The 200th: Stuttgart, Germany to Nîmes, France (July 7–9, 2013)

After a tough travel week in Germany—it was the time for a well‐deserved break: not one, but two days off. As travel from Stuttgart to Nîmes takes about seven hours, it was decided, when planning this trip, to spend one day off in Stuttgart, and use the second day off to travel to Nîmes. Such arrangement made most sense, balancing between time spent unwinding and time spent travelling, all the while reducing the risk of missing the show in Nîmes due to… well, who knows. This is France, and every day without a railway strike is a day to savour.

Sunday, July 7^th, was used to take things slow in Stuttgart. What a beautiful city, I tell you. Together with Köln, these two cities make for a great case to travel to Germany. The more time I spend in Germany, the more I grow to like it.

Germany has not always been a preferred destination for travellers born and raised in Israel. World War II, which ended less than seventy years ago, saw six million Jewish people losing their lives to the atrocities of the Nazis. The Holocaust, being one of the most studied subjects in the world, is a subject that Israelis become well aware of since early days in primary school. I am not sure how the Israeli education system works now, seventeen years after left it; but in my time, the tight association between the country named “Germany” and the atrocities of the Nazis was instilled in people’s minds as early as they could possibly understand, if only at the outset, what The Holocaust meant.

As years went by since World War II, however, Germany turned to be one of Israel’s closest allies in Europe. At least at the government level, German governments over the years showed a great deal of support in Israel in international forums. Trade and tourism ties strengthened significantly. Still, of course, nobody forgets World War II. Contradiction? in a sense, it is. But it is that contradiction that serves as a platform for the unique relationship between the two countries.

The day started with a late breakfast at the city center. Same group of people that met just the night before after the concert for drinks, minus one, were once away having a good time over breakfast out in some cafe’s patio. Weather? perfect. Clear skies, around 22℃. Good healthy breakfast for a very reasonable price, even though the place could hardly be more tourist‐oriented, being located at the very beginning of Königstraße, facing the central railway station. Time flew by, until we all bid each other goodbye. One left back to France, one to Belgium, one to The Netherlands… United Nations, really.

The day off was also used to do the laundry. There’s a Laundromat right at the city center. Luck had it and some inconsiderate bloke was doing the laundry of his entire family and closest circle of friends, occupying multiple machines at once. Other machines were idle, but with clothes in them—belonging to people who weren’t considerate enough to stay on the premises and unload their machines on time.

Of course, that was enough to make me lose yet a bit more faith in humanity; mind you, faith is really running out here. The more people I find myself in the presence of, the more I long to be in the presence of less people. When I find myself dependent on other people’s courtesy (not kindness; not looking for favours. Just plain, simple, basic courtesy), more often than not I end up getting disappointed.

The world is probably full of nice people; where the hell are they?

On the other hand, perhaps a cheap Laundromat off the most touristic area of Stuttgart is not the best place in the world to start looking.

My friend Dirk, who saved the previous day by recommending a good hospital for me to visit to look after my wrist problem, also recommended a good spot to see Stuttgart from above. Stuttgart’s city center is located in some sort of a valley, as it is surrounded by mountains. Of course, the mountains’ sides are dotted with beautiful red roofs, reminding me of the sights of West Vancouver when viewed from English Bay or Stanley Park. A short ride via U‐Bahn line 15 to Bubenbad station, then a short walk along Richard‐Wagner‐Straße and you can’t miss that viewpoint:

Along with the Dutchman, decided to walk a part of the way down instead of taking the U‐Bahn. It’s a moderate decline, making for an easy quiet walk through what seemed to be one of Stuttgart’s more affluent areas.

Just as if the day couldn’t be more relaxing, I noticed a nice cafe on the way down. Short sandwich and beautiful coffee, but my mind was set elsewhere. The place featured a beautiful black grand piano right in the middle of the cafe’s interior; everyone was seated at the patio, so at first I considered trying it out, eventually decided that I’m way too shy to have a go at it.

Tram back to the city center…

… and we split up as the Dutchman went away for dinner and I headed back to the hotel to do some writing and upload the previous post.

Later on, met with a friend who just happened to be in Stuttgart for the concert. A nice walk from the Schlossplatz where there was an open air Jazz festival going on, to a cafe nearby and back.

It was Sunday night. Hundreds of people were sitting on the grass in the huge Schlossplatz, biding their time with friends, listening to the live music playing in the background. As busy as this city is, there was a sense of calmness in the air: piles of people just enjoying a breathe of fresh air as the sun sets. I could have stayed there for hours.

As the night was falling, I realized that the next day was going to involve quite a bit of travel starting earlier than 7:00am. Still had most of my clothes to fold and repack. Bid my friend farewell and headed back to the hotel.

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One of the most interesting books I have read is James Surowiecki’s “The Wisdom of Crowds”. The book discusses the concept of crowd wisdom: when you present a challenge (such as a question) to a large enough group of people, aggregate all answers and analyze them, you often come up with the conclusion that, on average, the crowd is very smart—even though the variance in answers may be great. The book discusses the theory behind crowd wisdom, famous cases in which it was put in use and other interesting related topics; it is also usually high in the reading list of social sciences students.

I decided to do a little experiment. On my Facebook page, I posted the X‐rays I took in Regensburg about three weeks ago, as well as the X‐rays taken in Stuttgart just the day before, and asked people what they thought. Some of my friends are doctors, and some of them chose to respond privately. Some of my friends know other people who are doctors, and they also responded. I wasn’t particularly seeking medical advice; I just wanted to know two things:

1. What a group of people, dealing with medicine, may come up with; and
2. Whether the group, as a whole, thinks that I should be stopping following the tour and return to Canada immediately in order to not worsen things.

I know nothing about medicine. All I know about the status of my wrist is what I actually feel. I was surprised to find, however, that opinions vary. Some claimed that the X‐rays were just fine; some raised suspicions over a faint hairline in one of the bones, implying a fracture; and one suggested that I indeed had a minor fracture, but it is healing very well. I combined all opinions with the assessment given by the doctor at the Stuttgart hospital, and derived the most restrictive and conservative conclusion: returning to Canada now will not speed up recovery; and I should be wearing that compression brace for a few more weeks to let things heal properly.

Tour goes on. For now.

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The next morning started early. Woke up shortly before 6:00am, got ready quickly and was already at the station before 6:40am. The itinerary: leave Stuttgart 6:54am, arrive Strasbourg 8:10am; then leave Strasbourg 9:16am, arrive Nîmes 2:30pm. Both rides are with the TGV, 1^st class.

1^st class international travellers on the TGV are served a complementary meal on board. With that in mind, it was decided to buy one sandwich each from Le Crobag, for lunch (Le Crobag has officially been nominated the trusted provider of sandwiches for the tour’s leg in Germany).

Shortly after boarding the train, I felt that I’m starving. Turned out that the on‐board meal on the TGV is served after the last stop in Germany, which is in Karlsruhe, 35 minutes into the ride. As the train left Karlsruhe, it took fifteen more minutes until TGV staff handed in those small boxes with “breakfast”, hereby placed within quotes in order to not offend real breakfasts. Garbage. Really, garbage. Worse than most airlines’ food.

That had to do, though.

Arrived at Strasbourg for a full hour wait. I have never been to Strasbourg before, and for some reason, I was under the impression that I was going to visit a beautiful city located on the mountains (where the hell do I get these ideas, I really don’t know). Approaching Strasbourg, I realized that there’s no scenery here whatsoever. Didn’t even leave the station; instead, bought a couple of croissants from a bakery on site and devoured it along with some cappuccino which was surprisingly adequate.

Nowadays in France, there seems to be a trend of placing pianos in public places so you can simply sit at one, and play. I seem to recall a commenter on this blog informing me about this. Anyway, there was one in Strasbourg’s central railway station. Once again I had doubts, but then decided that, what the hell, I’m unlikely to see any of these people around anymore in my entire lifetime.

So, this particular piano had a very soft sound, as if its una corda pedal was permanently set. Wouldn’t be surprised to find out that this was true for all of the pianos scattered around France. It was good to touch a keyboard again, for the first time after more than three months, although I had to stop after a few minutes as my wrist was hurting.

Back to the platform, and boarded the next TGV train. Five long hours ride to Nîmes, as the train rides through a couple of places visited before in this tour—Dijon and Lyon. During the ride, I experienced a little of this, from the passenger seated right in front of me (needless to say, he opted doing so while his seat was fully reclined).

The direction was, in general, south; and the more you head south, the more sparsely populated the area appears to be. So sparsely populated, that a couple of minutes before arriving to Nîmes, it seemed as if the train was still riding through France’s rural areas. The city of Nîmes appeared as if suddenly, out of the blue.

Left the air‐conditioned train right into the platform, feeling the most unwelcome jab of hot air right in my face.

Welcome to Nîmes, and welcome to (possibly) the warmest part of the tour.

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The city of Nîmes is located in the south of France. 140,000 people live here. Its history dates back to the Roman Empire, and the city still has some of the best‐preserved Roman structures in France. The city’s name is pronounced as “Neem”, with a dominant “ee” sound.

I was always wondering what that strange letter î (that little “hat” on top of it is called “circumflex”) was all about and how it should be pronounced. A Facebook post I made ended up getting really useful information about the subject.

I have been to Nîmes before, during the 2010 Get Lucky tour. Back then, I was only there for a day, which I remember was a very hard day due to the immense heat and the inability to feed myself due to the French’s somewhat strict hours of restaurant dining. I was ready, then, to make amends: was going to spend two nights in this city and try to make sense out of it.

The hotel, Ibis Styles Nîmes Gare Centre, is located right behind Nîmes’ central railway station. From there, it’s about 800 meters walk to the city center: the closer you are to the city center, the pricier hotels become. For the purpose of following the tour, though, the location was perfect: a stone throw away from the central railway station (good for the next train heading towards Locarno, leaving very early in the morning), and about 10 minutes easy walk to the city center which, coincidentally, is also where the concert venue is.

Checked into the hotel and started the air conditioner even before considering putting my luggage down. The temperature outside was around 31℃, which is a temperature that I simply can’t agree to and think it should be outlawed.

A short while later, went outside to explore the city. Chose to take the stairs as the elevator was occupied by a clueless couple who didn’t quite understand the concept of inserting your key card in order to activate the elevator. Now, you might think that once you reach floor “1” and proceed downstairs, the next one will be “0”. Well…

From the hotel, it’s about 10 minutes walk north west, on a nice walkway featuring an artificial waterway. Due to the immense heat, people were sitting by this waterway with their feet inside it, to cool off. Children were bathing in it, too.

The walkway ends in a garden, bounded by two major boulevards—Boulevard de Prague to the east, and Boulevard Victor Hugo to the west. The old city center is located between the garden to the south; these two boulevards to the east and west; and Boulevard Gambetta to the north. Tourists in Nîmes are likely to be spending most of their time within those boundaries, and you can certainly see the entire old city center in one day.

Once you reach the garden at the end of the walkway…

… and look left, you see one of Nîmes’ most precious prides, which also, coincidentally, was to serve as a venue for the next day’s concert: the wonderful, splendid arena. We will get to that arena later on in this post, but for now…

(In the picture above, the arena is to the left.)

Walking west on Boulevard Victor Hugo is a good way to start exploring the old city center. From that boulevard, all you need to do is just pick on a random side street heading east and you’re already in the old city center’s core. Like most other old city centers I had seen so far in France, this one, too, isn’t too bad on the eyes.

The people in Nîmes appear to exhibit slightly different lifestyle than in other places I have been to in France. Casualness seems to be prevalent: people seem to be more vocal, less formal. This may have something to do with the fact that Nîmes is located in southern France, and Italy and Spain are very close. I wouldn’t be surprised to find that this proximity to Italy (to the east) and Spain (to the south west) has a lot to do with the impression you get out of people here.

It was hot. Very hot. How hot? I’m pretty sure I witnessed a cigarette setting a smoker on fire. So hot I wanted to peel my own skin off. There should be a bylaw in Nîmes allowing people to walk around naked. So hot that I was breathing fire. So hot that you couldn’t possibly throw ice cubes at people—they’d melt before hitting their target.

How on earth could I survive 24 summers in Israel—which is hotter than Nîmes in the summer—is beyond me.

At some point, it was time to eat something. Horrific memories of my last time in Nîmes, looking for food, crept into my consciousness. Wandering around the city center following recommendations by TripAdvisor for about an hour, all attempts ended in restaurants that were either closed altogether or open for drinks only.

By complete chance, I noticed a place that was open, selling baked goods, yogurts and fresh fruit. Well, at least I thought it was yogurt; it was, in fact, fromage blanc (French for “white cheese”). Absolutely delicious: together with a cup of fresh fruit, that small snack was enough to keep me going until dinner.

Back to the hotel as it made no sense at all to be outside for long in those temperatures. First thing I did was to ask my French friends & followers, on Facebook, what was that fromage blanc thing and how is it different from a yogurt. Many useful responses came through. Unfortunately, it’s not something I would prepare on my own. Hopefully they sell this stuff in Vancouver. It’s addictive.

A couple of hours spent in the hotel to escape the heat, then back again to the city center for dinner. Cafe Leffe on Boulevard Victor Hugo offers an interesting menu, and even though it is located in an area that attracts many tourists, prices are reasonable. Delicious beef portions simmered in a broth that was based on… beer. Quick dessert, and back to the hotel again.

Second day off—check. Off for a good night sleep.

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Waking up in Nîmes took a long while. Until the end of the tour, there aren’t going to be too many mornings not involving an alarm clock, so such mornings are very well used to get out of bed as late as possible. Breakfast, included in the hotel, turned out to be mediocre—not unlike the breakfast experience in many other French hotels. Seems like, in France, you simply can’t expect your hotel’s breakfast to be very good.

The plan was to take a walk from the city center to a large stain of green on the map—a place called Bois des Espeisses, some 4km away. Quite early in the journey, I already knew that I wasn’t going to make it all the way there: the weather was just unforgivingly hot, and as the concert for the night was scheduled to start 8:30pm and include an opening act, I wasn’t quite in the mood to aggregate much tiredness anyway.

Crossed the city center and then headed west towards another, smaller green stain on the map: a park called Jardins de la Fontaine. I knew nothing about this place before setting foot there: all I knew was that, on the map, it was represented by a green stain with some smaller stains painted blue, implying water.

Heading west from the north end of the city center, you walk by a nice canal that leads to a fountain:

The fountain marks the south entrance to the gardens. I couldn’t be happier about deciding to visit these gardens—the scenery is absolutely stunning. I could hardly find any location in these gardens not worthy of a photograph.

These gardens were built in the 18^th century, surrounding a then‐recently discovered ancient Roman thermae.

Walking north inside the park, the path inclines…

… until you reach the top, where another famous Roman site is located: the Tour Magne (“Great Tower”), a ruined Roman tower.

Once arrived to the north end of the gardens, Jeroen decided to proceed to Bois des Espeisses and I decided not to. That’s it for me: can’t take this heat anymore, I ran out of water, please leave me alone, thanks. The Dutchman kept going towards the forest, I headed back.

Back in Jardins de la Fontaine, I took a different route to the city center, going through a different part of the gardens. I was happy I did: came across a few small tiny caves, where you can sit and watch water drop into small little ponds in front of you.

All that was missing in this picture was my beloved Taylor acoustic guitar; that guitar in my hands, it’d take a bulldozer to force me out of that spot.

On my way back to the hotel, I came across a cafe in the city center featuring the word “Saladerie” in its name. Salad? sure, why not. Might be a good healthy lunch. Lots of greens, walnuts and slices of duck breast. The French… what can I say, they know their food.

Back to the hotel and I decided to forgo of any other activity, and get a good nap instead. The heat outside wore me out, and with a long evening ahead, I figured I should probably get some sleep now when time is on my side.

Quarter by 6:00pm… concert time approaching. The plan: grab dinner before heading to the venue, as the concert was scheduled to end close to midnight, and with an early train ride the next morning, going for a post‐concert snack was out of the question. Went to Cafe Leffe again, good hamburger. Ate too much. The search for a pre‐concert coffee yielded no coffee bars—couldn’t afford the time for coffee in a full sit‐down restaurant. No worries: coffee in France sucks anyway. Headed to the arena, got impressed once more with how fantastic it looks from the outside, and went inside.

Last time I was here, I was involved in a miserable incident: just before heading to the concert, I went to buy a deodorant in a drugstore. Entering the venue, some thug working for security grabbed my newly‐purchased deodorant, assumed that it was a spray‐on and simply tossed it into the garbage without even trying to explain what he was doing. I recall being livid afterwards, as I searched for an on‐site staff member who understands more than a word in English. That deodorant was then saved when the stupid thug had to immerse himself in a bin of dump to restore my precious purchase.

That thug’s face remained engraved in my memory; I was that upset. So, when approaching the venue this time, I was wondering whether I’m going to come across that lowlife scum dressed as a human once again. Lo and behold—he was right there. Didn’t even bother changing his appalling haircut.

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I was looking forward to visit the Arena of Nîmes again, as my recollection has it as being once of the most beautiful venues I had ever been to. The arena was built by the Romans during the 1^st century, and was changed in 1863 to function as a bullring.

Nowadays, the arena is used for all sorts of public events. In the realm of concerts, Knopfler’s own Dire Straits’ On the Night DVD features much of a concert performed right here in May 1992. On another end of the musical spectrum, Metallica recorded their 2009 DVD Français pour Une Nuit in this arena as well.

Stepping inside, you feel like you’re going back in time. Imagine: watching a concert in a place that was built nearly 2,000 years ago.

I was seated at the second row facing the stage, but was actually more than willing to give up my seat for a seat somewhere in the back. I’m convinced that, in such a venue, watching the concert from the higher terraces would be a memorable experience. However, all seats in the venue were numbered and I was in no position to start asking staff for something as involved as this.

At around 8:30pm, Paul Crockford took the stage and introduced a very special opening act for the night: Bap Kennedy, an Irish songwriter that recorded his last album, The Sailor’s Revenge, in Knopfler’s British Grove studios in London. Knopfler himself plays on it. The Sailor’s Revenge is a great album: I listened to it for the first time last October, as the Dutchman and I were scorching the USA’s west coast following a few Knopfler‐Dylan performances, and I still listen to it once in a while. Bap’s voice is soothing, accurate, and beautiful, and I was wondering what he would sound like performing live.

Bap took the stage along with another guitar player, Gordon McAllister. Bap himself played rhythm on a brown acoustic guitar, while McAllister played the more involved parts. Listening closely to the tone of McAllister’s guitar, I knew it sounded familiar. Looking at the guitar’s headstock, I confirmed my hypothesis: you just can’t go wrong with the Taylor sound. McAllister, if I’m not mistaken, was playing an x14CE. As much as I know Taylor Guitars’ naming scheme, the “14” stands for their Grand Auditorium series; the “C” refers to their “cutaway” variant; and the “E” refers to the guitar’s ability to be connected directly to an amplifier (an “acoustic‐electric” guitar). I just wasn’t sure about which series that guitar belongs to (that’s the “x” part): I wouldn’t be surprised if it was of the 800 series, or even the ridiculously expensive (and such as good) 900 series.

Back when I was shopping around for an acoustic guitar, I tried quite a few. Each and every HD Martin I tried turned out to be a failure: I just couldn’t play them (although I did hear that the Knopfler signature HD Martin guitar is different in that regards and has excellent playability; never tried it myself). Tried many other brands and models. At the end, there was no competition: Taylor Guitars, period. Bought the 314CE, and two days later exchanged it for the 414CE which I enjoy to this day. The better sounding models, unfortunately, were unaffordable for me back then. I may reconsider this.

It was the first time for me to listen to Bap Kennedy perform live. I enjoyed the performance—essentially, “thinned down” arrangements of a few of his songs—but something was missing. It was hard, at first, to understand what it was that was missing, until it hit me: the audience. The audience just didn’t seem to “be there”. I don’t think it was any of Bap’s fault—his performance was very good—instead, I just think that the audience wasn’t the perfect match for this kind of a thinned‐down, “down to earth” performance. Another indication that it wasn’t Bap’s fault at all was that the audience “wasn’t there” right from the beginning. Shame, really: they missed on a great performance by very gifted performers.

Thirty minutes after Kennedy and McAllister left the stage, the lights went off and the band kicked off its 53^rd concert for this tour, and their 200^th concert with me in the audience.

Two hundred.

So what did we have there? Nigel Hitchcock is no longer performing with the band, so we’re back to the original, Nigel‐less set. Dream of the Drowned Submariner, as expected, wasn’t played (as you’d need Nigel for the clarinet part; although, to my knowledge, Mike plays the clarinet as well); Gator Blood was played instead, like in the pre‐Nigel days.

A short audio mishap took place at the beginning, about a minute into What It Is; most of the speakers simply stopped working at once, so unless you were in the front, you probably couldn’t hear much of the concert for about 10–15 seconds. Not sure what went off there, but it was all over and done with quickly.

The band itself seemed fresh and rested, the audience—well, it’s France, so it doesn’t get much better than that, except for the endless chatter. Behind me, a group of 3–4 humans just kept talking and talking for about half an hour, until a guy sitting two seats to my left turned to them and yelled something at them in fluent French. I don’t know exactly what he said but an argument quickly ensued and just as quickly ended. They stopped talking from there on. Chatter was evident elsewhere as well. I’m not entirely sure why people bother going to a concert if they’re going to be sitting through it chatting their guts out. Then again, any attempt to understand stupidity is bound to make you feel stupid yourself.

Last time in Nîmes, I recall a rather violent Running of the Bulls taking place, followed by repeated calls by the back rows to sit down. Neither happened this time: there was hardly any running, and I couldn’t see much violence. Heck, people ran wilder in England. No calls to sit down, either: good encore played in front of a standing audience, on the floor as well as on the terraces in the perimeter.

Beautiful.

Concert ended. Headed back to the hotel for a good night sleep, expecting a long, long travel day to follow.

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As I am writing these lines on my way out of France and into Switzerland, I think it would be a good time for a confession.

Over the last few years, these modest travel blogs of mine have been receiving a great deal of attention. “No man is an island” (although I’d consider myself being as close to an island as a person could possibly be); naturally, over the years travelling following this wonderful band, I have met so many people—some of which I get to see more frequently than others.

There aren’t many opportunities to socialize when following a tour—at least not when the subject is Mark Knopfler, who doesn’t shy away from scheduling concerts back‐to‐back in cities that span vast distances between each other; and at times when socializing is actually possible, I often prefer to pass on the opportunity because I’m either tired or have to conserve energy before a long travel day.

Having said that (and here comes the tough part), when I socialize with people, I prefer to talk about… well, many things: life; the lives of the people I meet; my life; common interests. On the other hand, I dislike overly excessive discussions about topics that, for some reason, people assume that I’d be happy to discuss. Examples are aplenty:

• Any particular band member, their history and/or their personal lives.
• Past concerts, especially comparisons between them (which show was better than others. As if I can remember, really).
• What motivates Mark to do one thing or not the other; play one song and not another; wear one shirt but not another (as this is none of my business).
• Bootlegs, recordings, collectibles, signatures (not my thing at all).
• Set lists.

Why? Well, that’s a topic I wanted to write about ever since the first tour I followed, back in 2008. Perhaps I will, some day—when I find the right words. For now, I hope you will not find the preceding text offensive or condescending, because it certainly isn’t meant to be so.

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Signing off this post from the patio of my hotel in Cardada, 1,340m above Locarno, Switzerland. Yesterday was a very challenging day, full of strange occurrences. Heck, it was so challenging and tiring that I went to bed at 10:00pm.

You’ll definitely want to read the next post.

Isaac