Passau, Germany Sat July 19

The captain does an amazing job steering our ship.  We are sometimes just 2-3 inches away from the wall as we go into the docks, or parked next to other longboats when we dock.  Several days we were not able to sit on the sun roof because the bridges were so low they had to take down all the chairs and rails, and the captain's wheel house gets lowered to where he only has a slit to see out of.  But that doesn't stop the cruise boats -- there are lots of them on the rivers, especially when we got to Passau.

Passau, our last city in Germany, is where three rivers converge:  Danube, Inn and Ilz.  The Inn (or was it Ilz?) River has a whiter look, so the Danube supposedly is bluer now, but one guide said it is really only blue if you’re in love or had too much to drink.

It is another very old town with narrow streets.   There is a Bishop's Residence and a 14th century Town Hall.   We saw many markings of where floods had destroyed part of their city, the latest just a couple of years ago with a high water mark.  

After a walking tour of the narrow streets, we went into the amazing St. Stephan's Cathedral, with it’s super ornate Gothic style.   The best part… the very best part ..was the organ concert in the cathedral.  The cathedral was packed for the noon concert.   Couldn’t see the organist, but saw the huge pipes — there are almost 18,000 organ pipes, 233 stops including 4 carillons.  It is the world’s 2nd largest cathedral organ — the biggest was built more recently at a Congregational Church in Los Angeles.  All five parts of the organ can be played simultaneously — and I think we heard them all.  It brought tears to my eyes to listen to such powerful, beautiful music.  Awesome!

It has become quite warm, so being in cooler cathedrals is a pleasure.  John and I went back in the afternoon to take a closer look at this magnificent cathedral and walk around on our own.