schwarzenberg - erzgebirge (saxony)

how could i forget it? well, between allersberg in franconia and silesia in poland there was a night spent in schwarzenberg in the erzgebirge mountains in saxony. schwarzenberg is a really nice small ore miners (bergmann) city with the historic upper old city and its lower districts neustadt + vorstadt (=> uptown + new town + suburbia).

to be honest, my most persistent memory from erzgebirge is how difficult it was to find s.th. to eat 🍴. okay, there were only few small towns in the hlls and it was saturday evening 'between lunch and dinner time', buuuuuut we couldn't find any open / ready to serve restaurant in the city lauter-bernsbach (best know for its lautergold distillery) few km before the gates of schwarzenbach. in our hotel in schwarzenbach there were limited seats all pre-occupied by reservations due to corona restrictions. we were sooo hungry that we have decided to drive down the road and look for a restaurant. 15 minutes later and 10-12 km away we have found the village of breitenbrunn close to the chech border. our 1st trial there, the ratsstübel, was ready to close, but the 2nd trial, adners gasthof und hotel was open and not reserved for a wedding celebration or the like! unfortunatelly, that does not mean, we could eat immediately as the dinner for the hotel guests started at 6. know we had to bypass loooong 1.5 hours of our lifes. of course, we regretted a lot we did not eat in poland before the german border, but afterwards are we always more clever than before, aren't we? at least we've got some coffee + beer and it was warm there. my ready to die wife ordered an apfelstrudel in sheer despair ... if you asked me, the whole kitchen was either frozen or bewitched or both, thus her apfelstrudel with a hot vanilla sauce came maybe 10 minutes before the regular dinner time. i could not tell you what did we eat that day, but what i can tell ya for sure is their salad bar at 06:00:00 rescued my life ... #hungeristhebestcook 😅

however, i liked the erzgebirge (ore mountains) a lot. its landscape remembered me of the slovakian ore mountains (slovenske rudohorie) around einsiedel an der göllnitz, where both my parents were born.

st. georg's church + castle in schwarzenberg.

the uptown is easily accesible from the main paking via complimentary cogwheel railroad.

lauter-bernsbach

lautergold distillery

schwarzenberg neustadt

the erzgebirge (ore mountains) is really flat, isnt it?🌲

adners gasthof + hotel, breitenbrunn

back to schwarzenberg

erzgebirge - ore mountains

for the victims of stalinism & communists after 1945

georgenkirche, schwarzenberg, sachsen (saxony)

 

chime tower (glockenspiel)

freie republik schwarzenberg - after the WWII there was a small area around schwarzenberg between the u.s. and red army which survived as 'free and independent' republic for 6 weeks till it became part of the soviet zone and thus part of east germany DDR / GDR for 45 years

town hall, schwarzenberg

'glück auf' means good luck and it was and is the ore miners' salute

few memories from the past times

 

more pictures here.

funeral in eastern slovakia, SK

so sad, my youngest cousin roland is dead. he went from us after a short dread disease 😢😭😢

cemetery ('totengarten' as the locals say) in einsiedel an der göllnitz (mnisek nad hnilcom), 

region spis (zips) in the slovak ore mountains (slovenske rudohorie SK, ungarisches erzgebirge DE), which are part of the western carpathian mountains (karpaty), slovakia, SK

well, it was my 1st visit in slovakia this year. and for such a sad reason. although it was due to the mad corona regulations in SK for me not possible to come earlier, i would appreciate any other situation 😢.... well, funeral is one of the few exceptions, when not vaccinated people can come into the country without the mandatory 2 weeks in quarantine. there is 'only' a negative PCR test needed.

it is difficult to find any words which describe the pain caused by roland's sudden death ... so i will present only few pictures made...

 

the valley i love so much, my happy first view from the uhorna pass (999 m).

the first village is called uhorna today, the former german name was ahorn.

the lake uhorna is really cold all year long. it was buid for mining industry few hundred years ago on the creek schmöllnitzer bach named by the small nearby city of schmöllnitz (smolnik).

evangelic church in einsiedel an der göllnitz

'glück auf' means good luck and it was and is the ore miners' salute

einsiedel an der göllnitz was settled by german settlers in 1230.

in the 16th century became the majority of the inhabitants evangelic.

spitzenberg mountain and the CATHOLIC church in einsiedl an der göllnitz

spitznberg and the EVANGELIC church directly below the mountain in einsiedel / einsiedl

this picture is not ment as a joke as it would be not appropriate in this sad situation.
~~~
as the picture shows a cemetery and if i shoud sometimes look for a cemetery / funeral picture for some blogger-related reason i would probably find it in this google album first. the original 'message' was:

if someone pays enough, she would cry bitterly and grieve about his/her death at a funeral...

bratislava (pressburg)

mother + son

father + son

(very) few more pictures here.

RIP, dear ROLAND 💖