The gay hotel desk clerk warned me I wouldn't be able to see much of St. Emmeram's Palace, a converted monastery where the Thurn und Taxis dynasty has lived for more than two centuries, unless I had booked a private tour in advance. That didn't dissuade me from taking an 8 a.m. tour of the neighborhood, high and low.
More famous Germans, this time painted in an alley. I'm really surprised that Walhalla didn't include busts of the Brothers Grimm. In my assessment of Teutonic contributions to European civilization, their fairy tales rank pretty high. The citizens of Alsfeld think so, too.
Although I didn't realize it the time, I did get to see the rear of the palace when a kind guard allowed me through the gate to take this photo. The family, now headed by Prince Albert II, earned its fortune by providing postal service throughout the Holy Roman Empire.
Prince Albert's mother, Gloria von Thurn und Taxis, known as "Princess TNT" in the 1980's, was once described by the New York Times as "wild-child bride of the bisexual billionaire Prince Johannes von Thurn und Taxis." After the death of her husband, however, she made a pilgrimage to Lourdes and her life took a spiritual turn. Catholic orthodoxy supplanted youthful liberalism. In other words, she threw her gay pals under the bus, many of whom--like Andy and Keith--didn't live to see the day. Do we have god to thank for that?
At least some of the palace employees commute by bicycle.
Quite without knowing where I was going, I found myself almost completely alone in a basilica adjoining the palace. A man disappeared after lighting all the tapers.
Little descriptive information is available for a place as gorgeous as this although the church has been destroyed and rebuilt several times over the past millennium. This may be the final resting place for St. Wolfgang, one of Germany's most important saints during the Middle Ages.
There's also an archive of ceremonial candles in his crypt. If there had been a gift shop, I would have purchased one.
I'm guessing the family keeps the ornate basilica on the down low because they don't want it mobbed by tourists.
I wonder if Gloria, now the dowager princess, confesses here. When I mentioned my basilica visit to the desk clerk, he asked me if I'd seen her. "She still worships, there, you know," he said reverentially. Queens do love their royalty, especially if it's local.
But soon enough, she'll resemble this, just like the rest of us.
These worn reliefs probably date back to the original church.
Johannes Aventinus--there's a bust of him in Walhalla, too--is entombed at St. Emmeram's Basilica. He published the first history of Bavaria in 1523.
En route back to the hotel, I passed Regensburg's town library and this charming wooden sculpture.
More Bavaria:
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