Cruising From Niendorf To Bremen

    Good morning from the Victor Hugo. Today will be a day of relaxing on board as we make our way to Bremen. Last night we overnighted in Nienburg, a small town along the canal we are cruising. This morning there was an excursion into the city center, but I chose to stay on board. Last night, when my table mates Allen, Margaret, and Bill received our schedule in English for the following day, our little friend from reception told us the town is small and that there would be lots of free time in the town, primarily to allow people to shop. None of us being shop til you drop types, we opted to walk into town last night to see what there was to see. It was after 9 pm, so nothing was open, save a couple of restaurants and a strip club (we did not go in), so we saw the town and then returned to the boat. This morning has dawned overcast and there is a chance of rain this afternoon. Sailing along the canals is smooth and serene. The countryside is lush and green and along the way we see some farms, livestock, and wind farms as well as private residences and villages off in the distance. If relaxation is your goal when cruising, river cruising is your ticket. There are numerous bridges under which we pass, most so low that the captain's bridge needs to be lowered so our boat can clear the bridge. If passengers are on the sundeck, we are instructed to be seated and/or squat as we pass under the bridges. There are times when the sundeck is closed to passengers due to numerous low bridges. There are also a number of locks along the canals through which we have passed. The locks are truly amazing feats of engineering as they either raise or lower our boat for the next stretch of our voyage. We did sail on the Mitteland Kanal for quite a stretch. The water bridge the Germans constructed was quite impressive. It is a straight shot detour that means barges and river boats don't need to make some 180s on the rivers and canals below to keep going to their destination. As I write this, we are approaching a lock. The traffic control light has just turned green, so our captain will not need to wait to get clearance to enter the lock. Often, there is a boat (or boats) coming the opposite way who are in the lock, so traffic approaching the other way must halt and wait its turn. It appears that this lock will lower our boat, by how much I do not know.

   I am very happy I chose to take this cruise. The boat is comfortable, the food delicious, and the crew is very friendly and efficient. My guess is there are fewer than 100 passengers, the majority of whom are French. CroisiEurope is a French cruise line, so it is not surprising that most of the passengers are French. Our young friend from reception, who normally accompanies passengers on shore excursions, is fluent in at least three languages, French, German, and English. Yesterday when we had a tour of Hannover, there was no English speaking guide, so she served as translator for me and Bill. I find I am able to pick out a word or two in French when tour guides are explaining what we are seeing, but not enough to get the full flavor of what we are being told. There are some of the passengers who have limited English and try little snippets of conversation with me. They are apologetic about their limited English, but I tell them their English is much better than my French which consists mostly of bonjour, oui, merci, escargot, and French fries. Most of us are of a certain age, the minimum age probably being around 60 while the maximum is somewhere in the 80s age group. I suppose that makes me middle aged for this group. I am grateful this is a non-smoking cruise. The only place where smoking is allowed is on the sun deck, and so far I have seen very few passengers light up.

   As we cruise and see the beauty of the German countryside, it is almost impossible not to think back to the 1930s and 1940s when the Nazis came to power and war was raging in Europe. Yesterday when we toured Hannover, we went into the city hall where there were four large relief map displays of Hannover throughout some of its history, from 1689 to 1939 to 1945 to present day Hannover. The 1945 map gave a good idea of the amount of destruction Hannover endured due to being bombed in World War II. Germans do not gloss over their history. There is full acknowledgment of the horrors Germany perpetrated in the 20th century, the hope being that we will all learn form history and not repeat it. All countries could certainly learn a lesson from the German approach to its history.

   Until next time.