On the Road to Dresden...19th July

On the way out of Nurnberg, I made a late choice to find the Nurnberg Messe and see the new hall, 3C, designed by Zaha Hadid's office.Recently finished, it mirrors hall 3A..that flanks an earlier hall. The building 3C is approximately 9600m2 and 3A 8400m2

Building 3C..

I had to press my camera against the glass to photo the interiors. The halls were closed....

I have downloaded two images from the website..

The site of building 3A...

Collectively the halls have a floor area of approximately 180,000m2 and the site is at the top end of the Grosse Strasse...

Moving on.. driving to Dresden, I stopped for a break at Bayreuth, close to the Czech border, in the rain... my first pronunciation of Bayreuth.. 'Bay - Ruth'... to a car park attendant had short shrift.. 'Bi - Royt'...

The central street felt like any small town; this one with an African/Caribbean market.. the food smelt good.. 

A market totem like the one in Munich..

I wanted to see the Bayreuth Opera House, a UNESCO world site since 2012. ...

Unfortunately it was only possible to see the interiors on a guided tour and all the tours were full and in German..

Well another time... A gentle stroll through Bayreuth.. but acknowledging I had to get moving to Dresden.. 

After a short while, the rain stopped and the sun appeared...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bayreuth

Bayreuth is known for its association with Richard Wagner and the performance of the Ring Cycle each year at the opera house he designed. I didn't get to this.. There is a Wagner walking tour around the city as well as a tour that focuses on Jean Paul Richter one of the most important German writers and poets who was supported by a Bayreuth citizen and who died in Bayreuth in 1825.. 

Back in the car.. the journey to Dresden was lovely in the sun.. Due to roadworks, I was taken off the auto bahn and took the scenic route into Dresden..

The corn was being harvested (a month later than Hungary and Serbia) and the gently rolling hills were great to see.

Finally in Dresden, reaching the hotel, parking the car, and venturing out as soon as possible for an early evening walk to check out the centre. The hotel was just to the south-west of the centre and the walk from the hotel to the centre went past a whole new district, focused on the Postplatz, being re-developed with mostly residential buildings...

Not sure if I like how the porcelain tiles have been finished... This building sits on the former footprint of an earlier building. with the stone plinth used as the cladding line.

This tank track and memorial of how many people protested over the SED and their leadership of East Germany.

https://www.dresden.de/de/leben/stadtportrait/110/ereignisse/17-juni.php?shortcut=17.Juni

Into the heart of the centre.. .

All to be explored tomorrow......

Nurnberg...18th July..

I started the day heading away from the centre of Nurnberg to the Reichsparteitagsgelande (the Reich Party Congress Grounds) and to the Documentationszentrum Reichsparteitagsgelande (the Documentation Centre of the Nazi Party Rally Grounds). 

From the 17C the site had became a popular destination centred on a large lake, the Dutzendteich, with cafes, boating and in the winter, skating.There was even a lighthouse.
The site was handed to the NSDAP and Albert Speer began the megalomaniac design and layout of the site, approximately 11 km. 

The structure of the museum shows the chronological history of the site starting with the post First World War socio-political chaos, the rise and fall of the Weimar Republic and the rise of the NSDAP through the 1920's to the elections of NSDAP to the Bundestag and the subsequent takeover of the political structure to become a one party state. 
Nurnberg was chosen because its own political transition mirrored the country with the city electing a NSDAP mayor in 1927. All subsequent party congresses were held in Nurnburg. 

The masterplan assumed the construction of 9 centres of which only three were completed, 4 unfinished and the remainder only started. 

The museum is located in one of the two reception buildings that connect to the Congress Hall; the route carved out of the unfinished building

Model of the museum

I'm usually not a fan of audio guides but this hand-held one has been designed so that you can control through identified numbers when and what to listen to. Each gallery room has a '100' number (100,200,300 onwards...) with each board/presentation within the room identified with an individual number which you type into the guide.

The museum also sets out to explain why it was located in Nurnberg being one of the earliest cities to elect an NSDAP in the late1920's, Nurnberg being a pre-eminent medieval city in German history with a record of Jewish pogroms and its geographical location in the heart of Germany. 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_party_rally_grounds

What was planned, but never completed, was on a scale difficult to comprehend. Between 1933 to 1938, at the beginning of September for approximately a week approximately a million people gathered at the site. Its sole purpose was to showcase the power of the state and to awe individuals in believing in the collective, not the individual.

The final exit route runs through what would have been reception and lounge rooms for the NSDAP leadership.. 

and looks out to the main congress hall. This edifice, never finished, was designed to hold 50,000 delegates. the scale is similar to the Colosseum in Rome.

Had it been completed, it would have stood another 10 metres higher; at present 38 metres high... This building is an example of the mentality of the NSDAP. Impossible to complete, it looked to a vision of the future that was also unobtainable..it looked to a vision of lasting for 5000 years but the reality was 5 years.

The other reception building is now the home of the Nurnberger Symphoniker for summer concerts in the Serenadenhof..

I spent most of the morning walking to the other event spaces still remaining..

The Zeppelin Field.. 

The Grosse Strasse... (Great Road).

And the lakes, now part of the public park

Finally a quick ice cream and back in the car to the centre of Nurnberg...

A walk up to the Schloss.... to look over the city..

One of last surviving medieval merchants houses.. 

This building at the gateway to the Schloss is now a youth hostel....

The view from the battlements..

Finally, in the evening walking back from the schloss, I came across this congregation of students. thinking that something was about to happen, I stayed around... 

But nothing did.. Speaking to a waiter in a cafe facing the square, the students come each evening... (not sure if they are the same students.) and sit looking down the slope...
Nurnberg's university is one of the top German universities. It was good to see so many still in the city..

Albrecht Durer's house on the edge of the same square. 

Walking back to the car, the streets were full of people, moving through the streets and sitting in the open cafes. The contrast between yesterday's evening visit and today's was wide and great to experience it...