Lubeck and Legoland

After a brief stopover in the Netherlands (great site at Zevenhuizen) we headed East and stayed at a large camp site near Bad Segeberg which is by a lake. We decided on a rest day and opted for a stroll around the lake which was quite beautiful with its mixture of woodland. 

Calm waters

And colourful yacht club

As we noticed when we were in Denmark in 2009 some of the graveyards are more like botanical gardens.

We selected the site as it is close to Lubeck which we visited on the cruise to Norway (see July 2012 blog). The SW Holstentor gate is still standing despite the laws of gravity.

Clearly the towers were moving during construction. The conical top appears to have been set out separately during construction and a new “vertical” used to the main tower.

We wondered around and refreshed our memory of many of the sites. Old Lubeck is a large island in the  middle of a river. Residents were clearly religious with a choice of six large churches. We visited St Mary’s which adjoins the main square. It is painted throughout but the main attraction for me was a large clock which told the time, moon status and relationship to the various signs of the zodiac. It has similarities to the clock in Rostock (see August 201 blog) but somewhat bizarrely was designed for 169 years (1911 to 2080). Nonetheless it is very attractive.

Lubeck is largely constructed of brick and many of the buildings have been rebuilt following various wars and possibly a lack of maintenance as this was part of the communist block for many years.

The place buzzes and as we walked along the river we came across a barge that was the centre for all sorts of attractions including this walking the tightrope competition.

However, the main point of the visit was for marzipan cake. Although there were many other choices it is marzipan that is famously made here by the tonne.

We had a great lunch and then of course had to take a slice or two back to site where just serving the cake had its rewards.

The largest driver for this this part of the world was to visit Legoland. Helen had bemoaned her lot when we did not visit in 2009 (“Jo and I would not let her go”). So after six years of carrying on it was time to get this off the bucket list. A 2.5 hour drive was immediately rewarded with some wonderful entertainment by these five youngsters.

The more mature were also greeted. This guy just snored and snored.

Millions of Lego bricks have been used with years of work. Various scales apply. Here the animals were about half size.

Whereas many of the towns modelled were a slightly smaller scale. They need to do a bit more work on scaling the duck.

Apart from the various models of famous buildings/streetscapes world wide there is an enormous amount of work undertaken by Bonsai specialists. Although the people are the standard Lego size and may not fit into the cars the trees have been carefully manicured so that they are scaled to marry with the buildings.

There were many moving vehicles (trains, boats and planes as well as trucks). Here a boat is going through a lock where the water does rise and fall.

Next is the well known canal frontage to Copenhagen.

This model of Reichsburg castle in Cochem on the Moselle caught our eye as it is where we ate a hearty medieval feast with Sue and Martin back in August 2014.

Not that all models are of real places. There were a series of Star War scenes. No description needed here although some avid watchers may want to argue that this is real.

There were also many other rises and attractions. We did go on one of the roller coasters.

The haunted house was also fun. Turning on a torch and pointing it at small blue ghosts enabled a variety of models to move and ghoulish sounds to resonate. One of the most challenging attractions was the maze. With the low light and our slightly less than peak eye sight we found differentiating between mirror and open space quite a challenge. If it was not for youngsters bounding past us we may have been stuck forever and become a new ghoulish scene.