Day 2 - November 30

Last night was a relatively early night for both of us.  I went to bed just before midnight.  Was up at 6:00 which is quite normal for me.  I must be catching up on sleep because the mattress I thought was soft, now isn't!  My hips were a little sore this morning.

Opened the curtains to freshly fallen snow.  Looks nippy out there.  All the years of living in Ontario and New Brunswick during the winter came back to me fast.  Love being inside where it's warm.  Not caring for the cold wind that hits you in the face when you step outside.

For anyone who lived in Lahr, Germany most of the apartment buildings in this city remind me of the buildings we lived in.  Most of the downtown core of Dresden is all apartment buildings.  Reminds me of Berlin.  Same thing there.

I forgot to post a picture last night so will do that now.  As you know, if I see something that looks interesting I will go off the beaten track and check it out.  As we walked in town last night, I noticed a set of stairs leading underground.  At first I thought they would take you to catch the S Bahn.  I didn't, however, see a sign for the subway.  I also saw two people at the bottom of the stairs and what looked like a lit up painting.  Well, that was enough to get me to go take a look.  Poor Cathy just followed me down.  lol  Got to the bottom of the stairs and saw a piece of Dresden's art installation behind a big piece of glass.  The two people already down there told me it was Dresden's old sewer system.    The guy said he's lived in Dresden three years, walked by the stairs many times and it was the first time he noticed them so he took a look too.  Kinda neat to get a look a Dresden's underground.  Water was still running in the troughs too!

We left our hotel around 10:30.  Our goal today was a couple of things.  Cathy wanted to buy some Christmas light stars.  You know the ones I talked about earlier.  We went back to the store where they are sold for a third of the price vendors at the market kiosks want.  We also wanted to find other Christmas markets scattered around the city.  We succeeded in both.  We walked a lot.  With the wet snow on the ground, we had to tread carefully.  Neither of us wanted to fall.

Before today, we went to two markets.  One was the Dresdener Winterlichter.  There a couple were trying to get a selfie of them kissing under the mistletoe.  I asked if they would like me to take their picture.  They did.

The other market we saw last night was the Striezelmarkt.  That's the one where I climbed the stairs to take a picture.  That market has been in existence since 1834.  This year is it's 589th anniversary.  The market is there year round but isn't Christmas themed.

Today, we found three other markets.  You'll see them below.

This was a cute market.  A lot of food vendors too.  Germans aren't impressed with how many kiosks are selling food.  It isn't like the old days.

Look at the size of this piece of beef!  Crazy knowing that there will be enough customers to use it all up.

While standing outside the bells of the nearby churches started ringing.  For me, it's an essential experience of any trip I make to Germany.  The bells ring on the hour and at noon, really sound out as you'll hear in this video:

The Frauenkirche was beautiful.  It was set up for filming of a Christmas Advent concert by an orchestra on December nd2.  That was fine.  We really wanted to go in to seat down and get warm.  I lit two candles for my two aunts, Joan and Mary, who passed away several months back. 

Frauenkirche has an interesting history.  We saw a large rock outside of the church and went to see what it was about.  The rock is actually what remained of the church when it was bombed in WWII.  The placque was an account of what one of the church's inspectors witnessed upon arriving at the church.

The church was completely destroyed.  It was reconstructed between 1994 and 2005.  Money was sent to fund it by people all over the world.  Here is the block of cement from the original building.

This is an aerial view of what the church looks like today.  I only took two pictures inside.  With all the television equipment that was set up there was no sense taking pictures.  If you're interested in its interior, you can always Google it.

On our last trip together, Cathy and I went to a church in Hamburg.  I was able to convince her to pretend she was praying so I could take a picture.  Not one to miss an opportunity, today I asked her to do it again.  I said it has to be a tradition when we travel.  She was a good sport!  lol

Next market is called Stallhof - Medieval Christmas.  We liked this one the best.  It was simple and cute.  There is no constant sound from loud speakers, hardly any electric light and no plastic.  Around 50 grocers offer historical goods and craftsmen work with tools and materials from the late Middle Ages.  It's located in the courtyard of the Dresden castle.  No, it wasn't open to go inside.  Most former palaces, etc. are all being utilized for something else.  It too was bombed in WWII and was only rebuilt a few years ago.  It was almost completely burned out - only part of the historic green vault and the basement rooms remained intact.  So this reconstruction is amazing.  You would never know it isn't an old building.  The first picture shows you the courtyard where the Stallhof market is set up in December.

The next pictures were taken today at the market.

This was a kiosk where you could have a tarot reading.

Isn't this a lovely way to serve food?  Christine, next time I'm at your place for a meal .... just sayin!

Cathy ordered a hot chocolate.  There was a dark,  medium or light hot chocolate.  She said is was delicious.  Best she'd ever had.  She thought our mom would have really liked it.  The hot chocolate was 4 euros.  The deposit on the mug was 5 euros.  If you brought the mug back, you got your 5 euros back.  Cathy kept the mug.

Nearby was a wooden rocking pig.  Cathy thought I should get on it for a picture.  I thought she should.  Who won?

Cathy collects angles.  She found a darling handmade angle and bought it.  It's the blue one with its hand at its mouth.

We then headed across the bridge to the next market called Augustusmarkt.  It was quaint.  All of the kiosks were housed in the exact same type of medieval looking tent.  The market ran two city blocks.  Again, a lot of food was for sale.

We decided it was time to have something to eat.  It was 3:45 pm.  We hadn't eaten since breakfast.  I knew there was a Hofbrauhaus in Dresden so that's where we had dinner.  It was expensive but worth it.  We have leftovers for dinner tonight.  When we walked in I spoke in German to our male waiter.  I asked if there was a menu written in English.  He said, I could scan the QR code to go to the website and see it in English.  When he came back to take our order, I tried to explain we just wanted a schnitzel and fries not what was written on the menu.  He kept saying that was on the menu but it had cheese in it.  We went back and forth until I finally said "Do you speak English?".  He answered in perfect English "Of course!".  I said "Why didn't you say that?"  He said because I spoke German!  lol  Anyway, it was sorted.  We modified the expensive veal cutlet and it was 28.00 Euros each.  Ouch but worth it.  We have a lot leftover for supper tonight so it's no big deal.  BTW, today is Friday, December 1.  Yesterday's blog is being posted today.  Back to Hofbrauhaus waiter.  I took a couple of stealth pictures of him.  He was very pleasant.

We both had an original Munchen beer.  It was good.  The only time I have a beer is when I'm over here.  Our meal came and it was delicious.

The big mug of beer is called a maß.   It holds just over a litre 

of beer.

The next two pictures are before pictures of our meal:

After pictures:

Dinner was done so it was time to head back to the hotel.  We were both very tired.  Knowing we're heading to Leipzig to see more markets made it easy to say "Let's go.".

Here's a picture of the outside of the hotel.  The word Simmel is the grocery store.

The elevators are used to enter the hotel.  The doors next to them is the entrance to the grocery store.

For items you put in the fridge, you're asked to fill out a label with your name, room number and the date you're leaving.  That way, whoever cleans out the fridge knows what items can be thrown away.  Pretty slick, eh?

When we got back to our room, I was almost to the point of thinking I wouldn't make it.  Took my shoes and flopped down on my bed.  I didn't move for about 15 minutes.  Cathy captured the moment.

That's it for November 30th.

Steps today - 20,784