Gliding Quietly on Germany’s Historic Elbe : Notes on a Serene Springtime Holiday Cruise From Bad Schandau to Magdeburg

In Dresden, where a former secret police building is now a disco called Hollywood and shiny new Baskin-Robbins trucks touting “Kalifornien Eis Krem” toot by the charred ruins of a cathedral bombed by the Allies during World War II, locals have a joke they never seem to tire of: If you hail a taxi, they say, just give the driver your name; he already knows where you live.

More than two years after reunification, such jokes (this one alluding to the fact that ex-secret policemen are now working as taxi drivers) are still part of the common humor in the former East Germany.

“Everyone’s got a joke at the expense of the old government; that’s their way of distancing themselves from the oppressive past and latching onto what they hope will be a better future,” said Thomas Puettjer, marketing manager of Dresden’s aggressive new Tourist Promotion Board.

“People here still live in the dark ages as far as many services are concerned: There are virtually no phones in homes, people still carry coal to fourth-floor flats each day for fuel, and many apartment bathrooms are in the back yard. But life is becoming brighter; the colors are coming back to eastern Germany.”

Colors--in market windows displaying newly abundant fruits and vegetables; on house shutters painted Day-Glo shades; bursting from spring gardens and gleaming atop the often garishly hennaed heads of women of all ages--were among the many surprises we found on a cruise down the Elbe River last April through the heart of the once uniformly gray German Democratic Republic, as East Germany was officially called.

The cruise itself would have been impossible for most Westerners for the 45 years prior to the 1990 German reunification. Most of the Elbe was either wholly in East Germany or formed the border between East and West. The reddest of tape would have made the trip anything but a vacation.

But now the Elbe is accessible along with the rest of eastern Germany. (The terms “eastern” and “western,” though politically incorrect, are still used in Germany as geographical distinctions.) Visitors can take cruises ranging from day-trips out of Dresden to excursions of a week or more between Lovosice, Czechoslovakia, near Prague, and Lauenburg, Germany, near Hamburg.

Our four-night trip through Germany with KD River Cruises of Germany, a Cologne-based company, covered 200 miles from embarkation at the spa town of Bad Schandau, near the Czech border, north to Magdeburg, about 1 1/2 hours southwest of Berlin. Our itinerary took us past the dramatic Sandstone Mountains (Elbsandsteingebirge) and the brilliantly hued gardens of the Saxon Pillnitz summer palace; to Dresden, a treasure-trove of art and culture; Meissen, where the exquisite Dresden china has been manufactured since 1710; Torgau, site of the historic convergence of American and Russian troops toward the end of World War II, and Wittenberg, where Martin Luther launched Protestantism.

Our ship, the 312-foot Theodor Fontane--named for the 19th-Century German poet and novelist--was built especially for the Elbe’s often shallow waters. With less than a three-foot draft, we often floated intimately close to the river bed and docked right alongside the villages where we stopped each night.

The cruise line’s own buses followed the ship along its route, so that at each stop they could transport us, along with the ship’s two English-speaking guides, to key sights.

This was a quiet kind of holiday, a world away from the hubbub of a typical cruise ship. With just 62 outside cabins on two decks, a simple dining room and a cozy lounge, the Theodor Fontane was informal in a way that was very much in sync with the tranquil countryside. There was no plowing through high seas, no nightly extravaganzas or gluttonous midnight buffets. We glided quietly down the still river, both banks in clear sight, and at night we strolled the streets of that evening’s harbor village, or sipped after-dinner drinks in the lounge, where a brass combo usually played mellow dance music.

There were trade-offs: The food was far from gourmet (the meat, in particular, was tough and bland). Our cabins were tiny, with two twin beds converting to couches by day. And, in their second year of cruising, most of the riverboat’s predominantly eastern German crew still had not mastered even basic English, despite promotional literature to the contrary.

But none of this tarnished the joy of our journey. Sunning atop the sprawling roof deck, peering out the large portholes of our little staterooms or devouring kaffee und kuchen (coffee and cakes) in the picture-window dining room, we floated peacefully through history, watching 10 centuries of metamorphosis.

We passed ornate medieval castles on forested slopes, and ugly gray factories on gutted embankments. Fragrant green vineyards that had been producing wine for 800 years abutted huge piles of discarded Trabis--the much-mocked East German cars infamous for their little engines that couldn’t.

In some towns, villagers steeped in traditions of hospitality went out of their way to anticipate our every wish. In others, curt officials dismissed even our simplest requests with a crisp: “It is not possible.”

We exchanged waves with schoolchildren skipping along the banks, sculling teams rowing rhythmically downriver, and old folks downing sauerbraten and beer on the patios of half-timbered rathskellers.

A majority of the ship’s passengers were western Germans who had come to see how their other half lived. We were among a growing number of foreign tourists who wanted to witness the changes that are bringing--and sometimes wrenching--eastern Germany out of its Rip Van Winkle slumber.

In virtually every village we visited, torn-up roads and extensive scaffolding testified to a determination to rebuild and modernize. Whereas many European cities have a historic statue in their central plaza, in town after town along the Elbe, the square was dominated by a giant yellow Caterpillar crane--a motorized monument to the future.

In Dresden, the highlight of our cruise, virtually the whole town has been scaffolded while the ancient Saxon capital tries to regain its glory as the “Florence of the Elbe.” Once one of Europe’s most beautiful cities, filled with elegant 17th-Century baroque churches and palaces and abundant art trea sures, Dresden was demolished in a firestorm of American and English bombs on the night of Feb. 13-14, 1945. Ninety percent of the city was reduced to rubble; 135,000 people were killed.

“It was so close to the end of the war, but Churchill thought the Germans wouldn’t give in,” said Puettjer, of the Dresden Tourist Board, as he stood beside the preserved ruins of the 18th Century Church of Our Lady, just down the street from the recently opened Dresden Hilton.

“Germany lived in ruins but was still fighting, and the Allies decided that if they could kill our culture, they could finally kill Germany,” said Puettjer. “So just three months before the end of the war, they hit Dresden. They didn’t touch the industrial outskirts or the rich villas. They hit only the inner part of the city, the proudful head of our history and culture; and so they finally brought Germany to her knees.”

Since reunification, Dresden has moved quickly to get back on its feet. Recognizing its tourism potential, the city has speeded up restoration of historic buildings and instituted a plethora of festivals, from Dixieland music to international films and magic. The elegant Semper opera house, where many works of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss premiered, is in full voice. And visitors can stroll through much of the city’s most touted architectural gem, the baroque Zwinger palace complex, with its vast open plaza, cascading fountains, grandiose gateways, priceless porcelain collection and exhibit of Old Masters paintings, including Raphael’s famous “Sistine Madonna.”

The towering cathedral that dominates the compound contains a much-praised Silbermann organ, as well as an urn bearing the heart of August the Strong, the 18th-Century king most credited with Dresden’s cultural rise. While famous for his artistic vision, August was equally renowned for his 365 mistresses and double that many offspring. Legend has it that whenever a pretty woman walks through the cathedral, the king’s heart begins to palpitate.

Closer to the Elbe, the elevated Bruhlsche Terrasse--a 42-step climb--is a gracious stone promenade overlooking the Elbe, that Goethe called “The Balcony of Europe.” The Albertinum museum, set on the terrace, houses a gleaming collection of jewels from the treasuries of Saxon rulers.

Restaurants have sprouted up all over the city, from traditional basement rathskellers serving sauerbraten, wurst (sausages) and huge steins of beer; to cheerful outdoor pizza cafes with brightly colored awnings and white-wine spritzers--capitalist triumphs that would have been strictly verboten under the Communists.

Old and new coexist--sometimes happily, sometimes awkwardly--at towns all along the Elbe.

In the 1,000-year-old village of Meissen, artisans at the porcelain factory demonstrated how the iridescent china had been manufactured for nearly 300 years. Afterward, strolling the main street, we encountered “Toni’s Pizza Taxi” and “Dis & Dat Amerikan Store,” their marquees ablaze in neon.

We found history intact along the maze of cobblestone streets that climbed steeply past the town’s medieval houses and Gothic cathedral, and noted with pleasure that mail was delivered by a young woman on a bicycle--no rude awakenings there.

But wait. At Vincenz Richter, a venerable half-timbered tavern dating to 1523, we ascended from a visit to the basement’s ancient torture chamber to find the elderly German piano player belting out Louis Armstrong songs in English--with an attempt at Satchmo’s throaty singing style--followed by Petula Clark standards: ( “Das is mein song, mein serenade to you.”)

There were big doings in Torgau when we arrived April 25. Balloons and flags were everywhere, and thousands of people filled a fairground across the river from the ancient fortress where American troops moving east and Russian troops moving west converged in 1945, heralding the end of the Nazi era. People waved happily down at us as we passed under a narrow bridge spanning the river, and we wondered momentarily if all the hoopla could somehow be for us.

In a sense it was. We had arrived on the 47th anniversary of the Russian/American meeting. Encounter Day has been celebrated here since 1945, and the fact that Russians were no longer in vogue put nary a damper on the festivities. Exploring the town’s Saxon castle, whose moat contained live bears, we passed groups of uniformed Russian soldiers. But these were not the tough guys of yesteryear--say, 1989. No doubt waiting to be transferred home, they posed good-naturedly for photos and then shot us--with cameras.

Onward to Wittenberg. Here, in 1517, Martin Luther pinned 95 theses to the castle church, denouncing Catholicism’s practice of allowing sins to be atoned for in cash, and calling for reforms. Those theses later formed the foundation for Protestantism. Visitors can tour Luther’s home, which contains exhibits on the history of the Reformation--but unless you speak German, you’ll need the ship’s guide by your side. All descriptions of objects are in German, and neither literature nor guides were available in English.

That evening aboard the Theodor Fontane, we discussed Luther, Catholicism and communism. The conversation was livelier than usual, as we tackled those twin topics so hazardous to polite discourse--religion and politics.

We disembarked at Magdeburg and flew out of Berlin, 1 1/2 hours west, just as a massive nationwide strike was getting under way, paralyzing public transportation and sanitary services. Western German workers were angered by reunification’s drain on the economy and wanted immediate pay hikes; eastern Germans wanted faster advancement.

Democracy, it appeared, was in full swing.

GUIDEBOOK: The Elbe River Experience

Getting there: Lufthansa, USAir and Continental fly from LAX to Dresden, with a change of planes in Frankfurt; Delta connects to Dresden, with a change of planes in either Munich, Frankfurt or Stuttgart; Swissair connects through Zurich. Round-trip fare is $902, with advance purchase, through the end of March.

Cruising: KD River Cruises of Europe operates 70 Elbe cruises a year on identical 312-foot riverboats--the Theodor Fontane and Clara Schumann. Trips last 3-7 nights, depending on itinerary, and run April through October. Longer land-and-water packages, taking in cities such as Berlin and Prague, are also available.

Three-night cruises from Bad Schandau, south of Dresden, and to Wittenberg cost $525-$750 per person, double occupancy. Price depends on date and boat. (Upper deck is more expensive, though the room is no larger, and I liked being on the lower deck because the cabin windows open, while those in upper deck rooms do not.) Single supplement is 50% more. Rooms in outside cabins come with private baths. Price, not including air fare, covers all meals and afternoon coffee and cakes. Alcoholic beverages cost extra, as do land tours in Dresden, Meissen and Torgau ($9-$23 apiece, depending on excursion), and bus transfer to Berlin ($47), about a two-hour drive from the disembarkation point at Wittenberg.

The ship can be boarded on departure day, but it’s more relaxing to arrive the day before, overnight in Dresden, then take the cruise line’s free transfer to Bad Schandau (about an hour’s ride) the next evening for embarkation.

KD offers discounts for cruise passengers at the Elbresidenz, a hotel ship that once cruised the Rhine and now is moored permanently near Dresden’s historic center. Rate is $113 for a double room with bath ($94 single), instead of the regular rate of $142 double ($124 single). The price includes buffet breakfast; rooms, however, are small and stark.

For more information: KD River Cruises of Europe, based in Cologne, is represented in the United States by Rhine Cruise Agency, 323 Geary St., Suite 603, San Francisco 94102, (800) 858-8587.