O Tannenbaum - A tour of German Christmas Markets and other spots

[OZDUCK]

One day we took a tram to see the monument to "The Battle of the Nations" - the Völkerschlachtdenkmal. Completed in 1913 it commemorates the defeat of Napoleon in 1813 near Leipzig by a coalition of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden. The battle involved 560,000 soldiers and there were133,000 casualties. It was the largest battle of the Napoleonic Wars and the largest battle in Europe prior to WW1.

At 91 metres it is the tallest monument in Europe. This height triggered my acrophobia. I have been scared of heights for as long as I can remember and it seems to be getting a little worse as I get older. After we had looked around the insides of the monument we took a lift to the upper walkway. The lift opened onto a narrow ledge with a less than waist height wall. I had to tell my wife that I could not go outside and retreated while she continued her tour.

Monument to the Battle of the Nations - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

We couldn't quite work out why this was in the ticket office.

 

[OZDUCK]

You moved around inside by an assortment of retrofitted lifts and narrow spiral staircases. Everything seemed designed to trigger my fear of heights.

Looking up









Looking down' The interior parapets were pretty low as well









Described, with a bit of poetic license, as 'Napoleons Desk'.

 

[OZDUCK]

Looking around

There was an obvious explosives storage area across the road. Much of the infrastructure was old but there were new buildings at the far end. Nothing is listed against it in Google Earth so I assume that it still functions as a government facility



There is a large cemetery, the largest in Leipzig, on the other side. This rather fantastic looking Art Nouveau building contains chapels, crematorium, columbarium etc. It was built in 1907-09.



Behind the cemetery is a large group of what I am sure are Plattenbau flats built during the East German years. Millions of these types of flats, built with prefabricated concrete panels, were constructed in those decades.



Looking towards the centre of Leipzig





The 'gold' spire that can be seen slightly to the left-of-centre of this photo is not a church tower but a remnant of the Soviet era. It was built to top the Soviet Pavilion when the Trade Fair buildings were renovated in 1950.



A later photo from much closer



This Radar/Surveillance Tower was also close by but I can find no information about it. To me it also looks like something erected during the days of the DDR. There is no nearby airport.



Looking up



You can see people on the ledge/viewing platform where my courage failed me.



But you can go even higher

 

[OZDUCK]

At the very top



After the monument we made a trek to the remnants of the original Leipzig Railway Station. It was opened in 1842 and is the oldest preserved station in Germany. The station was closed in 2001 and a new station now operates underneath it. Part of the building has been turned into a Brewery, Restaurant and Guest House.











These are the toilet stalls. The train motif carried out in full.




there were more of the Plattenbau flats directly opposite

 

[Flyfrequently]

One day we took a tram to see the monument to "The Battle of the Nations" - the Völkerschlachtdenkmal. Completed in 1913 it commemorates the defeat of Napoleon in 1813 near Leipzig by a coalition of Russia, Prussia, Austria and Sweden. The battle involved 560,000 soldiers and there were133,000 casualties. It was the largest battle of the Napoleonic Wars and the largest battle in Europe prior to WW1.

At 91 metres it is the tallest monument in Europe. This height triggered my acrophobia. I have been scared of heights for as long as I can remember and it seems to be getting a little worse as I get older. After we had looked around the insides of the monument we took a lift to the upper walkway. The lift opened onto a narrow ledge with a less than waist height wall. I had to tell my wife that I could not go outside and retreated while she continued her tour.

Monument to the Battle of the Nations - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

View attachment 370935

View attachment 370930

View attachment 370931

View attachment 370932

View attachment 370933

We couldn't quite work out why this was in the ticket office.

View attachment 370934

View attachment 370936

View attachment 370937

View attachment 370939

View attachment 370938

As far as heights go @OZDUCK , I feel your pain, seems to get worse as we age.
Last time I gave it a go was the Colombus Monument Barcelona - yeah - nah!!!

 

[OZDUCK]

The restaurant was packed out but they squeezed us in on a small table near the entrance



My wife had a ginger and orange drink while I had my first taste of Gose beer. This is a slightly sour beer that, because of the use of salt and coriander, does not meet the German 'Beer laws'. But because it is a regional historical speciality it is allowed to be produced and sold. I liked it and drank it at another restaurant. But I would not be drinking it on a 40 C Perth day.

"Pronounced as “goes-uh”, Gose beer is a pale, top-fermenting wheat beer, flavoured with coriander and salt. A 1740 description of Gose stated "die Gose stellt sich selber ohne Zutuung Hefe oder Gest" ("Gose ferments itself without the addition of yeast"). There's a hefty lactic acid content and the beer was probably once spontaneously-fermented."

What is a Gose?

Pronounced as “goes-uh”, Gose beer is a pale, top-fermenting wheat beer, flavoured with coriander and salt. Learn more about the Gose style here.

www.beercartel.com.au

I had the "Fish and Chips Dolden Madel Style. That means "Girl with an umbrella style'. This flummoxed me for a while but my wife eventually found that it was probably referring to a photo of Taylor Swift with Fish and Chips and an umbrella.





My wife had smoked salmon and potato cakes. But it sounds much better as Raucherlauchs auf Reibekuchen





Both meals were excellent but it was a bit of a squeeze on that small table.

 

[OZDUCK]

As far as heights go @OZDUCK , I feel your pain, seems to get worse as we age.
Last time I gave it a go was the Colombus Monument Barcelona - yeah - nah!!!

I walked past that monument but didn't even think of going up. The weirdest effect that I suffer is that if I am sitting in a plane it is fine but if I stand up and look out the window then I get a reaction.

 

[OZDUCK]

Leipzig has a number of interesting passages and alleyways.

Probably the most famous is the Madler Passage built in 1912-14

Mädler Passage ♥ Leipzig Region

Discover the Mädler Passage, Grimmaische Straße / Neumarkt - Leipzig's most impressive passage ► See you soon in Leipzig & region!

www.leipzig.travel

Two entrances





Inside

 

[OZDUCK]

There are plenty of other passages in Leipzig and here are a few of them

We had a meal in the restaurant down this first passage one night

 

[OZDUCK]

 

[OZDUCK]

This little DDR Museum was at the back of this passage. We didn't discover it until we had no time to visit.

 

[OZDUCK]

This is the meal we had in the Barthels Hof passage

The exterior of the restaurant



Inside





History



The menu. Looking at this menu reminds me that the takeaway meal from the market that I was trying to remember was actually mutzbraten and not sauerbraten



I had Gose style beer again. When I ordered it the waitress was concerned that I didn't know what it was and may not like it.



You can see that it has a pretty distinctive colouration



We went for 'comfort' food for a cold night





And ended up sharing a very nice desert. The cake was a form of Leipziger Lerche. The dish originally contained Larks (the songbird) but the filling is now suitable for vegetarians.

Leipziger Lerche - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[OZDUCK]

We did a day trip to Halle (Saale). It is about a 30 minute rail trip. In my planning for our covid cancelled trip of 2020 I had been thinking about basing ourselves here for a few days as it located nicely between a few cities. I am glad I dumped this idea for this trip as, outside the very centre, much of the town that we saw felt a bit rundown and grimy.

The train there was fine but after we decided to return early to Leipzig at around 14:30 we experienced another grossly overcrowded and uncomfortable train. It was packed to the gunwales about 10 minutes before departure and people still forced their way on until everyone was jammed shoulder to shoulder. We stood for the entire return trip. Halfway back there was a stop at the local airport and there were a number of people left stranded on the platform there. It was patently obvious that the route needs more frequent trains.

As the train ran alongside a section of autobahn we saw a number of tractors on the road and a huge traffic jam. It turned out that this was part of an ongoing protest by farmers that has now spread across the rest of Germany and other countries in Europe.

100s of farmers arrive in Berlin to protest climate-driven budget cuts

Even a member of the ruling coalition is protesting against the changes.

www.euronews.com

The Halle train station has been nicely restored and is now like a large shopping centre.









We caught a tram to the marketplace where there was, naturally, a Christmas Market in progress.

 

[OZDUCK]

Halle likes to 'boast' about its five towers.



And here are they are







Handel was born here in 1685



Inside the Marktkirche Unser Lieben Frauen on the marketplace - built 1529 - 1554

 

[OZDUCK]

There were some nice buildings in the old town.











The District Court Building was gorgeous. Based on some on-line photos I have seen I wished I had poked my nose inside. But I tend to steer clear of snooping around court buildings in Europe. There was certainly no indication that visitors were welcome.







The Leipziger Turm - built in the 15th C as part of the city fortifications.



Part of the old city walls



After walking around the centre of town we hopped onto a couple of trams and passed by an area of urban blight on what is obviously 'the wrong side of the tracks' so we called it a day and headed for our unpleasant train trip back to Leipzig..

 

[OZDUCK]

Keeping on with the 'gritty' theme I had heard, and seen on YouTube, about an industrial site in outer Leipzig that had been converted into a home for artistic endeavours so we headed off to visit it. It was about a 2 - 3 km walk and it was very quite because it was a Sunday.

We caught a tram from outside the HBF and hopped off in the district of Lindenau. It was the sort of area that I would cautious about visiting at night. However I note that google says that it is "an up and coming" area. I guess that it is slowly being gentrified but there are still a lot of abandoned buildings and plenty of graffiti - something that is all too common in Germany.







There was a fine collection of Lego was in someone's ground floor windows so I guess they weren't too worried about it being stolen.



There were some interesting buildings there





We crossed over the Karl Heine Kanal a couple of times. Apparently there are boat tours on it in summer.

 

[OZDUCK]

I am convinced that this is the ruins of the mill owners house that was burnt down by the workers after 'trouble at t'mill'. Probably his oldest son had debased a poor working girl and left her pregnant and penniless to die at the door of the workhouse in a blizzard.





We stumbled across this place first. The "focus of its new use is on presenting immersive and digital art". It is housed in an old power station - commissioned in 1901 and abandoned in1992.

Kunstkraftwerk Leipzig

The 100-year-old former power station with industrial aesthetics is an exceptional cultural site for contemporary art, culture and design.

visitsaxony.com

We only had a quick look around as I was really trying to find another place





The wool spinning works were the biggest in Europe for nearly a century and at one stage employed around 4,000 people working 24 hours a day. It closed after German re-unification and has now been converted to host artists studios and galleries.

As I said, we went there on a Sunday thinking that it would be an ideal time for the artists to display their wares to throngs of Sunday day trippers. I forgot that we were still in Germany so everything was closed tighter than when the entire mill shut down. I guess that starving artists still demand have to have Sunday's off - or more likely local restrictive trading laws apply. I always have a laugh at complaints in the West Australian newspaperpaper that the main shops in Perth are only open for 6 hours on a Sunday and this deters the masses of tourist who would , according to them, rush to Perth if it was open all day Sunday. Tell them to visit Germany or France.

It was still a very interesting place to wander around.

Leipziger Baumwollspinnerei – Wikipedia

de.wikipedia.org

Spinnerei Art Centre ♥ Leipzig region

Discover Spinnerei Art Centre - production and exhibition site for contemporary art & culture ► See you soon in Leipzig & region!

www.leipzig.travel

 

[OZDUCK]

The sort of studio there



This group was having their photos taken by an obviously professional photographer at various parts of the grounds.

 

[OZDUCK]

This chimney is dated 1885 - a year after the mill was founded





This, old cemetery created in 1880 was across the road







Part of this old railway station is now a restaurant



The local Catholic Church and school dating to the early 1900's.



For those who can remember the rather lovely NSU RO80 manufactured from 1967 - 77. Unfortunately for NSU it basically caused their bankruptcy due to warranty costs as it used an unreliable early Wankel Rotary Engine. NSU was bought by VW and then merged with the Auto Union Company to form the modern-day Audi. In Australia a few of them were kept running after an engine transplant of, if I remember correctly, the Holden 253 V8.

 

[OZDUCK]

To quote Winston Churchill - It has been said that democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time; but there is the broad feeling in our country that the people should rule, and that public opinion expressed by all constitutional means, should shape, guide, and control the actions of Ministers who are their servants and not their masters.

To emphasise the truth in his words we visited the museum in the former Stasi headquarters in Leipzig. We hired English audio guides which is necessary as almost all of the written information and descriptions inside were in German.

The section of the sign refers the Monday demonstrations against the DDR culminating in the occupation of the Stasi headquarters by the local citizens.



The lobby. The door from the lobby into the offices was originally only able to be opened from the inside.



Across from the museum is the archives office where citizens can access all the information that was collected about them by the Stasi.



An original mural



The main hallway. While displays have been added all the paint, floor coverings etc is original.



A 'normal' office of a more senior apparatchik. All the evidence indicates that most of the people working for the Stasi were 'true believers'.



Stasi officers uniform



Lower ranks uniform issue



Display discussing how documents held by the Stasi were tried to be destroyed after the fall of the DDR. One of the means of disposal was for paper records to be feed into the hopper of the machine on the left. They were 'mashed' together with water to destroy them.



The end product of the destruction attempt