Local Street Festival

[airborne1092]

So, we live along the route one would take from the train stop to the city center; It's no more than a 10 minute walk. This weekend there is/was an International street festival with drinking, music, drinking, food and some drinking. Last night, my wife and I observed more fols than we could count walk past, headed that way for the evening. My wife perks up and says, with a gleam in her eye, you should go to the fest in the morning, AFTER all those folks are gone! So, I wake up the next morning at 0400 (happy Father's Day to me...) and decide it's too dark still - so I go back to sleep for another 40 minutes. I get up and drive to the market plaza and by 0500, I start looking. Already there was two guys who had almost half of the market plaza swept up already, and there was some old grandma type lady with a large plastic bag who was collecting all the bottles she could find for a return. Typically here in Germany it's 15 Euro cents per bottle (roughly 20 cents USD.)

None the less, I'm real careful about checking around the ATM locations, around the various stages that hosted music and the numerous kid's playgrounds. I also check esp. well around the honeybuckets. So, the story is a real downer, because all I found was 5 euro cents. However, I extend to you all the fact that I got in an hour long walk in some nice freash air and I did spy a housecat returning home with her loot: a fat mouse to crunch on!

All in all it was a nice start to another Father's Day and I look forward to planning my next early morning excursion!

 

[day_sleeper_99]

greetings from stuttgart. Early morning is always nice for a good walk and to take in the surroundings quietly. Thats my therapy on the weekends. Do you hunt on Patch or Panzer?? Do you need permission from the IC just wondering, will be back on post in a few months. HH

 

[airborne1092]

I live in Sindelfingen near the Goldberg S-Bahn station, but work on Patch. I packed my cr@p 1970s Red Baron in long term storage, as I wasn't sure how much time I'd have and what not. So, the short of the long is, I don't MD right now.

While I was working in Idaho, I would take it to some local beaches, however all I ever found was some big iron lag bolts (presuambly from an old dock) fishing tackle and a couple children's charms/necklaces. I 'inheritied' the Red Baron from my grandpa after he passed away the spring before last.

What I do is, shop the floh- and trodelmarkts, I want to do dig for fossils at Holzmaden near the airport and I've tried some CRH from the credit union on post. I'm still trying to perfect that one; a bit more liasoning/schmoozing and trying to understand days of the month the rolls come in and go out without seeming like a bad person planning bad things! Also, I need to find a suitable dump bank alt other than my CU - I don't want to pI$$ my own bed if you know what I mean. Of course I have a few other ideas in the works right now, too. Something I learned in recruiting (heaven forbid...) is you make your own opportunities!

As far as MD on post, I really don't know about that - I haven't asked. I would assume you are correct - the IC office. I would however go straight to him or her as it's a small community, and I would certainly get whatever permission I could, in writting.

It would be great if someone could find the 7th Panzer's missing buffalo on Patch Barracks and return it to the current German unit! I for one do not have any GPR units laying around!

How about you - where do you live/work? Sounds like you're 'out of town' atm...

 

[day_sleeper_99]

Hi, havent been on Patch in a few years. I live in a small town called hemmingen. long story sort of short.... Was stationed at Panzer from 89 to 91. Then went to tx. came back to Nürnberg for a while, got out of active army, stayed in germany, went Reserve, moved back to Stutgart area, been here since. Left the Reserve in 05, needed a break, but will go back in in a few months, need to finish up at least 20 yrs, bla bla bla. Im sort of new to Mding, got my ace 250 just this spring, interesting what is lurking in the sandboxes here. I have no clue as to the 7th Panzer buffalo, im at a complete loss.

Used to work at the CMR on patch, and Kelly. Got activated for Iraq, did that, came back and became a Full Time Dad. Still doing it.

 

[airborne1092]

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/patch.htm

Refering to Patch Barracks and the buffalo-

"The 7th Panzer Regiment chose the buffalo, (actually the "wisent", a European Bison) as their regimental insignia, and painted it on their tanks and vehicles. they also commissioned a sculptor to chisel a seven foot high statue of a buffalo from white granite, and it was erected in late 1938 on a pedestal near the present flagpoles. The Statue survived the Allied air attacks with little damage. When the Americans arrived they found the buffalo in place, the last member of the 7th Panzer Regiment in the Kaserne.

Just what happened to the buffalo is covered with the dust of history. An officer of the 346th Engineer Regiment recalls that it was removed from the pedestal and pushed by a bulldozer into a nearby bomb crater, but he no longer remembers where the crater was. Mr. Heinrich Elsaesser, who worked in the Kaserne, clearly recalls seeing the buffalo daily during 1946 as it lay at the bottom if a trash dump in a ravine behind what is now Building 2401, Weicht Village.

Former members of the 7th Panzer Regiment would like to return the statue to the 363rd Panzer Battalion, near Wuerzburg, which now bears the colors of the old 7th. Meanwhile, the memory of the buffalo is kept alive at Patch Barracks by the Post Headquarters, which uses a buffalo silhouette as its symbol, and by several Patch athletic teams that bear its name."

 

[day_sleeper_99]

Gee Whiz Wally, I never knew.!!!! Thanks for the history lesson.