Nuremberg

The day started out rainy but we opened our umbrellas and headed out to Nuremberg to meet our guide, "Elizabeth of Pommern", the 4th wife of Emperor Karl IV of Bohemia, who ruled in Nuremberg in the 1300's. A short walk from the train station we met her at St. Lorenz Church. Also with her was a Bavarian researcher, Marianne Sutter, who I had been in contact with for a few years, she would be available if anyone wanted to speak with her about future research.

Elizabeth first took us to a bridge where you could see the oldest hospital of Nuremberg jutting out into the river. This is the Holy Ghost Hospital and is still used as a senior citizen home and a restaurant today. In Elizabeth's time she explained how "stuff" from the hospital was dumped into the river and river was filthy and could not be used for drinking water.

We visited the churches of Nuremberg, St. Lorenz and St. Sebald. We learned that St. Sebald had been Catholic but in the 1525 Reformation it then became Lutheran but it still contains many statues of Mary and a relic of St. Sebald. The governing families who had donated these statues of Mary decided not to get rid of them at the time of the Refomation as they had spent too much money on them! This church was also heavily destroyed during the war but the citizens had yet again saved the statues and hid them throughout the war in a safe place, so they were once again able to be in the Church when rebuilt.

We had a wonderful tour, learned a lot of history and interesting stories of Nuremberg. I highly recommend having Elizabeth of Pommern as your tour guide if you travel to Nuremberg.

I have an interesting video uploaded on the Family Tree Tours Heritage Travel Facebook page, with Elizabeth's story of the Golden Ring but for some reason I can't get it to upload here. Sorry.

Of course we had to try the famous Nuremberg sausages, which are absolutely fabulous and we stopped at a store to buy some also famous Lebkuchen (gingerbread). Delicious. On our way out of town we discovered the craft market and went shopping for a little while. Fun day.

Tuesday – Freilichtmuseum THAT IS ABSOLUTELY RIGHT!!!

So day 3 we travel a little west to the Hohenlohe Freiland Museum. This open air living history museum shows farmhouses more typical to the Wuerttemberg area, mainly Hohenlohe. We finally got there and met our guide. Here is the story of the day, a very nice young woman who knew her facts and history very well but she knew it in great detail and she had a few catch phrases that were repeated quite often, “That is absolutely right”, “Perfect Question”, and “That’s Right.” After a while they kind of drove you crazy, but makes for a good group laugh. We learned about the type of pig bred in this area and visited a larger farmers house. What was different in this house from some of the others I have been in was the painted furniture. Very ornate and I think I have this right, if the piece had a picture of a cat on it, it was brought by the bride, a picture of a dog and it was brought by the groom. I will include some pictures.

So we had an “absolutely Right” time and a good catch phrase for the rest of the trip!

Ansbach Tours

Today we had 2 tours planned, a city tour of Ansbach in the morning and a tour of the Margrave Palace in the afternoon. It was a little bit overcast but off we went. We met our guide and started by visiting St, Gumbertus Church, the former Court church of the Margraves Brandeburg-Ansbach. This is built in the Romanesque style and is dominated by its Wiegleb organ. Next to the altar is a chapel called “Chapel of the Knights of the Swan”, built between 1501 and 1523 you see many shields of the Knights and an altar of the 14th century. We also went to a cellar or tomb next to the church which was the burial place of the Margraves and their families from the 17th & 18th century.
The 25 ornate coffins were made of tin and some displayed much detail and some were very simple.

We also visited a Jewish synagogue. This was built in 1744/46 and is one of the most significant original preserved synagogues of Southwest Germany and still is in good condition. It was not destroyed in 1938 on Kristal Nacht, as they were afraid that the location of the building being in a row of other buildings they would not be able to contain a fire. It was also used as a storage space for a leader in the Nazi party who lived next to it. Ansbach no longer has a Jewish community.

Moving along we stopped in time to hear the carillon play a traditional Bavarian tune. This is located in the Herrieder Tor or Clock Tower. This is a baroque tower built in 1750 and originally part of the town gate. The town itself was first mentioned in 700.

Lunch then in the afternoon then we went to the Margraves Palace. Of the 520 rooms we saw 27! You can get lost. Of course huge, ornate rooms but with very high ceilings, large ceramic stoves that were fed with wood or coal from rooms behind where the servants took care of it and did not disturb anyone in the main room. They had fireplaces in most of the rooms but just for decoration. In some of the restoration work they found beautiful inlay wooden floors that contained 27 different kinds of wood. Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed in there so I can’t show you. In the main reception room, which is huge and where they entertained and met with heads of state, there was a balcony overlooking the room and this is where the musicians would sit and play to entertain the dignitaries. It was a beautiful place and interesting history.

Bavaria 2011

Off again to Bavaria and Eastern Wuerttemberg:


Arrived in Germany, beautiful sunny day. After getting out of the extremely busy Frankfurt airport, made it to the airport hotel for one night to wait for the group arriving on Sunday. TIP: if you stay at the Holiday Inn Express (Mohenfeld) by the airport because it is close and has a shuttle, you may want to try a couple restaurants near here. You are kind of stuck on the outskirts of town and I was debating on eating micro waved pizzas at the hotel or taking the shuttle back to the airport to eat at the food court when I noticed a sign for an Italian restaurant nearby. Across the street, you walk down a country lane heading towards a campground and there you find Tommasa’s Italian restaurant and very close to it is a German restaurant with bier garten (didn’t see the name). I chose Italian this time, great food, reasonable prices and close to the hotel. Just an FYI.

Sunday – Back to the airport to meet group, which I eventually did and we were off for our 2.5 hour ride to our hotel in Ansbach. This was another gorgeous day, sunny and mild temps. The ICE train from the airport was crowded but once we changed trains in Wurzburg, we had open windows and a beautiful breeze. The further we travelled east into the Franconia countryside, the terrain was lush green, rolling hills and farmers fields. Near Wurzburg the vineyards stretched up the hills in orderly rows. Beautiful introduction to Germany.

We made it to Ansbach; the group getting very tired after the long plane and train ride so when we made it to the hotel and saw the unbelievable rooms and beds it was well worth the ride. This hotel is located in Old town Ansbach and the building had originally been a residence for the clerks of the Margraves (rulers) of Ansbach. Of course it has been renovated but still contains the charm and richness of a higher class. Spiral staircase (sorry no elevator, but small price to pay) lead to the rooms with high ceilings, large windows with beautiful draperies and soft beds under crystal chandeliers and a marble floored, gold handled bathroom with a very large (by European standards) deep bathtub. That is a rarity in German hotels. Incredible! I was then shown to my garden suite. This hotel has a charming café, breakfast room where they serve freshly made kafee und kuchen daily, past this outside is a bier garten set in the small garden and past this is a separate building with the garden suite. I felt like the Princess of Ansbach! Really, really luxurious. I will definitely be spoiled for anything else. I probably should not go on and on, because was just a lucky find for us, I sure can’t promise this everytime, but we will enjoy it while we can. Quick walk around town or a nap for some, good filling dinner and early to bed to get ready for the week ahead.

Organ Music St Michael's Bamberg

This is an extremely short clip of the organ music at St. Michael's Kirche in Bamberg. I can not get the longer videos to load. ???? Technology... Anyway, the organist must have been practicing because it was a lot of stopping and starting and maybe it is one of those "you had to be there" moments, but this beautiful church, sun shining through the windows, gilt and gold and music, felt like heaven.

Bad Salzuflen, Leipzig and Bamberg

Monday - Bad Salzuflen

Our last day with the group! We start out after breakfast by meeting a resident of Bad Salzuflen who had heard through his brother (who belongs to one of the genealogy societies we met) and he wanted to meet this American group staying in his town. He also had planned to take us on a tour of the town on the little white “Paulinchen“Bahn. The small train that takes visitors through the town. Incredibly nice gesture. We started off by Herr Ridderbusch giving us some history of the town and its beginning with the Salt trade. One of our stops was at the center of town and the “Gradierwerk“.

There are 3 large brown walls made up of blackthorn sticks which the brine water trickles over, thus extracting a purer salt. You can also walk into one of these Gradierwerk, Misty fog, colored lights and a starry ceiling,help you relaz at this mock sea side resort.

This is such a charming town, lots of history, timber framed houses, spa services and shopping. Couldn’t be better.

Since half our group was leaving late this afternoon to head to Dusseldorf to be able to catch their plane the next day, we had a good-bye lunch for them. We found a pizza place (I know-I know pizza in Germany!) but this was great Italian brick oven pizza place, owned by a Greek, and as we were laughing and talking over our pizza, a young man came across the room and said, “pardon me, but I have to ask what is a group of Americans doing in this small, out of the way townof Bad Salzuflen?“ We laughed and found out his story too, a native of New York, who had been a professional ice skater, met a german girl on tour and now lives in Germany. What are the chances?

So auf widersehen to some of our group and here is some pictures of our beautiful home base.

Tuesday – Last Day

So the rest of the group departs today, some going home and some going on to other parts of Germany. My german partner and I were headed off to Oldendorf to do some research someone had hired us to do. We had much luck, found his gr-gr-grandfather’s baptismal entry, and his parents marriage. This revealed the tradition that sometimes happens in this part of Germany where the man took the woman’s name at marriage. She was the widow of the mueller and whoever lived in the Muellers (mill) house had to go by the name Niedermueller. Luckily, it gave his born name of Weber and the place he was from. So then off we went to discover the mill house and found the only Niedermueller still left in town, living in the mill house and after he very warily wondered what these two idiots talking about family history wanted, he invited us in and we had a nice cha

t for a half hour or so. He is a somewhat of a cousin to our customer back in Florida and will be willing to meet with him when he comes in October. Good day!

I’ll finish this up quickly with the rest of our adventure, we headed down to the east German city of Leipzig. On our way we passed along the autobahn a “checkpoint“. Someplace you used to have to go through and be inspected before you were allowed into the eastern zone. There were barracks, more like corrugated mobile homes, that housed some information and videos of what the time period was like. Matthias remembered as a litle boy going one time to visit his grandmother and it taking hours and hours to get through a similar checkpoint. They would even make the woman go and disrobe to be inspected and make sure no one was carrying anything illegal into the East. It was eerie, but interesting. Of course I always spend part of my time on the autobahn sleeping, which is good because the other times I am jumping and complaining about how fast those cars in that left lane go. I don’t think I will be driving anytime soon.

Leipzig was nice but the first day we were there was rainy, rainy and cold. Matthias’s cousin met us and took us to the State Archives there. She had a friend who works there and is president of the Saxony Genealogy society. We were making contacts for a future trip. We did some more research for our Mueller guy, whose son ended up living in Leipzig. We found some of the “police records“ that I have heard about but have never seen. When or if you moved in or out of town (any towns in Germany) or I think even if you moved across town you had to report to the police your comings and goings. So we found several entries for this family, which then helped us when we then went to Evangelisch Church Archives to find out what church they belonged to. Along the way we stopped in Thomas Kirche, where Johann S. Bach had been cantor. Saw his grave

in the church and took some pictures. Long wild goose chase from the Church Archives, they sent us to the wrong church and by the time we found out the correct one the office was closing. Herr Mueller will have to visit PetersKirche on his own. Believe me it sure helps to do this with a native speaker.

Last but not least before we left Leipzig we visited the National Bibliotek of Germany. Grand, beautiful and huge place and Germany has a Law?? That all books published in Germany since 1913 must send a copy to this library. So it must have all kinds of good stuff. I kept asking if this meant Ortsippenbuchs, town histories etc. and the answer seemed to be, all books published in Germany.. hmmm, have to do more research on this. Here is a wikipedia site about it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_National_Library

Almost time for me to go home too. We headed down to Bamberg and finally got a little sun. Although we were here to check it out for our upcoming trip to Bavaria in September, I finally tried to be on “vacation“ for a couple days and not work. Bamberg is another beautiful city over 1000 years old.

It is called the Rome of Germany because it is built on seven hills and believe me I think we walked all seven! The river Regnitz runs through the town and this is the town that has its Rathaus on the bridge in the middle of the river. One of the stories I heard is that on the hill side of the river that is covered in churches and was once home to a bishopric and monasteries and ruled by Prince Bishops. The other side of the river, the more bourgeois town with lots of different market places and the business side of town, could not decide what side to put the Rathaus on, so they compromised and built it in the middle of the river. We also heard the church side did not want to give up any of their land for a town hall. Whatever the story, it makes for one of the most photographed places in Germany. The town is charming, with winding alleyways, and like I said lots and lots of beautiful churches. It kind of reminds me of Wurzburg a little while standing on a bridge and looking up the hill to a fortress (in Wurzburg’s case) and a Cathedral in Bamberg’s case. We walked these seven hills and visited in several of the churches, one magical thing happened when we reached the top of one of the hills and were standing in the courtyard of the Cathedral of St. Peter and St. George, all the bells of all these churches started ringing, here we were up on this hill, overlooking this fabulous city and church bells ringing gloriously. We then climbed the next hill to the St. Michael's church, which had formerly been a monastery, of course the church up on the highest hill was fantastic inside. The whole faulted ceiling is painted with the famous "Heavenly Garden", 578 biologically exact paintings of plants and herbs. As we entered the organ was playing, I guess the organist was there for practice, it was heavenly. To round out the day we went to the cafe in the Rose Garden of the Residence of the Prince Bishop for Kaffee und Kuchen, fantastic view over the city, finally some sunshine and then a wedding party showed up to have their picture taken in the garden. Great Day! Fortunately Bamberg remained largely untouched in the Second World War. This factor has given the city its special position: it has the largest intact old town in Germany. In 1993 it was added to the “World Heritage List“ by UNESCO. I will be glad to go back again in September.

So ends another successful trip. I hope everyone had fun, I did!

Bückeburg Palace

Sunday – Bückeburg


I think today may be my favorite day. We had some sunshine and it was warmer and we were going to a Palace! Bückeburg is a small town in the Lippe-Schaumburg area, east of Osnabrück area and the Palace is still the current home of the Prince of Lippe-Schaumburg. When we arrived there were a few tense moments with a lot of German language flying back and forth and I was getting nervous, seems like they didn’t have my English tour guide there. Oh no… but luckily there was an gentleman there, who I am not sure what his job was there, but he certainly must have given tours before because he was great! We were escorted through 12 rooms of the palace and our guide was very entertaining with stories of the palace and the different styles it embodied throughout its long history. The most magnificent place to me was the Chapel. Still in use today by the family every Sunday, it is awash in gilt and gold. The frescoed, vaulted ceiling was completely filled. We learned from our guide that centuries ago people believed that there could not be a speck of white on the ceiling, as this might allow evil into the chapel. No worries here. We then went through hallways with paintings from the 18th century, Reception rooms and the incredible Banquet Hall. The men’s Smoking Room and the Ladies Drawing Room, Hunting room etc. It was a look see into the lives of Royalty.
It was awesome. After the tour we had time to walk the beautiful grounds or visit the delicious, pink Schloss Kitchen and get some kaffee und kuchen. Since the last time I was here I walked the grounds, this time I went for the cake!. It was well worth it, incredible delicious.

Our day was not over yet, we visited the horse stables that housed the horses of the Baroque Riding School that is part of this Schloss. We attended a horse show in the afternoon. Unfortunately, the master of ceremonies told the story in German but we were able to get the gist with the performance of the horses. Magnificent animals.

Sun was still shining and it was a beautiful day and lots of FUN!