Our flight home departed Munich at 11:55am bound for San Francisco, arriving about 2:30pm (11.5 hours with the time change). We then had a three-hour layover before catching a flight to San Diego at 5:45pm and arriving about 7:15pm.

It was a great trip filled with new experiences, plenty of food and wine and many memories.

Elaina, Ralf and Martha from the Hotel Regina

The Dolomites

Memories of Ice Cream

Weinhaus Schneider Restaurant

Weinhaus Schneider Restaurant Interior

Kent’s Cheese Galette

We departed our hotel in Oberbozen at 10:00am bound for the Hilton Hotel at the Munich Airport. The journey took us about five hours with a comfort stop, ice cream and traffic.

After checking into the hotel for a quick freshening up we boarded a train for the 45-minute ride into the center of Munich at the Marienplatz stop. There we had a couple of hours to explore the town before meeting up for dinner.

Kent and I headed out to Maximillian Road to see the Rodeo Drive of Munich. All of the top designers have exclusive shops along this street. The majority of the clientele appeared to either be Asian or Middle Eastern. I suppose these are the people with all of the money to spend.

For dinner, we met up with the group at the Weinhaus Schneider Restaurant. There we started the evening with a glass of a sweet wine followed by endless bottles of red and white wine. Everyone ordered what they wanted from the menu including dishes like pork ribs, veal ribs, fondue dishes and Weiner Schnitzel. For dessert we all had a plate with chocolate cake, apple strudel and large platters of fresh fruit with a chocolate fondue. It was all very good but once again, too much to eat. Our former student, Marc Fritz, was able to join our group for dinner. It was good to see him again before leaving Germany.

As a little thank you gift to our tour leaders Kent and Christine, one of our fellow travelers, Linda White, wrote a song. The tune was to the song Deep in the Heart of Texas and the words are as follows. The whole group got up and did their best to serenade Kent and Christine with it. The dots represented four claps.

We get quite fit
And the schnapps won’t quit ••••
When we’re with Kent and Christine

The cows come home
The beers will foam ••••
When we’re with Kent and Christine

Kent talks a lot
We can believe it. Or not••••
When we’re with Kent and Christine

Just one more mile
And always smile••••
When we’re with Kent and Christine

They’re always there
With lots to share••••
When we’re with Kent and Christine

So here are toasts
To our great hosts••••
We thank you Kent and Christine.

After dinner we all headed back to our hotel via the train for our flights home the following morning.

Kent and Mark on the Freud Trail

River through Merano

Mark with Elizabeth

Kent and his Pizza

The Palace Hotel

Merano Architecture

This being our last day in Oberbozen and a free day to explore whatever we wanted on our own. We chose to take the Gondola down to Bolzano where we caught a train back to the town of Merano. We wandered the beautiful old town pedestrian streets with shops and restaurants of all sorts. The river meanders through the center of town with pedestrian and bike paths on both sides. Many hotels, restaurants and gelato shops line the riverfront.

We stopped in at the Cathedral of St. Nicholas, first mentioned in the year 1220 before expanding and taking its final shape in 1465. The architecture of the church is gothic with well-preserved stained-glass windows and a large rose window. Next to the church stands a tall clock tower with a sundial. We also explored a smaller chapel behind the church called St. Barbara’s Chapel.

Across the river from the old town is the Empress Elizabeth Park with a statue of Empress Elizabeth (SiSi) of Austria, Queen of Hungary. It was Elizabeth who made frequent visits to Merano for its wonderful microclimate and waters. She helped turn the town into a popular spa for the aristocracy, which contributed to the growth of the town. The park has a seated, life-size statue of Elizabeth hewn out of Laas marble by sculptor Hermann Klotz in 1903. The Laas marble is very white, is quarried near here and was also used in the rebuilding of the ground zero subway station in New York City.

Kent attempted to sneak into the Palace Hotel to use the rest room, but was quickly asked to leave when they found that he was not a guest. This lovely looking hotel opened in 1906 on what was once the Maur Castle dating back to 1676. The luxury hotel with 100 rooms, including 29 suites, is known for its health and beauty treatments including Detox programs.

We had lunch on the main street in old town at an historic Italian restaurant called the Flora-Trattoria which dates back to the year 1400. We sat outside at a table where we enjoyed eggplant parmigiana, pizza and a fruit smoothie.

By midafternoon we walked back to the train station where we boarded a train back to Bolzano. From Bolzano we took the Gondola back up the mountain to Oberbozen where our hotel is located. There Kent had the afternoon cake and we visited with fellow guests before heading to our room for a rest and packing.

For dinner we had a special awards dinner in a small private dining room in the hotel lobby. Kent and Christine handed out awards (think wine, maps, hats, chocolate) for all types of silly things that have happened during the last couple of weeks. Mark got an award for wearing the best hiking shoes (not) and falling on the trail while Kent got an award for always being fun and pleasant. It was a great dinner with plenty of wine, delicious food and lots of laughs.

Park Hotel Holzner

Kent on his way to town

Kitchen Tour

Lichtenstern Ice Cream

Farmhouse Museum

Beekeeping Museum

Bread Made for Winter

This was a fairly quiet day in comparison to some we had in the past couple of weeks. In the morning we had a kitchen tour to see how the chef and his staff prepare the daily breakfast and dinners for thirty guest rooms. He also prepares meals for the staff and the family that run the hotel. The kitchen is a decent size with a large pantry, wine storage area, dishwashing area, walk-in refrigerator and freezers and a large family dining table for the staff. They prepare many things from scratch in the kitchen, e.g., the cakes and strudel and pasta. They also make their own preserves each year and can them.

We walked over near the Gondola to visit a local hotel called the Park Hotel Holzner which has been here since 1908. Four generations of the Holzner family have run the hotel during the past 100 plus years. The hotel is quite beautiful today having obviously been remodeled and expanded over the years. It has tennis courts, indoor/outdoor swimming pool, spa, children’s areas and lush green lawns overlooking the valleys vineyards.

At noon we set out on the train to the town of Klobenstein where we walked through the town to take the Sigmund Freud walking trail. This promenade reminds people of the 150th birthday of Sigmund Freud which was celebrated March 6, 2016. Freud spent his holidays here in the summer of 1911 at the Hotel Post at Collalbo. The trail takes about 90 minutes to walk from one end to the other and has historical markers along the way depicting things about Freud and his time here.

Along the way we stopped at the Hotel Lichtenstern where Kent and Christine treated everyone to beers, water and ice cream. This hotel is known for its variety of home-made ice cream sundaes. Some of the sundaes feature chopped fruit, some chocolate, others warm raspberry sauce and then there was the amaretto laced sundae. Everyone enjoyed the stop.

From there we walked about 20 minutes to a beekeeping museum housed in the historic Plattnerhof Farm. This is one of the Renon’s (a province of South Tyrol) oldest farmhouses dating back to the early 1400’s. Two sisters had owned the home until 1978 and lived there without electricity, running water and indoor plumbing. It was restored in the 1980’s and now houses the region’s largest collection of beekeeping tools and machinery. You can also see some of the furnishings left in the house and how the two women lived, including a straw bed, wood burning stoves for heat and an outhouse built on to the side of the house. The roof is made of eight tons of rye grass woven together. There were several glass sided bee hives where you can see the bees at work.

When we were leaving the beekeeping museum it began to rain so we decided to take the train the remainder of way back to our hotel. Unfortunately, everyone else who was out had the same idea and the trains were completely packed with people. After about a 45-minute wait, we were able to push our way onto a train for the short ride back to the hotel.

Local Traditional Dress

Half Lingers Horses

Oompah Band

Cattle

Earthen Pyramids

Earthen Pyramids

When cattle in the alpine summer grazing pastures are moved to the valley for the fall it is a widely celebrated festival. They say that 2,100 alpine farms are nestled in the Dolomites with 110,000 head of cattle, 70,000 sheep, 5,500 goats and 2,000 horses. This was the day that they celebrate the moving of the cattle.

We left our hotel by taxi and headed for Pemmern where we began a one mile walk up the mountain to a spot where the cattle drive could be seen. Along the way we learned that the locals start out early in the morning walking towards the festivities stopping at local bars for beer. The locals are all dressed in their traditional dresses and lederhosen with plaid shirts. We shared the path with hundreds of locals also making their way up the hillside.

Once we arrived at the festivities, we found an Oompah band playing local tunes and thousands of locals eating sausages and drinking beer. Many had brought blankets and found a spot on the rolling hills to settle in for the morning. The Alpine horn players arrived to play the horns.

Also, of interest were the local cowboys or cattle handlers who carried very long braided whips. They would crack the whips which would make such loud noises you would think that they had caps or some type of explosive in the whips. Some of the cowboys would stand on top of their horses and crack their whips while balancing.

About noon, the cowboys would herd the cattle down the trail past the crowds using the whips to move the cattle. There were also many beautiful horses called Half Lingers that were also being moved. This cattle run and festivities dates back to 1927 and the proceeds of the refreshment stands benefit the Oompah band.

After the cattle were herded past us, they were corralled into a large enclosure where you could wander out and see the horses and cattle up close. Historically this would have been a time when the cattle would have been bought, sold and traded.

We then began our journey back down the hillside to our starting point where there was another festival set up similar to the festival for Assumption Day. There were hundreds of picnic tables and benches where you could order beer, sausage, half chickens, French fries and desserts. Strolling musicians wandered around performing for the crowds. Several vendors had tents set up selling local handmade wood carvings, food items, desserts and more.

Once we had a bite to eat, we headed down the mountain to the town of Klobenstein where we walked about 30-minutes to the town of Longomoso to see the earth pyramids. These pyramids are natural earth formations that are constantly evolving because of constant erosion. The pyramids are created when rain and weather conditions erode the soil around rocks on the surface of the ground over time. The soil continues to erode around the rocks until the rock is standing high above the ground on a thin pyramid. Over time the pyramids continue to grow taller and thinner until the rock on the top finally falls off the top. Once this happens the earth pyramid begins to slowly erode until it is completely dissolved into the soil. It is a very interesting thing to see and there are many places around this area where you can find the earthen pyramids.

We took the train back to Oberbozen. After a rest, we had dinner with our group and retired to our room for the night.

Gardens of Trauttmansdorff with castle in the background

Dorf Tyrol Cemetery

Brunnenburg Castle in the center of the photo

Ezra Pound Museum Items

Ezra Pound Suite

Ezra Pound Museum Items

Agricultural Museum

On this day we headed out about 8:30am for the Gondola to take us down the mountain to Bolzano and the train station. From the Gondola it is about a ten-minute walk to the train station where we boarded a train to the town of Merano. Merano is a lovely 35-minute train ride to the northwest of Bolzano though apple country.

Since 1969 they have been growing apples using a slender spindle system of high-density planting. The apple trees are planted in neat rows about 36” apart and about 8-12 feet tall. The apple trees resemble more of a column than a tree with clusters of apples from the ground to the top of the column. This new system of growing reduced labor by about 10% and increased production yields by 28%. We saw mile after mile of apple fields growing green, red and multi-colored apples. It was time to harvest the apples so many fields had people in the fields picking the apples.

Once we reached Merano we took a local bus to the Gardens of Trauttmansdorf Castle. The castle was once the holiday residence of Empress Elisabeth (Sisi) of Austria back in the late 1800’s. Inside the coach house they had an exhibition on Killer Plants referring to the carnivore plants like the Venus fly trap. In the old castle they have a large exhibit on the history of tourism in the area. Merano is known for its mild Mediterranean climate and hot springs. People would come from the colder north to escape the cold and enjoy the mild weather beginning in the 1800’s. Wealthy people began building large stately homes in the area and the city has grown to about 400,000 people today.

In the main castle complex there is also a small exhibit on Empress Elisabeth (Sisi) and the time she spent there. The rooms of the castle have old frescoes on the walls, painted ceilings and greats views of the area.

The Trauttmansdorff Castle includes a large botanical garden with a lake, restaurants, a palm beach and even a cactus garden. At this time of year, the gardens are filled with colorful lavender, water lilies and perennials. In spring time, the gardens are filled with blooming rhododendrons, Japanese Cherry blossoms and 200,000 tulips. After touring the castle, we enjoyed lunch at one of the restaurants along the lakeshore.

We took a taxi from the Castle to a small village by the name of Dorf Tyrol where we visited a Brunnenburg Castle owned by the daughter of the great American poet Ezra Pound and her son Siegfried Rachewiltz. Today the castle is partially open as a museum and also the private residence for four generations of the family.

Ezra Pound’s daughter, Mary de Rachewiltz, now 94, is the daughter of violinist Olga Rudge who was his mistress and not his wife. Mary says that her mother wanted a son from her father but that her father did not want any children. Her mother succeeded, only that a daughter was born, and for her, it was such a shock that she didn’t want Mary. Mary was entrusted to a Tyrolean nurse, with whom she lived until she was 10-years-old. Ezra Pound was linked to fascism and appreciated Mussolini and spent thirteen years in a mental hospital in America as a traitor to his country. After his hospitalization he returned to Italy and spent many years here.

Inside the castle there are several rooms dedicated to the history and relics of Ezra Pound. The grandson has also built a museum filled with historical items from the area. The items include farm implements, blacksmith items, felt making items, bread making items, wine making items, cheese making items and more.

We were taken on a tour of portions of the castle like the rooms dedicated to Ezra Pound, the private residence filled with books, art, papers and memorabilia, the museum and the wine cellar. It was all very interesting.

After our tour we walked back into town where we enjoyed drinks and apple strudel before heading back to our hotel via bus, train and gondola. It was a long day but very enjoyable. After dinner went to our rooms to recuperate.

Carezza Lake

Kent and Christine on the Gondola to the Glacier

The Glacier

Bare land left from the 2018 storm

Scenic Views Everywhere

Another Mountain View

Typical Scenic Valley

This is one of the local resorts

The early morning was filled with thunderstorms and light rain but as the morning progressed, the skies cleared and it was a beautiful day.

Our entire group left our hotel by bus stopping to pick up eight Italians in a nearby village for a full day tour of the Dolomites. Our first stop was at the beautiful Lake Carezza in the hamlet of Carezza, a province of Bolzano. This small alpine lake sits at about 5,000 feet in altitude and was set in a dense forest until October 30, 2018 when there was a huge wind storm that destroyed thousands of acres of forest land. They believe that more than 14,000,000 trees were destroyed in just four hours. The storm had rain and winds in excess of 90 miles per hour. The trees have mostly been removed by now leaving the surrounding hillsides bare. The lake itself is quite small in size but the water is fed from a natural spring, is crystal clear and full of emerald colors of blues and greens.

We continued on through the Dolomites experiencing beauty in every direction. The panoramas of forests, barren rocky slopes to ski slopes and chairlifts can be found around every turn.

For lunch we stopped at the Marmolada Glacier located on the mountain Marmolada in the district of Trentino, Italy. It is the only glacier in the Dolomites section of the Alps. We boarded open air Gondola cars that only hold two persons for the climb up the mountain to the glacier. The ride over pine forest and barren rock takes about 20 minutes to reach the base of the glacier. Today the glacier has shrunk and it’s not that impressive but it was an interesting thing to see.

For lunch Kent and Christine ordered plenty of beer and water, goulash soup and bread. We spent about 90-minutes up the mountain near the glacier before returning to the bus. The temperatures were cool but a heavy sweater or fleece was adequate at the glacier.

We stopped at the Sella Pass, the highest mountain pass between the provinces of Trentino and South Tyrol in Italy. The pass is 7,727 feet in elevation and has tremendous views of the surrounding mountain peaks. In winter this is a tremendous ski area but in summer the ski lifts continue to operate taking people up the mountains to hike, bike and enjoy the beauty of the area.

Our last stop of the day was at a small town by the name of Kastleruth with a population of only about 6,500 inhabitants. This area is known for its wood carving of all types. You find carvings of religious figures, tree ornaments, figurines of all types, animals and more. The town square houses a beautiful church and clock tower with many shops on the meandering surrounding streets.

It was a long day of touring but it was a wonderful experience and gave us a good idea about everything that the Dolomites have to offer. The scenery is spectacular. There is a unique style of architecture of most of the local ski resorts. Many of them are smaller hotels about four stories tall with beautiful flower boxes hanging from every balcony.

Some Bolzano area observations: bus drivers are not very personable; lots of people smoke; there are fewer observable Muslims in the area; you don’t know what language people speak….it could be Italian, Ladin, German or English…..all are possible; locals don’t say “excuse me” or “pardon” if they bump into you; generally, if you great people in any language, they will respond.

We arrived back at our hotel about 6:45pm where the barbecue for dinner had already begun. The dinner was similar to last weeks but delicious and plentiful as well.

Monumento Alla Vittoria

Monumento Alla Vittoria

Shopping Arcade

Dominican Church Frescoes

Ancient Gries Parish Church Cemetery

Church of St. Agustine Interior

Overnight, we had some heavy rain, lightning and thunder but the days have been mostly warm and dry.

On this morning we took the Gondola down the mountain to Bolzano where we visited the Kolping Center for a lecture by Professor Andreas Hapkemeyer. The Kolping Center is a place where folks can go to learn a trade like cooking, woodworking, parenting, horseshoeing, wood carving and more.
The professor discussed the Tyrolean region and how the change in borders over the last 100 years or so has resulted in the need for four passports even if you lived in the same home. This area was once a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Austria, German and now part of Italy.

At the end of the 1920’s there were about 30,000 residents in Bolzano but Mussolini wanted it to be more Italian to show his power on the border. He had a goal of increasing the population to 100,000 residents, mostly of Italian descent. The area was producing steel and magnesium and they needed a larger work force so mostly poor people from all parts of Italy were brought here to live and work.

New shopping arcades, apartments and streets were built to accommodate the new influx of workers and to increase the population. The new construction was much more streamlined and modern in comparison to the architecture that had existed in the past. The new shopping arcades lined new avenues and the covered porticos were much larger in scale than anything that had existed previously.

Between 1926 and 1928 a monument was built called the Monumento Alla Vittoria in what would be the new center of town strategically placed between the old town and new town. This would become the first Fascist Monument and would become the scene for the most important public gatherings in the city. Political rallies and ceremonies of the Fascist Regime took place here.

The monument is similar to the Arc de’ Triumph in Paris designed with the symbols of the Fascist regime. Columns resembling a bundle of wooden sticks with protruding axe-heads had been an ancient Roman symbol of power and were used for the monument. The bundled wooden sticks were a symbol that together we can be greater than we can be individually.

After the second World War, the monument has remained a focus of tensions between Fascists and anti-Fascists and between linguistic groups. Today the monument remains although there have been many discussions about whether this monument should be torn down. To help educate the public about the history of the monument over time, it now houses a museum in the basement.

During our lecture Christine snuck out and purchased twenty gelato ice cream cups in all different flavors for us to enjoy. After the lecture we had time for a small bite to eat before meeting back up with the group at the monument museum for a self-guided tour. The museum is not too large and but has a lot of information on its history and photos over history.

We also visited a couple of different churches in town. The first was the Dominican Church with very old frescoes painted on the walls. The second was an interesting cemetery at the Ancient Gries Parish Church. The third was the Church of St. Augustine with its very ornate interior.

Kellerei Bozen Winery

Inside the Winery

Winery Barrels

Winery Bottling Machinery

Vineyards

This morning we headed out on the Gondola to the town of Bolzano below. Once in Bolzano we caught a bus to the Kellerei Bozen Winery where we took a wonderful tour. The winery used to have two locations where they produced their wines until 2018 when they moved into this new facility.

The winery is not owned by one family or corporation but instead is a co-operative of about 225 families who own vineyards in this region. They pool their small vineyards grapes to create about 50 different wines with a production of about 3,000,000 bottles a year. Each member of the co-operative is paid on the quality of the grapes that they bring to the winery for processing. The members receive payment for the grapes when they are harvested as well as receiving a quarterly payment from the profits of the winery.

This new facility was designed by an architect who had never previously designed a wine processing facility. It was built at a cost of about $40,000,000 and is built into the hillside and partially covered with vineyards making it both productive and eye appealing. Eight stories of soil had to be removed from the hillside before beginning construction from the ground up. Much of the rock in the soil was used in the concrete and the remaining soil was sold. There are ramps and scales for trucks and tractors to deliver the harvested grapes. The grape processing begins at the top floor of the facility in a drive through warehouse where the grapes are delivered. Gravity is used, rather than pumping, to move the grapes and juice through each process of the wine making until it finally reaches the ground floor cellar for storage and sale.

The facility is the most modern and complex winery I have ever seen and the multi-story processing plant is like none I have ever seen. They have a beautiful store and tasting room where they offer tours and sell their wines.

We tasted three white wines, three red wines and one dessert wine in a classroom- type tasting room. The wines sell in the range of $15 to $40 a bottle and everyone seemed to like them all, even if they had favorites. They do export some of their wines to the US and Canada, although most are consumed locally.

After our wine tour and tasting we took the bus back to the center of Bolzano where we had a walk through town. We stopped for a sandwich and a soft drink before returning to our hotel at the top of the mountain. Dinner is always something special and this night was no exception. We had delicious spinach dumplings with brown butter and parmesan followed by a wine soup. The main course was a veal saltimbocca with scalloped potatoes and cabbage. Dessert was a very light chocolate mousse with a hint of orange accompanied with pears.

Kent and Mark in Bolzano

Bakery Cookies

Model of Otzi the Iceman

View of the Dolomites

On this morning we headed down the mountain to Bolzano to visit the Otzi or Iceman Museum. Otzi is a well-preserved natural mummy of a man who lived between 3400 and 3100BC. The mummy was found September 19, 1991, at an elevation of 10,530 feet in the Otzal Alps on the border of Austria and Italy. He is Europe’s oldest known natural human mummy and has offered an unprecedented view of Copper Age Europeans. His body and belongings are displayed in the South Tyrol Museum of Archaeology here in Bolzano.

The mummy has been extensively examined, measured, x-rayed and dated. Tissues and intestinal contents have been examined microscopically, as have the items found with the body. By current estimates (2016), at the time of his death, Otzi was 5’ 3” tall, weighed about 110 pounds and was 45 years of age. Using modern 3-D technology, facial reconstruction has been created showing Otzi looked old for his age with deep-set brown eyes, a beard, a furrowed face and sunken cheeks. Otzi wore a cloak made of woven grass and a coat, a belt, a pair of leggings, a loincloth and shoes, all made of leather and different skins.

Other items found with Otzi were a copper ax with a yew tree wooden handle, a knife, a bag with 14 flint tipped arrows with stabilizing fins, a 72” longbow, bowstring, and several other unknown items.

The cause of death remained uncertain until 10 years after the discovery of his body. In 2001, x-rays and a CT scan revealed that Otzi had an arrowhead lodged in his left shoulder and a matching tear in his coat. Bruises and cuts to the hands, wrists and chest as well as cerebral trauma were also found indicating a blow to the head. It is now believed that Otzi bled to death after the arrow shattered the scapula and damaged nerves and blood vessels before lodging near the lung.

The museum is quite fascinating as is all of the research that has been done to understand this mummy’s history, life and death. The mummy is displayed in a temperature-controlled cabinet with a small window that you can look into to see Otzi’s remains. The clothing items have now been beautifully displayed in climate-controlled cases and are in extraordinary condition given their age.

The afternoon brought out a mix of sunshine and a rain shower. The clouds continue to hover around the surrounding mountains creating an everchanging landscape.