No less than North America or the British Isles, continental Europe suffers from a profusion of nearly identical place names. Case in point: today's scenic tour from the port of Breisach will take us to the city of Freiburg im Breisgau, not to be confused with Freiburg im Sachsen to the east, nor yet with the city and canton of Fribourg across the border in Switzerland -- or the town in France, if it comes to that.
See what I mean?
At least, the tour would take us there. But when I looked out this morning and saw the dark cloudy skies and checked the weather forecast which showed 100% chance of rain throughout the day, I rebelled.
Truth be told, I was suffering from the ABCs of river cruising. If you've been following this blog throughout my travels, you may well be feeling the symptoms too. It works like this, according to the Cruise Director on my river cruise last year. On Day 1 of a river cruise, the letters A.B.C. stand for:
"Wow! What
A
Beautiful
Cathedral!!!"
By Day 6 or so, the letters mean:
"Oh, no, not
Another
Bloody
Church!"
It's so true. Freiburg's biggest attraction, in more ways than one, is the tall, shapely spire of its cathedral which has been acclaimed the most beautiful spire in Europe. Given the weather today, I'm not feeling sufficiently "inspired" to go and stand in the rain, looking at A------ B----- C-----. I'll just visit Freiburg some other time. Freiburg im Breisgau, that is. Here's an internet picture of the city and cathedral spire to tide you over. It sure wouldn't look this bright today!
At least I can take you back to yesterday when we had a successful and only partially wet tour of Strasbourg. I've always thought of Strasbourg as primarily a French city, although aware of the mixed Franco-Germanic culture of the borderlands in Alsace. I was more than a little surprised to learn, yesterday, that Strasbourg has been a German city for most of its lifetime, and only became solidly and definitively French after World War Two.
It was precisely that checkered history, and the need to affirm the unity of the new United Europe of the future, that led to the decision to locate first the Council of Europe, and then the European Parliament in Strasbourg. This firmly cemented its reputation as an international city.
As usual, though, our walking tour centred on the older, more historic districts. I confess to skipping the morning coach tour around the European administration buildings and sticking to just the walk.
There's no such thing as a coach tour of historic Strasbourg. Tour coaches and most motor vehicles are banned from a large segment of the central city, basically the entire island on which the city centre is located. Deliveries are allowed for a limited time each morning, and a few streets are available for vehicle access for cars. There are only two roads across the island with tram services. Strasbourg has these flashy 7-segment articulated trams and their right of way runs, quite sensibly, down one side of the street instead of right down the middle.
So, not only were we in for a long walk, but our ship had to dock in an industrial harbour area some way to the east of the city centre. Strasbourg is one of the biggest ports in France, and second biggest on the entire Rhine (after Duisburg in Germany) -- and it shows in the morning view from my cabin.
After we dropped off our coach at the Place de l'Etoile (which isn't star-shaped at all as the name seems to imply -- just a big bus terminal), we started walking and first encountered the original building of the civic hospital, dating from the 1600s.
All those shuttered windows in the roof provided ample ventilation whenever the rivers flooded, and the supplies of food and wine in the cellars had to be carried upstairs. Incidentally, this hospital still makes and sells its own wine, as it has done ever since the "good old days"| when wine was frequently prescribed for illnesses. "Use a little wine for thy stomach's sake." We saw some bottles for sale in several shop windows.
From there, we walked on a bit farther and entered the quaint historic neighbourhood known as "Petite-France." It is not a complimentary nickname. Our guide explained that the name became common in the years when Strasbourg was a German town, and the name "petite France" referred to what was called in English "the pox" -- syphilis. This was a district of butchers and tanners, and the asylums where syphilitics were locked up were put here too. Those victims, the lowest of the low, could deal with the stench of the tanneries, as far as most people were concerned. Today, it's picturesque enough to look like a set for a fantasy movie.
And wouldn't you know ti? I just can't go anywhere without running into this guy.
We walked on some more, and soon came to two closely-linked squares at the heart of the city: the Place Gutenberg...
...with its two-storey carousel...
...and monument to the inventor of the printing press...,
...and the adjacent Place de la Cathédrale.
Work was stopped on the cathedral after the north spire was built, because it was feared that the additional weight of the matching south spire would have brought about the collapse of the building.
On the south side of the church, the Place de la Chateau faces the ornate and clearly French Bishop's Palace of 1730 -- now the city's principal art gallery.
Just at this point, the cathedral clock struck twelve and the first spotty drops of rain began to fall. I found refuge under the awning over a wall with 4 ATMs, and stood there while the skies opened. For the first time in my life, I actually saw the gargoyles on a cathedral fulfilling the design requirement which made protruding sculptures such as these a valuable asset to the church -- downspouts!
Eventually the rain let up and I was able to make my way to the meeting point for the 15-minute nonstop walk back to the Place de l'Etoile and our buses. On the way we passed this Irish pub. In the ordinary way, I would give it no more than a passing glance, but in the company of so many musicians and music lovers, I had to wonder if it was a pub or a music store. Either way, any musician would certainly need to know if the supertonic was flat!
Soon afterwards, we were back on our coaches and then aboard ship once more. To add insult to injury, the sun came right out and shone brilliantly during our afternoon concert in the lounge. Sigh.
Just to keep you up to date, here's the latest map of the cruise with yesterday's visit to Strasbourg and today's indoor port call at Breisach marked in. Freiburg im Breisgau is a short 35-40 minute bus ride to the east of Breisach.
By bedtime tonight, we will be docked at Basel, the end of the cruise. Tomorrow morning we have to be off the ship by 0900 to continue our tour by bus to Zurich.
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