We were up early today for a nice hotel breakfast before the 5 minute walk to the Hauptbahnhof and our three step train ride to Quedlinberg. In no time we were there, and walking the 20 mins to our 'hostel' on the ourskirts of old town. Fucking hostels. I swore I'd never stay in one again, and now I remember why. Doors effectively locked until checkin, nothing in the way of service or even a smile. Eat shit hostels. Never again.
Anyway, we dumped our bags (we had to just leave them lying in the foyer - eat shit hostels) and headed out to take a look at the town. Since our 'hostel' was quite close to the castle, we thought we'd take a look there first. To be honest, it wasn't that amazing given the last few we've seen. Really, it wasn't even close. Oh well.
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| Quedlinburg castle - disappointing. |
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| The view from the castle wall. |
From the castle we headed into the centre of old town and the marktplatz where we expected the christmas market to be. It looked to us like there were still setting up for a saturday market start? Nuh-uh they were pulling everything down. We never saw a notice, but it was pretty obvious that the market had been cancelled in sympathy for the Magdeburg terrorist attack the night before. It did take us quite a while to realise what was happening though. We even ventured back into town after dark just in case we were wrong. Nup, we weren't.
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| Old town Quedlinburg and the rathaus |
Craving sustenance, we sought out the ratskeller on marktplatz - always a good option in any german village. It turned out to be a fantastic choice. We were immediately furnished with bier #26 of the trip - Duckstein Hefeweizen, and it was amazingly good. Soooooo damn good. I followed this up with what was billed as a 'pair of haxe' but must have come from some pretty small piggies (compared to the Bavarian monster haxe we'd been seeing).
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| Viva la ratskeller! |
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| Bier #26 - Duckstein Hefeweizen |
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| Haxe aus little piggies |
After a second weizen (and in Eb's case a third) we left the ratskeller and wandered around more of old-town. It's a pretty small town to be honest, and we exhausted the pictuesque roads and laneways pretty quickly.
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| More old town wandering |
Soon we craved caffeinne, and so we combined a coffee break with a chance to try another regional specialty - Baumkuchen (tree cake). We ordered it with a dark chocolate covering, and it came in 4 sections cut from a larger cake. It was so dense it seemed baked with almond meal or similar, and was almost edible if dunked in your coffee.
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| Baumkuchen - pretty dense, pretty dry, pretty meh. |
After the 'cake' if was time to actually check into our hostel so we got into our rooms and had a rest. Pretty soon it was dark, and as stated previously we stupidly went back out to check if the christmas market hadn't suddenly re-hydrated in our absense. No such luck. Just small knots of people and young families wandering around directionless and lost. Such a shame. Given Magdeburg is just up the road, I guess it's understandable.
Anyway, we continued on to dinner at the only brewery in town - Brauhaus Lüdde.
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| Brauhaus Lüdde |
My research had recommended to me their Schwartzer Bier, and so this was immediately ordered; becoming bier #27 of this trip. Sweet with little to no bitter after taste, it went down sooo smoothly.
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| Brauhaus Lüdde Schwartzer Bier - #27 of the trip. |
The schwartzer bier was so good that a second round was immediately ordered. Food orders followed, and since I was still so full from my piglet haxe, I ordered a simple 'wurst salat'. Yep it's just what it sounds like - rounds of weiswurst in salad dressing, In hindsight not the best choice (I coukd have had a real salad!), but you know, when in Germany..
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