Day 39 - Guten Tag Marga!

Saturday morning, sunshine in Dortmund and we are taking the local train to visit my Cousin Marga in the town of Letmathe approximately one hour away.  Reputedly nearly 1000 years old, this town sits in the Lenne River valley and has a population of about 25,000.  Arriving at the rail station it takes no time to cross the river into the main street. 



We did take a few minutes to walk up this street in order to purchase some flowers for both Marga and my Aunt Ilsa who I found out the night before would be making the trip to see us from nearby Kamen.  Before telling you how the day went, let me explain the family tree.  My cousin Marga is the only daughter of my mother's brother, my late Uncle Walter.  Marga was born at the end of the second world war so is an older cousin and the closest blood relative on my German side.  Aunt Ilsa is the wife of my late Uncle Kurt, the youngest of my mother's two older brothers.  Her son Peter from her first marriage (Aunt Ilsa was a widow when she met my uncle) was kind enough to drive her over to Marga's flat and while he claimed his English was not very good, he was quite able to converse with us in English.  I am always amazed by the ability of Europeans to speak English even though they are not working in that language. 

Marga cooked up a wonderful German meal of dumplings, goulash and red cabbage.  Combined with a German beer I was in seventh heaven.  No one could explain to me why Oktoberfest in Germany starts in mid September and finishes in early October.  That's not Oktoberfest, that's Septemberfest!  Our mixed conversation of German and English carried on through most of the afternoon until it was time for Peter and Ilsa to head home.  Angela and Becca retired to Marga's terrace (her condo makes up half of the top two floors of the building) to enjoy the late afternoon sun while Marga and I reminisced about my mother and her family.  When it was time for us to catch our train back to our hotel in Dortmund, Marga said her goodbyes with a collection of German chocolates, whisky, wine, cookies and whatever treat you can think of.  I had my suspicion that this would happen so fortunately I had brought an extra suitcase to Germany so that I could get this haul back to the UK.

Later that evening, we found ourselves hungry again and fortunately our hotel was located adjacent to one of the top-ranked restaurants in the city with schnitzel and roasted potatoes being a specialty.  It is called PfefferKorn and it has locations across the city.  As it was a Saturday night it was full and without a reservation we thought we might be out of luck.  But our waiter found us a table in the bar section which was just fine with us.  As you can see, Becca and I were not disappointed with the schnitzel or the atmosphere. 


Ale of the Day: Brinkhoff's No.1, Brinkhoff Brewery, Dortmund