Cigarette discount guide shopping

We were very pleased with a tour of central and southeastern Germany that we took Nov. 26 to Dec. 8, 2002. It offered not only visits to Christmas markets (Weihnachtsmarkts or Christkindlmarkts) but insights into history and experiences with the culture of the area. Echoes of World War II were an unexpected bonus to the trip.

We flew on Lufthansa from Denver to Frankfurt, with a connecting flight to Dresden. In Dresden we were met by our guide, Uli Buschmann, and by our bus driver, Vinzenz, then went immediately to Meissen. Including places both on and off the tourist route, our travels took us from Meissen (two nights) to Seiffen (three nights), Meisdorf (two nights), Hameln (one night) and Hamburg (three nights).

Meissen

Situated on a hilltop in Meissen, the Hotel Siebeneichen (Wilsdrufer Str. 35; phone 49 3521 47760 or fax 49 3521 477650) was clean and pleasant. A couple of miles away on another hilltop were the 14th-century Gothic church and surrounding village, once the center of medieval, fortified Meissen.

At the Meissen porcelain factory we saw workers making the famous figures--molding the porcelain paste, assembling the figurines, underglazing and painting. The factory museum of historic porcelain dishes and figures is worth a visit. The gift shop had many beautiful items priced from hundreds of euros to thousands of euros; a few "seconds" were available at lower prices.

Grunhainichen

At Grunhainichen, south of Chemnitz near Zschopau, the main shopping attractions were the Wendt & Kuhn store for miniature carved wooden figures and the Annadora Krebs dollmaker shop. However, the highlight for us was a visit to the workshop of Walter Helbig, an 83-year-old master woodcarver.

Herr Helbig was very excited to see a group of Americans in his workshop because from 1944 to 1946 he had traveled extensively in the United States--as a prisoner of war. He told us how he had learned to appreciate democracy in the USA. He then surprised everyone (even his daughter and grandchildren, who also work in the shop) when he pulled out a 60-year-old map of the United States showing the route he had traced as he was transported from one POW camp to another.

Seiffen

In the heart of the Erzgebirge Mountains, the friendly and spotless Hotel Seiffner Hof (Hauptstr. 31; phone 49 37 362 130 or fax 49 37 362 1313) was what we considered the best hotel of our tour. Our group was housed primarily on the nonsmoking top floor. Located near the lower south end of the main street in Seiffen, we could easily walk everywhere in the village from the hotel.

With their holiday decorations, the streets and shops of Seiffen resembled a Christmas card scene. We visited a woodturner, or "hoop-maker," in his workshop and watched him transform a circular chunk of log into a carved ring (hoop) that was subsequently sliced into animal figures.

At the Glasser Company, we saw workers cutting and painting wooden Santas, nutcrackers and angels and beginning work on wooden rabbits and sheep for Easter.

A light rain/snow mixture fell as we stood on the sidewalk watching the annual parade celebrating the opening of the Seiffen Christmas market. Many of the band members and others in the parade were dressed in traditional miners' clothing, reflecting the mining heritage of these mountains. Two teenagers dressed as a miner and an angel led one section of the parade, recognizing the importance of the guardian angel to the miner.

Three-foot-tall miner and angel candleholders, mounted inside the entrance of the small, octagonal Seiffen church, welcomed people to an Advent concert. Only candles illuminated the church as we listened to choral groups sing Christmas songs. After the concert, we joined towns-people standing in front of the city hall to hear children recite poetry and a brass band play Christmas carols.

At Neuhausen, near Seiffen, we visited the Nutcracker Museum, a private collection of historic and novelty nutcrackers, some of them in the "Guinness Book of World Records" (e.g., the world's tallest and the world's smallest).

A brass band played carols in the Christmas market in front of the museum as St. Nicholas handed out candies to children. We watched a performance of the museum's life-size music box, with 6-foot-tall nutcracker characters revolving on a slowly rotating stage to tunes from Tchaikovsky's "The Nutcracker Suite."

On to Meisdorf and Gernrode

As we were about to depart Seiffen, Frau Annette Neubert, owner of the Hotel Seiffner Hof, came aboard our bus and thanked us for our visit, then waved an American flag as we drove away. This gesture was in sharp contrast to what we experienced at our next hotel, in Meisdorf, not far from Quedlinburg.

The Parkhotel Schloss Meisdorf is a converted residence castle complex of outwardly elegant buildings in a lovely rural setting. Sadly, the management seemed still under the influence of East German communism.

The halls and many rooms reeked of cigarette smoke; the bed in our room was short-sheeted; the prepaid baggage handling never materialized, and the dining room staff overcharged for drinks, telling us that our drinks were "special" and therefore cost more than the listed menu prices. The tasty food almost made up for the hotel management's shortcomings.

On a trip to Gernrode we visited the Harzer Uhrenfabrik, the only German cuckoo clock factory outside of the Black Forest. The factory also makes pendulum clocks, weather houses and birdhouses. It boasts that the weather house in front of the factory is the largest in the world. On our tour of the factory we saw a demonstration of the bellows mechanisms that make the cuckoo sounds.

Family keepsake returned

Roger's uncle was in Germany during World War II. When the war ended, he returned to America with a collection of stamped and postmarked German postcards, which he gave to Roger knowing that his young nephew collected stamps. Roger placed the cards in an album, where they stayed for over 50 years.

However, after the death of his uncle, Roger wondered what to do with his collection. He noted that many postcards were sent to members of the Schumann family at various. Gernrode addresses. Knowing that we would pass through Gernrode on our trip, he decided to take the album of postcards to Germany to see if any relatives of this family could be located.

Our guide, Uli, made some phone calls and located Frau Ursula Matthias, the Gernrode town historian. She invited us to meet with her and Frau Kellerman, a descendant of the Schumann family, at her home adjacent to the clock factory. Both ladies were very excited to see the album, with postmarks dating back into the 1800s, and they were overwhelmed to have it repatriated to the town and to the Schumann family.

Within only a week after returning from our tour, Uli e-mailed us that he had received a phone call from a Peter Schumann, a direct descendant of many of the postcard recipients. In fact, one card was from Herr Schumann's aunt to his mother. We were happy to know that this album was finally returned to its rightful owners.

Ominous approach

It was late afternoon and nearly dark when we arrived at the hilltop fortress of Burg Falkenstein. A dense mist rose from the forest as our bus wound its way up the narrow road, and we joked that Frankenstein would meet us at the castle door. The defensive tower and castle were constructed around A.D. 1100 and then gentrified around 1500.

We saw a museum of medieval weapons, a medieval kitchen and an elegant (for the 1500s) dining room. Probably influenced by the mist and freezing weather, we thought that the castle had an atmosphere of great age and foreboding.

We enjoyed a walk through the streets of the historical half-timbered buildings of Quedlinburg. At Sorge, we visited the Freiland-Grenzmuseum, a chilling outdoor monument that reconstructs the East Germany-West Germany border of only a few years ago. Double barbed wire fences and areas for dog patrols are displayed here.

We continued on to Goslar, where we visited a large Christmas market, then drove along scenic secondary roads. Although only a few forests remain on these hills, we could imagine how the geography and isolation of communities in ancient times influenced the stories collected by the Brothers Grimm, who lived in this area.

Near Goslar we stopped at an Aldi discount store, one of a chain. Our group stocked up on packaged Christmas cookies and candies to bring back to the U.S.

Hameln

Our stay in Hameln (Hamlin) was at the Hotel zur Krone (Osterstrasse 30; phone 49 5151 9070 or fax 49 5151 924733), a small, pleasant hotel located in the city center with a lively Christmas market right outside its door.