clairedavieswriter

While enjoying a sustaining supper in the friendly local Italian last night, I calculated that Team Bernard have clocked up just over 400 miles since setting off on Tuesday. As usual, I won’t be breaking any speed records, but the pace has been perfect for me so far, allowing plenty of time to appreciate the surroundings along the way. For the most part, that has involved multiple photo stops and very few extended periods of rest, simply because I’ve passed so few cafés. Today offered the perfect moment to change that:

However, even before food, my priority was to get Bernard’s slightly chafing gears checked out. I thought I’d struck gold when I found Fahrrad Alex just 5 minutes’ ride away, but on this occasion our guardian angels must’ve been otherwise engaged: Alex insisted that he had no time for Bernard today, not even for a quick once-over. There were no other workshops within a sensible distance (probably why Alex was so busy). The issue only arises in Bernard’s highest gears, which I suspect I’ll be using less from now on, as the terrain gets hillier, so he’ll most likely be fine, but I’ll be sure to treat him with care nonetheless:

Hannover’s architecture is sadly mostly a legacy of the RAF, which over the course of WW2 destroyed more than 90% of the buildings and killed around 7,000 people. On a single night in October 1943, over 260,000 bombs were dropped on the city. In many areas, this kind of look was the result:

In some cases, damage has been left deliberately unrepaired, as a sobering reminder of the evils we perpetrate on each other:

But I gather that the small so-called Altstadt (Old Town) was in fact reconstituted post-war using rubble from buildings all over the city. If so, they did a pretty good job:

While nearby, the new pays homage to the old:

Just around the corner from here, I stumbled across the Ballhofplatz, which wasn’t mentioned in my guidebook, but an unsparing information board explained that it used to be home to the local Hitler Youth (HJ) and League of German Girls (BDM).

The board didn’t say, but I assume the Ballhofplatz was also destroyed in the war, and rebuilt, ‘lest we forget’.

The paved area in the middle was used for marches and flag-raising ceremonies:

The League of German Girls was based in this building, the Spitta House, which bears a line by the Nazi poet Georg Stammler:

“Wir Jungen haben die Aufgabe, neue Wege zu suchen und zu bahnen, und den Mut, sie zu gehen”

(We young people have the task to seek and pave new paths, and the courage to walk them)

And on its far left corner you can see a single ‘Sig rune’, the emblem of the Deutsches Jungfolk (German Youth).

Today, possibly because the city had to be so extensively rebuilt, Hannover is a place of broad boulevards and shade-giving trees. Traffic is kept to main roads, and the result is a city on human scale where cycling and walking are the most popular ways to get around. It’s so quiet without the traffic noise.

Though there were loads of people about – I couldn’t work out how so many people were able to sit around in cafés on a Monday afternoon. More active locals were even queuing to surf on the weir

Apparently the city was laid out (I don’t know if originally or post-war) in such a way that everyone would have a park or green space within 10 minutes of their home. This is the Maschpark, a glorious green lung (with a lake) right in the heart of the city

All this exploring gave me an appetite so I was pleased to find the brilliant Markt Halle, where I could have chosen anything from bao buns to tapas or sushi, but opted for a taste of the Middle East instead

Tomorrow Team Bernard is back on the road again, with a longer day in the saddle in prospect. So I’ll leave you with this uplifting message from my breakfast café this morning: