Lübeck, Germany
We awoke to light gray skies over the River Trave, which flows into the Baltic Sea. We were sailing southwest from Travemunde, at the river’s mouth, toward Lübeck, Germany’s largest port on the Baltic Sea (or Ostsee, as it’s called in German). This industrial city of 210,000 people is one of Germany’s prime tourist destinations in the north, because of its charming medieval city center towered over by the spires of several red brick churches completed in the 14th century.
In the Middle Ages Lübeck was one of the most important towns in this part of Europe. A founding member of the Hanseatic League, Lübeck prospered as a trading and shipping center, with much of its wealth coming from the sale and transshipment of salt. Successful merchants built tall brick houses with steep gables and provided funding for ecclesiastical and social institutions such as the Heiligen-Geist-Hospital (Holy Spirit Hospital) which cared for the sick and elderly. Today it’s a museum of that aspect of medieval life, and the site of a popular Christmas market held every year for 10 days in December.
Our Lindblad/National Geographic group first glimpsed Lübeck from small canal boats, with a guided tour on the water surrounding the island that forms the historic city center, now a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Today, 10,000 people live in the small houses clustered along little lanes that crisscross the island.
Walking tours of the city gave us a closer look at the characteristic Gothic red-brick architecture of Lübeck, including the 15th-century Holstentor (Holsten Gate), the best-known symbol of the city itself. We were especially impressed with the soaring height of the Marienkirche (St. Mary’s Church), in the center of town, which is Germany’s third largest church. A masterpiece of North German Gothic construction (on a Romanesque base), the church was badly damaged in a bombing raid during World War II and has now been lovingly reconstructed. The bells that fell from its tower during the raid remain in place on the floor of the church, as a memorial to all the suffering and damage of that war.
On a lighter note, we visited the nearby Rathaus (City Hall), another Gothic structure, this one made of glazed bricks, part of which were overlaid by a more “modern” structure of white-painted stone in the 16th century. Across the street, the Niederegger marzipan shop and café tempted everyone with its impressive selection of marzipan almond-paste confections and marzipan-covered cakes. A small museum on the upper floor provided information on the history of marzipan-making in Lübeck, which has been a center of the marzipan industry since the Middle Ages.
With the afternoon free to explore Lübeck on our own, many of us headed for lunch at the Schiffergesellschaft, a well-known restaurant housed in a historic 16h-century building that was once the headquarters of the ship masters’ society. Inside, the nautical theme was carried out by ship models suspended from the ceiling over the long wooden tables where we ate regional fish dishes washed down by plenty of good German beer.
As the golden autumn light of northern Germany broke through the gray clouds overhead, we all boarded zodiacs for our return along the canal to the National Geographic Explorer, where our day in Lübeck ended with our Captain’s welcome cocktail party and a fine dinner aboard the ship, as we anticipated our next adventure: traversing the Kiel Canal between the Baltic and the North Seas.
