Tom`s travels: Bad Muskau (12/03/2022)

On a nice rather warm sunny weekend in March, Ania and I decided to go with Miriam and her friend to visit a couple of places southeast of Berlin. We took Miriam's car and after a 2h drive reached our first stop, the Kromlau Azalea, and Rhododendron Park. This 80-acre landscape park was laid out during the 19th century and is the largest rhododendron park in the country. As it was still early for the flowers we did not see any but still enjoyed walking around the grounds and admiring the main feature of the park, the Rakotzbrücke, or so-called Devil's Bridge. This 7.4 meters long and 6.8 meters wide bridge spans Rakotz lake and was originally commissioned in 1860. It was recently renewed, in 2019, and had just opened up a few months before. What really surprised us and was a bit disappointing was that it really looked quite fake and modern, with the artificial basalt columns which it is made up of looking like they were made of paper-mâché. After visiting the place we then got back in the car and drove to the nearby town of Weißwasser, located in Oberlausitz a traditionally Sorbian area, where we decided to visit the Turm am Schweren Berg, an observation tower. We climbed to the top at 30m and from here had an incredible view over the Tagebau Nochten, a huge open-pit mine stretching as far as the eye could see. I had never seen such a type of mine and from the top, it looked quite incredible. Far off in the distance, we could also make out the structure of the Boxberg Power Station. After enjoying the view we headed back down the tower and into the car to then drive to the nearby town of Bad Muskau. Right on the border with Poland, the place is famous for holding Muskau Park, a Unesco world heritage site straddling the two countries. Once there we first found parking right close to the border and next to a restaurant where we then chose to have our lunch, Zur Grenze Il Confine. It was an Italian restaurant but had other meals as well: I took a schnitzel with salad and potatoes. After lunch, we then headed on to visit Muskau Park. The largest and one of the most famous English gardens in Central Europe it was laid out from 1815 onwards at the behest of Prince Hermann von Pückler-Muskau around his residence, the Schloss Muskau. The park, which as mentioned straddles two countries, covers approximately 2.1 square kilometers in Germany and 3.5 in Poland. In 2004, the park and its castle were added to the World Heritage List, as an exemplary example of cross-border cultural collaboration between Poland and Germany. As we walked we first passed by the structure of the old castle, a baroque palace, and then past the structure of the main Schloss, built at the end of the 19th century in a Neo-renaissance style. Unfortunately, both structures were destroyed during WWII and only later rebuilt. We walked around the structure admiring the nice architecture and then decided to continue on through the rest of the park. We crossed a bridge and entered the Polish part walking further until we had completed a quite large section of the whole complex. We then ended the walk on the polish side where the town of Łęknica is set. Here right next to the border was a kind of shanty town made up of sheet metal structures and market stalls that serves the many visitors from Germany who wish to buy tobacco, alcohol, and many other things for much lower prices. We noticed though that many of the cars of those market stall owners had Bulgarian or Romanian, or even Turkish nameplates so it didn't look like most of them were Polish. Once there most of the shops were closing so we decided to go back to where we had left the car, on the German side. Once there we got in and then drove back to the Polish side where we stopped at a supermarket to get some groceries and purchase then gas from a petrol station as the prices were much cheaper, 1,4 euros instead of over 2 euros in Germany. After that, it was time for us to go and so we drove the two hours eventually arriving back in Berlin.