A Day in Nuremberg

We started our river cruise with an official tour of the town of Nuremberg where the ship was docked, a place made famous during modern times for the Nazi trials after World War II.  We drove by the Palace of Justice where the tribunals were held, as well as the attached prison where infamous Nazis such as Hermann Goring and Rudolf Hess were sequestered throughout the process.  


Nuremberg is also famous for staging Nazi rallies held from 1927-1938, an important part of Hitler's propaganda machine.  

We got to tour what's left of the old grandstand and parade grounds area.  I've included a B&W Nazi pic I found of the grandstand with the three swastika banners flying above it taken during one of the 1930s rallies.  It's in this place that Hitler stood and surveyed hundreds of thousands of troops, spewing his venom about racial superiority as well as world domination.

We continued our visit in Nuremberg with a tour through the old town.  The city was systematically bombed in 1945 by the RAF and USAF so that over the course of an hour, 90% of the medieval city center was destroyed.  What a shame - way to go, Adolf.


Below are some of the beautifully restored buildings we saw.

The gothic Frauenkirche (Church of Our Lady) was built on a corner of the main market square in the 14th century and it contains a little glockenspiel.

Below is St. Sebaldus church, named for the 8th century hermit and missionary who is the patron saint of Nuremberg.

The following building wasn't any more interesting than most of the other facades until you looked up at the top two narrow windows in the upper right corner.  Love the happy smiley face!

Look - a river runs through this part of old town.  And a building sits over it, with some cute little windows in the roofline.

Check out this odd bit of wall art - a mythical griffin doing Lord only knows what to that smaller creature.  Intriguing, yet also disturbing.

Plus an interesting old door with some statuary above it on either side of the shield.  Compare the entry column on the left and right.  Can you tell it's built on a street that slopes downhill towards the square?

Beer, glorious beer, in these man sized pitchers sporting a convenient handle with which to down your brew of choice in the local biergarten.  Never fear - he drank every drop.

On the corners of buildings in both Rothenburg and Nuremberg, I noticed statues and collected several pics of them as we toured because I thought they were unique.

A bit of trivia about Nuremberg - the Faber Castell pencil company was founded on the outskirts of the city in 1761.  We drove by the old factory and family palace in Stein on our way to tour Rothenburg the day before.


Another thing I noticed in Nuremberg is how the cemeteries all look as if the local florist has just paid them a visit.  I'm thinking graveyards wouldn't play a big role in German horror films or halloween scenes since they're so beautiful.  It makes you want to take a stroll through the headstones just to enjoy the floral arrangements.