Adventures in Deutschland: Day 35

Yesterday (Sunday) we spent the day in Basel, Switzerland. Basel is such a beautiful city with such neat history. Plus it is Swiss and therefore was very clean and organized with wonderfully clear signs pointing the way to various sites.

We set off early in the morning in order to make the most of the day. We caught a 7:58 train that took us to the German train station in Basel (Basel is on the border of Germany, France, and Switzerland and has a train station in each of these countries). On the train we ended up across from two middle aged women who were also from Radolfzell. They were eating some goodies from a local bakery which Todd and I eyed jealously when all of a sudden they whipped out a liter bottle of wine and two plastic cups. Over the course of our journey, the two women got louder and louder, laughing and telling stories. They managed to finish the entire liter of wine by 9:16 when our train arrived. We have heard many accounts of people just using the trains as a place to hang out and drink, but an entire liter of wine before 9:30 in the morning? Wow...

When we arrived in Basel, I noticed the sky-scrapers and glass front towers that smack of the 80s. Then I turned around. Basel is an enormous city that continues to thrive and grow so naturally the new growth is very modern. However, the modern sections of the city are grouped to the outskirts of town in a way that allows you to enjoy the historical city without being reminded that you are in a contemporary cosmopolitan city. Todd, Therese and I set off from the train station to find something of particular interest to Todd - the Community of St. John. This lay community was founded by Hans Urs von Balthasar, one of the theologians Todd is studying for his PhD. It is located alongside the Balthasar archives in a little residential part of Basel. We were able to walk up to the gates of the community and archives and peer in.

After this little excursion, we walked along the Rhine and over a bridge into the city proper. We had read online that the tourism office has little guides that take you around the city so we thought we'd try this out. From the tourism office we got a little booklet in English called somthing like "5 Walks through Basel" (it was located right next to a German booklet called "A Tour of Basel by Segwey"- yep, it's about going through the city in your own mall cop-like Segwey). Anyhow, the 5 walks booklet was amazing. It set out 5 different types of tours through the city, the amount of time they take, and a map marking out each journey. Each walk is color-coded so that once you start the tour, you just look for these little signs of a guy in your color pointing the way. We took the medieval lanes tour and part of the academic and craftsmen tour. Here we saw numerous buildings dating back to the1300s as we wound our way through narrow cobblestone streets. We crossed a bridge from the year 1200 (though it has been refurbisheed) and saw where they executed people on the bridge in the Middle Ages (morbid, but interesting). Other highlights included visiting the Spalentor which is the oldest city gate and the house where Nietzche stayed while he was in Basel (which is a little house that is being used as a house and is completely unmarked).

Perhaps the most striking part of the trip was the former cathedral (it is now a reformed church). I know, I know, another church, but this church was really moving. The outside is mostly from the late 1300s through 1500 due to a large earthquake that destroyed most of the city in the 1350s. It is made of the same rusty red local sandstone that adorns Strasbourg's cathedral. Not my favorite. But the outside isn't what's important. The inside of the church was so beautifully simple. It had high Gothic ceilings made of what looked like grey cement. This same gray filled the entire building except for some simple stained glass windows. The altar was even very simple, though very beautiful with an airy openess. There were bishops, governors, and such buried all over the cathedral with the earliest I found dating back to 917. I can't even imagine what was going on in the 900s. I loved walked from tomb to tomb looking at the overlying stones that were carved to look like the pe0ple inside so I could see what they looked like and what they were wearing. The detail involved was tremendous - you could see little grooves portraying chainmail and parts of their belts. In the crypt of the church there is an enormous section under the altar that is being excavated. It is supposed to be the remains of the 9th century cathedral. You could peer through glass to see it from many directions. There were empty tombs and papers marking what things were - you could tell this area was an active excavation site. On our way out of the church, we saw an 8 foot piece of marble that was more ornate than most of the church stuck to the side of a random pillar. A little reading told us that this is Erasmus' burial site. It's amazing to think that there was no crowd here or no sign or anything. Even with all he did, there's just a stone.

After an exhausting day hiking through those medieval streets, Todd and I decided to capitalize on the regional day pass we had for the train and go to Konstanz for dinner. We had a relaxing beer (and pretzels for Therese) at our favorite pub/brewery and then ate at a little place called Costa del Sol. It was recommended by Todd's former teacher. The restaurant is owned by a married couple - one of them is from Spain and the other is from Portugal. They know 7 languages between the two of them. We enjoyed some authentic sangria along with a Spanish omlette (Todd says it was very authentic) and an Argentinian steak. It was delicious and a great change of pace from all of this German food.