Welcome to our 2002 June/July Washington Chorus tour of Germany and Austria. The trip took us to Freiburg, Ehingen, Munich, Linz and finally Vienna. We sang four concerts, saw many beautiful sights and tasted many wines. This travelogue started with pictures taken with my Kodak 4800 but after it "lost its focus", (a condition a Bob Shafer singer dreads,) the slack was taken up with pictures taken by Jen Pierce, Beth Riggs, Glenda Finley and a fantastic photographer from Ehingen. Finally, Ken Bailes loaned me his backup Olympus for the remainder of the trip. Many thanks to all of them. This page serves as a table of contents, and we begin with

Freiburg, our Jet-Lag Recovery site.
Then; France winery & more Freiburg
Ehingen welcome;     Concert & party
Munich Walking Tour   Ottobeuren Abby
Munich to Linz    Linz Walking Tour
Linz Concert & Trip to Vienna
Vienna, Day 1   Danube River Cruise
Vienna, Day 2  Final Dinner

Comments or suggestions

The map below shows the routes of our first few days. We landed in Frankfurt, and immediately took a very sleepy ride south to Freiburg.  None of us remember much of that trip, because it was 2 to 5 A.M. body time.

We were immediately impressed with the lovely (although tilted) view out of our window. We were sure we would get to see this impressive building up close because we were scheduled for a walking tour in a few minutes.
 
At Freiburg, we were welcomed by the Hotel Dorint, a very modern building just five minutes from the old part of town.
This is a nice view of the entire hotel.
WRONG!!  This nice tour guide took us the opposite direction to the old section of Freiburg. Apparently, the church we admired so much was only a hundred or so years old and not of interest to tour guides.

These symbols on the pavement were made with stones which look very narrow, but are the edge of long stones that reach several inches deep. For that reason, they have lasted a long time without needing replacement.

Here ends our brief tour of Freiburg. We returned at the end of the next day to take some pictures from the inside of that marvelous cathedral. We couldn't go in the day before because of a Very Holy Mass to which we weren't invited. These pictures come later. Now, we turn to our wide awake tour of Colmar, a small village in France. On the map above, just move West from Freiburg into France, and you are there!
Ingrid, our tour guide, was very helpful and full of information. She told us lots of information about all these points of interest and if we hadn't been so jet-lagged, we might have remembered it. I noticed that Amy Solomon took voluminous notes. Amy, where are you when I need you?
    A Gargoyle Goiter.

 A very pretty house with flowers everywhere  -- and a very efficient transportation system.

These two pictures, above and left, are of the central square in Freiburg.

The magnificent cathedral on the right is the one our neighbor, Ron, told us to climb. It was a very hot day, but we decided to try. The steeple was closed the day of our walking tour, but we went back the next evening, only to get there too late to make the climb. To the left, note the red flowers above the clock.
Below, Martha stands before a very colorful set of houses.

June 27, Our excursion into Colmar, France

. Below is a map of central Colmar. We decided to follow the numbers beginning with 1, the Unterlinden museum. 
The museum houses the Issenheim Altarpiece by Matthias Grunewald. The model above pictures it.
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A closer view. From here, the graphic detail is very disturbing. A spike is driven in the leg of the left most figure. 
Does anyone know the meaning of the flags below?
Elaine was quite taken by all the ornate signs.
Another intricate sign on the right. These buildings were strikingly beautiful. We tried to get into the Collegiate Church of St Martin (#10),  but the exterior doors we tried were locked. It was also very hard to get a picture of the church from the outside that showed the beautiful roof, but just when we had to get back to our coach, a view presented itself below that I had to photograph. 
This square, Place d' unterlinden,  evokes the linden trees which surrounded the Gothic style buildings in the 13th century. The water in the middle is an artificial canal which provided the town's water supply.
The Unterlinden Museum surrounds this pretty grassy square.

 

A time exposure of the Grunewald. I tried to lean against another display to steady my Kodak, but my elbow came dangerously close to another priceless relic and I was told to desist.

 
From there, we tried to follow the map above in numerical order. I was faithfully following Elaine and Andy this day.
Below are close ups of six of the gargoyles seen below the window in the above building.
On the left, the flowers below the window have these clever storks with bright red beaks and feet.  Just down the road, Elaine and Andy could have bought some for themselves. I guess there is some symbolic meaning to storks in Colmar.

I waited a considerable length for that green truck to move. It was parked very close to me and, frankly, ruined the view. But my patience was rewarded when it drove away. Doesn't this sight make you drool for Murphy's Irish Stout?

 

NEXT: Trip to a Winery and the rest of Freiburg.

Table of Contents