Respected thoughts

For such a small city, I can't think of anywhere that has punched above its weight more than Weimar. Home to Goethe, Schiller and Liszt, the place where the Bauhaus movement began in 1919, and also where the Weimar Republic, Germany's first (admittedly failed) democracy was founded in the same year, it's fair to say that Weimar has been at the forefront of European history for the last 200 years. Before going there, I knew it was highly unlikely that I would be able to see everything in one day, even if I made as early a start as possible. The reality is that nearly all of the museums in Germany are open from 10am to 6pm and I knew Weimar would be a museum-heavy place. In the end, despite hitting the city shortly before 11am, I barely touched half of the things I wanted to see. All that means is that I'll have to come back.

Weimar is only a 10-minute train journey from Erfurt so after another tasty breakfast of chicken balls, potato rostis and Bierwurst sandwiches, I traipsed over to the railway station. My feet were throbbing somewhat due to the 21,000-plus step day the day before, but fortunately they did not have blisters. At least not yet. As a precaution, I ended up buying some blister plasters as soon as I got to Weimar, calling in on the pharmacy on the main road leading from the station to the city centre. The throbbing got worse as the day progressed and there was many a time when I just needed to sit down on a bench and rest my feeties. Fortunately, there were no blisters, but I am amazed that I used to be able to do whole weeks of touring like this, yet now I struggle with barely two days.

The Bauhaus Museum was my first port of call - a concrete slab of a building that's on your approach into the city. I had been to the Bauhaus Museum in Dessau, where the movement moved to in 1925 after being kicked out of Weimar, and indeed the most fascinating part of the exhibition was about this. Despite claiming to be apolitical, there were clear socialist themes running through Bauhaus. There were masters and apprentices rather than teachers and students, while they built some of the very first social housing for Germans in the 1920s. Of course, the politics of that time was fractious and the Bauhaus attracted a lot of criticism, particularly from the right and far-right of German politics at the time. Weimar was one of the places where the Nazis got their first foothold (along with Dessau as it happens) but conservative influences conspired against them throughout the 1920s. They were beholden to local parliaments for their funding which, with the rapid inflation of 1923, caused huge problems. In that same year, they put on an exhibition to highlight the studio and all their projects, and this too was fascinating. As well as architecture (which became an increased focus as the 1920s wore on), they did things like music and theatre shows with characters that don't look too far removed from other films from the Swinging Twenties. There were 1920s science fiction and lifestyle films shown on the walls, giving you a glimpse into life of that time, while the aesthetic of the Bauhaus movement which focused on geometric shapes and form was explored. We also got to learn more about some of the leading members of the Bauhaus, including its founder Walter Gropius, who withstood a savage beating from the press at the time. The 15-minute chronological running of newspaper excerpts highlighting the pros and cons of the Bauhaus were particularly fascinating and, as usual, I can't help but feel that people on the right didn't realise what a good thing they had until they had chased it out of town. The main complaint was Weimar was too small a place to have such an avant garde institution, but it also attracted some of the best artists and architects from the period to such a small place. The renown it gave Weimar was real, and seeing this play out socially had clear resonance with today.

As well as the politics, a lot of other things were covered too. The ethos of the Bauhaus, in particular, was highlighted and we got to see some of the architectural and interior designs that they promulgated. The use of tubular steel or the rounded lamps that have since become synonymous with 1920s style originated with this movement and so it was fascinating to see all of the things they created. It must have been an exciting if tumultuous period and it was one I found incredibly absorbing, so much so that despite this museum only having three modest floors, I ended up staying there for over four hours. There was also a lot of focus on design and painting, with the use of specific shapes and colours to denote certain feelings. It was truly a unique way of doing art and craft at the time, and you can see why stuffy conservative types didn't like it.

I had bought the Moderne Card, which entitles me to year-long access to three museums in the city. When I bought it, I just wanted to save money on the day, but the possibility of returning made this excellent value. In many ways, I should have gone the whole hog and gone for the card that covers every museum, but I did make use of the three modern museums that my Moderne Card covered. At €19, it was also a decent price. My next port of call was the Neues Museum, on account of it closing at 4pm, rather than the usual 6pm. Formally the Grand Ducal Museum, this impressive building was constructed in 1869 and was one of the first museums established in Germany. It covers the period before the Bauhaus, and specifically the two schools that merged to form it in 1919. The exhibition "Ways to the Bauhaus" covered this best, as it focused on pieces by the Weimar Painting School as well as avant-garde painters such as Claude Monet and Max Beckmann, who were supported by Harry Graf Kessler, the director of this museum. There is a wonderful Monet painting contained within, while there was also an exhibition dedicated to the cult behind Friedrich Nietzsche. There were three separate areas to the museum and, like with the Bauhaus one, there were audio descriptions available on your phone by scanning a QR code. I found this particularly useful, and this museum did a great job at setting the artistic tone in the area prior to the Bauhaus movement. The staff here were also really friendly, while I found the basement exhibit on book binding and the printing press particularly fascinating. I had never really thought about how books are bound before, so to go through the process in a step-by-step manner was good. I also enjoyed the big golden statue which greets you on the way in. There was also a lot of focus on Henry van de Velde, a Belgian painter, architect, interior designer, and art theorist. He introduced art noveux to Belgium and designed the Kunstgewerbeschule in Weimar in 1907. It was one of the few architectural projects he did. He moved to Weimar in 1899 while in 1907, he established the Grand-Ducal School of Arts and Crafts under the patronage of the Grand Duke Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach. He suggested Gropius take over the group in 1919 after stepping down due to the First World War.

I hopped on a bus for the next stop, partly because it was nearly half an hour walk away and partly because my feet were in flames by this point. Having the Deutschland Ticket was also a huge convenience and soon enough I had made my way to the Haus Am Horn. This was the first ever house built by the Bauhaus movement, as part of their 1923 summer exhibition. Unlike many houses of the time, it had running water, a bath, and toilet facilities, while the kitchen was designed in such a way so everything was to hand. The idea was that the lady of the house would save time during the cooking process as she wouldn't have to scurry here, there, and everywhere to get what she needed. The interesting thing about this squat cubic building was that the living room was right in the centre, with all of the other rooms off to the sides. The children's bedroom was actually the biggest and it was interesting that the man and woman had different rooms of their own. The house was built for a family of three and again I found it fascinating, although the €7 was perhaps a bit steep (it was included in the price of my Moderne Card so it was perfectly fine for me). Most of the furniture in here was replica - indeed the house had been lived in as normal up until 1999 - but the child's jungle gym climbing frame, bookshelf and desk ensemble was an exquisite and efficient use of space.

The Haus Am Horn is on the eastern flank of the Park an der Ilm, a UNESCO World Heritage site as it's an English country garden heavily influenced by Goethe. This means there are quite a few sites to see dotted about, while it was pleasant to walk in the weak springtime sun. There was something of a bitter wind, but it was great stumbling across various follies and other things. The statue of William Shakespeare was something of a shock, but not as much as the stone column around which there was wrapped a snake. I didn't like that at all, largely because it was quite realistic. The main sight though was the Roman Haus, the basement of which contains the original snake stone column, largely to preserve it from weathering. There were stone knights down there too along with a stone lion sphinx. The Roman Haus itself is in Classical style and looks like a Roman villa. It was the summer residence of Duke Carl August, who was a friend of Goethe's and essentially designed this whole complex with him. It was great having a look around this small yet beautiful building. The summery yellow salon (a study with stucco lustro and animal-themed wallpaper) or the stunning blue salon (used as a ballroom and audience chamber with Duchess Anna Amalia's portrait dominating the wall) were probably my two favourites of the six, but then the right half of the building looked very paired back. I imagine it would have made for a fantastic summer residence.

Around the park, I also got to see the Soviet Cemetery, where some of their war dead are buried. This is from the final days of the Second World War, and it's interesting to note how drab and grey the gravestones are as opposed to the Commonwealth's stunning white. Going into the cemetery, there is a huge gate upon which two Soviet stars are adorned, while the gate which forms part of the pedestrian entrance has a hammer and sickle latch which I thought was a nice touch. Around the corner from here stands the Tempelherrenhaus, which was once part of the orangery. This used to be used by the Weimar court for balls and concerts, but it was mostly destroyed in the Second World War. It's now left in ruins as a monument of war, but the building must have been huge, and incredibly ostentatious for the times.

While strolling through the park, I also stumbled across the house of Franz Liszt. The Hungarian composure lived in Weimar twice, and it was in this house where he resided for the second time, up until his death. Ever since Liszt had left, the Grand Duke Charles Alexander was desperate for him to return and he was given the Hofgärtnerei (court gardener's house) as an incentive to come back. The interiors were designed by the finest designer of the age, while a grand piano sits majestically in the main living room. The house only has five rooms, and one of those was for his valet, but they are stunning. Liszt came back to give masterclasses to local residents, as well as students from further afield. He spent the summers of the final 17 years of his life in Weimar, saying he felt like it was coming home. There were a few striking paintings in this house, not to mention the clocks, which were also particularly fine. While the living room and study area were quite sumptuous, the dining area and his bedroom were both more modest and austere. The people running the museum were particularly friendly and let me stay as long as I wished - I only discovered this place at 5:20pm but you only need half an hour to look around. They also complemented me on my German, which was nice. Indeed, I had to use German throughout this three-day stay, barely speaking English, which was a nice challenge. Alas in some of the museums, particularly in Erfurt on the Sunday, I wished my German was much stronger as I could get the gist of the exhibitions and what I was being told, but not everything.

It was past 6pm by time I finished in the park, and I realised that I still didn't get to see everything here, with the underground Parkhoehle closing to the public. The entrance was still open but I didn't fancy being stuck down there, so I decided to press on. I also realised that I hadn't seen any of the main city by then either, so I decided to walk into the Altstadt to see what I could see. The southern fringe of the city, which I was entering from the park, is dominated by the castles. Sadly, most of these were closed for renovation, but it was still good seeing them. There's a huge black imposing clock tower outside one of them, while the Stadtschloss was very similar to others I have seen in the likes of Wurzburg. Opposite this, there is a Doggy Spa, which I thought would be of interest to Wilma and Henry, but I never sent the photo. In this area, there is also the Herzogin Anna Amalia Bibliothek, which is the jewel of the city. The ornate Rococo Hall, constructed in 1766, is the highlight with the three-story hall housing around 40,000 volumes. A fire broke out here in 2004, destroying 50,000 books, but the restoration has been executed perfectly. Alas, I didn't realise you had to book this for a specific time around a week in advance, so by the time I came around to booking, all tickets had sold out for the day. This, along with missing out on all the Goethe and Schiller stuff, makes another visit to Weimar desirous.

With everything closed, I decided to kill some time just walking around the city. There is quite a lot to see, while the place is so compact, that I had it covered within an hour. I did check out Goethe and Schiller's houses, where their respective museums are situated, while Weimar's central Markt was a delight. The market itself had shut up shop for the day, but this afforded a greater view of the wonderful buildings. The neo-Gothic Rathaus is undoubtedly the highlight and I rushed back from touring to hear the rare Glockenspiel made from Meissen porcelain chime the hour at 7pm. Porcelain bells are very rare and they had a more earthy, timorous tone. Interestingly, off to the side of the Rathaus, there was a British ER postbox. This was donated to the city by Stratford-upon-Avon upon Weimar being the European City of Culture in 1999. It's a nice story and a rather odd thing to see in the middle of a German city.

The Renaissance Cranach House, painted a dark green or grey, flanks the side of the square opposite the Rathaus and is now a theatre. It is so-named because it was where Cranach the Elder spent is final days, before his death in 1553. Even the pubs here are steeped in history, with Zum Schwarzen Bären being one of the longest-standing and best for traditional local food, and the Hotel Elephant, which has welcomed both Napoleon Bonaparte and Richard Wagner. Down the road, George Eliot also spent some of 1854 in Weimar.

Three minutes up the road, around some winding cobbled streets, you come to the Church of St Peter and Paul (Herderkirche). This is an impressive white building that is almost too big for the square it is sitting on. The interior was quite nice, although the lady inside did try and get me to come back for their 11pm Easter service, which sadly I couldn't do. It is named the Herderkirche as there is a statue of the theologian, philosopher and poet situated outside. He was another influential period during the time of Weimar Classicism, which included the likes of Goethe and Schiller, yet he is not as well known as those two.

Wandering on, I also stumbled across the theatre in which the Weimar Republic was founded in 1919, with a museum dedicated to this directly opposite. This is on one of the main squares in the west of the city and I was glad to see this was more lively than other areas, which were starting to die once the shops had closed. To this end, I had tried to check out Hoffmann's Buchhandlung, which was founded over 300 years ago, but they closed at 6pm and thus the shutters were all down. On the square near the theatre, there was also an interesting clock with metal discs which recorded the temperature and air pressure, in a way that I thought was particularly unique.

I had a meal booked for 8pm at the Watzdorfer Geleitschenke, a wonderful timber-framed building tucked in one of the side streets. Like the night before, I thought it wise to book a table in advance, but this time they had no issues seating me. Indeed, with my barking feet and having seen everything I wanted to see of Weimar, I got there about fifteen minutes earlier yet they were still happy to seat me. They put me in the back conservatory, with one other group, so once they had left, it was a bit odd eating there on my own. It was also stiflingly hot and although when asked I had told them I wasn't too bothered where they sat me, in a way I wish I had been with more people. I grabbed a beer from a local brewery, which wasn't as nice as the one I had the night before, and opted for the schnitzel. This isn't particularly Thuringien, but it was close enough and was what I fancied. The portion size was huge, with a load of greasy diced potato too. There was some nice caramelised if slightly soggy onions and a modest salad too. Despite having had no lunch, it was still a hefty amount of food, which made running for my bus difficult. I couldn't be bothered walking the twenty-five minutes back to the station and I was just in luck, leaving the restaurant just in time to catch the half-hourly service. Again, the Deutschland Ticket is a wonderful thing. In fact, the food arrived so quickly, that I ended up being back in Erfurt about one hour earlier than anticipated. There were some loud kids on the station waiting for the stopping RB20 service (the train I had taken in the morning had sailed straight through), while it being a few minutes delayed, meant more endurance time on the platform. Still, I got back to my hotel just before 9:30pm with the thought of maybe going to the Irish bar over the road at some point. Alas, once I had got back to the room, I couldn't really be bothered and the bar looked a little too busy to be enjoyable. In the end, I just got a beer from the vending machine downstairs in the hotel bar (although the member of staff did have to cajole me into getting it as the touchscreen said the alcoholic pilsner wasn't available when there were clearly bottles there) then headed back to my room, taking a shower and heading to bed early. It had been another long, tiring, but rewarding day.

This Easter weekend, I headed down to Erfurt, the capital of Thuringia, as it's a city I'd wanted to visit for sometime. Wolfie was due to come with me, but due to his wireless engineering exam snafu, he had to stay behind and revise. This was probably for the best as it allowed him three days of quiet study time while I wasn't getting in his way. He booked the exam for 9pm on Easter Sunday - an odd time yet a time that was available - and the good news is that he passed, thus justifying his decision to stay behind. This still meant that it was a rather lonely weekend for me in the centre of Germany, but I suppose individual travel means you can do all the things you want, when you want, with ultimate freedom. I certainly took advantage, although after three days and 55,000 steps, my feet are not thanking me for it. They still ache today.

My train was at 19:54 from Hauptbahnhof on Thursday evening, allowing me to finish work and even cook a Hello Fresh meal before setting off. Wolfie walked with me to the train station, but needed a wee en route, so we said goodbye at the annoying traffic lights outside the Ibis Hotel. I boarded a train towards the main station, any train, then found out I had about 45 minutes to kill once there. I grabbed two expensive 500ml cans of Berliner Kindl - I got two as the €7 deal was far better than the €4.50 individual price - and enjoyed one of them on the train. As Wolfie was not using his seat, I thought I'd have an empty one next to me for the duration of the trip, but it was a busy train and I let a nice lady take it. 

I got into Erfurt shortly before 9:30pm and made my way to the hotel, some 10-minute walk away. I had rebooked from the Mercure to the H2 Hotel on account of a cancellable booking and only needing a single room, which meant that Wolfie did not have to pay for the hotel costs. Walking around the disturbingly named Juri-Gargarin-Ring was an experience, but it seemed that Erfurt was largely dead. I got to my hotel and checked in, noting that it was on the corner of the delightful Hirschgarten, which has some ornate buildings down its sides and has a children's play area in the middle. There was also an interesting Irish bar directly opposite my hotel which I wanted to try, but in the end did not. The room itself was fine, but the open space outside must have been drafty as I could hear the wind whooshing past my window throughout my three-day stay. It was either that or the #4 tram that trundled past my window every 15 minutes or so. On the Saturday evening, I ended up saving a dozy duck from being run over by one of them. The driver had stopped yet the duck just sat there. One lady had tried to remove the duck before giving up, allowing me to step in. The tram driver beeped his thanks.

On the Thursday evening, I decided to go out for a short while, knowing there is a craft beer bar called Die-Bier-Rufer on the other side of the city. This is quite a good bar-cum-bottleshop as it has a wide range of craft beers on the shelves. It also has four beers on draft, although two were the standard German types rather than being anything craft. I went on both the Thursday and Friday evenings, but it was so busy both times, I had to sit outside. It was a little too cold for this and on the first day, there was a group of six men just standing about and smoking, who were a little intimidating when on one's own. Therefore, I only bought one drink here on both days, but on the Thursday I did take a can of the Ultjie Brewing Company's Bird of Prey IPA to take back to the room with me. While walking to the bar, I spotted a number of top sights, which I was going to take a much closer look at on the Friday. I also got to see the famous Bernd das Brot statue outside the main Rathaus. It is here because KiKA, the children's channel, is based in the city and so there are statues to many famous characters dotted about the place. I saw Die Maus and Elefant on the fantastically-named main street of Anger, Kobold Pittiplatsch near Krämerbrücke, the friendly Fledermaus Fidi up at the Zitdelle and Tigerente chilling on one of the main streets. Alas, I missed out on quite a few of the other characters though including Tabaluga, Rabe Rudi, Jan & Henry, Der Goldene Spatz, Herr Fuchs & Frau Elster, Moppi & Schnatterinchen, KiKANiNCHEN and Käpt'n Blaubär. Just more reasons to come back to the city.

The other advantage of the H2 Hotel was that breakfast was included, meaning I got up on most days. This was a standard buffet affair, but there were chicken meatballs and potato rostis too. I had those along with some warm bread with cheese and meat fillings. This was enough for me to survive most of the day, at least until dinner time. Alas, I was so tired on Friday morning, that getting up early didn't really help things as I went straight back to bed after eating breakfast. The bed was so comfortable to be fair and I spent the next three hours wrestling with myself, demanding I get up. In the end, I arose at about 1:15pm, a little pissed off that I'd spurned half a day, but aware that I am nowhere near as young as I used to be and my permanent sense of fatigue is making short trips like this all the more hard. In the end, I'm glad I did what I managed to do.

I found an online walking tour of Erfurt, which made sense to do as Friday was Good Friday so many things were closed. This is always a risk, particularly in Germany, but with lots of architectural delights in Erfurt, I didn't think that would matter too much. However, many of these were churches and, with it being Good Friday, were closed for services and the like. Still, I did get to see an interesting ritual at Saint Martin's Church towards the end of my five-hour walking trip as I heard the sound of clopping before seeing a carpet being paraded into the church. This is a Catholic church so I'm assuming its a Catholic thing, but it's not one that is known to me. At least I could observe this though, as the Dom was inaccessible due to masses, meaning I had to revisit on Sunday (Easter Sunday I worried would be fraught too, but services tend to be in the morning, allowing for afternoon tourist visits). 

I started at the Hirschgarten and wandered through the city from there. This saw me see the likes of Westliches Wachhaus, a baroque three-story complex that highlights the wealth and grandeur of the city in the 16th through 18th centuries. This is next to the Haus Vaterland, the state capital of Thuringia. It is worth noting that the state parliament is in a modern glass building that was about forty minutes' walk out of town, so I couldn't be bothered going to see it. After seeing the sights around Hirschgarten, I walked down the fantastically named Anger, which is one of the main thoroughfares of the city. There are many fine buildings here, including the yellow-fronted Angermuseum, which houses modern art. The shopping centre Anger 1 looked a little like a train station while there was also a statue to Martin Luther outside the Kaufmannskirche - Sankt Gregorii, Luther having lived in Erfurt from 1501 through to 1511.

There are a few waterways cutting through Erfurt, including the River Gera, so there are quite a few ornate stone bridges. Roßbrücke is one of the oldest preserved natural stone bridges in the city, but it is the Krämerbrücke that is the most famous. This medieval arched bridge is one of the few remaining bridges in the world that have inhabited buildings, with them having been here for over 500 years. The original stone bridge dates from 1325, while it now forms a very lively shopping street between two of Erfurt's major squares - Benediktsplatz and Wenigemarkt. I had actually seen the Krämerbrücke on the Thursday night as it is around the corner from Die-Bier-Rufer, but there was a fat man shouting to his friends, which made me feel uncomfortable. The full majesty of the structure can only be appreciated in the daylight, while there was also the Stiftung Museum here which gave a few details about its history. You could also go down into one of the arches here and have a view of the river below. Rathausbrücke, which runs immediately parallel to Krämerbrücke, allows you to appreciate the structure side-on, while there are maps drawn into the concrete paving slabs down here too.

This area used to be the Jewish area, with the Mikwe around the corner. This ritual bath dates from the Medieval period and it is possible to enter via guided tour. Alas, the timings weren't right for me, so I just had to peer in from above through a glass partition they had cut through. Its main use was for ritual purification after coming into contact with the dead, blood or other objects that were considered unclean in a religious sense. There used to be a rather large Jewish community in Erfurt, with Jews and Christians living side-by-side. However, the pogrom of 21 March 1349, when Jews were accused of poisoning well water during a plague and were massacred, saw around 900 die. By 1354, there were some Jews living in Erfurt once again, but the municipal council revoked the protection of the Jews in 1453, with all Jews leaving the city around this time. By 1454, Jews were no longer tolerated in Erfurt. All of this was covered in the Old Synagogue, a fascinating building that was built in the 11th century, but was closed from 1349. It was used as a warehouse for the next 500 years and a restaurant in the 19th century. You can still see the green wallpaper and stucco statues dating from that time. There used to be skittle alleys too here. It was restored from 2003 to 2009 as an exhibition to highlight the Jewish history in the city. The interactive displays detailing the travails of the 14th and 15th centuries were particular fascinating, as were some of the printed manuscripts in Hebrew during that period. On the ground floor, there were displayed some archeological artefacts discovered around the site, including a stunning gold engagement ring with the synagogue in relief. While I enjoyed walking around here, I was also keeping a close eye on Middlesbrough FC, who were hosting Millwall in a top-of-the-table Championship clash. Typically, we went 1-0 up and peppered their goal with shots, but again failed to score, conceding a last-minute Millwall goal so they won 2-1. This probably ends our automatic promotion hopes, despite having been in the running for so long, which put a small dampener on my day. I pretended not to care though.

The neo-Gothic Rathaus, built in the 1870s, is a stunning sight although Fischmarkt, the square upon which it sits, is quite small. I stumbled up here on Thursday en route to the beer place and I was quite surprised this was one of the main squares in the city. Opposite it, there is the Römer, a statue in the form of a Roman warrior. He is holding the city flag of Erfurt in his right hand. I had also seen the Neue Mühle (New Mill) on the river on the Thursday evening too. This is a museum which is currently closed, and features the last functioning water mill in the city. There used to be sixty of them. It is called the New Mill as it was reconstructed after a fire in 1735. Around the corner, towards my hotel, there was also the imposing Barfüßerkirche. This was the old centre of Erfurt and the building is significant because it's largely in ruins, having been bombed in 1944. The choir was restored in the 1950s, beside the nave's ruin, but it has largely been left as a monument to war. It reminded me a lot of Coventry Cathedral and I was dismayed that it wasn't open to the public, or at least it wasn't at any point during my three-day stay in the city.

Domplatz is one of the main squares in the city, and it has the cathedral, a church and the citadel towering over it. Sadly, I couldn't get a full view of the square as there is a fun fair sitting in the middle of it. This obscured my view of the Erthal-Obelisk - an 18-metre-high monument erected in 1777 on the occasion of the first visit of the Archbishop of Mainz and Erfurt city lord Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal - nor the Minerva Fountain as both were obscured by attractions. The fair itself, which I wandered around on Sunday (it was closed on Friday as it was Good Friday), was typical of the type you get in Germany with the usual rides and concessions. I swear I had seen some of the very same rides in Spandau, while there were the usual eateries selling langos, almonds, garlic bread and bratwurst. The Thuringer Bratwurst, which is famous throughout Germany, comes from here and I did manage to try one at a traditional place overlooking the fair ground. This was in a permanent concession though and it was very much like all of the other sausages I had had in the country. On the Friday, I did walk up to the cathedral and adjacent church, but both were closed for visitors. I couldn't do the guided tour of Erfurt Cathedral's giant bell, the Gloriosa, either. On Sunday, I opted to have a sit down and a Bratwurst instead of doing this, on account of my aching feet. After being shut out of the churches, I went up to the Citadel, but the main attractions here were closing within forty minutes and I was advised by the kind lady on the front desk that it would be better to come back another day. Therefore, this was my first port of call on the Sunday.

This left me with a few things to see on the walking tour, most of them churches. I did enjoy getting lost in the winding cobbled streets of the city, while history oozed everywhere. The Sibyllentürmchen is a pleasant enough devotional column, built in the 1370s in Gothic style. It sits opposite a Tierpark that was closing when I got there. The bright yellow Christuskirche (SELK) was a bit of an anomaly in the suburbs of the city, but it was a striking building nonetheless. Meanwhile, the Theater was a giant concrete monstrosity and the Brühler Garten a pleasant enough small park in the heart of the city.

With it being Good Friday, I thought it best to book a meal in advance. Having gone through all of the recommendations, I settled on Zum Goldenen Schwan (The Golden Swan) conveniently opposite Die-Bier-Rufer. I had booked a table for 8pm, giving me an hour back at the hotel to recharge (both my phone and my body). This was just as well as I was starting to feel the need to go to the toilet during the final hour of my walking tour, which got progressively more uncomfortable the more I wandered. Once relieved, I had a quick nap, then headed out to the restaurant, where I arrived bang on time. The man manning the reservations was confused when I told him I had a booking, with another member of staff pointing out that I did indeed have a table reserved (although to be fair to him, my name wasn't appearing on his booking sheet). Anyway, he led me to my table and I ordered their Saisonbier, a chewy toffee and caramel offering which was probably the best traditional-style beer I have ever had in Germany. Upon asking what the 'Hunter's Luck (Jagdglück)' meat was for the day, I was told it was wild boar instead of deer, so I opted for that. This was served with Thüringer Klöße, the traditional potato ball dumplings, which soaked up the gravy quite well. The meat was served with cranberries, which cut through the richness well, but it was the brussels sprouts in rich Semmelbutter that really stole the show. They were so sweet and rich, possibly the best sprouts I had ever tasted. The food was very quick to be served, meaning I was in and out within 45 minutes, but I still enjoyed every bite. It was definitely a good choice of restaurant, even if the portion size was huge. Due to this, I could only manage a single beer at Die-Bier-Rufer, but drinking on your own is never good anyway. This saw me head back to the hotel just before ten o'clock, after a long and tiring, but ultimately rewarding, afternoon.