Today, we will visit Hamburg downtown by ourselves. I am a little bit nervous. We first walk around the hotel.
I found a two-wagon bus at a nearby stop. On the entrance of the bus, there is a board like this. It means tied dogs can be taken onto the bus.
On the street are such strong iron duster recycle boxes. Carton, newspaper, colored bins, and transparent bins should be sorted before putting in.
Just a few minutes walk takes us to the riverbank of Elbe. The width of the river is very big allowing large boats sailing up and down. Willow trees make shade on the sand beach.
A large boat is cruising up, then...
Welcome radio started to air the national anthem of the boat and its national flag is hoisted on the pier. Yes, this is "Welcome Pier" of Elbe.
Elbe flows sedately allowing many boats to sail up and down. The sky has cleared up and the number of people walking around has increased.
We will get on a tram from Wedel terminal with the ticket we bought yesterday.
We got off the tram at the center of the downtown. Today, the Municipal Building shines beautifully in the blue sky. We entered the Hall, but was said "Sorry, there is no guided tour on Saturday." We were disappointed and looked around just the main lobby and the courtyard filled with many tourists from countryside.
We headed to Brahms Memorial. We came up to Hamburg Hauptbahnhof on foot. The main station building is very large and grandeur. There are many shops and railroads in the building. We took U-bahn from here.
I must open the door of a wagon by myself. The train has separated wagons and we have to get out from it at a station if we want to move the wagon from one to another. Street performers can get on and perform their arts to collect money from the passengers on the train. This is very unthinkable in Japan.
We asked a couple of pedestrians the way to the Brahms Memorial House on Peter Strasse that was restored to 18th century style. Unfortunately, the House was closed today. It is open to public on very limited days only. The birthplace of Brahms nearby was destroyed by fire in WW2. We could see the outside and courtyard only.
It was very pity for us. As we were tired, we got in a restaurant nearby called "Brahms Bistro." We took late lunch of pizza and beer. They were very good and the master of the restaurant was a nice guy. He taught many things by writing sketches of the streets and German language to tell us the way. We took a picture with him and said good-bye.
We then followed his words and came up to a square on which Musik Halle is located. The building is of Neo Baroque style built in 1908. The building escaped fire of WW2 and keeps the feature of the old days with a slight refurbish of outside. It is the headquarters of Hamburg Symphony Orchestra.
The yellow car is a post office car. The mail carriers also wear yellow uniforms. The symbol mark is a trumpet and the color of a mailbox is yellow, of course.
