August 25, 2010
Werben
The concert last night was a very strange affair. We arrived about fifteen minutes early - the streets in the little town were packed with cars. When we got to the church we saw that a marquee had been erected beside it. This was decorated with flowers as for a wedding. We felt somewhat under dressed. A man was selling , or rather giving away, tickets. We were given two small tickets stapled together and two bits of cellotape. He explained to us that we had to wrtite or name on the top ticket then find a seat to cellotape it to to reserve it. The bottom ticket was a pass to allow us to go in and out of the church. The concert goers were eating drinking and generally having a good time but we decided we had better find a seat. When we went into the church of course nearly every seat had a small ticket cellotaped to it but we found two places on a form at the back of the church and stuck our tickets to them. Eventually people took their places and the Pastor and the Organizer both spoke at length. The church itself was unusual to our eyes, it was very plain ,in a Luthern style I presume ,and because of this it was extremely difficult to judge its age. The pianist, Arkadi Zenziper, was superb. He played both Schuman pieces by memory. He really came to has peak however in the Beethoven Trio. Now was the first 'pause' and we went out into the marquee and had a glass of wine. Everyone started eating and drinking again so this was clearly going to take some time. The next section was to be a reading of poetry of the region, clearly difficult for non German speakers. This to be followed by another 'pause'. More eating and drinking I presume then the final vocal section. We estimated that it probably wouldn't finish till around midnight or latter so although we would have liked to listen to the singing we finished our wine and went back to bed. This event apparently is not a concert but a Schubertiad. Ken who is considerably more musically literate than me says such musical / cultural events were established in Schubert's time. Perhaps an opportunity for the fund raising, social committee of the Bombay Pokeno parish!!
I have always found cobbles romantic and charming . I love the sound of tyres on them, the way they look and the pictures they conjure up in my mind. Today cured me of that and I felt extreme sympathy for those poor athletes in the Tour de France this year who had to endure two sections of them.
The smell along the river bank today was that of a receeding flood and the betragled grass was coated in muddy silt. When we crossed on the ferry we didn't have to go to the landing for a flooded river but could land at the normal place. There was no rain although the sky still looks threatening. The wind is viscous and when we rode directly into it it was hard to do more than about 12km per hour although in the odd time it is behind us we got up to over 30km per hour and feel like champions.
We have stopped at the Red Eagle Guesthouse in Werben and Gunter (our host) has given us a large beer.
Today's ride: 80 km (50 miles)
Total: 663 km (412 miles)
| Rate this entry's writing | Heart | 0 |
| Comment on this entry | Comment | 0 |