Easter 2022: Roland of Stendal, astronomical clock, and car race

When you arrive to Stendal from the airport, the eminent Uenglinger Tor with its rich ornamentation and a tower of 27.5 meters welcomes you to the old town:

I was biking, and stopped immediately when I saw it, which almost caused a crash with another biker I didn’t see! The Uenglinger Tor is one of the two city gates that are still preserved today. Both were built around 1450-1460.

Behind the Uenglinger Tor, there was this charming old house:

It wasn’t possible to avoid seeing the 84 meter tall towers of the Marienkirche – one could see them from almost any direction. The church has four bells in the belfry, among them two very special ones. They are the bells called “Maria” (diameter 1.99 m) and “Anna” (diameter 1.58 m). Both were cast in 1490 by Gerhard van Wou from Kampen in the Netherlands, who was probably the most famous European bell caster of that time.

A Roland statue (above, right) is a statue of a knight with a drawn sword, signifying the town privileges of a medieval city. Such statues exist in a number of cities in northern and eastern Germany, where they are often placed on the market square or in front of the city hall. The first Roland statues began to appear in the 12th century, placed outside churches. During the 14th and 15th centuries, Roland statues became more common.

The Stendaler Roland is known from 1525, but was later restored. It is not clear, whether there was an older one. The total hight of the sculpture is 7.80 m, with the length of sword 4.39 m.

The first Marienkirche was mentioned in 1283 and the current building was consecrated in 1447, according to the inscription on the vault.

There was a 16th-century astronomical clock under the organ that was restored to working condition in 1977:

It is one of the few old clocks of its kind that are still intact in Northern Germany. The pendulum length is 3.25 meters. It has to be raised every 5 days.

The streets of Stendal were empty – probably because everybody headed to the airport for the annual car race! I wanted to experience it, too. There were so many cars participating – all brands, ages, conditions.

Many of them were also on static display, some of them quite unique:

Food stalls were everywhere, and guess what people wanted most? Danish hot dog, of course! In fact, the only queue I saw there, besides racing, was a queue after Danish sausages! The grass is often greener on the other side 🙂

The car race was very well-organised. There were also several “sexy car wash” events. I wanted to see what it was about, but thought with all those big men I wouldn’t have had any chance to come close. So after a couple of hours I biked back to Stendal and went for an admiring tour of the town’s architecture.

There were many interesting details on the houses:

I soon realised, due to the Easter holidays, everything was closed, even restaurants. And I was getting hungry…  Maybe the only option was to bike back to the airport and buy a bunch of good hearty German sausages? I was lucky to locate one open restaurant, and they had fish. It was Dorsch fish (Atlantic cod), and tasted great:

I walked down the West Wall, all the way to my hotel:

My hotel was located in a very nice residential area:

The hotel was relatively small, very comfortable, and very quiet (though fully booked). I had a big single room with huge windows and a balcony, overlooking some green gardens and blooming trees, and enjoyed staying there a lot.

When I got back in the evening and was walking around the room, I suddenly noticed some bloodstains on the floor. After trying to find out where that blood came from, I realised it was from my left foot – my sock was full of blood! It showed up, a tiny blister of approx. 5 mm broke and was bleeding for obviously long time without any pain! I clearly walked and biked plenty of kilomentres that day…