“Digging Dresden”?! If you are in for exploring a new city with a jolly happy English girl (“BackPackerBecki“) as well as a cool Canadian lady, Leigh McAdams who “HikeBikeTravels”, talking Saxon German, English as well as Canadian, then you may well mix everything up a little. Like, for example, the story of our darling city guide Christoph Münch about “Saxon Wine”, becoming something like “Sex’n’Wine” in American English. Yes! “You have told us a lot about wine tonight,” Christoph laughs quoting his last American tour group to Dresden. “So what about … ?” 😀
Christoph, however, is all cool about it and prefers to laugh a lot – just as much as we do representing “the new species of happy, ‘tweeting’ travel bloggers” that have come to town. Three days in a row, we are in for a visit of the city at the Elbe river, a city that draws us in immediately owing to its eventful history, its warm-hearted people as well as its pretty and rather picturesque scenery. After only three hours, I hear myself talking: “I want to come back already. I know that I will be coming back one day!”
Happiness spreads all over my face, Becki & Leigh too are sparkling with joy. “On yer bikes”: First and foremost, we start exploring Dresden by bike!
“Planning your stay, I looked upon your blogs to find a common theme running through all of them. That is when I realised that you all love biking, and have even tried E-Bikes before. And Dresden just lends itself to a beautiful cycling tour across its old town and the Elbe river!”
True that, dear Christoph. I simply love bike tours, especially for exploring large cities such as Buenos Aires, Lima or Paris. You get the feeling that you already know a good deal more about size and characteristics of a city by actually cycling across it. In the case of Dresden, this includes a magnificent trail right by the Elbe river, a trail that due to its wine terraced-hills does remind me a lot of my own beautiful home zone, the World Heritage Cultural Landscape Krems an der Donau. Gorgeous! Go check this out.
Off we go exploring Dresden, passing this magnificent historic Renaissance palace …
… travelling across the inner city of Dresden featuring magnificent building works of art, such as this one.
Christoph Münch is such a great guide, we simply loved having him next to us explaining all there is to know about Dresden (thank you, Christoph!) …
… some moments, however, need no further explanation, such as this one I believe: Peace & romance by the Elbe river in Dresden.
Becki, too, appears won over by the charm of Dresden …
… and loves to check out those magnificent cultural landscapes by the Elbe river, which thanks to a cross-breed between southern wine terraces and English-style castles give off a very particular and special charm.
Right after an extensive bike tour, we recommend you do exactly what Christian points to:
Having beautiful “Saxon Sauerbraten” in one of the city’s most iconic restaurants, the “Pulverturm” right in the heart of the old town.
Here, we also try “Goldriesling” white wine from some of the vineyards we passed on the way before …
… served to us on medieval torture instruments! No joke: The “Pulverturm” restaurant is in fact historical and does combine an excellent local cuisine with rather dark, authentic memories from the Middle Ages in Germany. I am glad we picked a “normal” table after all, though!
The food – this is the famous Saxon Sauerbraten we went for – is amazingly good, especially if you’ve done some good cycling just before. Go enjoy, is what we recommend!
“Kunsthof” art residences & amazing musical performances at the Church of our Lady in Dresden: A once-in-a-lifetime experience!
Now here is the thing, dear readers. As travellers, we do tend to get around a lot. We hear much, we see much, we like to make up our own minds about people and places. But to witness a performance of the famous musical piece by Bach, the “Johannespassion” on Good Friday in the equally famous Church of our Lady in Dresden? Amazing. Absolutely amazing! And Christoph, “our” Christoph as we have taken to calling him, he was there too, singing in the choir! Besides his passion for Dresden tourism & marketing, he actually turned out to be a really good singer. I can only recommend taking chances and go the extra mile while travelling: It is so refreshing, and eye-opening, to see and experience things you have never heard of or experienced before. Even, or especially, when you don’t know what to expect.
Another performance that captures our minds and hearts: Mesmerized, we stand in front of the Church of our Lady in Dresden watching dozens of bubbles spread all over the place. Pure magic, not only for children!
Pure Pleasure here: Inside the Church of our Lady in Dresden, getting ready for the big evening concert on Good Friday just before Easter.
Christoph Münch is part of this very talented choir, who continue to impress us during their one and a half hour performance. You can see him on the far left in the second row from the top.
This lady gives everything singing and has the most beautiful and clear voice ringing through the Church of our Lady in Dresden!
Art & culture can come in many different ways, after all. One of the must-do experiences Dresden offers in that sense is visiting the Neustadt district featuring lots of different street art graffiti, cool atmosphere and the famous “Kunsthof” art residence buildings. The latter ones do remind me a lot of the “Hackesche Höfe” in Berlin as well as the famous Austrian artist Friedensreich Hundertwasser. Among others, he designed the “Hundertwasser-Haus” residential building areas in Vienna: Colourful, different, and simply worth seeing. This is exactly what applies equally to the “Kunsthofpassage” art residence in Dresden. Only three stops away from the city centre on either tram line number 3 or 7, it is absolutely worth coming out here. Being the creative traveller I am and having a great sense for colour & artwork, I do feel very much at home out here.
Arriving at the “Kunsthofpassage” of Dresden, this is one of the first sights to great you upon entering the residential area of this part of town.
Walls decorated like these ones …
… or these ones, I really appreciate a lot (look at how small Leigh appears next to this amazing giraffe!) …
… all of it was worth coming out here: “Give me five”, girls – Leigh (top hand), Becki (on the left) and myself hugging the wall in Dresden together.
The entire district around the “Kunsthofpassage” has inspired us in a photographic way. We pretty much felt like real artists when we roamed the streets, celebrated the moody springtime sun and wished for more of its light to make our photos shine. We let ourselves be carried, enjoy a late-time brunch at “Day & Night” Café, discuss all matters life with new friends, go back to roaming the streets, take a polaroid shot at a local photo booth, … All of this is Dresden & Becki & Leigh & Elena. I recommend you to come back with your friends and family, too. This city just has a lot to offer for everyone.
Exploring Dresden’s famous art district.
Looking around the corner from the main road: “Planwirtschaft” economy?
Streetart graffiti in Dresden.
Really love that door: On Instagram, publishing this photo got me as many “Likes” as never before. Would you want to live here and walk in and out of that door every day?
Even walking across the pavement, you cannot help but notice those “stepping stones” reminding of Dresden’s darker chapters in history, when people got deported or murdered in or around the Second World War.
Erich Kästner, a famous German author and novelist, is originally from Dresden. As a girl, I would have read many of his children’s books and so fall in love with words, writing and stories from an early age on.
Last but not least, have a look at this! Wouldn’t you, too, love to live in a flat with such a beautiful and colourful house to it?
About visiting Dresden, I recommend you take a tour with one of its “most famous sons”: Albrecht Hoch.
The Hoch family, according to our second charming city guide Albrecht Hoch, has proven its worth as “Germany’s Next Topmodel” even back in the days. We are marvelling at a piece of art outside Dresden’s famous Renaissance palace, staring at a figure in the middle. “My great-great-great-great-great-grandfather!” (Even Albrecht might have forgotten about the actual times of “great”-ness there were, but proud he is to this day!). Naturally charming and a great storyteller at that, Albrecht leads us from the main square and the Church of our Lady to the Luther memorial across the Renaissance palast all the way to Dresden’s famous Semperoper opera building. Thanks to showing us lots of historic photographs and documents, we step right back in time with him – until we realise that one of the photos even shows young Albrecht himself (“just after the Wall came down, in 1990”)! And so, all of sudden, we are reminded that it “all happened not so long ago, lest we forget”.
Correspondingly, #Germany25Reunified is one of Germany’s Social Media buzz-words, the country celebrating 25 years of being reunited in 2014. “My father got to take one of the last photographs of the actual Church of our Lady during the Second World War”, Albrecht tells us, moved by the memory. “Two hours after he took this photo”, he says pointing to a blurry image that nevertheless revealed the silhouette of a church tower, “two hours and the church simply disappeard. That was a serious blow to my father’s world view at the time, that such an iconic sight as the Church of our Lady should simply have disappeared, gone and been destroyed forever.” Nevertheless, Dresden’s famous Church of our Lady got rebuilt and was finally revealed again in 2005 according to original plans. This trend is apparent in many other historic buildings of the inner city of Dresden, which after the war have been rebuilt in historic fashion but with brand-new technology inside, such as proper heating, air conditioning and insulation. Personally, I think this is a great achievement. Like combining the best things of two worlds.
Having a look upon the Church of our Lady right here in Dresden. We stay right inside the QF Hotel to the left here – a centrally located hotel great for exploring the city.
Albrecht Hoch is really keen on telling all the details and stories to Dresden life “as it is”. Thank you for a great tour, dear Albrecht!
This is the famous historic drawing that features one of Albrecht’s direct descendants right in the middle, the young man with the blonde curly hair. Albrecht is quite openly proud about his lineage there!
And here, only a couple of years back, one of his brothers was “honored” to portray their predecessor once more during a historic festival, the similarity being undeniable I would say. 😉
What a nice way to end my time Dresden: The city tour with Albrecht Hoch and this charming family from Munich. Mum (on the very left) is originally from Austria, though. You see: Austria IS everywhere, as we recently found out during the Social Travel Summit in Leipzig, too. 😉
Disclaimer: We have been invited by the city of Dresden on this visit. All opinions are my own.