The Four Corners of Europe -- Wales, Greece, Mallorca and Krakow

TO ALL

In the last 3 months, Mike and I have been on 4 sightseeing trips. Each of them involved traveling a considerable distance in a totally different direction: we went northwest to Wales, southeast to mainland* Greece, southwest to Mallorca, Spain, and -- most recently -- northeast to Krakow, Poland. It would not be much of an exaggeration to say that we have traveled to the four corners of Europe.

WALES - The NW Corner of Europe

To get to Wales, we flew into London Stansted Airport. It’s about 300 miles from Stansted to the farthest point of North Wales. This was the first weekend in November. Alan decided to join us although he didn’t have a four day weekend like we did. We picked him up on Saturday morning in Manchester, England which is fairly close to Wales. We spent Friday and Monday doing things along the way between Stansted and Manchester. On Friday, we stopped in Cambridge, wandered around a bit and spent some time in Christ Church Cathedral. Again, just when you think that cathedrals are all starting to look the same, something totally new shows up. Check out the fan webbing on this ceiling.

On the way back to London on Monday we spent most of a day in York – not New York but just York. Again we spent some time in a cathedral -- the York Minster. We took advantage of a free tour they offered that turned out to be really good. The group happened to be really small and the volunteer guide was very interesting and we learned a lot. Here’s a couple of things that have stuck with me: (1) some structural components of a cathedral entail enormous amounts of time, labor, and talent to construct, but, because of their isolated locations, they are never seen by anyone – except God. Apparently the workman did, in fact, understand that and were content to be laboring just to please God. (2) Even the experts don’t understand the significance of each and every detail in cathedral art. Notice, for example, the rabbit in the very center of this stained glass window. (3) Humor in cathedral art is clearly not against the rules. Notice the silly face in the middle of this picture. 4) The word “cathedral” is Greek for “seat of a bishop.” Whether a building is called a cathedral or a church has nothing to do with its size or style of architecture, but solely to do with whether there is a bishop presiding over its activities.

The part of York called “The Shambles” was also interesting. Topsy-turvy is a good descriptive term for the historic part of almost any European town, but the Shambles takes the prize on this one.

Now here’s an interesting sign. A “busker” is a street performer. Just days prior to this trip I was caught making fun of my husband for making “busker” into a verb. I repent in dust and ashes. I also grieve over the message conveyed by this sign. Buskers are one of my favorite parts of European culture. Apparently not everyone shares my love affair.

The highlight of Wales itself was Mount Snowdon. Unless you are more into hiking than I am, the way to experience Mount Snowdon is via the Snowdonia Mountain Railway, a single-car coal-fired train that climbs to a point just short of the summit of Mount Snowdon, weather-permitting. That last little detail is the key. Sometimes it stops short of the end of the line and if it’s foggy you could end up spending a lot of money to see . . . . basically nothing. The first day we were in Wales, the weather was poor. The second day we lucked out: the weather was just short of spectacular. Here are some pictures:

On the first day, when the weather was bad, we toured Caernarfon Castle. I won’t bore you with a detailed explanation of the significance of Caernarfon Castle (partly because I still don’t totally understand it myself!). Suffice it to say that (1)“Prince of Wales” is a title traditionally bestowed on the heir apparent of the British crown, (2) the investiture of the last two Princes of Wales – Edward (1911) and Charles (1969) -- was conducted at Caernarfon Castle and (3) Prince Charles actually gave his investiture address in Welsh. Apparently all this is part of a half-hearted attempt over the centuries to make the subjugation of the Welsh by the British more palatable.

One last little anecdote about this trip: airport security in the UK is clearly one notch higher than most of the rest of Europe. I’ve suspected this for some time. Now I’m sure. On Saturday morning as we sat in the airport waiting for Alan to arrive, we heard something about “the parents of Alan Strohm” on the loud speaker. We went to an information desk and discovered they were refusing to let Alan through passport control because he didn’t have an address for where he was staying in the UK. Mike made up something and they were happy and a few minutes later Alan showed up.

MAINLAND GREECE - The SE Corner of Europe

This trip happened in early December and included my dad and brother who were here for most of the month of December. It was supposed to be a trip to Normandy, but 2 days before blast off the forecast indicated many days of continuous rain. That didn’t appeal to any of us – least of all my dad. So . . .we found some reasonably priced tickets to Athens and headed that direction instead. My dad was really wanting to do the Greek Isles and we ended up spending most of our time on the mainland, but, oh well, such is a consequence of a last minute decision.

Unfortunately, our trip got off to a really bad start. We landed in Athens at about 11:30PM (for some reason cheap flights to Athens always seem to arrive around midnight!), picked up our rent car, plugged in our GPS, and headed for a hotel where we had reservations. The hotel was less than an hour from the airport, but it was 3:00AM before we crawled into bed. First the GPS started doing erratic things and it took me awhile to figure out that something about the construction of our rent car roof was causing the signal to be intermittent. Once I figured out how to hold the GPS to get consistent reception it took us immediately to the address I had entered . . . . but there was no hotel there. We had a phone number for our hotel but the person who answered the phone didn’t speak any English. Very few businesses were open at that time of night and, among those that were, we couldn’t find anyone who spoke English. We had an internet map showing a small area right around the hotel, but we never could get close enough to the hotel to be “on the map.” I’m still not exactly sure how we finally found our hotel. I did, however, eventually figure out what the problem was: the hotel had their address listed as the town of Glyfada but they were actually located in Voula. According to Alan, this may not have been just carelessness on their part. Apparently it is possible to have a mailing address in one town but actually be physically located in a different town. Alan works on Google maps and apparently this is a fairly common situation. What made it particularly problematic in our situation was that the hotel street name was a fairly common one. In fact, there was a street of that name in both Glyfada and Voula! Oooops! I must confess that between 1:30AM and 2:30 AM my frustration level was about as high as it’s been on any European adventure so far. To top it all off, when we finally got to our room, there was no heat – or so we thought. We were too tired to care – until we woke up the next morning REALLY cold and realized that my dad had probably just had a really miserable night (he is 82 yrs old and tends to get cold at night). As it turned out the AC unit in our room was also a heater – duh! – Mike had thought of that possibility and messed around with it some but could only get cold air. Fortunately my dad was a little more savvy and got his AC to put out heat.

This trip also had a really strange ending. We were due to leave Athens at about 3:00PM on a Wednesday. We spent that morning in Athens, attempting to see the Acropolis. Mike was really intent on getting the car as close as possible to the entrance of the Acropolis to save my dad a few steps and, in the process, we kept running into streets that were blocked because of a demonstration. Hmmmm. When we finally got the car parked we discovered that the Acropolis was closed due to a “strike.” Hmmmm, again. So . . . .we climbed up Mars Hills and viewed the Acropolis from there and then headed for the airport. We arrived at the rent car office around 1:00PM ready to ride their shuttle to the airport and were informed that the airport was closed for the day because of a government workers strike – no flights in or out. Period. End of story. My dad was just sure that Mike was joking when he came out and gave us the news. A trip to the Olympic Airways ticket counter at the airport got us seats on the same flight, the next day with the assurance that the strike would not go on another day. Several phone calls back to Germany got Mike an extra day of leave and a teacher for my Bible Study the next morning. We went back to the hotel we had stayed in the first night and this time we figured out how to make the heat work. I wish I could say that we saw some totally amazing sight the next morning that made it all worthwhile, but that would probably be stretching it a bit. About all I can say is that we did get home the next day without further ado.

In between that frustrating beginning and unusual ending we did see some neat sights. We basically circled the Gulf of Corinth. Here are some of the highlights:

Delfi (or Delphi, but pronounced DEHL-fee regardless of the spelling) – this is an extensive set of ruins on the slopes of Mt. Parnassos, including a theater, a stadium, several temples, a market place, a gymnasium, etc, etc, etc. And, of course, the famous Oracle of Delphi. She typically sat on a stool over a crevice and inhaled vaporous fumes until she started speaking gibberish which was then translated into prophetic announcements which probably changed the course of ancient history on more than one occasion. More than anything, I was impressed with the setting of the ruins. Mt. Parnassos is a pretty impressive mountain. The drive to Delphi was neat, the view from the ruins was wonderful and the ruins themselves were interesting. The modern village of Delphi is close by, also perched on the side of Mt Parnassus and we spent the night there. Here’s the view from our pension.

Zakynthos – this is an island in the Adriatic Sea, off the left coast of Greece. It is much greener than the islands we visited in the Aegean Sea in October. We took our rent car with us on the ferry to Zakynthos and in 24 hours we basically drove every road on the island. This is sort of a pattern with the Strohms in case you hadn’t picked up on that. Those chance encounters along the way are really fun. A good tour book typically points us in the right direction, but some things are just plain serendipitous. The first day we stopped for lunch at a little “mini-mart” a long ways from nowhere that turned out to be run by an American lady from Illinois who answered all our questions about Greece as she fixed us some delicious sandwiches. Some time later we came across a flock of turkeys that let us take pictures of them close up (even my Dad who grew up on a farm where they raised turkeys seemed to enjoy this). The phrase “strutting turkey cock” now has new meaning to me. Next was a spectacular view of a beach called “Shipwreck Beach.”The next morning, we discovered a wall of interesting plaques in a monastery in a little village called Maherado. Each plague had a rather ordinary stone embedded in the middle of it and a location inscribed on it (in Greek) – presumably the location from which the stone was taken – Jerusalem, Jericho, Samaria, Patmos, etc. The lady showing us around spoke no English, so we never did figure out what this was all about. And Alan, I’m sorry, but this time Google was of no help.

Ancient Olympia – this is where the first Olympic Games were held. Again the location is noteworthy – it is out in the countryside, not in a city and not, btw, anywhere near Mt. Olympus (see the map above). Two things of interest here: (1) the columns of the temple of Zeus are enormous – maybe as much as twice as thick as any columns I’ve seen anywhere else, including Rome. None of them are still standing in their original form, but here is one that has been restored. (2) the hills around Ancient Olympia were pretty well charred from the fires that came through back in September.

The Corinth Canal – this is a canal that connects the Gulf of Corinth with the Aegean Sea, thereby allowing ships to avoid the journey around the southern tip of Greece which apparently is (or was?) treacherous in the winter. The idea for the canal was actually conceived in the 7^th century BC. Some centuries later, Nero broke ground, but it was not finished until 1893. It is 3½ miles long and really narrow and deep. In NT times ships were drug across the isthmus to avoid going around the southern tip. I was aware of most of this from introductory lectures/sermons on Paul’s letters to the Corinthians, so it was fun to actually see it. We didn’t get to the ruins of ancient Corinth, but we did spend a night in modern Corinth.

A couple of concluding thoughts about Greece: (1) This was our second trip to Greece, but I would love to go back at least once more someday – it’s a big country with lots to see. Yet to be seen ( in my book at least) are Thessaloniki, Meteora, and the islands of Samos and Santorini. (2) December is definitely off-season in Greece and probably not the best time to go. Not only are the hours of daylight really limited, but lots of things are closed -- many, many restaurants, some hotels, and even some sights. (3) Olive groves were the feature of Greece that really got my attention this time around. Lots of the more spectacular viewpoints look down on huge valleys covered with olive trees. Olive trees are also interesting close up – the relative age of a tree can easily be determined by how gnarly the main trunk is.

MALLORCA, SPAIN - The SW Corner of Europe
Mallorca (or Majorca) is an island off the Mediterranean coast of Spain. Amy and Deanna have decided (based on their knowledge of Spanish), that Mallorca is pronounced muh-YOHR-kuh. Of course, Mallorcans don’t speak Spanish. They speak Catalan, so who knows? In the summer, it seems like Mallorca must be one giant beach resort. Parts of the island are clearly over-developed and are not places I would want to visit in the summer. Here's an example: (This is the Port of Antratx. I think it's pronounced AHN-dratch but mostly we just called it Anthrax.) However, in December the whole island is pretty quiet. It wasn’t quite as sunny as I had hoped, but it was an improvement over Germany to be sure. We rented a vacation home in Port de Soller which is on the coast, due north of the main city of Palma. Our apartment was really nice, lots of room, kitchen, great view, reasonable price, etc. etc. Only one complaint: there was some kind of electrical wiring problem and every little thing caused the electrical breaker to flip off. What a trip!

Amy and Deanna were both home for Christmas and went with us on this trip as well as my dad and Curt. Again we did a lot of driving – more than the girls really wanted to do. We had an interesting little Citroën rent car. It was sort of a mini-van that theoretically could accommodate 7 people, but actually was rather crowded even with 6. The trick was to figure out who should sit where, based on size, agility, interest in taking pictures, ability to drive, etc, etc, etc. Once I figured out how to take pictures from the very back seat, I was content to be there the whole week. Here’s the trick: when you need to take a picture, you kneel on the floor in between the two middle seats, open the sun roof and stand up. This puts you in a perfect position for taking pictures (even better than if you had gotten completely out of the car!) and no one has to get out of the car to let you out. And no, I did not do this while the car was moving.

Here are some of those roads we drove:

Hmmmmm. Would this pass for a guard rail where you live?

The big attraction in Mallorca (at least for me) was the fabulous seascapes. We spend most of our time on the northwest coast of Mallorca, which, in Hawaiian terminology would be called the windward side of the island. Again, we drove most of the roads on that part of the island and saw lots of rugged cliffs,

(btw, that is Amy, Mike and Deanna at the top)

and pounding waves,

and spectacular coastlines,

and secluded beaches,

and spacious views,

and interesting rock formations,

and picturesque villages,

and windmills,

and interesting varieties of sheep and goats.

There were two other places of interest on the island: (1) Palma Cathedral which is a very attractive structure and is beautifully situated right on the main harbor in Palmaand (2) Coves d’Arta which is a giant cave on the northeast corner of the island. I’ve toured a few of the more significant caves in the US (Carlsbad, Mammoth, etc) but somehow this one made a bigger impression on me than any of those -- mostly just because of the seemingly endless display of stalactites and stalagmites and other cave formations. Perhaps the fact that we were in a small tour group and things seemed a bit less formal also caused it to be more impressive.

KRAKOW, POLAND - The NE Corner of Europe

This trip happened in January and was our first excursion into Poland. (How did that happen, when Poland is right next door to Germany?) We are actually headed to Poland again this weekend to a little town just over the border from German called Boleslawiec where all the Polish Pottery is made. That's a trip that's been on my mind for a long time. However, I kind of wanted to see a little more of Poland than just that border town and I sort of got the drift from Rick Steves that Krakow might be a more interesting town than Warsaw or Gdansk. In early Januray, I happened unto some cheap plane tickets from Frankfurt-Hahn to Katowice which is near Krakow, so off we went to Poland -- on Wizz Air. Mike’s chaplain supervisor and his wife, Jerry and Cynthia Jones, went with us on this trip. They were great traveling companions – as long as we made sure that Ch Jones had scrambled eggs for breakfast and pretty of time to drink his second cup of coffee!

Poland is cold in the winter – no duh! – and if they ever have Indian Summer we wouldn’t know about it. However, the wind was minimal and it only snowed for part of one of the days we were there. So the weather was at least bearable.

We spend several hours at Auschwitz the first afternoon we were in Poland, which was (as you might guess) sobering. The name “Auschwitz” actually refers to two concentration camps which are about 3 km apart. The first one started out as a Polish military camp and was made into a concentration camp when the Nazi’s took over Poland. The second one (Auschwitz II or Birkenau) was built later when they ran out of room at Auschwitz I. Birkenau ended up being a lot bigger than the original Auschwitz. Together they were the largest of the Nazi concentration camps and the nerve center of the whole extermination project. We took a guided tour of the two camps – well some of us did. Mike missed the bus and got left at Birkenau after the first half of the tour. He walked back to Auschwitz I but never was able to locate our group again. (There’s a joke there somewhere, but it’s probably best if I skip it.)

Here are a couple of thoughts/impressions about the whole Auschwitz experience:

(1) The Polish are one notch more passionate and open about the whole Holocaust phenomenon than are the Germans. I would assume that’s because their role in what happened is less complex – they were victims – pure and simple. The Germans on the other hand have to juggle two roles: victim and perpetrator. Not that I sense that the Germans are actively trying to cover anything up. Just that their view of things and their emotional baggage is slightly more complicated.

(2) The Nazi’s were really good at keeping their victims from understanding what was happening to them until literally minutes before their death. Herding hundreds of people into a room on the pretense of getting a shower and then gassing them to death, was something I remember hearing about from my mother even as a youngster, but the subterfuge goes much deeper than that. When the Jews were rounded up and put on trains they were told they were going to a new home and encouraged to bring valuable possessions with them. They were then conned into leaving those possessions beside the train track inside Auschwitz while they went to take a “disinfecting” shower. Children were separated from parents on the pretense of some kind of medical treatment which was actually medical experimentation. The cries of terror coming from inside the gas chambers were muffled by large trucks sitting outside with their engines idling, and on and on it goes -- the whole idea being that docile, unsuspecting mobs can be controlled, terrified ones cannot.

(3) Everything that could possibly be of value was scavenged from the victims – including their hair which was used in making Nazi uniforms. Some things that were scavenged and collected were apparently never used for anything and it’s hard to figure out why they were saved – shoes, suitcases, eyeglasses, etc, etc. There are huge roomfuls of such things at Auschwitz.

(4) Auschwitz is the only concentration camp where numbers were tattooed on the prisoner’s arms. Mike and I had a landlord in Ft. Worth when we first got married who had numbers on his arm. It was somehow significant to both of us to realize that those numbers tied him, not just to a concentration camp, but specifically to Auschwitz.

(5) Efficiency was a big priority in the whole extermination project. Not only did they not want to waste bullets (they needed those for the war they were fighting), but they didn’t want to waste gas either. They knew exactly how much Cyclon B was needed to kill x number of people in x number of minutes.

(6) Auschwitz I is pretty well intact. Auschwitz II (Birkenau) was mostly destroyed by the SS as they retreated from Poland. A few barracks have been reconstructed from original materials, but mostly it is just the barracks chimneys that are still standing – the number of them is astounding.

Auschwitz is about 30 minutes west of Krakow. Here are some things of interest in Krakow itself:

(1) The main square is huge.
In the center is a large attractive building that use to be a Cloth Market.Also a couple of churches and a freestanding bell tower.

Around the sides of the square are all kinds of interesting buildings with restaurants and stores inside.

(2) There is a large picturesque castle on the Vistula River. Krakow was actually the “capital” of Poland for several centuries up until the late 1500’s.

(3) Krakow is the setting for the movie “Schindler’s List.” Oscar Schindler was a real person and the actual factory he owned still stands today – waiting to be made into a museum. Much of the movie was filmed in Krakow’s Jewish Quarter which is called Kazimierz.

(4) Krakow is also the home of Pope John Paul II and they are obviously very proud of him.

(5) There is a cemetery in the Jewish Quarter that rivals the one in Prague.

Two anecdotes about Poland and then on to some family news:

(1) On Saturday evening we returned to our car, cold and tired, and found . . . .
(you guessed it!) a boot on the front left wheel. Somehow we were just supposed to know that parking within the old town walls was for residents alone. After all “it’s been that way for 16 years.” Well darn. How could we be so stupid? Hello, Rick Steves???? Why does your book not say anything about this????? Fortunately, the guys managed to get a Polish Policija on the scene in less than an hour and he took pity on us and lowered the fine from 200 zl to 100 zl. ZL stands for złoty (the “l” has a diagonal line through it about midway for those of you who aren’t reading this online). Złoty is correctly pronounced ZWAH-tee although every American I know says ZLAH-tee – probably for the same reason that we think Lech Wałesa (that funny “l” again) is lecht wah-LEHN-sah when it’s really lech vah-WHEN-sah. The złoty is worth about 40 American cents. That sounds wonderful until you realize that a just a few years ago a złoty was worth about 25 cents. Poland is part of the EU but they have not been deemed “ready” to adopt the euro yet. At that rate, they should be ready soon!

(2) On Sunday evening we all set our alarms for various times prior to 3:30AM the next morning because we needed to leave at 3:30AM to catch our 6:10AM flight home. Somehow both Strohm alarms failed to function and we woke up at 3:35AM to the sound of Chaplain Jones pounding on our door. The next 2½ hours were a little tense. We were out the door in 10 minutes with most of our possessions in tow (I left some pajama bottoms behind). We got to the airport about 30 minutes later than planned (partly due to some construction along the way) but still well before the check-in counter closed down. Mike decided he had time to go back and put gas in the rent car before turning in the keys and heading through security (unfortunately somehow in all that he left one of his coats lying somewhere). But then we got hung up going through Passport Control. Somehow Ch Jones got right through (which was fortunate because he was able to alert the Wizz Air personnel that the there were three more people on the way.) The immigration officer didn’t speak much English, but somehow we were made to understand that there was some stamp that was supposed to be in our passports that wasn’t there. In retrospect I think the guy just didn’t know what a SOFA stamp looked like or how it worked and therefore he didn’t understand that it was OK for us to have US Passports but live in Germany. At some point he just gave up and yelled “GO ON . . . NOW!” which we did – quit willingly. When we arrived at the gate, the rest of the people on our flight had already been shuttled out to the plane, so Wizz Air sent another bus out just for us. Our plane actually started taxiing toward the runway 10 minutes before flight time and we boarded it just minutes before that. WHEW!!!!!

Now for some family news. I seem to be into lists in this travelogue, so I guess I’ll continue with that bent.

(1) We had eight people in our house in Heidelberg for several days around Christmas – my Dad and brother (Curt), Alan and his girlfriend (Rose), Amy, Deanna, Mike and I. Last time I checked we were still all speaking to each other. Miracles never cease. Here’s a pictures of all of us.

Now here’s another picture that was taken after Dad and Curt left. This is what happens when two introverts marry and procreate: a somewhat strange idea of what it means to “be together” starts to creep in.

(2) Rose (I feel she's like part of the family at this point) has been accepted at the University of Geneva in Switzerland. Rose had been in Tel Aviv, Israel, for the past year (more or less) working on a master’s degree in linguistics. Unfortunately, there have been lots of problems: student strikes, administration strikes, classes taught in Hebrew when she was told they would be in English, professors not seeming to be able or willing to articulate exactly what classes are required for a degree, etc, etc, etc. Plus Israel’s political stability doesn’t seem to be moving in the right direction lately. So it was time for Rose to look elsewhere. She’s been patiently waiting to hear something from the University of Geneva for several months now and finally, last week she got the green light. There are still a number of wrinkles to work out before classes start in a couple of weeks but at least the initial hurdle is passed.

(3) Amy is living in a house again after several months of camping on a farm outside of Bellingham and riding to classes on her bicycle. She has an application in for a one month work study project in Siberia this summer, all expenses paid. She thinks there is a good possibility that she will actually be chosen for this. My only comment is that she needs to look carefully at her ticket before she gets on that plane to verify that it is a round trip ticket.

(4) Mike and Nancy are moving to Washington DC this summer. Yes, it’s true. We asked to stay another year in Germany and everyone here in Europe who has any say in the matter said “yes.” But someone in DC said “not.” Except for the fact that I wanted to stay here another year, I’m happy with the new assignment. Mike less so. He feels pretty apprehensive about the job he is going to, but I suspect he will survive it as he has his present job. There probably aren’t very many jobs at this stage of his career that he would actually enjoy. And yes, DC is a pricey place to live but we are empty nesters so it should be OK. There is definitely a lot to see and do on the East Coast.

(5) Our good friends Mary and Louie Trout are coming for a visit in May. Any of you who think that Mike and I do crazy things in the name of sightseeing had better hold onto your hats at this point. Louie’s number one sightseeing priority is to climb the Pyramid at Giza. My first response was “we’d have to go with a tour and that would be expensive.” My second response was “Forget the tour. I found some cheap plane tickets. Can I buy them before they disappear?” Deanna’s response was “I want to go, too” and Alan’s was “Definitely” and the Jones’s response was some variation of the above. Voila! Suddenly this idea has taken on a life of its own. So rest assured, the Strohms may be leaving Germany and this blog may soon become inactive but we’re planning to go out with a splash.

Nancy

P.S. One last picture, just for grins. Wouldn't you like to be a fly on the wall and listen in on this conversation?