Ulm, Calw, & Bad Soden: By German Trains

Wednesday morning we took off on the train for Ulm, where Rich gave a talk in a physics group led by Wolfgang Schleich. Kathy, his wife, graciously escorted me around the Museum of Bread Culture, took me out to lunch, and drove me out to see the Wiblingen monastery with a high baroque library and a small microscope museum. In the afternoon I went to the Ulm Museum (art, archaeology, city history), and walked around the city center. Ulm cathedral has the highest steeple in Europe and inside one is constantly bending all the way back to see the ceiling. There was someone trying to tune a small organ, but the sounds of construction were making his task difficult.

Ulm's City Hall and Münster

Looking up at the side aisle inside Ulm Cathedral

 

One thing that keeps surprising me is how cities we've visited before have changed. Ulm just built a new synagogue in 2012 to replace one that had been destroyed during the Hitler regime.



 St. Christopher Fountain in front of the new synagogue

 

Ulm has also added a new city library in the shape of a glass pyramid and a new modern art museum.

One of my favorite things about walking around German cities is the wonderful signs. Here are two of many that caught my eye:

Ulm Sparrow Sign (There are sparrows everywhere -- a city symbol)

 

Ulm Doorway - Painting of Fisherman Jousting

 

Ulm has a "fishing quarter," part of the town where the fishermen used to live, and it's fun to walk through, since it has rushing water and weirs with houses built beside and over the water. Every year there's a jousting festival when competitors try to push each other off the boats into the water with long poles. It was pleasant to walk along the city wall and peer down into the gardens on one side and look across the Donau (Danube) on the other.

Fischerviertel Fachwerkhaus

 

Carved Door Fischviertel

 

There are so many unlikely things in this world. I ran across this sign in a garden with several snail statues. Who knew that Germans exported snails in casks down the Danube to Vienna to eat during Lent? 10,000 per barrel!

Snails for Lent

 

German Post Cart, Ulm 



Friday morning we took the train to Stuttgart, stopping for an hour to see some Rembrandts, Klees, a Feininger, and other paintings at the city gallery, and then took the S-bahn on to Weil der Stadt, where Elisabeth picked us up. She took us out to lunch and then for a long walk in the Black Forest to a castle ruin and along a river. We didn't see one other person hiking or cycling. We stayed overnight at her home in Calw. It was fun to see one of her sons all grown up and employed in the Bundespolizei, not a dangerous job here. Sat. morning we walked down through the market to hear an organ concert in the church and see the town. Hermann Hesse was born in Calw, so there was a statue and a quote painted on the side of a building.

Jennifer & Elisabeth in front of Black Forest Castle Ruin

 

Rich with statue of Herman Hesse, Calw 

 

Saturday afternoon we took four very different trains to get to Bad Soden. The first was a Zug-Bus (train-bus), a one-car local train. In Karlsruhe we transferred  to a French high-speed TGV, clocking 248 kilometers per hour. I must admit that I have a strong case of train-envy; I wish the Germans could just come and build a high-speed rail system to connect Los Angeles and San Francisco. They are very apologetic when trains are 5-10 minutes late, whereas Amtrak was unapologetic when my 10-hour train ride to SF was extended to a 12 hours.

French TGV arriving in Karlsruhe

Bärbel picked us up from the train station in Bad Soden, just north of Frankfurt, and took us out to the country for a nice meal in an old inn. We walked beforehand to see a very fancy stable, more like a castle, nearby.

Jennifer & Bärbel, near Bad Soden

 

Sunday morning we got to pet several dogs, a Golden Retriever and a Bernese Mountain dog, on our morning walk before taking the train back to Hannover Sun. afternoon.

 

P.S. When we stopped in Darmstadt on the way south to eat lunch with a physicist there, I took a picture of this toilet. After you flush, an arm comes out of the back and the toilet seat actually spins while the arm wipes the seat with some cleaning fluid!