Didjman: June 2011

Monday, June 27, 2011

Canterbury

Dover is beautiful from the water and from above, looking over the city from the cliffs. But is is a depressed place, dirty and not really what I imagined it would be. It is not exactly a destination, but a stop-off point for people going on cruises or passing through to the continent. The English Channel is narrowest between Dover and Calais (which is also why so many battles have been fought here).

We decided to spend the next day in Canterbury instead of Dover. Christ Church Cathedral is incredible! Of course, the pictures are not even close to the experience of being there.

More castle

Inside Castle

More Dover Castle

Exterior of the castle. The main structure is intact and the inside rooms are all staged as they would have been in the "olden days" as my students say.

Dover Castle

A view of the castle in the fog from near our hotel.

We are in London now, and I am behind on the posts. We took the train across France from Germany to the coastal city Calais. From there we sailed on a ferry across the English channel to Dover, England--famous for its white cliffs. The cliffs are part of the reason I wanted to do this. Another reason is that many writers mention Dover in their literature. Matthew Arnold wrote the famous poem "Dover Beach" while there on his honey moon, and Mary Shelley describes the cliffs in her travel writing (and in the novel Frankenstein).

Dover is also very dense with English history--from Roman and Norman invasions (Hastings is close-by--think 1066) to the Napoleonic wars to WWII. The Dover Castle was very interesting. We saw all of the above-mentioned history there in one place. We took a tour of the underground tunnels built during WWII, including the underground hospital. Very eerie.

Last night in Germany

Our last night in Germany was fantastic. Gisela and Wolfgang, with a lot of help from others, made unbelievably good hasenpfeffer (rabbit stew). Using Wolfgang's recipe, I make a similar dish at home with beef, but there is no comparison--not even close. I ate four plates. I could have eaten more....

Horst brought the wine from Huber winery in Malterdingen. The wine is very good, especially the dry red wine. I like this much better than the sweet missouri wine many people like at home.

Sunday, June 26, 2011

More literary stuff...

Herman Hesse is one of my favorites. We visited the town he was born in--Calv (pronounced "callvf"), which is near Stuttgart in the northern black forest area of Germany. The upper-right photo is the house he was born in.