Category Archives: Europe

A Prodigy of Grandeur and Delicacy

Did I say we would be going inside the Strasbourg Cathedral on Friday? I lied. It’s Monday, and we’re still lingering on the steps. But I can’t help it. The facade of this cathedral is one of the most beautiful … Continue reading →

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The Big Sleep

When we place a city on the imaginary globe in our minds, we tend to think first in terms of weather. Kaiserslautern, Germany, has a wonderfully mild climate: the average daytime temperature in winter here hovers several degrees above freezing. … Continue reading →

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The Last One Standing

It wasn’t the prettiest medieval castle on the Rhine, or the biggest, or the richest, or the most famous. But the Marksburg is the only castle in the whole middle-Rhine region that didn’t get destroyed. All the others had to … Continue reading →

Posted in Europe, German history, Tourist destinations | 2 Comments

More whimsical Germany

Speaking of that sense of magical fun and good humor that often emerges in German public art, here is a little charmer who resides two doors down from my apartment. She’s peeping out at the world from underneath the mailbox, … Continue reading →

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Whimsical Germany

From an American point of view, German culture often exhibits a streak of whimsy. My introduction to this came before I arrived in Germany, back in 1999. I was paging through a coffee table book on Hanover and encountered the … Continue reading →

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