Passau-- a confluence of three rivers topped off with one regal town
How would you like to spend the night in a bed once slept in by an empress or climb into a bathtub in which the likes of Marcel Marceau, Neil Armstrong, Roman Herzog and Jose Carreras have all soaked? In a pretty little town on the edge of the Bavarian Forest there’s a hotel that lets you do just that.Flanking the borders of Austria and the Czech Republic, Passau—just 180 km northeast of Munich—boasts a heritage that totally eclipses its reputation as a magnet for the rich and famous. The town’s history spans over 2,500 years. Originally a Celtic settlement (“Boiodurum”), Passau fell to the Romans in 15 BC when it was named after Batavis, a local Roman fort. It later became Bazzawa, then Passawe and ultimately Passau. A bishopric in the fifth century, Passau subsequently evolved into the largest in the entire Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, its sphere of influence extending into present-day Hungary.
Viewed from the castle perched on a cliff high above the city, it is easy to appreciate how Passau earned its name as a center of trade and travel. Countless settlers from the east passed through, as did the armies of Barbarossa on their crusades and the Bavarian Princess Elizabeth, popularly known as “Sissi,” who stopped here en route to the Imperial Throne of Austria. This sight of a town at the confluence of three rivers, with the snow-capped Alps rising majestically in the distance, so fascinated German naturalist Alexander von Humboldt that he described Passau as “one of the seven most beautifully situated cities in the world.”
Passau’s location is indeed unique. Nowhere else in the world do three rivers—the Ilz from the north, the Danube from the west and the Inn from the south—meet. Wedged between the Inn and the Danube, the Old Town is a maze of narrow cobblestone streets lined with well-preserved burgher and patrician houses and a plethora of churches. Many streets have been closed to traffic giving the town an almost Venetian feel and making it a pedestrian’s paradise.
Passau is one of the few German towns to have survived bombing during the war—the majority of its Baroque buildings remain intact. Passau owes its Baroque features to the Great Fire of 1662, when much of the medieval town was destroyed and Italian architects were called in to redesign it. While most of the buildings in the Old Town—notably those around the Ludwigstrasse—have since been meticulously restored and painted in an array of pastel colors, others have been left to stand the test of time. Fine examples of this can be found in the area around the Town Hall. Such side streets as the Milchgasse and Marktgasse, with their old-fashioned lanterns and musty smells, evoke the aura of a bygone age—something more reminiscent of parts of Eastern Europe than flourishing, hi-tech Bavaria. One can well envisage the old horse-drawn milkcarts rattling their way over the uneven stonework all those years ago.
For a good view of the Old Town, guided walking tours (available in English by prior arrangement) are given every weekend at 2:30 pm and take in the major sights in just an hour. The walk starts on the highest point of the inner city, the atmospheric Domplatz by the statue of King Maximilian I Joseph—grandfather of “Sissi” and great-grandfather of Ludwig II. The square, and indeed the whole town, is dominated by the Stephansdom, the largest sacral Baroque building north of the Alps. The cathedral, named after its Viennese counterpart at a time when the Austrian capital belonged to the bishopric of Passau, boasts the largest church organ assembly in the world, with five individual organs, 17,774 pipes and 233 registers. Visitors (weekdays May–October) should listen out for midday recitals of Bach, Händel or Muffat. The church is also home to the most powerful bell chimes in southern Germany—so overwhelming that just one of the seven bells suffices to announce mass.
On the other side of the cathedral, on the Residenzplatz, is a Baroque fountain commemorating the annexation of Passau to Bavaria in 1803. The square is a popular meeting place on weekends—look out for folksy-looking members of the local Schützenvereine. Well-groomed men in feather caps ceremoniously down the local brew (of the some 200 private breweries in eastern Bavaria, five are in Passau—try the Inntal) before heading for one of the many festivals held around town during the summer months. If you’re visiting in July, don’t miss the Altstadtfest (13–14).
Next to the cathedral is a grand Baroque edifice—the bishops’ New Residence (Neue Residenz). Take a look inside at the exuberant ceiling fresco and magnificently decorated Baroque stairway—one of the loveliest in Germany. Also in the new residence is the Cathedral Treasury and the Diocesan Museum with an extensive collection of gold and silver crosses, figures and precious chalices.
Visitors often wonder why so many of the patrician houses in Passau have more than one roof each. After the Great Fire, the bishops ruled that no buildings be built higher than 2.5 m. Wide houses therefore needed several roofs, resulting in the building of so-called ditch roofs. To make the architecture more appealing, facades were raised over the roofs creating what soon came to be known in the region as the “Inn-Salzach style.”
The Old Town Hall (Altes Rathaus) is graced with a Glockenspiel, the most resonant in Bavaria. Programmed to play 80 melodies, it is every bit as good as the bells at Marienplatz in Munich—when it works. Marks on the tower wall of the 14th-century Old Town Hall testify to historic flood levels. The last high water was in 1954, almost reaching the record mark of the Great Flood of 1501. Go round the corner of the clock tower, through the Town Hall portal and up the stairs to the Great Assembly Room. The imposing room shows scenes from the history of the city, including a monumental mural of the arrival of the Nibelungs in Passau. Stopping in town with his family en route to Salzburg, Wolfgang Mozart played here and was rewarded with one ducat—barely enough money in those days to pay for his family’s board and lodgings for the night. The setting remains a popular venue for concerts and other cultural events.
Across the road stretches the Promenade. Turn right and you’ll come to the end of the peninsula with its pretty park, while the other direction leads toward the busier part of town. During the summer months, the Promenade is lined end to end with Austrian, Hungarian, Romanian and Russian riverboats that start their week-long trips from here down the Danube as far as the Black Sea. Cruise prices range from € 500 to € 2,500. The quay in front of the Rathausplatz is where visitors can embark on regularly operating 45-minute boat trips. See where the Ilz joins the Danube before briefly venturing into the Inn with its views up to the pilgrimage church of Maria Hilf. The 17th-century church and monastery, commanding a spectacular view of the Old Town, are well worth the steep climb and, backing on to open countryside, lie just one kilometer from the Austrian border.
The prettiest promenade walk in town is along the banks of the Inn, where you can stroll from the Three-Rivers Corner almost as far as the university. On the other side of the peninsula, towering over the Danube, are the Upper and Lower Citadels, which form one of the biggest castle complexes in Europe. Virtually impregnable, the two 13th- and 14th-century fortresses were designed to protect the bishops not only from outside invaders but also from their own, often unruly, citizens.
The Upper Citadel complex today houses the Municipal Local History Museum (Historisches Stadtmuseum). Part of the museum is dedicated to the history of the Bohemian Forest, just over the Czech border, documenting how the German population was driven out of the area after the war.
A special hands-on exhibition is the Faszination Mittelalter, an intriguing account of the life and thoughts of people in medieval times. Visitors are invited to sniff archaic scents, slip into knight’s armor and chill out in the castle coldroom. The display, which runs until November, also offers a good opportunity to watch local artisans at work.
From the top of the citadel observation tower, the spectacle of the three rivers converging is breathtaking. Note the color contrasts: the Inn with its chalky-green torrents, the Danube, more brown than blue and, flowing from the fens of the Bavarian Forest, the Ilz with its almost black water—once famous for its healing properties. At the confluence of the latter two stands the privately owned Lower Citadel. Like the Upper Citadel, this castle served as protection for the salt trade, which formed the basis of Passau’s wealth. Back in the citadel museum, visit the “white gold” exhibition documenting Passau’s history as a salt trading center. The castle complex, which commands views far beyond Passau, is best reached by a shuttle bus leaving every half hour from Rathausplatz. If you’re feeling fit, it’s a 30-minute trek up the Ludwigsteig path.
To gain insight into local heritage dating as far back as the Stone Age, visit the Roman Museum. Here, on the site of the Roman fort Boiotro, exhibits include weapons, jewelry, ceramics and some of the very first iron implements.
The Museum der Modernen Kunst in Passau is housed in a Gothic edifice, which provides an interesting backdrop for an excellent collection of modern art. The museum will be hosting an exhibition of American photography until September.
Further reason to visit Passau this summer is the European Weeks Festival. Now into its 50th year, the event originated as a tribute to the ideal of European unity. This year the festival of music, theater and film is dedicated to North American Culture. Entitled “Thank You America,” the festival honors those Americans responsible for initiating the festival back in 1952, when the event was the first of its kind in Germany.
This year’s festival is being held in palaces, churches, castles and monasteries not only in Passau and neighboring towns but also Upper Austria and Bohemia. Highlights include: Citizen Kane (open-air showing, June 17), Glenn Miller Orchestra (June 25 in Straubing), West Side Story (July 5 in Waldkirchen), On the Town (July 7) and a German-American Organ Night in the Stephansdom (July 7). The Band of the First U.S. Infantry Division has also been signed up to play two free open-air concerts (June 16). The patron of this year’s festival, scheduled from June 14 to July 7, is dramatist Arthur Miller.
Can you imagine any self-respecting travel guide recommending that tourists visit a town’s cabaret before seeing its cathedral? The Baedeker guide to Bohemia does. Just next to the Rathaus at Milchgasse 2, the site of the former town prison, stands one of the most respected cabarets in Germany. “We sell a way of thinking,” says cofounder Walter Landshuter, who named his business,the Scharfrichter, after the town’s executioners. Initially boycotted by the local press and authorities on account of its irreverent treatment of the Church, today Landshuter’s club plays a key role in promoting Passau as a cultural hotbed. Its political cabaret and jazz concerts are frequently sold out, especially toward the end of each year, when the tiny stage hosts a widely acclaimed festival known as the Passauer Kabarett Tage.
A stone’s throw from the Bavarian Forest, Passau makes a perfect base for exploring an area that, together with the Bohemian Forest, on the other side of the Czech border, forms the largest continuous woodland in the whole of Europe. A unique refuge for native flora and fauna, the forest offers hikers a 320-km network of footpaths. Much of the sparsely populated forest is a National Park, characterized by undulating hills, isolated lakes, castles and quaint villages. For an idea of how people lived in the region some 400 years ago, the Museumsdorf Bayerischer Wald, 20 km north of Passau, makes for a great day excursion. The open-air museum, one of the largest of its kind in Europe, displays an extensive range of clothing, furniture, ceramics and agricultural equipment as well as beautifully well-preserved mills, smithies and the oldest elementary school in Germany.
The Tourist Information Office has put together about a dozen tour routes in the region, which can be covered either by car, bus or bike. If, for example, you’ve ever wondered what monks and the country’s best beer have in common, take the Baroque Tour, which investigates the link by visiting a monastery and a brewery museum.
Vaunted as the “Bavarian cyclists’ town,” Passau also affords numerous opportunities for exploring the area on two wheels. Cyclists have a choice of eight long-distance paths along the Danube and Inn rivers. These include the so-called Biedermeiertour (Passau-Linz- Vienna connecting with Bratislava and Budapest), the “German Danube” tracing the river to its source at Donaueschingen and the “Inn Tour,” terminating at the river’s source in the Swiss Engadine. Bikes are permitted on board most Danube boats and local trains, so you can cover part of the route by rail or river. The route is also the scene of the annual “Rad Total,” when, on one Sunday every May, cyclists have almost 100 km of roads between Passau and Schlögen in Upper Austria all to themselves.
Budget accommodation specially geared to cyclists is available at the eye-catching Rotel Inn, resembling a ship more than a hotel. The rooms are truly shipshape—hardly any wider than the bed inside. But for just € 15, it’s worth the squeeze. Located alongside the Danube cycle route, the bizarre bed bunker is just minutes away from the center of Passau.
But what about that very special bed—the one in which some of the most eminent statesmen, singers and moon walkers have slept? This, together with the bed in which Empress Elizabeth II slumbered when visiting Passau in 1862, forms part of the historical royal suites at the Hotel Wilder Mann. Ironically, the bed owes its raison d’être to the one famous person who has not slept in it. It was a wedding gift to Ludwig II of Bavaria—the king with an obsession for building fairy-tale castles. Alas, Ludwig’s marriage to Duchess Sophie Charlotte was called off and the monarch never actually made use of the present. One wonders, though, how His Royal Highness might feel, if he were to learn how many famous names have since taken his place in the royal berth.
Nestling in the shadow of the Town Hall, the beautifully restored Wilder Mann is also home to the Passau Glass Museum. With over 30,000 exhibits spread over 35 rooms, it boasts the largest collection of Bohemian glass in the world. “I have seen many glass collections in the world,” enthused expert Karl Fürst von Schwarzenberg, “but none like this.”
To help visitors make the most of the sights of Passau, the Tourist Information Office sells an all-inclusive ticket, which offers free entry to over 80 attractions in and around Passau. The excellent-value PassauCard includes admission to the thermal baths in the so-called Spa Triangle of Bad Birnach, Bad Griesbach and Bad Füssing. The latter, not to be outshone by its partner on the Danube, will stage its own cultural festival this September, featuring guest star Montserrat Caballé.
HOW TO GET THERE:
>>>By car: A92/A3 Munich–Deggendorf-Passau
(allow two hours)
>>>By TRAIN: Departs every two hours
Tourist Information:
Bahnhofstrasse 36, 94032 Passau
Tel. (0851) 955 98-0
www.passau.de
Hotel Wilder Mann
Tel. (0851) 317 12
The PassauCard is available for
3/7/14 days at € 22/30/46
