On Sunday, May 17th I took a train into Leipzig. I was on the way to Prague, and thought I would stop along the way to have some Gose. I had never tried it before, but I knew that it was an odd German beer that did not meet the requirements of the Reinheitsgebot (the so-called Beer Purity Law). So I was game to try it, and what better chance would I ever get? I had researched it on the net and had a list of pubs in Leipzig that sold it.
Leipzig is in the former East Germany and the Gose beer style was practically wiped out during the Soviet years. He style has since been revived by a couple of daring breweries. I made it to three of the six pubs on the list, and tried two different brands of Gose. I enjoyed them both, although the Ritterguts brand was a bit sour for my taste.
I met a German coupe at the last pub I went to. They wanted to speak English, and were very nice. I bought a round of drinks, and we chatted for a while. It was raining so when we left I took a taxi back to my hotel.
This was my first time in the former East Germany. It’s been twenty years since the wall came down but the area suffered from 45 years of neglect before then. Leipzig was the second largest city in East Germany, so I’m sure it faired better than most. It actually has a pretty downtown area, and seems to be coming around relatively nicely.
I did see some “exposed” water pipe…
I thought it might be just a temporary line during repairs, but I saw another that had obviously been there for a while…
Leipzig is the birth place of J.S. Bach
and Felix Mendelssohn
It is actually a pretty nice city, although I don’t see myself driving too far for a Gose in the future.
The next day I took a train to Prague. And as I stated (rather eloquently I might add) in the last post … “holy shit”. I was really dumbfounded by how incredible Prague is. It’s a bit touristy (or tourist-full) but I can’t really complain seeing as I’m one of them. It’s got a really nice subway and tram system, so once I figured out where I was going and exchanged some money it was pretty easy. A lot of the people spoke English, which was good.
I found my way to the hostel where I had reservations, dropped my rucksack, and headed out into the town. I arrived about 1600 in the afternoon, and spent the remaining daylight hours strolling around and taking pictures. I had a dinner of pork neck and potatoes along with a few Pilsner Urquells.
I slept well that night, but in the morning it was raining. So I decided to head out to Kutna Hora that day because I knew that most of what I wanted to see there would be inside. It’s about one hour on the train to get there. The weather was actually not too bad when I got there, and it ended up being a nice day.
I went into the Church of the Assumption of the Virgin, which was formerly a Cistercian Monastery.
And then into the Kostnice Ossuary. The Ossuary (Bone House or Bone Church as it is sometimes called) is this old building where the bones of up to 40,000 people were placed after the cemetery was full.
Most of the people in here died before or during the plague. As is common in Europe: once the cemetery is full, you dig up the old bodies, place the bones into an ossuary, and start filling the cemetery back up with new ones. Only at this particular place, the owners gave someone the task of (or freedom to) doing a little decorating with the bones.
I asked if I could be put on display here when I die, but they are apparently not taking any more applications...
It is a pretty wild place, and definitely worth the one hour train ride to see it.
This town was on top of a silver mine and was one of the richest towns in the Czech lands during the middle ages. Once the mines were exhausted, many people just left the town. So now you have this small town, with an incredible cathedral and one of the best preserved medieval town areas in Europe.
I also got to see the Cathedral of Saint Barbara in Kutna Hora, which is also incredible…
I’ll post some more about the trip when I can, but I’m leaving for Italy in the morning and still need to pack. We will be there (working) for a week, but may stop in Austria for a couple of days on the way back (or maybe Munich for some more viscera and beer).
As always there are plenty more pics on the flickr site. You can either click on any picture or click HERE.
