Luxembourg!
Mar. 26th, 2015 03:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
motodraconisIt's Spring in Luxembourg City!
Anticipating a strenuous week, I'd booked a quick flit to Luxembourg. Why? Well, I'm starting to run out of places in Europe I've not already visited!
It being near Easter, the Easter Sheep Cakes were out - never seen anything like this before.
Easter eggs too...
Easter bunnies,
Easter bling!
Easter cake and pork pie - for breakfast. The first time I've ever stumbled across a pork pie outside of the UK, (though I'm sure they exist.) In Luxembourg they are Zeppelin shaped with a port hole filled with meat jelly. They seem to come in all sizes, this one cigar, but also handbag issue. I've no idea if they're Easter significant.
I know very little about Luxembourg, and expected to find a pretty, but a bit dull, standard 18th/19th century main architectural motif town. What I did not expect, was just how mental the place actually is.
The Old Town is perched on a rock, the "bock" and surrounded on all sides by a steep natural moat. The only way in is via incredibly high bridges.
A double layered town, with the "moat" stuffed with buildings.
With steep cliffs on both inner and outer walls of the valley-pseudo moat, there are many buildings, such as this Rock church, built troglodyte-style back into the cliffs.
I went to the tourist information and asked if there were any nearby castles (for some reason, I could have sworn I'd seen a line saying there was a castle 2 miles from my hotel) but the tourist info lady looked stricken. "I'm sorry, the nearest castle is more than an hours drive away."
But it was a stupid question to ask on my part, as the whole bloody old town is pretty much a gigantic castle surrounded by battlements...
Because of its strategic position, Luxembourg was, from the 16th century until 1867, when its walls were dismantled, one of Europe's greatest fortified sites. It was repeatedly reinforced as it passed from one great European power to another: the Holy Roman Emperors, the House of Burgundy, the Habsburgs, the French and Spanish kings, and finally the Prussians. Until their partial demolition, the fortifications were a fine example of military architecture spanning several centuries. Unesco Info.
View down from the bock.
You're so high up, you get views that appear to have been taken from an aeroplane!
Fountain in the old town.
At one point, I popped into the main cathedral, which happened to be having a recital of organ music. You can see just how exciting that was for the listeners...
Actually, there doesn't seem to be much in the old City you can go into. No galleries or palaces or museums leaping out begging to be visited, though I didn't do any great research. I popped into the foyer of The Luxembourg City History Museum but it looked a bit tedious to be honest. Here's a guard in front of the official residence of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, but you're not allowed in.
However, there is one thing in the Old City that is brilliant and unmissable... the Bock Casemates.
The first underground tunnels were built in 1644, in the era of the Spanish domination. The 23-kilometre long galleries were enlarged only 40 years later by Vauban, the French military engineer and fortress builder, and in the eighteenth century by the Austrians. The subterranean defensive passages were placed on different levels and reached down as far as 40 metres. It is these impressive defence works that conferred Luxembourg the name of “Gibraltar of the North”.
After the dismantling of the fortress in 1867, 17 kilometres of the casemates were spared, left in good condition. Since 1933 the Bock and Pétrusse casemates have been open to the public. The fortress ramparts and the historically impressive Old Town enjoy international reputation: in 1994 UNESCO listed them as World Heritage. Tourism Luxembourg.
When you first go in, it looks a bit shit, but then you do down and it opens up into a labyrinth of endless tunnels and oubliettes.
It's really worth checking out - but don't get lost, and not for the wobbly of foot. The tightly twisting stairs, uneven surfaces and (at times) dimly lit ground will be hair raising.
On Sunday, the place is pretty dead. Nothing is open, apart from a few restaurants which are often fully booked. Luckily, I was able to find my way down on foot to explore the low "moat" area. In places this is idyllic wilderness, though I can't help but notice that most of my snaps of European weekend escapes feature rather bleak and grey nature, since I do most of my visits at Easter-time or Halloween time, when the trees are leafless and nothing is in flower. It's giving the impression that most of Europe is grim and barren. Not so! It's just a touch of winter lingering.
So that was the capital of Luxembourg! Two days was quite adequate for me. A nice little escape to a place unexpectedly weird.
Anticipating a strenuous week, I'd booked a quick flit to Luxembourg. Why? Well, I'm starting to run out of places in Europe I've not already visited!
It being near Easter, the Easter Sheep Cakes were out - never seen anything like this before.
Easter eggs too...
Easter bunnies,
Easter bling!
Easter cake and pork pie - for breakfast. The first time I've ever stumbled across a pork pie outside of the UK, (though I'm sure they exist.) In Luxembourg they are Zeppelin shaped with a port hole filled with meat jelly. They seem to come in all sizes, this one cigar, but also handbag issue. I've no idea if they're Easter significant.
I know very little about Luxembourg, and expected to find a pretty, but a bit dull, standard 18th/19th century main architectural motif town. What I did not expect, was just how mental the place actually is.
The Old Town is perched on a rock, the "bock" and surrounded on all sides by a steep natural moat. The only way in is via incredibly high bridges.
A double layered town, with the "moat" stuffed with buildings.
With steep cliffs on both inner and outer walls of the valley-pseudo moat, there are many buildings, such as this Rock church, built troglodyte-style back into the cliffs.
I went to the tourist information and asked if there were any nearby castles (for some reason, I could have sworn I'd seen a line saying there was a castle 2 miles from my hotel) but the tourist info lady looked stricken. "I'm sorry, the nearest castle is more than an hours drive away."
But it was a stupid question to ask on my part, as the whole bloody old town is pretty much a gigantic castle surrounded by battlements...
Because of its strategic position, Luxembourg was, from the 16th century until 1867, when its walls were dismantled, one of Europe's greatest fortified sites. It was repeatedly reinforced as it passed from one great European power to another: the Holy Roman Emperors, the House of Burgundy, the Habsburgs, the French and Spanish kings, and finally the Prussians. Until their partial demolition, the fortifications were a fine example of military architecture spanning several centuries. Unesco Info.
View down from the bock.
You're so high up, you get views that appear to have been taken from an aeroplane!
Fountain in the old town.
At one point, I popped into the main cathedral, which happened to be having a recital of organ music. You can see just how exciting that was for the listeners...
Actually, there doesn't seem to be much in the old City you can go into. No galleries or palaces or museums leaping out begging to be visited, though I didn't do any great research. I popped into the foyer of The Luxembourg City History Museum but it looked a bit tedious to be honest. Here's a guard in front of the official residence of the Grand Duke of Luxembourg, but you're not allowed in.
However, there is one thing in the Old City that is brilliant and unmissable... the Bock Casemates.
The first underground tunnels were built in 1644, in the era of the Spanish domination. The 23-kilometre long galleries were enlarged only 40 years later by Vauban, the French military engineer and fortress builder, and in the eighteenth century by the Austrians. The subterranean defensive passages were placed on different levels and reached down as far as 40 metres. It is these impressive defence works that conferred Luxembourg the name of “Gibraltar of the North”.
After the dismantling of the fortress in 1867, 17 kilometres of the casemates were spared, left in good condition. Since 1933 the Bock and Pétrusse casemates have been open to the public. The fortress ramparts and the historically impressive Old Town enjoy international reputation: in 1994 UNESCO listed them as World Heritage. Tourism Luxembourg.
When you first go in, it looks a bit shit, but then you do down and it opens up into a labyrinth of endless tunnels and oubliettes.
It's really worth checking out - but don't get lost, and not for the wobbly of foot. The tightly twisting stairs, uneven surfaces and (at times) dimly lit ground will be hair raising.
On Sunday, the place is pretty dead. Nothing is open, apart from a few restaurants which are often fully booked. Luckily, I was able to find my way down on foot to explore the low "moat" area. In places this is idyllic wilderness, though I can't help but notice that most of my snaps of European weekend escapes feature rather bleak and grey nature, since I do most of my visits at Easter-time or Halloween time, when the trees are leafless and nothing is in flower. It's giving the impression that most of Europe is grim and barren. Not so! It's just a touch of winter lingering.
So that was the capital of Luxembourg! Two days was quite adequate for me. A nice little escape to a place unexpectedly weird.
no subject
Date: 2015-03-27 02:26 pm (UTC)(My favourite part was somewhere in an outlying bit of the battlements - since they were still fortifying some bits of it at a time that post-dated the invention of trains, there's a traditional-castle-gate-with-portcullis arrangement that was built to take a railway line. It doesn't feel like the castle age and the railway age should overlap at all, but they did right there.)
no subject
Date: 2015-03-27 06:14 pm (UTC)