Day 29: Day of the glare

The sun at this time of year in Dresden is pretty intense. Both yesterday and today we left the hostel at about 11am to find the streets in long shadows with lazy light like it was six o'clock in the morning. The sun barely rises out of the sky before it drops again in the late afternoon. Turn into the light (due south-ish) and pre-suspicions about its apparent weakness are dispelled by the blinding glare bouncing off the cobblestones and shiny buildings. One pair of sunglasses between two do not bode well for headache prevention. The river, bridges and surrounding buildings (patchwork, blackened and scarred) look beautiful in the afternoon light. That is when you're not directly facing it.

The area of Dresden that we're staying in (Neustadt) is probably the most entertaining of the two main sections. Oldstadt Dresden is by far the more historic section of this city, but the presence of awful aggressive Italian/Polish tourists was getting my ire yesterday which at times put me off the beauty of the Zwinger and other famous landmarks. Neustadt in a nutshell is a sprawling matrix of four story old skool apartments (1900 stylie & bomb-free), funky cafes, jazz clubs and proper punks/bohemians everywhere. The graffiti (excluding the territorial piss-stains) is quite good too - especially the colourful stencil art that adorns the underside of the bridges and backsides of buildings.

The record stores here (which I'd heard favourable things about) are a bit of a letdown - overpriced and lacking esotericism. The adjacent erotic bookstore looked far more interesting.