At least with this series of inspections, we had an agreement that the working day would start at 09:00, which meant a lay in, a late shower and a nice drive to the factory. The area around the factory is typical German I guess, lots of farmland, forest and factories. Its a great area, and despite it being muck spreading season, with the farmland being fertilised, it was still a pleasure to drive along the country road to the factory.
The day passed with inspections, questions, questions and more questions. It may be work, but for me, and the others it seemed more like an interrogation. It was a relief when the day ended at 5, just as it looked like the day might drag on into night. THe cloud from the morning had cleared, and the sun was heading towards sunset, casting wonderful pastel shades in the sky. I decided to follow up on my plan to drive to Meissen to look at the cathedral.
Last week I had been looking through some tourist leaflets in the hotel, and I came across one for the cathedral in Meissen: looked interesting, but it was clear that it would be closed by the time I got there, should I go? The promise of a fine sunset and clear skies for night shots made me want to take the chance. Our hosts had said it was a 40 minute drive to the city, so, should be easy. I had seen a sign for it from the motorway last week, so it couldn't be hard.
I set off down the autobahn at 140kmh, there are no speed limits as such, and the car seemed happy enough, quiet enough anyway. I switched on the radio to find another station playing nothing but 80s tunes. They seemed very excited to be playing these tunes, many of which I had forgotten There was the occasional German tune mixed in, but mostly 80s chart pop. British pop. Sounded good anyway.
Off the autobahn onto a minor road, heading still towards Meissen. At least the name kept appearing on signs. Still 30 plus KM to go, but now I'm here and all that. The sun set and the sky turned burnished orange; I really wanted to stop and take shots, but I felt every minute was precious as the light was fading, fading, fading.
I came to the outskirts of the city, headed towards the 'zentrum', traffic was light, there was still light in the sky, and the city seemed nice enough, but then this was the neustadt, the new town. I came to the bridge over the Elbe, and was greeted with a wonderful view of the old town, altstadt, gather around a rocky outcrop round which the river flowed, on top of which was a castle and the cathedral. The warmth of the streetlights contrasting with the cool blue of the sky. It was a wonderful sight, and worth the drive on its own.
I found a place to park, walked along the cobbled streets to the main town square, all lined on each side by either tall merchants houses of the town hall. And above it all was the castle and cathedral. I would love to have walked up there, but it would have been dark by then, and probably not got shots, so I resolved to come back, one day. I walked round the square, got more shots, pondered about calling in the already busy Italian restaurant, but decided to drive back to the hotel.
I thought it best to use the sat nav, now that it was dark. A wise choice in the end I believe. It wasn't hard anyway, back though the dark landscape, through wonderfully pretty small towns until I came to the autobahn. I put my foot down and was back in my room by seven, and tucking into a plateful of saffron flavoured pasta by half past. My gosh, I was tired again. Back in my room, I packed, wrote some more mails and had an early-ish night.
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