ianmac62
Guru
- Location
- Northampton
Terrific tour; many thanks to @redfalo and @Gordon P!
Some photos are here at Vi(v)a Colonia; also at Aachen Cathedral; and Sabine took plenty of photos while she was with us. (The links point to albums on Flickr.) The photos she sent include the light display on the façade of the Rathaus (she went back one evening later in the week) and of Parking Day in Aachen on the Saturday (car park spaces are taken over and transformed into gardens). I've learned that Aachen has a Green Party mayor.
You may remember the new bridge (the High Bridge) in Maastricht immediately after coffee. It was signed in two languages:
The upper part of the sign is in Dutch; the lower part is in Limburgish and, in particular, the Mastrichtian dialect. Limburgish is spoken by about two million people across the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany; it's one of the Netherlands' three minority languages; and it comes in many dialect forms, each unique to a particular town or village.
Further interweb research into my beer glass at lunch in Roeselare
revealed that Rodenbach is the local brewery in Roeselare; that the cyclist is Jean-Pierre Monseré who was born in the town; and that the glass commemorates the 40th anniversary of his victory at the World Road Championships in 1970 (held at Mallory Park in Leicestershire). He died in 1971 in a collision with a support car during a race in Belgium while still the reigning world champion.
Some photos are here at Vi(v)a Colonia; also at Aachen Cathedral; and Sabine took plenty of photos while she was with us. (The links point to albums on Flickr.) The photos she sent include the light display on the façade of the Rathaus (she went back one evening later in the week) and of Parking Day in Aachen on the Saturday (car park spaces are taken over and transformed into gardens). I've learned that Aachen has a Green Party mayor.
You may remember the new bridge (the High Bridge) in Maastricht immediately after coffee. It was signed in two languages:
The upper part of the sign is in Dutch; the lower part is in Limburgish and, in particular, the Mastrichtian dialect. Limburgish is spoken by about two million people across the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany; it's one of the Netherlands' three minority languages; and it comes in many dialect forms, each unique to a particular town or village.
Further interweb research into my beer glass at lunch in Roeselare
revealed that Rodenbach is the local brewery in Roeselare; that the cyclist is Jean-Pierre Monseré who was born in the town; and that the glass commemorates the 40th anniversary of his victory at the World Road Championships in 1970 (held at Mallory Park in Leicestershire). He died in 1971 in a collision with a support car during a race in Belgium while still the reigning world champion.
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