On to Regensburg, Bavaria: a heritage city

From Zurich I took a train to Regensburg, an old city on the banks of the Danube. The Romans established an outpost there in AD179, naming it Ratisbona; some of the ancient fort is still extant. The invading germans pushed them back, and the medieval city grew upon the ruins. The city has been well preserved, and has gained the status of a Unesco World Heritage City. It is compact enough to walk to all the historic places, and I also took a city tour on a "Tourist train". Regensburg is dominated by the french gothic style Dom (cathedral), and I found there were about eleven other well-preserved churches, displaying some of the most remarkable rococo interior decoration I've seen. My thoughts at the time are contained in e-mails:

E-mail dated 28 May 2008:

Guten Tag, jeder,
Hallo everybody,

Regensburg, Bavaria, Tuesday,

Yesterday I travelled up from Zurich via München; Deutsche Bahn managed to lose my ticket, it was supposed to go to the P___s' address, R____ phoned them for me, the woman in Hamburg knew nothing about it, so we had to go to the Bahhof in Zug & book another. DB say they will refund if I claim against the old ticket, meantime I'm more than CHF100 out of pocket. The trains were slow "Interegio", so only got here about 3pm. Turned out the hotel is only a short walk from the station (good planning?), in the Fröhlicher-Turken-Strasse: I'd have to look that up, but think it means "Street of the Happy Turks". It's in the old part of the city, and I must say I was a little alarmed at how seedy the street looked. The hotel did not look great, and I had to sit in the park until 4pm when the office opened; however, all turned out OK, it's quite a popular hotel, as it is cheap, but the room is fine, clean & with shower & toilet. You have to go outside to re-enter the "Frühstuck-kamer" (breakfast room). Parts of this "Alt-stadt" are a jig-saw of little lanes and courtyards. The city is on the Danube, on summer evenings the quayside seemed to be the 'in' place to have have a picnic supper.

Of course, I notice bridges, and this one across the Danube was at one time the only crossing, built long ago, 15 arched stone spans & still going strong. The upper Danube is now linked by a canal to the Mainz (and hence the Rhine), so you can now navigate from the Black Sea to the North Sea, it is an important trade route, a lot of goods are transported by barge across and into Europe. This city merits a book on its own: I strolled around this morning and then took a 45-minute bus tour, which loaded my old brain with so much history I can't digest it all. The first settlement was a Roman Fort, set up by order of Marcus Aurelius in 179 AD, and that was followed by layer upon layer of kings and emperors, and a rich Italian family whose descendants still live here. The architecture seems vary from the Roman ruins to a French Gothic cathedral, to German merchants and thence to some modern buildings, but all in keeping with the tradition of a UNESCO World Heritage City. It would take about 3 weeks or a month to study it all ! Meantime I'm just resting [in an internet cafè], but was very peeved when I returned to the hotel after lunch for a snooze, and they close the door from 11am - 4pm! I was so thirsty and tired I sat quite a while in the PO, where you can get coffee & cold water; my temper hasn't improved since I found the toilets at the Bahnhof (ie station) are not too hygienic.

Rococo decoration, I think in the cathedral.

Generation after generation.