Pomeranian Tour -- Hamburg

Pomeranian Adventure Tour -- Hamburg

After taking a connecting flight from Paris to Hamburg, the group was met at the Hamburg airport by Lyne Ranalter, our tour escort, and our brand new bus, driven by Erich. We were escorted to Arcadia Hotel, located near the central part of the city. This was our home for the night, and also the location of our first of many pork and potato dinners.

Hamburg is the second largest city in Germany, the commercial and cultural center of Northern Germany, and its harbor is the second largest port city in Europe, and ranks number nine in the world. The city lies at the junction of the river Elbe with the rivers Alster and Bille, and the city center is set around two lakes, the Binnenalster ("Inner Alster") and the Aussenalster ("Outer Alster"). The Greater Hamburg area includes some districts in the adjacent federal states of Schleswig-Holstein and Lower Saxony and covers an area of 18,100 km with a population of just over 4 million.

Emperor Charlemagne in 808 AD built a castle on some rocky round in a marsh between the Alster and the Elbe as a defense against Slavic incursion. The castle was named Hammaburg, where "burg" means castle. The hamma, is an "angle" and a hamme, "pastureland." In 834 Hamburg was designated the seat of a bishopric, whose first bishop, Ansgard, became known as the Apostle of the North. In 845 a fleet of 600 Viking ships came up the River Elbe and destroyed Hamburg, at the time a town of around 500 inhabitants.

In 983, the town was destroyed by king Mstivoj of the Obodrites. In 1030, the city was burned down by King Mieszko II Lambert of Poland. Hamburg had several great fires, notably in 1284 and 1842.

The charter in 1189 by Frederick I "Barbarossa" granted Hamburg the status of an Imperial Free city and tax free access up the Lower Elbe into the North Sea. This and Hamburg's proximity to the main trade routes of the North Sea and the Baltic Sea quickly made it a major port in Northern Europe. Its trade alliance with Lübeck in 1241 marks the origin and core of the powerful Hanseatic league of trading cities.

In 1529 the city embraced Lutheranism, and Hamburg subsequently received Protestant refugees from the Netherlands and France. Hamburg was at times under Danish sovereignty while remaining part of the Holy Roman Empire as an Imperial Free City.

Briefly annexed by Napoleon I (1810-14), Hamburg suffered severely during his last campaign in Germany. The city was besieged for over a year by Allied forces (mostly Russian, Swedish and German). Russian forces under General Bennigsen finally freed the city in 1814. Hamburg experienced its fastest growth in the second half of the 19th century, when its population more than quadrupled to 800,000 as the growth of the city's Atlantic trade helped make it Europe's third largest port. Hamburg was the port for most Germans and Eastern Europeans to leave for the New World.

After World War I, Germany lost her colonies and Hamburg lost many of its trade sources. During World War II, Hamburg suffered a series of devastating air raids which killed 42,000 German civilians, and the city also lost much of its architectural past.

The skyline of Hamburg features the high spires of five principal churches:

St. Machaeliskirch (Saint Michael's Church)
St. Nikolaikirche (St. Nicholas' Church, memorial)
St. Petrikirche (Saint Peter's Church, 11th century)
St. Jakobikirche (St. Jacob's church, 13th century)
St. Katharinenkirche (St. Catherine's Church, 14th century)

65% of inhabitants are of ethnic German origin; 35% belong to other groups (mostly Turkish, Iranian, Afghan, Russian, Polish, Portuguese and Ghanaian). 38% of the inhabitants are Protestants, 10% are Catholic, and 12% Muslim, while 40% profess no religion.

After we arrived at the hotel, Lyne offered to take anyone interested on a brief walking tour of the city. About half of the group went on the tour, while others opted to catch a brief nap. Some of the sites seen in Hamburg include the following:

Click on the picture to enlarge it.