Nijmegen (Nigh-megen) 3 November 2019
Today is our last day and night on the River Rhapsody –
tomorrow we will be in Amsterdam. Where
did the time go? It has been a wonderful
cruise – our trip leader was knowledgeable, funny, and had lots of
stories/legends to tell. The Christmas
Markets were what we had envisioned and then some – what a way to get into the
Christmas spirit. And the Glühwein – it
was delicious as our 18 mugs will attest to.
We will spend a few days in Amsterdam and then travel to Bruges and
Brussels in Belgium before heading home.
Our last cruise stop is Nijmegen, the oldest city in the
Netherlands. The earliest recorded
mention of Nijmegen was around 8th century BC when the Romans built a camp where the River
Waal meets the Rhine River. With a
population of165,000 people, it is the 10th largest city in the Netherlands.
During WWII, Nijmegen was the first Dutch city captured by
the Germans in 1940. It played a
strategic role in the unsuccessful Allied military operation called Operation
Market Garden (17-25 September 1944).
The largest airborne operation of the war up to that time, it was an
attempt to secure the bridges across the Rhine thus allowing Allied armored
troops entry into Germany. Initially,
the operation was marginally successful, and several bridges between Eindhoven
and Nijmegen were captured. However, the
Allies ground tank force advance was delayed, which eventually forced the
airborne troops who were working to capture the bridges to evacuate the
area. The Allies failed to cross the
Rhine in sufficient force and the river remained a barrier to their advance
until the offensives at Remagen, Oppenheim, Rees, and Wesel in March 1945. The failure of Market Garden ended Allied
expectations of finishing the war by Christmas 1944. The Operation did succeed in liberating
Nijmegen from German control. . Even today at nightfall, 48 townsfolk cross
over one of the bridges (where 48 Americans were killed) carrying lights to
commemorate the lives lost in trying to capture the bridge.
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| Woman Watching for Her Husband |
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| Mother Crying for her Daughter |
Our day began with a guided tour through the center of
Nijmegen. There really is not much to
see in the city but our guide made the best of it. On one building was the statue of a woman
looking out to sea for her husband who worked for the Dutch West Indies Trading
Company. Another old shop for the Dutch West Indies Trading Company had an
elephant statue on its corner to indicate that it did business with countries
that had elephants. Another statue
showed a mother crying for her daughter who had been sent to the Dachau
concentration camp and later died. We
walked past the old hospital which is now a brewery. In the center of town we saw the Town Hall.
which was once a weigh house and ended our walk near St. Stephens Church.
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| Old Hospital |
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| Rathaus |
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| Mariken of Nijmegen |
Near the church in Grote Markt is a bronze statue of a woman
called the Mariken of Nijmegen (Little Mary of Nijmegen). One of the symbols of the town, it is also
one of the most popular pieces of Dutch literature – a play written between
1485 and 1510. It tells the story of
Mariken who, for seven years, lived with the devil.
In the beginning,
Mariken lived with her uncle outside of town.
One day she had to go into town to shop for her uncle. By the time she was through it was too late
to walk back into the forest and her aunt did not allow her to stay in her
home. As she wandered through the
countryside, she met the Devil (who called himself Moenen) who convinced her to
go with him to Antwerp. There she lived
for seven years. But Mariken longed to
return to Nijmegen and see her family.
She and Moenen returned to Nijmegen where Mariken saw a pageant whose
message was that anyone can receive God’s forgiveness of sins if they
repent. Moenen sees her asking for
forgiveness and tries many times unsuccessfully to kill her. The Pope tells her she will not receive
forgiveness until the three rings she must wear around her arms and neck fall
off through the help of God. Mariken
then enters a convent where one morning she wakes up and finds that the rings
have fallen off and God has forgiven her.
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| Devil in Front of the Church |
St. Stevens Church was built during the period 1260 to
1560. We did not go in as they were
having a mass, but we had been in it the last time we visited Nijmegen. One of the more interesting things to see (or
maybe bizarre would be a better name) is the little statue of the devil in
front of the church. Some people claim
that the devil is “mooning” the church.
At the end of the tour, Stefan went to a little cheese shop
and bought some delicious Dutch cheese for us to sample. The Dutch do know how to make cheese. Then it was back to the ship for lunch and a
talk about Operation Market Garden by one of the town’s older residents before
we set sail for Amsterdam.
Unfortunately, he was not very organized, started a story and then
skipped to another subject, and just seemed to ramble. We were fortunate in that on our last river
cruise down the Rhine, the woman that talked about Operation Garden Market was
very good. Needless to say, we did not
learn anything new this time.
After this talk we had our Christmas gift exchange as our
ship set sail for Amsterdam. When we got
our final documents about a week before we left, they said that if you wished
to participate bring a gift of about $5 to exchange. So, Patrice and I hurried to Walmart to find
two gifts each – I found a nice 2020 calendar and a cookie mix with a Christmas
potholder. Each person who participated
went up to the table where all the gits were and selected one. Bill got two Christmas hand towels and I got
a Lenox snowman ornament.
Tonight was the Captain’s Farewell Dinner. Unfortunately, unlike our last Rhine cruise,
we did not get to sit at the Captain’s Dinner.
But we did enjoy a delicious dinner of Roasted Beef Filet and Baked
Alaska. After the dinner we all had
one final drink in the lounge and then headed back to our rooms to pack our
suitcases for our departure tomorrow.
How quickly this cruise went by.
We all enjoyed it very much.
What’s not to like about a wonderful, attentive crew, knowledgeable and
funny Trip Directors, enjoyable
traveling companions, beautiful Christmas Markets, quaint old German towns,
good food and wine, and great Glühwein! But
for us the trip is not over yet – we still have Amsterdam, Bruges, and Brussels
to visit.
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