Stranger, if you come to East Thuringia...

at first you’ll get to know the inhabitants of East Thuringia. This is a little nation with a provincial way of life, characterized by the particularization of the various landvogts and princes. You can notice it, for instance, when you hear our dialects, which are different from one village to the other village. A lot of sounds are not spoken exactly and we are often assigned to the Saxons by mistake.

The following anecdote describes our mentality very well:
Once upon a time there was a vagabond in a tavern, which was situated in the middle of a border line between two rural communes. While begging for a glass of beer he is said to have suddenly dropped dead. As he dropped just on the boundary he provoked a bitter local quarrel between the two villages about the question which of them is responsible for his burial. At last, the argument convinced that the head is of prime importance.

Looking into history books and finding the headword Thuringia, you can read: Kingdom of Thuringia, Duchies of Thuringia, the Landgraves of Thuringia, the Free State of Thuringia... And the frontiers hardly ever were identical! Thinking about the fact that towards the end of the 1 8th century the territory was fragmented into eleven states of Thuringia and four more states outside of Thuringia, which again had also been composed of more than one hundred small territorial fragments, one should be grateful for the existence of the name of Thuringia as a generic term at all.

But what matters is the current situation: The Free State of Thuringia celebrated its rebirth in 1990, and East Thuringia has gained one more territory: It is the region Altenburger Land, from which we have received an original dowry: mustard, liqueur, goat‘s milk cheese, a castle and a unique skat museum. The inhabitants of the East Thuringian town Greiz at their turn may well insist on being inhabitants of the Vogtland region - the jewels of the former royal seat nevertheless belong to the treasure chamber of East Thuringia. The castle, for example, and the marvellous park with the Summer Palace. It is such a thing with our customs. During the last decades, the friends of folklore have cultivated traditional costumes, songs and dances. Popular traditions and customs have come to life again recently at different public festivals. Altenburg has remembered the traditional country wedding and country horse riding. Gera invites its guests annually to the cave festival Höhlerfest with a medieval spectacle and a guild road. In Weida, the biggest festival is preoccupied with the housemade, fresh cake. In Schmölln, there is the “Pfefferberg“ (pepper mountain) festival, in Zeulenroda the “carp whistler festival“ - which reminds the visitors of a former anecdote - ‚ and in many villages there are festivities around the putting up of a maypole and the fairs.

“hilly cake" – recipe
Huckelkuchen
Batter: 6 egg yolks, 6 tablespoonfuls of oil, 6 tablespoonfuls of flour (ca 100 g), 6 tablespoonfuls of rum or brandy (40% alcohol)
Beat briefly but well all ingredients. Spread batter onto a very well greased baking sheet and bake at strongest heat for 5-8 minutes. Allow to cool down, then thickly brush with melted butter so that butter „is standing“ on the cake. Sprinkle with vanilla sugar.

It is due to the historic affinities that East Thuringia owes its greatest treasure, a lot of cultural riches surrounded by a countryside of local colorfulness. Fortresses, castles, churches, monasteries, town houses and half-timber farmhouses, surrounded by a delightful panorama -  just as if done by an artist. It doesn‘t matter that East Thuringia only seldom comes close to the cliché of the solitude of the forests and of murmuring streams. Our guests can arrange their holiday activities depending on temperament: walking through the valleys, driving, riding a horse or driving in a horse carriage, going out in a rubber dinghy on the river Weisse Elster, spending restful hours in a gondola on the various lakes and ponds. It is even possible to observe our region from the bird‘s eye view, starting the flight at the following points: from Altenburg-Nobitz, Gera-Leumnitz or Greiz-Obergrochlitz. You can enjoy many and excellent theatre performances in Gera, Altenburg and Greiz. In the Heinrich Schütz-House in Bad Köstritz, in the castle church of Altenburg and in many other village churches you can listen to concerts of a high standard. Museums and galleries invite the tourists everywhere. You can stay in nice hotels, comfortable pensions or - quite romantically - at farmhouses, eat in restaurants of high quality or have a break in the friendly country guest houses.

With knife and fork…

it is quite easy to conquer East Thuringia Guests often say that it didn‘t take them long to become accostumed to our good meals. Of course, the very famous “Thüringer Klösse" (dumplings) and the “Thüringer Rostbratwurst“ are among these outstanding meals. Forget all and everything you have eaten at other places and which was also called Bratwurst! It requires a lot of tips and tricks to make an original “Bratwurst“.
The genuine Thüringer Rostbratwurst is made of a mysterious substance. The somewhat slippery raw sausage extends its contents only at the moment when it is roasted over the charcoal and cooked in its own juice. Here and there, the sausage has to be black and brown, than it has the right quality!

Now, when the Bratwurst is  put  into a
roll… We recommend to drink beer
only, beer,  and nothing but beer.

So much for the Thuringian poetry. Let’s add prosaically: It should be East Thuringian beer; from Greiz, Altenburg or Köstritz. It is the dark beer “Köstritzer Schwarzbier" that has a wide-spread reputation and represents the East Thuringian art of brewing all over the world. Beside our Klösse and sausages, East Thuringia can offer a variety of other typical specialities. One of the culinary pleasures is the roast meat Schmöllner Mutzbraten - a joint, roasted on a spit over an open fire of birch wood. The proof of the pudding is in the eating! Just follow your nose. The best place is at the charcoal grill. And if the meal should have been a little bit too sumptuous, soothe your stomach and drink a good liqueur from Altenburg or Greiz.
Do you feel like having some? - Than let‘s go - put on your travelling shoes! Come and look around for yourself. Assuming that you do enjoy discovering the surroundings, holidays in East Thuringia are never boring. And the East Thuringia-tourist can claim to have captured a region at a time, when it was still a tourist secret.

Welcome and have a restful and exciting stay!