Double-decker tour bus

We no sooner walked out of the subway station than we spotted a tour
bus pulling up in our direction. We jumped on, paid, grabbed a map,
and threw on the headsets.... Berlin, here we come (from a comfortably
seated position!).!

Off to a late start

After an exhausting run of day touring and traveling... We slept in a
bit this morning, had a luxurious breakfast after noon, and hit the
subway system to go and tour Berlin around 2:45pm. Better late than
never, right?

We decided to head to pottsdamer platz in the center of town to see if
we could hook up with a bus tour of the city. Berlin is such a massive
city that we couldn't cover all grounds on foot, and after several
days reading the history ourselves, we figures it would be nice to
have a little doppn feeding for a change.

And on to Berlin

After we were completely saturated with am amazing dinner in Meissen,
we hit the road again... And traveled on to Berlin. A little over two
hours in the car, we arrived after 10:30pm, and were thoroughly BEAT
from another long day of touring, eating and drinking! We settled in
at jana's uncles apartment in a north-east Berlin (quite an up-and-
coming neighborhood, a cross between Fillmore, noe, and the haight),
unwound for a short while... And were asleep in no time!

The site of our romantic dinner...

Main village square of Meissen

Looking stunning as the light was changing, Jana and I found a little
restaurant off the square, and settled in for quite the romantic
dinner, candlelight and all.... Ha!

Our local cuisine treat of the night was tasting the early harvest
wine (pulled out of the barrels before it is fully fremented, so it is
really fruity, unrefined, and has a little bubble to it)... Served
with a fresh fluffy quiche -like dish. Quite delightful, (Jana will
have to fill in the German names later,she I'd fast asleep right now!).

Cobblestone road

We amazingly found parking along this quaint little street, and walked
into the main square in search of dinner...

Touring the porcelain factory, we sure worked up an appetite!

After the porcelain factory, we headed into the town of Meissen
proper. Formerly the capital of saxony (before Dresden), it had the
requisite castle and cute town square.

The traditional rose pattern...

After we were thoroughly saturated by the beauty in the museum, we
were dumped into the gift shop and got to see appreciate the value of
all the fine craftsmanship! Woah.

Mom, this pattern particulary jumped out as being one you would
love... (but don't get your heart set on the full tea set, it was a
mere 250 € per cup and saucer... I didn't quite make that much lady
year! Ha.)

I mean really!

Not my style, but pretty gorgeous!

More amazing porcelain pieces!

Every bit of hand craftsmanship kept running through my head while I
was looking at these pieces.

Next up the Porcelain museum

After impressing upon the visitors the craftsmanship of the work... We
were shuffled into the museum displaying an overwhelming amount of
gorgeous porcelain pieces, many of which were mindboggling after
learning about the process of how they were made! Mom, and Aunties...
Y'all were with me in spirit, as I know how much you would have
enjoyed drooling over these luxurious items!!

Demo room #4

The final demo room showed the process of hand-painting all the finer
details on the pieces after they had gone through an initial glaze
firing. This included the multiple layers of flowers, figure details,
and the addition of the hold and silver trims... Each individudl color
of which needed to be added and cured, or fired in some cases,
individually. Needless to say, after the little demo tour, jana and I
were both pretty overwhelimngly impressed with the fine craftsmanship
of the Meissen porcelain.

Demo room #3

The next lady showed the techniques for hand painting the traditional
designs on the pieces, as well as the underpainting for more complex
designs. At this phase, the pieces have been fired once, and are
sometimes sent through an additional firing to set the underpainting.

Demo room #2

The lady in the second demo room showed the assembly techniques for
the porcelain pieces. Each piece of Meissen porcelain is hand
assembled, and individual workers add the unique details to the pieces
before being fired (fingers, face details, handles, flowers, Etc...
Some of which are cast from molds, and others are created free-hand).

Demo room 1

After an informative movie about Meissen porcelain, we moved into demo
room #1. The dude demo'd how all the porcelain for ALL Meissen pieces
is still hand spun. It is formed into cones, then pressed into one of
the hundreds of thousands of molds that the factory houses. He showed
examples of figurines which are made from dozens of different
pieces... And even gave Jana and I each a baby head after we chatted
him up. I think he was just excited to see girls under the age of 60!
Ha. (definitely a grey haired tour bus destination, but interesting
none the less)

Off to the next castle town...

Back in the car, we drove a few towns over to Meissen, the European
home of fine porcelain... And embarked on a tour if the factory and
porcelain museum.

Neustadt Dresden

We took the train back to neustadt, and I was wishing we had a half a
day to check this area out. It had quite the lived-in feel of the
Haight in SF. Old buildings with graffiti, and funky shops, bars, and
all night food on every block. I felt right at home. But we had places
to go and things to see yet.... So I will have to make a note to
return someday!

The 'Trabbi' Stretch Limo in front of the Semper Opera House

This delightful stretch limo used to be the common means of
transportation in the GDR in its original length. Its shell is
actually made of some plastic compound, and a GDR citizen had to wait
around 10 years to get one . Production has been stopped and the
Trabbi (loving diminuitive for Trabant) has turned into a cult and
collector's item. Or even a stretch limo for a city tour...

Eischecke and Beer

As usual, we needed to fortify ourselves with some local fare: the
famous Dressen Eischecke, basically a local cheese cake with custard.
Yum.

Saxony's rulers on 25,000 porcelain tiles

...depicted from the middle ages until the end of the 19th century.
The tile wall is about 120m long and 4m high, consisting of 25,000
handpainted Meissen porcelain tiles.

Academy of the Arts

Located along the Elbe river, this beautiful academy shows the
importance of the arts in Saxony in previous centuries.

Frauenkirche - old and new

This image nicely depicts the integration of old and new elements in
the reconstruction of this church, the old and new symbol of Dresden.

Church of our Lady (Frauenkirche) in Dresden

The church in this picture was nearly completely destroyed during the
air raids in February of 1945. Only after the reunification in 1990,
discussions to rebuild the church were started. Many believed it
should remain a (destroyed) symbol of the atrocities of war. In the
end , the art lovers and architects prevailed and the church of our
lady was reopened to the public in 2005.

Communist art

Can still be found in various places in East Germany, like this
theater wall.

Nymphs among nymphs...

Guess which nymphs do not belong here...so we walked on.

Another view of the zwinger complex

Old and new

You can see the signs of reconstruction everywhere. Jana is Sitting
above the nymph baths, where the pool seemed to be the original, and
all the surruonding statues were new reconstructions.

Main courtyard of the "Zwinger"

Baroque era compound that was the center of social activities in its
time, adorned with the crown of Poland (also the duke of saxony).
Gardens, glass, fountains, statues, and current day museums.

The main square coming into old town Dresden

Old town from the northern bank of the Elbe river

We walked along the northern bank of the river, and crossed over into
old town on the bridge that leads directly into the middle of town.

Almost completely devestated by WWII, and then 50 years of neglect and
disrepair behind the curtain of communism in east Germany... The "old
town" area of Dresden is quite a contrast of historic buldings all
battered and blackened, with the polish of reconstructed statues,
buildings and ornaments. The most striking contrast were the shiny
golden statues high atop the blackened buildings.

Dresden on foot...

After quite a late evening, Jana and I set out to tour Dresden on foot
(with a little less than the usual spring in our steps).

First stop, still in neustadt, was the post office to get airmail
stamps for all the postcards. Second stop was Pfunfs milk shop. Known
in the guiness book of world records as the most beautiful milk shop
in the world, with more than 300sq meters of painted tiles on the
walls. It was gorgeous indeed... But also a stop on every bus tour,
and so packed with tourists, we went in, and left 5 minutes later. :(