May 11-12th, Dresden & Bautzen
As Thomas had an appointment in Bautzen (60km from Dresden), we decided to use the Pentecost weekend to stay a night in Dresden ...
We arrived Sunday early afternoon and checked-in at a hotel, directly at "Neumarkt", the plaza with the famous "Frauenkirche" ...
... which you can see here ... During the air-raid in 1945 Dresden was completely destroyed and only after the reunification of Germany, was this church rebuilt ...
... we climbed up the "Frauenkirche" and had a fantastic view over Dresden and the river "Elbe" ...
... here the two of us on the view platform ... btw we had fantastic weather (25°) ...
... in the evening we had a fantastic dinner with local food at the restaurant "Pulverturm" (powder tower) ... medieval-costumed service included ...
Monday, we did a sight-seeing tour by bus, train and ship ... approx. 2,5 hours that gave us a good overview of Dresden ... here in front of the bridge "Blaues Wunder" (blue wonder) ... quite an engineering challenge at its time ...
... and a last view of Dresden, coming back from sightseeing by ship, taken from the river "Elbe".
Monday afternoon we drove to Bautzen, further East, and visited the memorial of the "infamous" prison "Bautzen II", where political prisoners were kept secretly ...
... it was a huge memorial, lots of authentic documents of former East-German secret service methods ... and throughout you had that uneasy feeling ...
We ended our "mini-holiday" in a traditional "Sorbian" restaurant in Bautzen ... and worked the next day!