Top Retirement Blog
Online MBA

Spring paid us a visit….and then left

Posted on March 10th, 2010 by Retired-Ed in Daily Life

Well, I’m back after an absence from the Internet, some of it enforced by nature.  We’ve been having quite a winter here in our corner of Germany. Many would think, “Yeah, so what else is new?” But honestly, our winters have not been all that severe usually here in Unterfranken. But this year has been an exception. I am SO ready for spring. The week before last was wonderful. Spring actually came for a visit. Temperatures were over 10°C (50°F) for a few days and all of our snow melted. But alas, the melting snow produced another perennial problem: flooding. Our village is bisected by a stream. It has a name, and I suppose it is a small river, a tributary of the Main (pronounced like “mine”) River. Our river is called the Wern, and it is really not much to talk about….until it floods. I have some visual effects for you.

This is the view looking down toward the river from my house on January 31st. As you can see, we had had some snow. You can click on the image in order to enlarge it for viewing. By the way, that’s our “Wintergarten” that is shown at the right of the picture. I think that the word doesn’t need a translation; it’s almost the same in English. The river is hardly visible, just beyond that first tree line down in the valley.

So we had snow. Over and over again. I really got tired of shoveling. I had to shovel again last Saturday morning, and I was not at all happy about that. As I said, however, it did warm up for a while, and all of the snow melted over a 2-3 day period. We’ve had flooding in the past. In fact, the flood plain that borders the river has become inundated almost every year since we have lived in our house (15 years+), but this time had some serious consequences. The picture on the left is almost the same view, taken from my house on February 26th. The water kept rising and rising. As I said, we’ve had floods before, but this time it seeped into the underground cables and wiped out our telephone and internet service for the better part of 5 days. It affected the entire portion of town east of the river, and that’s where we live. I had my iPhone for some internet connectivity and email, but writing a blog on an iPhone tries my soul. The Queen said that she thought she was going through withdrawal. There were no emails from the kids, no blogs from Drew and Wendy, and (worst of all) no online shopping was available. Somehow, she managed to cope, but I’m not sure how.

To give you an idea of just how extensive the flooding was, the picture on the right is of the meadow (flood plain) on a normal day. This picture was actually taken from the edge of the river looking back at the Siedlung, or “housing area”, where we live. What is not visible in this particular picture is just off to the right, and it is a religious monument with the date “1685″ etched into it. Impressive. I’ll try to post a picture of that when space permits.

Since my recent hospitalization, the doctors have been telling me that I need to get more exercise. I have obliged them by walking and exercising every day. I am pleased to say that I passed the 23 pound mark this morning, and I am enjoying my walks as long as the weather stays nice. Cold I can handle, but I don’t like to walk in the rain. We’ll see how things go come spring when the rains come. The picture on the left was taken on one of my walks during the flood. This is the view of the valley from the opposite side, as compared to the previous picture. The sign warns of high water. No surprise there, huh? It did recede in about 3 days, but it took a while for the ground to be able to support the equipment from Deutsche Telekom to get in and repair the damage to the cable.

We live in Oberwerrn, or the Upper Wern area (I can’t account for the extra “r” in the name), and just downstream from us, less than 1 km away, is our sister city of Niederwerrn, or Lower Wern. The picture on the right is of a bridge across the Wern, and you can see just how close the water came to flooding the bridge. Once since we have lived here, that road had to be closed because the bridge was flooded. There are other access roads to Niederwerrn, but there is only one access our our housing area, and my landlady (and downstairs neighbor) was joking that she keeps hoping that our bridge will get flooded so she won’t have to go to work. Great idea, but the Queen had another thought. She was afraid that our bridge would get flooded and she wouldn’t be able to get home from work. That’s a scary thought, but there are some farm roads that I know of and I’d be able to get into and out of the village. Right now, we are down to one car because mine is in the shop and has been there for three weeks. I blew an engine while driving on the Autobahn almost a month ago. The Queen is certain that it was caused by a sudden stop that I had to make to avoid hitting some obliviot in the next lane who decided to pass while I was passing her! Seriously, I doubt if a sudden deceleration would cause such damage, but one never knows. Perhaps it was because the old engine had more than 340,000 km on it! So I would be driving the Queen around even if our bridge had flooded. Lordy, I hope to get my car back by the end of the week!

This final picture represents something of a novelty, at least for my American readers. In the background is a sports field that was flooded This field is used by the “Jugendsportverein“. Here in Germany, kids don’t get involved in organized sports through their school. Instead, their athletic competition is provided through “sportvereins” or “athletic club. Almost every community has one. This field is used for korbball, which is sort of a cross between team handball and basketball. I have never seen it played in the States. But the really interesting part of this picture is in the foreground. The plowed area is for flowers. This is a pick-your-own flower plot. You’ll find them all over the place. The blue drum in the foreground is for payment. Later in the spring, various flowers will be blooming, and customers will come and cut their own flowers and leave the required amount of money in the bucket. That’s something else I have never seen in the States, and I doubt if I ever will. Maybe when hell freezes over and then thaws, causing a flood.

Retired-Ed

1 Comment

One Response to “Spring paid us a visit….and then left”

  1. Sue Says:
    March 12th, 2010 at 1:46 am

    In our recent move to Port Dalhousie I discovered a green house up the road. Last fall, after driving by the bright coloured potted mums for sale for weeks on end I finally stopped to buy some for our balcony. I quickly realized there was no one actually working there. Hundreds of flowers on display and a little table with a money box and a sign saying to make change if necessary. I picked up flowers worth $15.00 but needed change for a twenty. I opened the little wooded box and found it filled with money. As I reached in to take my change I was sure someone would pop up because I was being watched on video or something. No, I left my twenty, took my change and my flowers and drove home.
    Every day I looked at those flowers and I was reminded of the honesty of my fellow neighbours (or is it naitivity? … is there such a word?)

Leave a Reply