cathedral.

There are 39 stained glass windows in this Cathedral that date back to between 1310-1450.

You can see the Baroque Silver Altar behind the main altar - it was made of silver and gilded copper, and built by Augsburg artists between 1695 and 1785.

And of course, because we were only a week into the Easter season, they had lovely flowers surrounding Jesus on the cross.

By now we were getting a bit hungry so we walked BACK across the Old Stone Bridge to go to Spitalgarten, a restaurant we saw recommended on a travel show.

The Spitalgarten had great views of the river and the Old Stone Bridge, and they've been brewing beer here for almost a thousand years!  St. Katharinenspital, or St. Catherine's Hospital is right next to this building, and as the website says, "As early as 1238, the "Spitalers"/ (or hospital residents) were guaranteed a nightcap, which could consist of beer or wine."

Now THIS is a cool light fixture!  I also really liked this place because of their love of dachshunds (which you can see in the picture behind/above the light fixture.)

Todd had a nice dark beer, while I enjoyed the helles.

And we had a fantastic schnitzel mit kartoffelsalat!

Grant enjoyed Kartoffelknödel, or potato dumplings.

After a hearty dinner, we made our way back across the Old Stone Bridge and headed toward the Hauptbahnhof.

But first we had to swing by the old Roman walls.  First, we checked out Porta Praetoria, or the old Roman walls that date back to 179 AD! It's one of only TWO partially preserved Roman gates north of the Alps (the other one is in Trier.) 

Because of it's proximity to the Danube, this section was known as the Porta Aquarum, or the Water Gate as late as 932 AD.

This sign was outside of a bar not too far from the Porta Praetoria and I'm not entirely certain what this has to do with a "redneck and beerpong bar" (which is how they bill themselves on their website!)  But I love it!

And then we came across another sobering reminder of the war.  The Stumbling Blocks Guide website says, "Rosina Röhrl, born September 28, 1891, lived with her parents at Unter den Schwibbogen 21 until she was 21. She had nine siblings. After the death of her parents, she first worked as a housemaid in Regensburg and then in a clinic in Munich; from 1926 with a clergyman in the parish of St. Peter am Rindermarkt.  In 1931, she had to go to the Haar-Eglfing Clinic because of a mental illness. From 1937 she lived in the Paulusstift Neuötting. In 1941 she was moved back to Eglfing – like all the other residents – and on the same day she was deported to Hartheim to be exterminated."

I don't know what Grant is doing here, but this is the corner of the Roman Wall that was built under Marcus Aurelius in 179 AD. Following the city's expansion eastward, this wall lost it's significance around 1320, and the wall was incorporated into a new building.  They only recently discovered it again in 1905, and it was renovated in 2013.

Uh oh! I didn't do it! It wasn't me!

The best part of walking through this really old building is that it's actually a nightclub called the Wasch Bar.

This kid was exhausted and jet lagged, as were the adults, so he slept on the train back to Weiden.

Ahhh, I miss the beauty of Bavaria so much!

AND I miss being able to have adult beverages on public transportation!!

Ohhhh, there I am! Bet you were wondering where I was in the picture above this one!

If you're wondering what Natalie did all day with Giya - well, here you go!  The evening before, they made cake!

And of course, took lots of selfies!

When we were in Regensburg, they took a road trip to Pilsen, Czech Republic to go to the mall!

Yes, I totally sent my teenager to another country. It's fine.

THESE GIRLS.  I am so glad they were able to see each other after a VERY long 3 and a half years! We promise that it won't be that long before we see each other again!

Until next time, Regensburg (and Pilsen!)