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In February 2006 Barbara joined Lilo and Klaus, her brother in Hamburg, for a 2-week "Kur" in Karlsbad-Karlovy Vary in the CZ. Karlsbad and Marienbad are the Bohemian Spas where our grand- and great-grandparents took refuge when their arthritis or other ailments became too painful: One drank the warm mineral waters, took baths and packings with moor or healing earths, ate well, gambled, pursued intrigues, had affairs and wrote poems. All the famous German writers and poets spent time there. In 1946 the German population of the Egerland was expelled wholesale, the great spas fell into ruin. After the fall of Communism they have been restored and revived to their former 19th-century splendor - and they are very reasonable. - A full 2-week cure at the 4-star Grand Hotel Richmond including three meals, a private room with modern bathroom cost under 1000 Euro. .

Grand Hotel Richmond.  It's a veritable fairyland: great expansive public halls, olf-fashioned, meticulous service, white table cloths and crystal glasses... and mostly empty in February. Even the snow is a decorative addition. .

 Rolling Hills rising towards the north and the German border (Erzgebirge). The hot springs and the spas lie in the steep valleys that cut across this pleasant, wooded landscape.

Karlovy Vary, Peter and Paul, the Russian Church, with its golden onion domes - in the foreground - was supposedly built on orders of Peter the Great. It testifies  to the fact that these places were before 1914 truely European.

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 Lilo and Klaus in Karlovy Vary.

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The Maria-Magdalena Catholic Church in Karlsbad is built in the characteristic Bohemian late-Baroque style of the 18th-century counter-reformation.

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 Restored houses along the old main street along the bank of the Tela rive.r. - Most are hotels and Pensiones.

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 A horse-pulled carriage on a bridge across the Tela.

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 Mariensäule-St.Mary's column on the Market.

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 St. Mary's column and the 19th-cent Hotel Romance.

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 Main street following the Tela at the bottom of the steep valley

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Städtisches Schauspielhaus - City Theater

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 One of the many beautifully restored Art Nouveau Facades

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 A restorer finishing an antique wardrobe at the Richmond

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 Haus Mozart, another restored Art-Nouveau facade

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Hotel zur Post, probably from the 17th century it has a generous Renaissance stolidness compared to the Baroque extravaganzas.  

And then it began to snow again, as seen from Barbara's window at the Richmond. 

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 The bridge and access road to the Richmond.

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Dresden

 On the drive back to Hamburg the trio spent 2 days in Dresden, to visit the newly rebuilt Frauenkirche (Church of Our Lady), which burnt to its foundations during the infamous air-raid in 1945. It had been left by the Communists as a memorial to the brutality of the Western Allies air war. It was rebuilt (the black stones are old) from public contributions with the aid of an IBM-computer reconstruction.

 The church is a rare example of a Protestant Baroque church, which explains several pecularities: the organ is above the main altar

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 And the subject matter is Christ praying on the Mount of Olives and receiving the chalice in the night of his arrest.

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The restored dome 

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 And the peculiar galleries of the church. The enclosed ones were reserved for serious praying (?) or for members of the court.

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The Frauenkirche and part of the royal palace 

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 The Schlosskirche (Palace Church) freom the bridge across the river Elbe.

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 The so-called Semper Oper - the Semper Opera

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 Another snow storm in the night of their return had left Hamburg white. View from Klaus and Lilo's apartment.

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 On Sunday all children and grandchildren came to Klausen's Birthday. This is Petra, Jochen's wife, Kelly and their dog

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Gerd and his twin-brother's wife Monika 

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 Ecki and Thomas, Gerd's son under the Kirchner.

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Petra, Kelly, with Gerd's daughters Alena and  

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 Barbara with Jochen and Gerd