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| The Elbphilharmonie, Hamburg Symphony Hall, Germany. |
Our friends, Susan and Tom Weisner, went along with their son Jeffrey and
granddaughters and family on a tour of Europe with the National Symphony in February 2024. Jeff plays the double bass in the National Symphony Orchestra (NSO) in Washington, DC. Seven flights, six
train trips, and many bus transfers later, here are some highlights from five
cities along the way of the 14-day tour.
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| La Sagrada Familia, Barcelona, Spain--still under construction. |
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| Mercado de la Boqueria, Barcelona. |
First stop, Barcelona, Spain, capital of the Catalan region
of Spain. The Antoni Gaudi designed and imagined La Sagrada Familia Cathedral
is a highlight, as is the Ramblas walking street off of Catalan Square, and the Mercado
de la Boqueria open market.
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| View of Toledo, Spain. |
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| The Gothic style cathedral, Toledo, dates from the 1200s. |
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| The narrow streets of Toledo--cathedral dimly visible in background. |
We then took a train to Madrid, and a half day train ride and tour of
Toledo – a wonderful historic Spanish city about 40 minutes from Madrid.
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| Berlin Wall Museum. |
We all then flew to Berlin with the NSO. We visited the cold
war era Berlin Wall museum and model of the former “Checkpoint Charlie”
crossing; the new glass dome on the German Parliament or Reichstag Building,
and the Holocaust memorial site near the Brandenburg Gate.
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In Berlin we toured the new German Parliament glass dome which looks directly into the parliament chamber.
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| Holocaust Memorial, Berlin. |
We also took our
granddaughters to the Computer Games Historical Museum in the former East
Berlin on the Karl Marx Allee, the Illusions museum, and the Spy Museum (sorry,
no photos)! There are huge shopping and walking streets and parks in Berlin as well. The
rest of the family flew home from Berlin – school and work!
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| In Cologne, on the way to the train station. |
Next Susan and I took the train to Cologne, Germany, where we
met up again with the orchestra, and went to a concert in their beautiful concert hall. We then took the
train for one day to Kassel, Germany, for a brief visit, where Tom’s
father and grandparents had lived until they fled Hitler in 1938.
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| La Scala, Milan, Italy. |
The NSO chartered a plane to Milan, Italy, to play a concert
at La Scala for one night. The La Scala experience was great, but no time for
anything else to see in Milan, because we flew the next morning to Hamburg, Germany, the last stop on the tour. We and the NSO
stayed at the Elbphilharmonie, an amazing new building. (See first photo.)
The Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, Germany, which opened in 2017 with multiple concert halls and hotel all built on top of an existing former warehouse. The hotel is in the
building with the symphony halls, and the public can walk up to see the views
of the city.
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| Concert hall, Hamburg. |
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| The Brahms Music Museum in Hamburg, Germany. Can you name the seven famous composers? |
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| Inside the Brahms Music Museum. |
Many thanks to Susan and Tom for sharing highlights of their trip with The Intrepid Tourist!
