Tag Archives: bavaria

Photographs: Europe, Photographs: Germany, Photographs: Travel

Munich Christmas Market

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“Munich Christmas Market” — The evening crowd at the Munich Christmas Market.

Among other things, we timed our late-2024 trip to Europe to coincide with the Christmas market season. We had heard about these events for years, and this was finally our opportunity to see some of them as we visited various cities. Our main targets were in Germany, but before we were done we also saw some in France and Spain. They are everywhere, and the basic theme is similar despite regional variations. (Gluhwein in Germany becomes vin chaud in France.)

Munich was the final Germany city we visited this time. We were not there primarily for the Christmas market — we planned to attend a concert, go out to dinner, and generally experience the place. But on the first afternoon our walking route took us right through this main market. It was crowded, to the point that it was hard to walk. Vendor stalls lined the street, selling all kinds of holiday items, from food and drink to Christmas ornaments and warm gloves and socks.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Germany, Photographs: Travel

Bavarian Door

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Bavarian Door
Inscriptions and hardware on the of a small building in a Bavarian forest.

Bavarian Door. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Inscriptions and hardware on the of a small building in a Bavarian forest.

Some years back when we visited Europe we managed to meet up with a big group of extended family members near Berchtesgaden, Bavaria, where we rented a big farm house (or so it seemed to us) for a week. In addition to doing all the usual family stuff, we visited a number of nearby sights, from some in Bavaria to the not-too-distance city of Salzburg, Austria.

Königsee, part of the Berchtesgaden National Park was very close by, so we took that famous electric boats up the lake to the landing at Kirsche St. Bartholoma. It was a nice day so we decided to take a hike to the Eiskapelle, a place at the base of a gigantic ice chute coming from the upper reaches of Watzmann, the highest peak in the neighborhood. Along the way we passed this small building, which I think may be a chapel of some sort, and I was intrigued by the rustic metal fittings, the many carvings, and the color.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Germany, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Travel

Bavarian Alps at Königssee

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Bavarian Alps at Königssee
Alpine ridges and peaks above the Königssee, Bavaria.

Bavarian Alps at Königssee. © Copyright 2021 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Alpine ridges and peaks above the Königssee, Bavaria.

Today’s photograph ties together several threads — mountain landscapes, travel, and my continuing pandemic survey and reevaluation of older photographic files. This photograph comes from a wonderful trip we took almost a decade ago. Among other things, we all rented a big “farm house” near this location for a week — with a backyard view of the Watzmann massif, the highest peak wholly within Germany. (If I’m correct, the face on the right in this photograph leads up toward that summit.)

We did the tourist thing on this day, taking the electric boats up the Königssee lake to St. Bartholomä, from which we did the hike to the Eiskapelle at the base of a mountain face where fallen snow and ice collects. The photograph is from the boat. Every mountain range seems to have a personality of its own, and here (at least while we were there) the very steep faces, the forest along the lower slopes, the large meadows, the soft light and haze, and the non-granitic rock (which gets the attention of this Sierra guy) seemed to define this range.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Austria

Salzburg Castle, Bavarian Alps, Sky

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Salzburg Castle, Bavarian Alps, Sky
Looking towards the Bavarian Alps from the Salzburg Castle

Salzburg Castle, Bavarian Alps, Sky. Salzburg, Austria. July 17, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Looking towards the Bavarian Alps from the Salzburg Castle

I’ll admit that this photograph has one of the more unusual compositions among my photographs. Late in the afternoon on a summer day, I made the photograph from within an upper courtyard of the Salzburg Castle during our visit to that part of the world a couple of years ago. We were actually staying in Bavaria, in the portion of the distant mountains that is in Germany, but we arrived by train in Salzburg, departed the same way, and managed to travel down to the flatlands and visit the city on a couple of other occasions.

The castle is a spectacular place, located on the high ground above the old town and a bend in the river and having a commanding view of the surrounding flatlands and all the way to the mountains. As impressive as it is to us today, it must have been far more impressive when it was built. From this vantage point I was just able to see over one of the upper walls toward the mountains, and the backlit, hazy sky glowed. I suppose that the photograph is all about shapes, mostly abundant rectangles, but also the triangular shapes of the roof of the white building. The mountains echo those shapes, but inverting the tones — where the white buildings are the lightest things in their part of the image, the mountains are the darkest things in the upper rectangle holding the distant landscape.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | Email

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