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Ok to start with a couple more pix from Basel, by the old paper mill

And along the riverside

And just a nicely blinged building.

Hanspeter and I went up to Weissenstein above Solothurn in a gondola

step 2

Fairly bleak up there, would usually have been covered in snow

And down below the fog we came up out of

See,I was there

They have signs for folk like Hanspeter and Katrin that fly around these places

Anyway I headed back to Mainz and went to Frankfurt with Birgit and checked out the Christmas markets etc, I have never really had a look around Frankfurt before.

The shopping mall that should be called Vortex

Stayed another night in Mainz with Guido, now I really wonder how this looks after snow.

Have gone to Munich now, this looked great but visually challenged me

And not sure why this has become a Michael Jackson memorial

Tempted by this golden rose

And the Bavarian beer business …

Even managed to go for a run today, having trouble believing that I ran that fast though

And early morning tomorrow morning to get to the airport and meet the Frauen

 

Solothurn today.

 

There was an art super market on in one of the halls, but it was good to see the art surviving on the street too.

Probably back to Germany tomorrow.

Yesterday I went to Basel, while Hanspeter and Katrin went parasailing.

Link below to a bit of the Tinguely fountain at work

img_2249

Mainz -> Hattersheim-> Aarau -> Solothurn.

Left Hamburg on a cool morning with trees looking like puffs of smoke. Not great through the train Window.

The to the Landschaftspark in Duisburg, there are concert areas, climbing walls, scuba diving and probably more, I didn’t have lots of time to check it out fully.

Would be a great place to go in summer with events on.

 

In Hamburg with Oliver from Laos. A chilly steely blue day to get shown around a bit on.

Mulled wine then into the new Elbphilharmonie, a new 900 million € concert hall.

From the 37 Meter high level of the concert hall the views below.

The off to the beach for more mulled wine and viewing the river.

The to a part of the town where some of the anarchist squats still exist.

Wandered along the river and then to the Reeperbahn

Pic below from the bar Heaven 23 floor at Reeperbahn 1

Then  to the Dom, which in Hamburg is a carnival

I agree with Finley that Currywurst is a pretty good invention.

 

When they built the Flevoland Polder they got some artists to create land on it for the occasion.

Yesterday Judith, Christian and I went and checked out a few of the pieces.

I shall add my pix later.

That water was mostly solid

The negative

The positive

The one below “garden of love and fire” was partly missing, maintenance I guess, but the aluminum wall parts were not there.

In some ways you need a drone view for some of them, but Judith says the Observatorium draws a crowd at the solstices and equinox.

Some time less wintery would make quite a difference too.

I am really glad I accidentally became aware these were around me.

Tried to get to the Robert Morris Observatorium but failed, I only noticed that this iconic piece of land art was in the area today, hope to get there tomorrow.

Went for a run in the cold, felt cold and old afterwards. A bit out of practice I guess not having run since leaving home in October.

Yes there is a layer of ice on the water in the pix below

 

Cold and clear day in Amsterdam yesterday.

Amsterdam caters for a variety of tastes

Industrial scale Nutella

And extreme

Sort of conventional

More sort of Amsterdam

Hmm mm!

There is heaps more to see there, all I did was a canal tour and then walked around for a while.