Today I drive to Mannheim to look around. I leave the car in the big garage under the Haupltbahnhof, ride trams and take pictures; there’s a street fair going on; with live music, lots of bars and stalls, with hordes of people and I enjoy that! Later take a tram to Marktplatz for an early dinner at the same French café. It was still hot and muggy and eventually it started to rain very hard. I was under the awning and finished dinner without getting wet. The rain lets up for a bit so I catch the next tram to the station, pick up my car and head home; then it starts to rain ‘cats and dogs’ with lots of lightning. I drive home very carefully. According to the newspaper, the Mannheinner Stadtfeste (the city fair) had 280,000 visitors over three days!
Today, Saturday, is Heidelberg’s Lange Nacht des Einkaufens (Long Night of Shopping), when the downtown shops will stay open till midnight. In the afternoon I take the bus downtown and check it out. There are lots and lots of people; but as my buddy John Marshall (who I worked with in Washington DC 40 years ago) would say, “Don’t count the people, count the shopping bags.”
After a ‘Campari and orange', my now favorite drink at my now favorite bar I go to the concert at the cathedral. It’s early Renaissance music, written in the 1500s and 1600s and played by three women on a viola de Gamba and two early wood flutes. This is not my favorite music and at intermission I leave.
On Sunday, June 1, I explore the Weinweg (Wine Road) I drive through Mannheim, cross the Rheine at Ludwigshaven and to Neustadt; where I follow the Weinweg south through tiny old wine villages surrounded by vineyards as far as the eye can see. I take lots of pictures and do not stop even once at the many wineries offering tasting! The weather is hot and humid so I drove home via Landau and Karlsruhe. Later, when the weather has cooled, I drive into Heidelberg, stop for dinner at the café at the Hauptbahnhof and attend the cello concert at the Stadthalle (City Concert Hall). This is something quite different! The concert is by students from the Staatliche Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Mannheim. (State University of Music and Performing Arts) this is where Germany gets its talent. Students aged from 19 to 21 play cello sonatas and duets with enormous skill and precision. There are about 30 people in the hall including parents, teachers and fellow students. The hall is a beautiful semi-circular Baroque room with gold ceiling, walls with large frescos of old battle scenes and gold and red plush seats. The students play very complicated sounding scores without notes; one of them appears to be playing two different tunes simultaneously. Afterwards I speak with a couple of the students, one is 19 from Heilbronn, still in high school with five years to go at the university; another from Mannheim is 21. After the concert I drive to a section of town where I have never been before, near Police Headquarters and have an ice-cream and walnut sundae for dessert.
Photos:
Water tower, Mannheim 3A#032
Street fair, Mannheim 3A#038
New bridge, Ludwigshafen 4#001
Mannheim cello student 4A#023
Today, Saturday, is Heidelberg’s Lange Nacht des Einkaufens (Long Night of Shopping), when the downtown shops will stay open till midnight. In the afternoon I take the bus downtown and check it out. There are lots and lots of people; but as my buddy John Marshall (who I worked with in Washington DC 40 years ago) would say, “Don’t count the people, count the shopping bags.”
After a ‘Campari and orange', my now favorite drink at my now favorite bar I go to the concert at the cathedral. It’s early Renaissance music, written in the 1500s and 1600s and played by three women on a viola de Gamba and two early wood flutes. This is not my favorite music and at intermission I leave.
On Sunday, June 1, I explore the Weinweg (Wine Road) I drive through Mannheim, cross the Rheine at Ludwigshaven and to Neustadt; where I follow the Weinweg south through tiny old wine villages surrounded by vineyards as far as the eye can see. I take lots of pictures and do not stop even once at the many wineries offering tasting! The weather is hot and humid so I drove home via Landau and Karlsruhe. Later, when the weather has cooled, I drive into Heidelberg, stop for dinner at the café at the Hauptbahnhof and attend the cello concert at the Stadthalle (City Concert Hall). This is something quite different! The concert is by students from the Staatliche Hochschule fur Musik und Darstellende Kunst, Mannheim. (State University of Music and Performing Arts) this is where Germany gets its talent. Students aged from 19 to 21 play cello sonatas and duets with enormous skill and precision. There are about 30 people in the hall including parents, teachers and fellow students. The hall is a beautiful semi-circular Baroque room with gold ceiling, walls with large frescos of old battle scenes and gold and red plush seats. The students play very complicated sounding scores without notes; one of them appears to be playing two different tunes simultaneously. Afterwards I speak with a couple of the students, one is 19 from Heilbronn, still in high school with five years to go at the university; another from Mannheim is 21. After the concert I drive to a section of town where I have never been before, near Police Headquarters and have an ice-cream and walnut sundae for dessert.
Photos:
Water tower, Mannheim 3A#032
Street fair, Mannheim 3A#038
New bridge, Ludwigshafen 4#001
Mannheim cello student 4A#023
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