Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Thursday, 13 August. We arrived in Speyer about 9:00 and
left on the walking tour 20 minutes later. It was cool and overcast, but at
least there was no rain. We walked through a large park, eventually coming to
a sculpture garden with beautiful flowers. We saw sculptures depicting the
legend of the ferryman who transported ghosts of deceased German emperors across the
Rhine, where they joined the Battle of Liepzig against Napoleon in 1813.
A short distance further we came to the Kaiserdom (Imperial Cathedral
Basilica of the Assumption and St Stephen), begun in 1030 and said to be the
world's largest Romanesque church. (Our group didn't go inside then, but we
returned later during our free time.) The Tour Director then led us into a
charming old neighborhood from where we also had a good view back to the
Cathedral. We visited St. Magdalena Convent where Edith Stein once lived
(1923-1931). A Jew who converted to Catholicism and eventually became a nun,
she was murdered in the gas chambers of
Auschwitz in 1942.
When our tour broke up, we headed back to the
Cathedral to explore the interior. It was huge, but not very ornate. We then
walked down the main street toward the Old Gate, stopping along the way to get
Jane an ice cream. We were just about to start walking down Judenstrasse back
toward the ship when it started raining fairly hard. So we caught a city bus
instead. It took us very close to the ship, although we had a minor problem
finding our way across some railroad tracks.
Lunch was early, at noon, because we were going on home-hosted visits with local families at 2:30. These are a feature of all GCT tours. We drew the most distant home and, with two other couples, were dropped off last, at about 3:20. Our host, apparently a farmer, was most gracious and informative, but his wife was ill and couldn't join us. After we'd had more than enough cake and coffee, he showed us the entire house, even the storage and utility rooms. The home was heated by hot water from solar panel on the roof, supplemented by burning agricultural waste to heat more water when necessary. So he buys no fuel to heat his house. Naturally, our group was also picked up last, about 5:30, but with no stops or detours along the way, we were onboard the ship by 6:00. Dinner was at 7:00 as usual. We were in bed when the ship sailed for Greffern at 11:00. Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17
Copyright © 2000-2023 DarrellPeck.com All rights
reserved. | |||||||||||
