Our second stop in Germany was in Garmisch Partenkirchen. It is a lovely town nestled in the Alps, with glorious views all around. Our temporary home was the Edleweiss Hotel.
We drove back into town and explored the downtown area. We had discovered that
Garmisch-Partenkirchen was the town that composer Richard Strauss
called home. To celebrate his birthday, the town has a festival every
year. We had arrived in time for this musical festival and on our walk downtown, we went to the ticket office and purchased tickets for an orchestral performance. At the time, we did not know much about Richard Strauss, but thanks to YouTube and the internet, familiarized ourselves with some of his work and I recognized a few pieces.
Also when we were downtown, I found the fabric store I planned to visit! It was just there, on the corner, waiting for me. Grasegger's is not primarily a fabric shop, they custom make drindl's, a traditional dress for German women. The clothing in this shop was fabulous, beautiful and priced accordingly! (out of my price range!) Fortunately, I was interested in purchasing cottons for my quilt. Once again, Vince was very helpful in picking out fabrics. Once again, I believe he was just trying to make sure I did not spend too much time or money in the store!
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| The shop was beautifully organized. |
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| All of these cottons were fun just to look at. |
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| I loved how they were color coordinated. |
We had dinner and then ate some fabulous ice cream cones as we walked back to the hotel for the night.
The next morning, we were up early for our trek to Munich. It was a lovely drive through the mountain. Our destination was the town hall, where the Glockenspiel brings in each new hour with a musical display! The musical performance went on for more than 10 minutes. We were there at 12:00 Noon, so perhaps it was a longer display because of the time. It is hard to imagine working near this beautiful clock and hearing it play this musical performance every hour! It was very hard to get a good video of the clock, but we did get some wonderful still shots of the building. Additionally, there were two mimes in the square who were extremely entertaining! The one we were standing near appeared to be a bronze statue/fountain. When a person would walk up to him, he would move slightly and pretend to pour water on the person's head. The other mime appeared to be a marble statue. Whenever someone approached her, she would move gracefully and blow kisses!
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| Square in front of the Glockenspiel |
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| Glockenspiel |
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The figures on the top are the king and queen, watching a jousting match.
On the bottom are dancers who dance with joy when their knight
wins the joust! |
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| This mime looked like a marble statue! |
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| Vince drove 123 MPH on the autobahn |
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| Remember the Alpaca Jam in Australia? This is a Bovine Jam! |
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| We thought this sign for Tennsee, was amusing! |
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| Hotel Edelweiss |
We ended our evening back in Garmish, with a fabulous dinner and then the Richard Strauss Concert. We were pleased with the music and I enjoyed the orchestra very much. The pieces played were rather long and we did find it odd that the audience did not applaud in between the pieces, nor did the orchestra or conductor seem to expect any. It was unusual!
Thursday, we arose early (yes, again!) and made our way to the Partnach Gorge. The Gorge was declared a natural
monument in 1912. The walkway takes you right along the Partnach river. It is loaded with waterfalls, rapids and beautiful rock formations.
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| There were also tunnels to walk through |
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| the river looking back into the gorge area |
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When we reached the end of the gorge there was a riverbed
just filled with rock towers! |
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| Olympic ski jump at the Olympic Stadium |
After we left the gorge, we drove to Oberammergau.Oberammergau is well known for woodcarving and the Passion Play.
There we visited the shop of Toni Baur
http://www.oberammergau-woodcarving.com/
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| There were rooms FULL of beautiful nativity sets |
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| The details were awesome |
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| The room of crucifixes was a little overwhelming! |
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| We liked the climbing men so much, we bought one home! |
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| This dog reminded us of Lizzie! |
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| Front of Pilate house |
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| Front of house including gardens |
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| side of house |
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| side of house |
The town performs The Passion Play every 10 years. It is a major
event and one that everyone is involved in. There are glorious frescos
painted on the buildings throughout the town. In particular is Pilate's
house.
http://www.oberammergau-passion.com/en-us/the-oberammergau-area/the-village/the-village.html.
Our last day in Germany, we decided to try and see if the view from Zugspitze was any clearer, so UP the mountain we went again! It was just as exciting as the first time, and fortunately, there were less clouds and more mountains to see!
This is one of my favorite views. The sign on the right lets you know that New York is 6504 kilometers away. Can you see it?? :)
Thus ends our Germany adventure. It was a wonderful combination of nature and culture and history. We spent a lot of time in Germany, but it is not enough.
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