Very loud noise started outside our hotel at 05:00 this morning. Construction is not actually allowed to start until 07:00 but deliveries are done overnight since they are prohibited in the Altstadt (old town) between 09:00 am and 01:00 am. This morning’s noise involved the delivery of a huge truckload of skids of lumber that had to be offloaded – and apparently dropped on the ground – by a forklift with a nice loud backup klaxon.

It’s a good thing we’d called it an early night last night and that I’d booked nice comfy first class seats for today’s 3 hour trip.

---

What follows is just a quick chronology in photos of our afternoon and evening in Bremen, where the rain seems finally to have caught up with us.

Oh well. We’re not made of sugar.

---

---

---

The room comes with gummy sheep called “sleep sheep”. I guess you count them as you eat them?

---

---

We walked past the former main post office.

---

---

And then around the Regional Courthouse complex, which is not only massive but imposingly beautiful.

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

---

That was ALL the Court Complex, and we didn’t even walk the entire perimeter! Knowing it would be closed on the weekend, and we leave Bremen on Monday morning, I had hoped that we might get to see the interior. Unfortunately it closes early on Fridays.

We turned the corner to pass the old police headquarters, built in 1906-08 by the Berlin architect Carl Börnstein.

---

The design of the façade and the excessively large building size are typical of the desire here at the turn of the 20th century for imposing public buildings. Two towers on the entrance side to the Wall (remaining from the mediaeval city walls) mark the eastern entry to the Bremen old city.

---

Along the perimeter of the old wall is the verdant Wallanlagen (ramparts) Park, a green oasis that is a favourite with walkers and cyclists.

---

It contains a statue of Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers, the Bremen astronomer who found a convenient method of calculating the orbit of comets, and in 1802 and 1807, discovered the second and the fourth asteroids Pallas and Vesta, the Roman goddesses who are depicted on the sides of the statue’s plinth.

---

---

---

At the edge of the park we found Bremen’s iconic greeting expressed as a hashtag to identify the city. “Moin” comes from the Platt northern dialect and translates roughly as “good”. People in this region are known for wasting few words, so “Moin” alone is sufficient greeting any time of day. Never “moin moin” because twice would be redundant and wasteful!

---

---

---

---

That piece was located beside the Gerhard Marcks Sculpture Garden.

---

From there we walked through an archway back to street level and the “meat grinder” fountain in front of one of the entrances to the old Stock Exchange (Börsen Hof) and then back to our hotel.

---

---

---

---

The only thing left to do today was have dinner, which we did in the restaurant beside our hotel: Schüttinger Gasthausbrauerei ( “guesthouse brewery”).

I really wasn’t hungry, so ordered just an appetizer of fries with cheese, that was so huge I only finished half. Son #1 ordered and enjoyed a main dish of Knipp , a traditional Bremen dish that is more like haggis than anything else (pork belly, rind and liver combined with oat groats and spices). It is served fried to crispy edges, accompanied by potatoes fried with bacon, and half-sour pickles. I really like it, and #1 agreed.

---

Of course we had the Schüttinger red beer. I’m holding both my glass and #1’s in the top photo.

Honest.

---

This afternoon we got a taste of Bremen’s architecture and food; tomorrow we will – weather permitting – explore the main square, guild houses, and The Schnoor.