Moving through Europe

It has been awhile since we posted our adventures in Europe, we will attempt to bring you up to date with this posting.  If you are on Facebook,  we have posted pictures and narrative about our travels hoping to keep everyone appraised on whereabouts.  It has been quite the trip as we travelled in the former   East Block communist countries and marveled at the architecture, history, culture and the natural surroundings of these beautiful countries.  Our last posting was in the Lake Balaton area of the, the largest lake I Hungary.  We travelled north to the capital city of Budapest, where we where immediately impressed with the rich history and architecture of the city.  Unlike some of the large cities of Europe; Budapest was not destroyed in WWII, so we actually felt like we were taken back in time to the early 1900s.  Budapest's history as the capital of the Austrian-Hungary empire, the European center of trade throughout history, the Nazi and Russian domination and control, and today as a vibrant capital and enterprising city speaks to the resiliency of these people.  We left Budapest and ventured back into Slovakia to visit the small village of Velky Folkmar, the ancestral home of Maryann's family.  We were amazed at the welcoming we received in the village.  We were treated like visiting heads of state.  The towns people went overboard to help us.  Even though it was a Saturday,  the town's Manager took us to his office, called his secretary to come in to work to provide us with drinks and attend to any needs we would have, called his son to come to his office to translate for us, called around the country to assist Maryann with her family history, gave us two personalized books on the town's history and then gave us a tour of the village (in the rain)!   To say we were impressed would be putting it mildly.  Leaving the village we drove to Kraków, the home of Schindler's factory and the story of Schindler's List depicting brutality of the Nazi's regime and how Oskar Schindler save thousands of Jews from the death camps.  Auschwitz-Bergen concentration camp was close to Kraków so we drove over to visit the infamous death camp.  The horrors of the Nazi's brutality came to life , man's inhumanity to man, the pain, suffering and deaths of a million Jews and another 100 thousand non Jews was too much to comprehend.  We were overcome with emotion as we toured this memorial to what the Nazi plan of Jewish extermination really meant...it also caused us to pause and think of what ISIS is doing now in the Middle East.  We can only hope that savagery of history will not be allowed to be repeated.  Our next stop was Warsaw, the capital of Poland.  We stayed in the smallest hotel room we have ever saw...but it had all the conveniences of larger hotel rooms, just smaller.  The Jewish Ghetto and memorials throughout the city tell the story of the plight of the Jews in WW11.  This is also the city where we attended a Baroque Organ concert by the famed organist Przemyslaw Kapitula, he is the Continuator of the musical tradition of Warsaw Cathedral and Saint Anne's Church in Warsaw.  This was our first time actually hearing Bach, Surzynski and Ernst on an organ...amazing!  We were walking through the Center of town square and got caught up in a protest rally for the better treatment of horses in Poland.  On a more somber note we watched the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknown in Warsaw.  The most fascinating part of Warsaw is the amazing architecture.  Since Berlin was a six hour drive we decided to stay in the city of Poznan where we crossed a big bucket list item...we went to the croissant museum.  Actually, it was interesting and we had a lot of fun, trying to make St Martin Croissants.  We also enjoyed our evening meal on an outside cafe in the market center.  On to Berlin, the divided city is divided no longer and you can not tell the former East Berlin zone from the West.  We saw all the tourist things including the Brandenburg Gate, Check Point Charlie, the Berlin Dom (an Evangelical Curch that merged the Lutheran reform and United Churches and the burial place for the German royalty.  We stayed in the old East Sector in a Holiday Inn that had a 5 star rating and was as any in West Berlin.  The people we met throughout Berlin were friendly, outgoing and extremely helpful.  After Berlin we made it to Weimar, the birthplace of Goethe, the Weimar Republic and where Martin Luther actually preached,  in the Church.  We stayed  in a romantic hotel with a vineyard, homegrown vegetables gardens and a history dating back 300 years.  One of the highlights of our adventure is looking up the ancestral towns of our forefathers.  We have visited Pat's in Lancaster, England and Maryann's in Velky Folkmar, Slovikia and now we have visited the ancestral towns of both the Cannode's and the Mohns (George's mom and dad's forefathers).  We were surprised in Langenselbold when we actually met a couple named Mohn and spent some time with them.  Only 3 miles away was George's dad forefather's ancestral town of Huttengasse.  Small world when these families were united in Ohio in 1939.  Now we are staying near the Luxemburg boarder and will attend the Memorial Day services this country conducts in memory of the Americans who fought and died to save their country.

  

Budapest, gave us an old world feel with the massive government buildings, electric tram cars skirting around the city, and century old buildings still in use today as offices, apartments and quaint neighborhood stores.  

 

Tom and Pat discussing where to go next as Maryann documents our visit to the city on the Danube.  We rode on all the modes of public transportation in Budapest, from the trams and buses to the rail and boats....very efficient way to visit any city in Europe

 

Maryann standing at the bus stop in her ancestral home of Velky Folkmar, Slovakia 

 

Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, "the death camp" of Nazi Germany.  This "museum" stands as a reminder of the horrific actions of man and a testament that we should never forget and guard against this occurring again....but today we have monsters in the Middle East that are as bad or worse than the atrocities of the Nazis....ISIS!!!!!

 

 

All that remains of the infamous Warsaw Ghetto walls surround the Jewish population of Warsaw during the Nazi occupation.   There are reminders throughout Warsaw of the treatment and disposition of the Warsaw Jews but the wall is a vivid reminder of the inhuman treatment these people suffered!

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Pat and Maryann doing their impression of Lucy and Ethel while making St Martin croissants in Poznan.  This was a stopover between Warsaw and Berlin and we enjoyed the Croissant Museum's light hearted approach to making their world famous St. martin's croissants.

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Standing in front of the Brandenberg Gate in the former Soviet zone of Berlin

 

The Berlin Dom, a magnificent church that houses the sarcophagus of the Kings of Germany!  This a high church and Tom and I climb to the Dom!

The beauty of the Berlin Dom can not be captured in a picture.

 

 

The church in Weimar where Martin Luther actually preached his sermons, also the home of the German writer and statesman lived and died, it is where the Weimar Republic was born (Weimar Republic was the government of Germany before Hitler), and Schiller, the German poet and philosopher died.  We took a side trip to Weimar and stayed overnight in a Romantic hotel just outside of Weimar.

 

George standing with Wilhelm and Rosemarie Mohn.  This family is at least a twig on George's mother's family tree.  Visiting the Mohn ancestral town will be one of George's memories of our adventure in Europe.

 

The famous Porta Nigra, the oldest andr largest Roman structure north of the Alps built in the present day Trier, Germany from 186 to 200AD

We are winding down our European adventure with only three weeks left, but we still have one major goal and a few minor goals to accomplish before we board the plane in Heathrow on June 15th.  Our reason for coming to Europe was to spend June 6th at Normandy, we had originally planned on spending about three weeks over here....see how old people lose track of time.  We will wrap up our almost three month adventure by driving to Luxemburg for a Memorial Day observance at the Luxemburg American Cemetary where the people of Luxemburg pay their annual homage to the men who freed their country and General Patton who is buried there.  From there we plan to either drive to the Atlantic coast of France or go up to Normandy early to observe their various city celebrations of the Normandy beaches invasion.  After Normandy we will visit London, friends in Bristol and northern England and relax the night before our plane trip home at Heathrow.  Thank you all for following our adventures, we have a remarkable time, lots of laughs, a few close calls on the roads, seen some of the most beautiful architecture, followed history and cultures in 10 countries and through it all made memories that will last the four of us a lifetime.  We hope you stay tuned for the wrap of of our adventures in France and England they maybe the best adventures of our trip.