Visting Relatives and Past Memories- Karlsruhe, Germany

Karlsruhe is the city in Germany that my mother is from. I have not been here to visit in over thirty years. We did not have Germany on our list when we left. But when we got to Europe, on the urging of my brother, who has visited here pretty regularly, we contacted one of my 21 German cousins. We had already visited Mechthild in Athens and she encouraged us too. It is a little weird to contact people from your family who you haven't seen in many years but it turned out really well.

I had all these child hood memories of Karlsruhe which was another reason I was hesitant to go. Like with Greece, where my 20 something year old memories were so special and important to me, I didn't want to go back and have them proved wrong or that everything had changed for the worse. As with Greece this didn't happen and I had a great time sharing what I remembered with Dave and Anika as well as reliving it myself.

We spent the first day exploring downtown Karlsruhe. Many things were exactly as I remembered. Of course there were new and different stores. The city is undergoing a huge project to put in an underground metro to replace trollies so there is a lot of construction in the center. But other than that we easily found the places I remembered.

Marketplatz flower market. Every big European city seems to have one.

Anika in front of the schloss (castle)

300 year old tree in the Schloss Garten

Schloss Garten

From the schloss and Schloss garten ( castle and castle garden)we headed to the Stadt garten (city Garden). On the way we stopped for lunch at a Thai restaurant. This is one of the things that has changed since I was last here. The city has become integrated with immigrants from many parts of the world, just like most big cities in Europe or the US. When I was here from a child you did not see African's, Asians and  Arabs walking the streets speaking German. Food is available form all kinds of places. We made sure to have some traditional German food but were happy to have all the yummy options.

Anika and I in the Stadt Garten boats. I loved these when I was a kid.

Here are the boats going under a bridge. There were lots of water birds a round and you pass close to parts of the zoo which is also in the Garden.

Little children "playing" chess. there are several big chess sets and some other games too that anyone can play throughout the gardens.

 In the late afternoon we went to visit my Tanta Roswitha. We used to stay in her house when my family visited. She lives in a different house now but in the same area. We really enjoyed our time with her and her stories of the family past and present. She liked getting to know Anika and Dave and reconnect with me, I think. She and Anika made these thin waffles she said I loved as a child. It was so cute to see them working in the kitchen together. Roswitha speaks English (like almost everyone here) but we spoke in a kind of English -German mix. It was a great afternoon

The next day Dave and I went with Roswitha in the morning to see the family home where she, my mother and the five other children of the Stark family grew up.

The first six of the Stark children. My mom is the one on the far right holding two dolls.

This house had been hit by bombs three times during WW2 and there was a bunker they used down the street. I had visited it once as a child. Dave , Anika and I have heard stories from my mother about this house. The morning turned into an tour of more than the house as Roswitha did a running commentary on everything we saw as we drove around Karsruhe. We were struck by the fact that you can see how the city was devistated by bomb during the war. Building from 1800 stand next to 1950s architecture. This city was heavily bombed because of its industries. Although it has completely recovered your sense of the effects of the war here are more real than in some other places.

Rappenwort on the Rhine

The prettiest place we stopped was RoppenWort. This is a spot along the Rhine river where there are swimming pools, parks and a water park. I came here too as a child and I remember the special swimming pool with aritficial waves. Its still there. We took a stroll and enjoyed the peaceful atmosphere with swans gliding by and other water birds about.

Dave, Roswitha ,and Farida, Roswitha's friend at Rappenwort

In the afternoon we celebrated the birthday of my cousin Greti with her and her husband Volker. We went to a nice Italian restaurant and then they took us to a wonderful old part of Karlsruhe called Durlach. It was fun the walk around and compare the old architecture to what we had seen in France, Spain and other parts of Europe (or the world). There are these sculptures around Karlsruhe by a local artsit that I really liked. In the Durlach area they are mostly animals.

Froggy fountain sculpture

Durlach street

Greti and Volker at our Gellato- espresso stop

For our last adventure in the area Dave and I went to Baden Baden. This is a town with hot water springs in use for bathing since Roman times. It was fantastic. The town is full of gardens and parks. The architecture is well preserved and pretty. As with almost every European city we have been in it is pedestrian friendly with great no car streets for strolling lined with shops and cafes.

The baths themselves were elegant. It was a coed day and you do not wear bathing suits so you know we liked that. You go through a series of rooms that increase and decrease in temperature. Some are hot air, some steam, some pools. Part way through we had a soap and brush massage. You lie of a slab of marble. I thought this would be uncomfortable but its not. The brushing is really good and I hope Dave will add it to Well Within. The interior is beautiful. The steam rooms have tiles work from the 1800s painted with patterns and pictures in bright colors. The pool rooms all have domed ceilings with a sky light in the top, some have stained glass. This means there is lots of natural light. Everything was calm and quiet and very laid back. The attendants seem there to pamper you. At the end you get wrapped up in blankets in a dark quiet room. We both fell asleep for a nap. I hope we can go back here some day. We did not get to visit the ruins of the Roman baths that are in the same complex because we had to go home.

The back of the Freidrich's Bath spa

Front of the Fredrich's bath spa building

Our last day in Karlsruhe we visited more relatives. We saw my uncle Condrad and Tante Krista. They live in the same house I used to visit with my cousin Wolf,and his wife Stephie and their children. Krista speaks excellent English and we really enjoyed talking with her. The house brought back memories as we ate breakfast together in the same room I ate with them as a child. It was another really nice visit and reconnection. The whole time we were here we stayed with my cousin Mucke and his wife Caro. They live in a house in the same complex Tante Roswitha used to live in. They were very gracious hosts and made us right at home.

Wolf and Steffie

Krista Anika and Dave

Stark home on Tillsiter Strasse

Anika, Dave, Caro and Mucke

Muck and Caro's house

Only going to one city, I don't have a color for Germany. The only dogs we saw were on leashes and well behaved and cared for. No poop on the streets of Karlsruhe.  We loved Germany. We feel sure we will be back soon to visit family and explore the country more. It is good to reconnect with family. We found people easygoing and helpful. Like the rest of Europe there is history everywhere.This was one of the unexpected positive surprises of this trip.

On to Amsterdam!

Paris in Shades of Grey

 Paris is a city like no other. I am sure I am not the first person to think or say this. I came away thinking this is even better than NYC, and I like NYC a lot. But it doesn't have the history Paris has or the wide open boulevards, monuments and sculptures, palaces and range of architecture styles that Paris has. Paris has every kind of person you can imagine from street people who would fit right into Santa Cruz to women who look like they just arrived from Saudi Arabia. The history and art alone are more than you can take in in five days. But we did our best, walking every day till our feet hurt.

We stayed in our third Air BnB apartment. It was a bit outside of all the famous things which was good because we felt like we were in a regular neighborhood. There was easy access to the metro and shops and restaurants near by. The place itself was spacious and had a good kitchen where we could cook. We only ate dinner out once and so did not find Paris that expensive.

Front of our Building

Front door of Apartment

Day one-
We were lucky enough to have an excellent tour guide on our first day in Paris, my Uncle's friend Cristiane. She is French, lived in the US for years but has spent much of her life in Paris and retired here a while ago. She took us on a walk and bus tour along the Sienne that hit some of the famous and not so famous sites and helped us get oriented to the city.

This is a wonderful new museum building that is very alive. The plants are like a living collage on the building

Anika and Cristiane

These are a series of sculptures representing people from various countries.  What is really cool about them is the textures or imprints he used from objects in the city or country they are from.  If you want to know more about them go to this web site http://lesenfantsdumonde.zeblog.com/.

This is a phenomena we saw in France and Germany. People lock a lock to a bridge to seal their love. The Notre Dam is in the background. The bridge is covered with these.

This guy below and his "vehicle" here would fit right on the mall in Santa Cruz.

Santa Cruz type guy

Two of the oldest homes still standing in Paris from Medievel times in the Marais area.

One of our last stops was a Jewish neighborhood. I had no idea there was such a strong Jewish presence in Paris but there is. I would like to go back to some of the museums in this area

Day Two-
We had very grey, sometimes rainy weather in Paris. Our second day it was hard to get out of the apartment it was so uninviting. But we finally did. We spent some time going to stores Anika wanted to see. Then we hit a couple of sites.

Dave in front of the Angelic Pretty Store one of Anika's picks.

After Anika's stores we headed for the Musee de l'Orangerie. This is a great small museum of impressionists. But its real claim to fame is two rooms designed by Monet for his water lily paintings. These are incredible to see in real life and to hear how they became the focus of the last years of his life and career.  This building was damaged during WW2 and there were photos of the state the Water Lily room were in at the end of the war, so we are lucky the paintings survived. There is also a good collection of other artists of that time. We discovered an artist new to us. We had only ever seen a piece or two by Soutine in the past, but this museum has the biggest collection and it was impressive. It is always fun to discover a new artist you like.

You can't take photos in the museum but these below are from the park it is in.

Anika in a Henry Moore sculpture

Arc d' Triumphe

Day Three

Anika took a day off from touring and Dave and I headed for the park on our first day of sunshine. We went to Parc de la Villette.

From there we headed to Montmartre. this is where many artists and writers have lived in the past. Now it is pretty chi chi and touristy. We had lunch there and took a self guided walking tour.

This is an original metro entrance in the art nouveau style.

Typical Montre Mart street

House Van Gough lived in with his brother Theo for a short time.

Cafe where Amalie worked in the movie.

Day Four - The Louvre
It is hard to believe you can spend one entire day at a museum and still feel that you only saw a fraction of the place. But that is how it felt to us at the Louvre. This museum is HUGE. We had audio guides and did a basic tour that takes you to the most famous pieces (Venus de Milo, Mona Lisa etc.) Then we went to the sections that most interested us. It is very easy to get lost and you get directions like "You must go up to go down." or "You must go down to go up." The building itself is so grandiose it almost over whelms some of the art. Everything is ornate.

Venus de Milo

This painting is so big it took the artist three years to paint. It is of Napoleon's coronation.

My favorite piece of the day by Michelangelo

Final Thoughts on France

Color
I hope the people who love France will not take offense, but my color for France is grey. I do not mean like dull or dingy but it felt grey. This may be because we had so few days of sun but it was like a film over everything much of the time. Buildings were tinged in grey. Nice was a little more colorful but still there was the grey. there was a lot of green in the country side. Lets say it was muted. This did not make me like it less or leave a bad impression. It just felt grey. All the old stone buildings in the country and cement in the city, it was grey. Think black and white Woody Allen movie, its really shades of grey and some how very stylish.

Dogs
The dogs were well behaved and pampered. They are allowed every where. We saw one sitting on a seat next to its owner at a restaurant. Dogs come and go in public places with their owners. There is less poop on the side walks than Buenos Aires but you still have to be careful. There are cats too and they don't look like strays but its harder to tell with a cat sometimes.

Toilets
Public bathrooms were okay. But many had no toilet seat. What is up with that!

Food.
Of course there was great food everywhere. We did not eat out a lot but could get great ingredients for doing our own cooking. And we had a few really good meals out including Chinese food in a restaurant full of Asian people in Paris. We learned about rose wines and cheeses of all sorts. I could have had pastries every day. Even chocolate croissants tasted better in France. We saw many people especially in Paris eating Mc Donalds and I wanted to grab the bag and tell them don't you know what's in this? Don't eat it when you have so much good food around!

I think the French people appreciate art and pretty things. There seems to be public art everywhere.

They have a significant social safety net with child care from infants on, for all as an example. They have one of the highest birthrates in Europe which some say is because of the childcare available. History also seems appreciated as buildings are restored and kept up. Like every country and all people it has its contradictions. The above photo of a baby playing at the beach on the side of a cooling tower, next to a wind turbine sums it up. They have the highest percentage of their energy from nuclear power of any country in the world. People where helpful and not rude ( as you often hear in the US) but they were a bit more aloof than in some places we have been. As Dave said " The French were nicer than we expected". Sometimes it seemed things were made more complicated than they had to be. We really were told to go up to go down and the systems for some things did not seem well thought out. But you could have wine and cheese and a bagette, sit in a cafe and talk for hours, look at beautiful art even on a grey day.