Via Romea Germanica Day 9: Sülze - Celle

Many people nowadays live in a series of interiors…disconnected from each other. On foot everything stays connected, for while walking one occupies the spaces between those interiors in the same way one occupies those interiors. One lives in the whole world rather than in interiors built up against it.

― Rebecca Solnit

The sitting room sofa in the Kirchegemeindehaus, the Lutheran church community centre, in Sülze made an excellent bed. I covered it with a disposable mattress cover from a hostel - I always carry one for such occasions - topped with my thermal sleeping bag liner and then the heavy, fluffy blanket I found in the room. I covered one of the sofa cushions with my circle scarf, tying knots in the corners to make a pillowcase.  And I slept very well!

Cord, the sexton, arrived just as I was getting into my raingear ready to leave, so I was able to thank him in person for this comfortable accommodation. As it was already drizzling, I put on my rain poncho for additional protection against the weather. 

Then I set off, passing by a house with a rather sinister collection of dolls in the garden.

Just outside Sülze I passed a tractor sprinkling steaming fresh manure over the fields. Crossing the street to avoid being sprinkled in eau de manure, I soon came to the village of Eversen, where I had originally sought accommodation in a Gasthaus. I'm actually glad they had no rooms available, as the Kirchegemeindehaus was perfectly comfortable... and free!

Coming out of the village of Eversen, I saw that there was a cycling path alongside the highway. I sat down in a covered bus shelter, used Google Maps street view to check that the cycling track continued all the way down the highway to Celle, and decided to follow it for 10 kilometres and rejoin the official route in Scheuen. As I started out a bus drove past - an encouraging sight, meaning two good things: 

1. I could take a bus if the weather got worse

2. There would be covered bus shelters where I could rest out of the wind and rain at regular intervals. 

The first time I did sit down to rest in one of these shelters, the sun came out! Just as it came out yesterday afternoon, precisely when I reached my accommodation. It's as if the weather were making fun of me and my senseless enterprise of walking across Germany!

Cycling path by the highway

Shortcut!

The trouble with walking on a cycling path by a major road is where to go to the toilet. It's not like being in the forest... I soon wished I hadn't had both coffee and tea with my breakfast porridge! A couple of times I had to find a spot where, without walking too far out of my way, I couldn't be seen from the road - even in my high-visibility orange poncho. Then I had to get past several layers - rain poncho, waterproof trousers, regular hiking trousers,  leggings for extra wamth. The tough part was tucking it all in again properly afterwards - while wearing a backpack and a waist pack, too!

I turned off the cycling path one kilometre before Scheuen to take the shortest route back to the official route. Then I stopped to eat my lunch - a leftover salmon and cream cheese sandwich from last night - in a shelter by the clubhouse of the sports club, beside its football field. 

From here I followed the walking route shared by the Via Romea Germanica and European path E1, which my friend and sometime walking buddy Massimo is currently walking from his home in Genoa to Nordcapp, at the northern tip of Norway, to raise funds for sports and rehabilitation programmes for autistic children. Click here to follow him on Facebook!

This route brought me through a rather downtrodden suburb where loads of children's bikes, prams and carseats had been abandoned on the sidewalks (🤷‍♀️?). In the outskirts of Celle, I sat down in a Bäckerei/Konditorei for a hot chocolate and a giant rumball. I am happy to report that it tasted much like the ones I make... though it was about ten times bigger!

Finally I came into Celle, walking through a park to the river Aller and crossing over the bridge to the old town centre.

Celle

The town of Celle is first mentioned in a document of A.D. 985 under the name Kiellu (meaning "fishing bay" in the Old Saxon language).

In 1378 Celle became the Residenz of the dukes of Saxe-Wittenberg, and in 1433 the princes of Lüneburg took up residence in the castle. The ducal palace was situated on a triangle between the Aller and its tributary, the Fuhse; a moat connecting the rivers was built in 1433, effectively turning the town centre into an island.

From 1665 to 1705 Celle experienced a cultural boom as the Residenz of Duke George William, whose French wife, Eleonore d'Olbreuse, invited fellow Huguenot Christians to Celle. During the persecution of the Huguenots under Louis XIV, many French Huguenots sought refuge in Germany, opening businesses introducing French cuisine and fashions.

Eleonore also invited Italian architects to the city, and it was at this time that the town's French and Italian Gardens were laid out and its baroque castle theatre was built. 

And it was Italian craftsmen who provided the Baroque decorations in the city's church, Stadtkirche Sankt Marien, first consecrated in 1308. Originally Catholic, it became a Lutheran church when Duke Ernest the Confessor introduced the Reformation to the duchy of Lüneburg and Celle. The richly decorated altar, dated 1613, is the work of Danish craftsmen. 

The Alte Rathaus with Sankt Marien in the background 

The church was the first place I went to in Celle. There was a stamp for my pilgrim credential, and a place to sit down for a while in peace and quiet. 

I then spent the rest of the afternoon wandering about the streets of the old town, marvelling at the half-timbered houses, each with its own Gothic inscription. 

I paid a visit to the synagogue, which was spared destruction on Kristallnacht, the anti-Jewish pogrom on the night of 9 - 10 November 1938, only because it was in a very narrow lane and burning it would have been a risk to an adjacent leather factory and to the other wooden houses nearby.

I then bought some supplies for dinner and walked to the home of my Couchsurfing host, Ayelan. Argentinian of German/Polish and Italian heritage, Ayelan applied for a Polish passport and began a new life in Celle only a few months ago. She found a job here and moved into a flat, as yet sparsely furnished; she is currently working on the paperwork required to bring her two teenaged children over to join her. 

I made Ayelan some spaghetti and we enjoyed dinner with a glass of Argentinian Malbec! :)

Sülze - Celle 23 km