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Published: December 2nd 2014
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Square inside the Rathaus
This beautifully restored City Hall was built in 1501 The unthinkable happened. I woke up at 9.30 after what seemed to be going into a coma! But it was northern hemisphere time so a good start to a readjustment of time.
The morning was spent walking around Frick to get a feel for the place. It is a lovely smallish town, with good amenties, plenty of walking and biking paths and close to excellent train transport to either Basel or Zurich. We immediately had to acclimatise to a high temperature of 3 degrees. Thankyou to Lynny for her long puffer jacket.
Later we got the train to Basel with Irvahn as our Tour Guide since this is where she works. Basel is the 3rd largest city in Switzerland and sits on both sides of the Rhine on the French and German border. We took the tram to Marktplatz and lunched at the Coop Restaurant. We then visited the beautifully restored Rathaus built in 1501. It was evident from the decorated buildings and trees that the city was going to look lovely once the lights were turned on later in the day. As always, the Old Town in most cities is far more interesting with greater attention to small
Two Kiwis tree hugging
In Basel on a not so warm day details than we have in our modern, spartan, throw them up, mow them down buildings.
We walked up the hill to the Munster which was grand and imposing. It turned out to be far more than just the cathedral. Adjoining it was probably what had once been a monastery as it had cloisters with a garden within it. Inside the main church they had opened part of the floor to show the remains of a previous Roman building. Outside, the paving and lawn reached out to overlooking the Rhine with a fine walkway backed by old traditional houses along it. It must be amazing on a fine day but today was cloudy and cold. We were well wrapped up in our warmest of clothing.
There seemed to be Christmas market places either set up or being set up in various parts of the city. Wow! This is what we had come to Europe for, but not especially Basel. It was more than we expected. We didn't actually need to go to Germany at all. If Basel was anything to go by and German ones are supposed to be better, I wonder what will be the point of difference.
Ideal place for a Gluwein
At this strange wee place we bought lovely tummy warming Gluwein. Over the door was a large moose with batting eyelids and mouth and head moving, singing Christmas songs in German. Weird. As the day got darker more lights came on until it became a fairyland of lights and old world markets. The actual markets are made from small wooden houses/shops with an amazing variety of goods - candles, models, toys, cakes, chocolates, Gluwein, eats, cookies, woollen ware, christmas ware, glass items, wooden items, and so much more. The atmosphere was something we could never ever hope to experience in New Zealand. It is so unlike anything we have and really is the Christmas of our imaginations and what is being presented to us as Christmas. Of course we cannot do it at home. It would be all wrong. But here, well, it just seems all right.
So we were pretty impressed with Basel, it's shop, it's openess, it's history and it's markets. A well worth visit.
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