German Royalty

Have you ever wondered what happened to the line of royalty that once existed in Germany and the various states that made up the country; probably not. But, in our travels, we’ve learned that these royal descendants are very much alive and active in German society. It’s an interesting thought to think that if things had evolved differently these people would be kings and emperors. Here are a couple examples.

In Bavaria, the country, and eventually the state, the Wittlesbach family reigned from 1180 until the end of World War I in 1918. During that time their family members included two Holy Roman Emperors, Kings of Hungary, Denmark, Norway, Sweden and Greece, in addition to the Dukes, Electors, and Kings of Bavaria. The Wittelsbachs built magnificent castes and palaces throughout Bavaria such as Nymphenburg, Linderhof and Neuschwanstein. The last royal ruler of Bavaria was King Ludwig III who ruled from 1913-1918. That all came to an end when Germany lost World War I and, by German law, royal titles were no longer officially recognized. To the right is the Wittelsbach family coat of arms.

Today the head of the Wittelsbach family is Ludwig III’s great-grandson, 78 year old Franz, Duke of Bavaria. Interestingly, also as a descendant of Charles I of England and a member of the House of Stuart, according to the Jacobite view of English royal lineage, Franz is the legitimate heir and rightful king of England. Unmarried with no children, Franz lives in an apartment within the Nymphenburg Palace in Munich, the once summer home of Wittelsbach kings. He’s a senator of the University of Munich and an honorary member of a number of civic, religious and scientific organizations within Germany. None of those sound like they pay much so I’m assuming he’s inherited a tidy sum. Again, had things been different he could very well be wearing silk stockings and pink satin pants.

OK, it’d be nice to be king of Bavaria but what about Emperor, that would really be sweet. The House of Hohenzollern, established during the 11th century, were the Dukes, Counts and Kings of Prussia. When Germany was unified after the defeat of France in 1871 they became the Emperors of Germany. The last reigning Emperor of Germany was Wilhelm II, Kaiser Wilhelm, who was a driving force that led Europe to the first world war and a strong proponent of Germany’s military during that war. The Kaiser was forced to abdicate at the end of WW I. Despite the abdication, the Hohenzollern family never relinquished their claims to the thrones of Prussia and Germany. At right is the House of Hohenzollern family coat of arms with the Prussian black eagle crest in the center.

Today, the great-great grandson of Wilhelm II is the head of the House of Hohenzollern, Georg Friedrich Ferdinand, Prince of Prussia. Here he is to the left with the family's Hohehzollern Castle in the background. The 35 year old Georg Friedrich just married for the first time in 2011. He works for a company that helps universities bring their ideas and innovations to the commercial market. (That’s gotta be fun for that CEO, telling his friends the emperor works for him.) He probably doesn’t even need to work since he’s been declared in German courts as the primary beneficiary of a trust established for the descendants of Wilhelm II. I’m sure that’s nice but he could have been the Emperor and, given the nature of 20th century Germany, who knows how big that empire might have been, if things had happened differently. Just saying . . . what if?

Trier & Mehring

Jeff and I spent last Saturday checking out some sights in Trier and then the evening with friends in a winery gasthaus in the town of Mehring on the Mosel River.

Trier is the oldest city in Germany, founded around 16 B.C. and, according to some historical documents, a settlement may have existed here as early as 2000 B.C. The city sits on the shores of the Mosel River near the western German border shared with Luxembourg. Because of its location, Trier, over the centuries, has been part of France, Prussia and Germany. Probably the city’s most famous son is Karl Marx, author of the Communist Manifesto, born here in 1818.

The most famous sight in Trier is the Porta Nigra, an ancient Roman gate built around 200 B.C. The gate got its name from the black, sandstone used in its construction. Today the Porta Nigra sits at the northeastern end of the city’s main shopping street.

Trier’s pretty, main market square.

We’d received e-mails warning us of a protest in Trier during the days leading up to the weekend. Well, this is them. About a 100 young people protesting international anti-piracy laws. We couldn’t quite figure out what there is to protest about that. Overall, they were a very well behaved group under the watchful eye of a number of German Politzei.

This is two of Trier’s main churches. On the left is the Cathedral of St. Peter, the oldest church in Germany, and on the right, the Liebfrauenkirche, Church of Our Lady. It’s quite interesting that these two churches ended up right next to the other. They are so close together they appear to share a common wall.

Beautiful stained glass windows inside the Liebfrauenkirche.

Almost right across the walk path from the Liebfrauenkirche is the Weinstube Kesselstatt. It’s a great place to sample the local wines and some excellent German faire.

This huge press is inside the Kesselstatt.

Nice little tray of German delight. We’re just south of Bitburg so the beer is an obvious choice, plus a couple of different Riesling wines.

Here’s the home of Karl Marx.

A plaque on the wall of Karl Marx’s house shows that he was born 5 May 1818. Interesting, 5 May, Cinco de Mayo!! I bet old Karl was quite the party animal with a 5 May birthday. Oh yeah, 5 May, Jeff’s birthday too.

The Constantine Basilica in Trier built around 300 A.D. Nice barn shaped building with little cross on top. Hope they didn’t pay the architect for this design because I don't think they got their moneys worth.

On the south side of Trier are these ancient Roman baths built in the 4th century A.D.

Front side of the Roman baths.

Near the edge of the city is this Roman amphitheater built around 100 A.D. Originally, this amphitheater was incorporated into the city wall. There’s an interesting story of the city under siege by a hoard of barbarians. The Romans opened the amphitheater gates allowing the hoard to pour into what they expected was the city. However, they found themselves on the floor of the amphitheater with the opposite gates locked tight. Above, along the rim of the amphitheater, where Roman archers who proceeded to decimate the barbarian forces.

OK, we’re done with our visit to Trier and on our way to Mehring. Driving along the Mosel in the late winter, without the leaves of the vineyard vines, these thousands and thousands of wooden stakes really standout. When you see the vineyards like this you can understand why WW II aviators feared bailing out over these vineyards with the possibility of being impaled on one of these stakes.

Our destination in Mehring, Sebastiani.

Sebastiani has a long affiliation with the US Air Force in Europe. He sells his wines at the major bazaars in Germany, Ramstein and Spangdahlem. For years, he’s made specialty labels for his bottles of wine. Here’s a label he made for the 53rd Tactical Fighter Squadron, an F-15 Eagle squadron stationed at Bitburg Air Base. The 53rd no longer exists and the last remnants of Bitburg Air Base, grade school, BX and commissary will finally be closed within a few years.

Here’s another specialty wine label that Sebastiani produces for the 81st Fighter Squadron, an A-10 Warthog squadron, at Spangdahlem Air Base. Sadly, the 81st will no longer exist in about a year.

We tried all of Sebastiani wines. This one had a particularly interesting nickname, Angel’s Pee. I’m not sure if that name creates images of good or bad taste.

Our host for the evening, Alfons Sebastiani.

The next morning before we left, Alfons gave us a tour of his cellars. These are old wooden barrels but he also had stainless steel and fiberglass. Combined, this cellar holds enough wine to fill 60,000 bottles.

Well the drive home was only 45 minutes from Mehring so we had plenty of time to rest up from a great night at Sebastiani's. These wine events are a lot harder to recovery from compared to the beer events but maybe that's a nice problem to have.

PROST!!

German Monastery Breweries

As far as we can tell there are only three operating monastery breweries still in Germany. They are, from north to south, Kloster Weltenburg, Kloster Sheyern and Kloster Ancechs; all in Bavaria. There are other breweries that were once associated with a monastery such as Tegernsee and Weihenstephaner (which is the oldest operating brewery in the world beginning operations in 1040) but, although the brewery still operates, the abbey, for various reasons, no longer exists and so they can't be considered a monastery brewery.

Below is a map that shows where these three monastery brewies are located in Bavaria. At the top you can see Nuremburg, in the upper right corner of the map is a gray line showing the Czech border, bottom right, Austria, and just northeast of the blue pin is Munich. The green pin is Kloster Weltenburg, the red Kloster Scheyern and the blue is Kloster Andechs.

Kloster Weltenburg is situated on a peninsula in the Danube River just below the high granite walls of the Danube Gorge. This Benedictine monastery was founded in 620 by Irish or Scottish monks near what is now Kelheim, Bavaria. They began brewing operations in 1050 which makes them the oldest operating monastery brewery in the world. Weltenburg Kloster Barock Dunkel has been selected as the world’s best dunkel beer at prestigious beer competitions.

If you happen to arrive at Weltenburg on the west side of the river you'll have to take a quite unique ferry across the Danube to access the kloster, there are no bridges for quite a few miles in either direction.

The Kloster church is a magnificent example of Baroque designs built by the famous Asam brothers.   Interestingly, one of the breweries best beers, which we have in our fridge right now, is called Weltenburger Asam Bock, a great doppelbock dunkel; double dark beer.

A large beer garden courtyard serves the Kloster’s wonderful beers and Bavarian dishes and if the weather isn't agreeable they have a great gasthaus to serve all the same.  You can see from the photo above that Kloster Weltenburg has a quite majestic setting which makes it a very special place to visit and an amazing place to sample some of Germany's best beers.

Kloster Sheyern is a another Benedictine monastery in the Bavarian town of Sheyern. The monks began brewing beer in 1119 for their own consumption and some of the lucky local people.  In the mid-1800's the monks moved their brewing operations to Augsburg but in May 2006 the monastery’s newly renovated brewery began operating once again on the premises of Kloster Sheyern.

Scheyern was considered the monastery of the Wittelsbach royal dynasty who swayed power in Bavaria from 1180 to 1918. Today Kloster Scheyern, in addition to a monastery and brewery, also houses a vocational high school. Plus, if you notice in the picture above, the monks have a pool too.

Above, you'll see the empty square by Kloster Scheyern. No check there because we haven't been here . . . yet. It's on our list for this summer. I'm sure we'll let you know about it right here on our blog. So all we know about Scheyern is the pictures we've seen on the Internet and what we've read on their web site. We haven't met anyone that's actually visited Kloster Scheyern either. But, from the pictures it looks like a great place to visit with a very nice beer hall and beer garden.

Kloster Andechs is situated on a hill that has become known as the Holy Mountain. This Benedictine monastery has been brewing beer since 1455 and, by many accounts, their Kloster Andechs Doppelbock Dunkel is the best beer in the entire world. The Kloster is located in the town of Andechs on the eastern shore of the Ammersee just a half hour drive southwest of Munich.

Originally, a castle sat atop the hill but that was leveled in 1080 because of an assasination and much political intrique. Today, the interior of the abbey church, which dates from the mid-18th century, is another example of amazing Baroque designs, much of it decorated in shiny white porcelain.

Kloster Andechs has a large, dark wood, typical Bavarian beer hall for inside eating and drinking, a big outdoor sun deck where you can sit and see the Alps on a clear day and, part way down the hill, a very nice beer garden.  With all that is some of the best beer in Germany, an maybe the world, and certainly the best schwein hax'n eaten to date.

We've been making pilgrimages to Kloster Andechs for almost twenty-five years now. It's one of our favorite locations in all of Germany.   That little phrase on top of their logo says, "Food for the body and soul" and we'd have to agree because everytime we leave Kloster Andechs we're always very happy and quite full.

Macht Nichts Sticks

Along the highways in Germany, the autobahn and secondary roads, you’ll see these white and black posts. They're a plastic road edge marker and because they’re along all the main roads there are millions and millions of them throughout Germany. Americans have affectionately named them Macht Nichts (mokt nix) Sticks. Macht nichts means it doesn’t matter or it makes no difference. In reference to these posts, they’re macht nichts because if one is taken out or run over by a passing vehicle it’s no big deal, there’s another one just down the road. So, they’re macht nichts sticks.


Here's a little video with Jeff's explanation about the macht nichts sticks.

Jeff and I happened to find a dead macht nichts stick, just laying there on the edge of the road, back in December while Kelly was visiting.  We figured it'd be a great souvenir that would look good standing near our pool in Texas.  So we devised a clandestine operation to pick it up.  The plan required three people; one to drive, one to make the pickup and one to document the event. Here's a daring black ops, right here in central Germany.

The macht nichts stick weighs almost nothing, other than the metal foot that attaches the post to the base anchored in the ground, as mentioned, it's a hollow, plastic post. Now, the trickest part of any foreign abduction, getting it out of the country undetected.

Sunday In Germany

We had a bit of snow the last week here in Germany and with that comes the inevitable salt on the roads. The snow was just enough to make things messy as the day warmed up and because of that most of the cars now had a nice coating of salty crud. So last Sunday I drove down to the local gas station to run my car through the car wash. The key word there is Sunday. I already knew that Sundays, by law, are a noise sensitive day but I didn't think it applied to something as quiet as this car wash, which, oh by the way, is a drive in, doors close, wash car, doors open, back out and leave, so in reality, a no noise operation. But, silly me, we're in Germany.

The big Sunday noise law is the ban on long haul trucks on the autobahn and secondary roads. Truck drivers have to park their trucks wherever they might be at midnight Saturday and can't move them again until midnight Sunday. The autobahn rest stops and big roadside gas stations become a huge truck parking lot on Sundays. Of course, this is an issue for countries that border Germany too because now, along the borders trucks must stop and wait to enter the country on Monday.

Mowing your lawn is strictly verboten on Sunday here in Germany. With noise reduction laws on Sunday a gas powered lawnmower is certainly an obvious criminal but the restriction goes beyond that. Even electric lawnmowers, which are popular here and make about as much noise as the typical house fan, are not to be used. Should you violate this noise restriction, even with your quietly purring electric mower, at the very least you'll get a quite obvious disdainful look from the German folks walking by or, more likely, one of them is going to tell you of your extreme misdeed.

I'm pretty sure loud talking is banned in Germany on Sunday. Come to think of it, we have certain friends, based on noise, that would be banned in Germany on Sunday . . . Goof.

You don't dump your recyclable glass in the town's central collection points on Sunday because of the noise.

You don't vacuum out your car on Sunday.

No hedge clippers on Sunday.

No fireworks on Sunday.

No noise on Sunday, damnit!!!!!

When it comes to a German Sunday, just don't annoy anyone with your noise and you should be OK.

Hunting in Germany

Let me begin with the fact that I know almost nothing about hunting. So almost all of the information below comes from a few friends of ours who are hunters and hunt here in Germany. As you might expect, there's a lot of rules and regulation to hunting here and because of that it's a very interesting subject even for a non-hunter like me.

If you’ve ever driven in Germany, whether on the autobahn or country roads, you’ve seen these wooden, stilted structures out in the farmer’s fields. They look like some kind of hunting blind and that’s exactly what they are. They're called a Hochsitz, high seat. The story behind them and the regulations that govern their use is quite interesting.

German Hochsitz (High Seat) hunting blind.
All land outside the cities, towns and villages in Germany is controlled by the local Waldmeister, Forest Master, which most Americans refer to simply as the Forest Meister, a German, federal employee. A farmer or land holder may own a property but the Forest Meister controls the hunting and wildlife conservation rights to that property. The Forest Meister leases those hunting rights to a Jagdpächter (game tenant), also called a Revier (pronounced, ra-fēr) Owner. So if a farmer wishes to hunt on his own property, he must obtain the hunting lease to his own land and become the Revier Owner of his land. Along with the rights to hunt a property, a Revier Owner is expected to control the population of deer, wild boar etc. by taking a minimum number of animals per year. The Forest Meister establishes those numbers and monitors each Revier Owner’s progress.

Should a herd of wild boar enter a farmer’s property and tear up one of his crops he makes a claim with the Forest Meister for compensation. After evaluation of his claim, if warranted, the farmer will be reimbursed by the German government. Because of this process, it’s important to the Forest Meister that his Revier Owners adhere to their contract and control the population of the various wildlife that inhabit the German countryside.

That’s where these hunting blinds come into play.  As mentioned, they're called Hochsitz, High Seat.  The Revier Owner constructs these hunting blinds. Some are quite sturdy and provide good protection from rain and wind, others are just a ladder with a seating ledge at the top. Apparently the Revier Owner can place the blind pretty much wherever they choose because you’ll often see them in the middle of a field which requires the farmer to plow, plant and harvest around the structure. These hunting blinds are used for all types of game, deer, wild pigs, fox and birds.

Jeff standing on the ladder to a Hochsitz (High Seat), a German hunting blind.
"Hunting structure. Entry forbidden under punishment. Game tenant."
Speaking of Americans hunting here in Germany, service members here have to take numerous classes and prove their knowledge of German hunting rules and their shooting proficiency before they’re allowed to hunt here. Once all that’s done, which can take about six months, they have to find a Revier Owner who will allow them to hunt on their leased land. Even after that they must prove their skills over a period of time. Until that probationary period is complete they are not allowed to keep any game they shoot, all of it being turned over to a local government office who will distribute whatever meat might be available. All animals shot in Germany, whether kept by the hunter or not, must have certain organs turned over to a government office who will test them to ensure they are absent of any toxins or radiation poisoning.

Another interesting thing about a Jagdpächter or Revier Owner is there are two types of leases; low game and high game. Low game is for small deer, wild pigs and smaller. High game is catagorized as red tail deer and elk. Some Revier Owner's may lease a particular piece of land because they want to nurture a herd of large deer so that at some point in the future he may have a spectacular trophy buck. In that case, he may want to lease the hunting rights of that property for ten years which can cost as much as 10,000 Euros.

A rather crude Hochsitz.

Same Hochsitz up close.

Bringing in your own guns to hunt in Germany is complicated. Guns have to pass an inspection and, should it fail, the gun is confiscated never to be returned. For that reason, it's best to buy a pre-approved gun here in Germany and, of course, they're not cheap.

Wild boar in Germany are quite a nuisance. They can travel 20-30 kilometers a night tearing down fences and uprooting crops. Over a half million of them a taken by hunters each year in Germany.

Once a hunter is allowed to keep the meat or a trophy of an animal that he's shot it's not a simple matter of just cleaning it and taking it home. He has to register the kill and then pay a fee for whatever he keeps. Of course, the more the trophy is desired and the better quality of the meat and the amount will dictate the cost. For a single animal that can run into several hundreds or thousands of Euros.

Well, that's about all I know about hunting in Germany and maybe a lot more than you wanted to know. But I found all this quite interesting and a great illustration of how some things are done quite differently here in Germany.

German Station Wagons

In the US the station wagon is pretty much a thing of the past. With the introduction of mini-vans and SUV’s there’s very little demand for the station wagon. But, here in Germany, and across Europe, the station wagon is still very popular. I think all major automobile manufactures make a station wagon that’s sold here in Europe; Mercedes, BMW, VW, Audi, Saab, Volvo, Peugeot, Renault, Citron. Even Asian car makers build a station wagon that they sell here in Europe but not in the US; Mazda, Toyota, Nissan, Hyundai. Two of the most popular station wagons in Europe are sold buy American owned manufacturers Ford and Opel (owned by General Motors) even though they sell no such vehicle in the States.

Opel

European station wagons are not like the behemoth land cruisers that once roamed the highways of America. Like most cars in Germany, these station wagons get up and go. It’s very common to be cruising along the autobahn at a 100 mph and have a station wagon of some sort blow right by you.   On top of that, a high percentage of these station wagons are diesel; room, speed and economy.

VW

Audi

Volvo

BMW

Mercedes

Yes, there's a whole different mindset about a lot of things here in Germany and Europe and the station wagon is one of them.  It's here to stay.