Regensburg - Day 5

Last night after dinner there was a local entertainer on board - played 'favourites' on his guitar.  Good voice, was able to sing German, Australian and American songs upon request.  Quite nice, and as the evening progressed you could tell people were feeling looser...more dancing (including Ken and me).

The tour Ken and I signed up for in Regensburg was cancelled, not enough people signed up.  Crushing, because it was a beer tour.  Poor Ken.  But we made do...the suffering....we slept in a bit and I had the light breakfast in the Piano Bar (fruit, a roll with honey and a glass of OJ).  I think I'm coming down with whatever 'crud' Ken has.  Nothing bad, just that neither of us are 100% (we're probably just 90%).  That and the rain, which also isn't anything bad.  Mostly just enough to either have the jacket hood up, or use the free umbrellas or my trusty 'Robin' hat.  (Thanks again Robin, it's been wonderful to have)

We opted to have our own walk around town today, rather than the guided tour.  All the shops are closed today.  It's Ascension Day today May 29th.  We were told that there is a special service going on that they are expecting 20,000 people for (Mom and Dad sat with a visiting priest who said 50,000), so they can't do the services in town in the Cathedral of St Peter, instead they have to do it out of town in a coliseum/stadium because it is so popular.  So again, not so many people in town.  There are quite a few ships, though not as many as Passau and the river is narrower here so there is no double parking.

Walking across the Old Stone Bridge (Steinerne Brucke)

The bridge supports (pylons?) look like a ship's prow.  

Here's a section of the bridge not yet under repair, see the bridge supports...

Too bad the sky is grey, the water reflection would have been extra cool if it weren't raining, too.  But still gorgeous!

Since we didn't go on the guided tour I just knew that this was an important statue, I just looked it up and found out it's Bruckmandl - a mostly naked boy shielding his eyes from the sun, at the highest point on the bridge, and is said to symbolize the city's freedoms and its emancipation from the control  of the Bishop.  I'm happy that I read about it before, so when I saw it I was able to recognize it as something special.  The benefits of my pre-research, I guess!

Selfie on the Old Stone Bridge

Looked up a street and noticed some art on the wall ahead

David and Goliath - notice he's resting his arm on the window!

Cathedral of St Peter (Dom St Peter)

And Ken noticed this guy - we still aren't sure if it's a cow...

And I'm glad my horse isn't ugly like this poor creature

Ludvig I - Koning von Bayern (Yolanda translated that to King of Bayern, a province in Germany)

Not sure what this is - an old city wall or just a cool stone covered archway, but it looked neat.  And yep, that's Ken.

The Old Stone Bridge is going through a major renovation that'll take a few more years to complete

The Historic Sausage Kitchen (Historische Wurstkuchl) - I've heard it's Germany's oldest sausage house

We couldn't read the menu (turns out they have an english menu but we just pointed to the plate next to us - the  universal language and ordered exactly what they had.  Then we started talking to the couple, they're from Portland, Oregon travelling on their 35th anniversary.  Very nice.  

Yep, that's me drinking a dark beer!  When we placed the order we'd just asked for what the people next to us had - 10 sausages (bratwurst) mit sauerkraut, two beers and they had a giant basket of crusty rolls - when we paid after our meal they ask you how many rolls you had (we had 2) and they charge accordingly.  We paid 23euro for our meal.  

And you can tell we enjoyed our meal (oh, and when the waitress tried to take my beer glass away I grabbed it back - I wasn't finished with it and it was yummy!

That's Ken sitting with his back to the camera to the left of the door - our two umbrellas are hanging on the window sill and the doorway is into the kitchen (the earlier photo).  They had about 6 tables under an awning so we were able to sit out of the rain.  Additional 10 tables outside for nicer weather.

View of the building from the other side.  It's the small greenish building in front - very small, you'd miss it if yo blinked.

Toni and Bob - this is the day-cruise for you - a Swarovski crystal decorated ship.  They have a couple of them, very sparkly!

Map of Regensburg - but I bet you can figure that out on your own, huh?

Another selfie - with the River Princess in the background.  it's raining, still, but lightly

I like the decoration on the front of the ship

As we were sailing away we noticed this blue sign on the shore - we'd seen it on our way in also - we figured out it's the 'flip a bitch' location - where the ships all make u-turns!

At this point now, we're on our way to Nuremberg next.  The Sun deck is closed until Frankfurt due to low bridges.  We'll be hanging out in the Piano Bar a lot, I think!  Again, the suffering.  I don't know how we will manage.