{"id":1115,"date":"2008-12-15T11:07:34","date_gmt":"2008-12-15T16:07:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.robertlpeters.com\/news\/?p=1115"},"modified":"2018-11-08T23:25:53","modified_gmt":"2018-11-08T18:25:53","slug":"goodbye-heimweh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/goodbye-heimweh\/","title":{"rendered":"Goodbye Heimweh…"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"fresh_snow.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"sledding_goetheanum.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"tinguely_basel.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"weihnachtsmarkt_basel.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"laeckerli_huus.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"stadt_tor_freiburg.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"zum_roten_baeren.jpg\"<\/p>\n

Basel, Switzerland<\/em><\/p>\n

I\u2019ve felt privileged to be able to once again<\/a> spend this weekend \u201cback home\u201d in my childhood stomping grounds in and around Basel. En route from the Zurich airport I drove by Reinach (where I lived for 5 years, from age 7 through 12) and the neighboring village of Dornach (in Canton Solothurn<\/a>), where I visited the Goethanum<\/a> (world center for the anthroposophical movement) and the castellated remains of Dornach Ruine<\/a> on the hill above (a destination I used to bike to Saturdays with childhood chums\u2014also a family favorite for picnics). There I was greeted with an enchanting 30cm snow-dump, spectacular back-lit ice-fog, and the delight of locals digging out (just hearing<\/em> Schweizerdeutsch<\/a><\/em> brings back floods of memories).<\/p>\n

Then, off to Basel<\/a>, and several hours walking the familiar downtown streets\u2014of course with the multi-sensory (and admittedly indulgent) delights of roasted chestnuts, Gl\u00fchwein<\/em>, alpine cheese, B\u00fcndnerfleisch<\/em>, and the best (I swear) pretzels in the world. At 16:30 I met my younger brother Phil at the Historisches Museum on the Barf\u00fcsserplatz, then on to a Raclette<\/em> dinner and evening reminiscences with bro\u2019s brood in the wee village of Holzen<\/a> (bei Kandern).<\/p>\n

Sunday morning it was off to the medieval Black Forest city of Freiburg im Breisgau<\/a> (Germany\u2019s quintessential \u201cGreen\u201d city) for a Stadtbummel<\/em> with friend Silvie Engel<\/a> (thanks for the superb tour, angel)\u2014then a tasty organic dinner at a nearby village Straussi<\/em> (a winery licensed to serve home-grown produce and meats).<\/p>\n

Ah\u2026 Heimweh<\/em> mitigated once again (48 hours can make a world of a difference), and back to the \u201cnew world\u201d (replete with -40 degree windchill upon landing in the \u2018Peg)\u2026 oh well, fine fun while it lasted.<\/p>\n

Images: snow in Dorneck; sledding down to the Goethanum; the kinetic Tinguely<\/a> sculpture outside the Basel Theater; angel-encrusted booths of the Christmas market in Basel\u2019s Barf\u00fcsserplatz; the home of Basler L\u00e4ckerli<\/a> (drool); one of the city gates in Freiburg; outside \u2018The Red Bear,<\/a>\u2019 purportedly Germany\u2019s oldest Gasthof (since the year 1120).<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Basel, Switzerland I\u2019ve felt privileged to be able to once again spend this weekend \u201cback home\u201d in my childhood stomping grounds in and around Basel. En route from the Zurich airport I drove by Reinach (where I lived for 5 years, from age 7 through 12) and the neighboring village of Dornach (in Canton Solothurn), […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,5,7,10,21,14,17],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1115"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16663,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1115\/revisions\/16663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/robertlpeters.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}