My
pilgrimage to Eisenach, Germany
My
pilgrimage to Eisenach, Germany
My long lasting dream became true when I got to know Frank Reiher - a real East German Wartburg enthusiast through the internet in August 1997. He invited me to come and make the trip with him. I immediately decided to do so!
Friday, March 13, I stood in Tegel airport in Berlin. Frank and his girlfriend Nadine came to pick me up - with a Wartburg of course. Unfortunately it was not his own but his sisters anyway. We went to his apartment in Berlin - the east side of course - and spent a nice evening there talking about cars...
Saturday morning we woke up early and headed down to Eisenach - with a Wartburg. Firts we drove past the former Berlin Wall that separated the whole city into east and west parts. Then we drove towards the Brandenburg gate and under it!
It took us a couple of hours to get there but finally we found the beautiful city of Eisenach between the mountains. This is the home of all Wartburg cars. The car production started in 1898. We parked the Wartburg by the main gate of the fromer AWE factory. Unfortunately most of the factory buildings have been torn down. Some of the buildings still remain but they are in a really bad shape. The main Wartburg museum was under construction but luckily we found the storage place where most of the cars that are not exhibited are stored. I took a couple of pictures of the prototypes of the cars like the first 353 with 4 stroke engine and the one made in early 70´s that has very close relationships with first VW Passats - the Wartburg was first anyway. These pictures are taken through a window and the quality is bad... Aside of the building we found a couple of Barkas vans and IFA W50 lorries - original prducts of the former DDR.
Then we entered the museum and saw the line of cars produced in Eisenach. The older ones, like the Dixi and BMW are not as interesting as the F9 , 311 and the last ever built Wartburg - the 1.3. It was so sad to look the last Eisenacher!
Of course we went through downtown Eisenach to see the Wartburg Fortress too. Then we had lunch in McDonald's Eisenach where I shot a picture of a very sporty 1.3. After lunch we hit the road back to Berlin. When we were there, we had 776 kilometers behind - in a Wartburg, without any problems even though we kept up pretty high average speed.
On Sunday we headed north to the city of Schwerin where Frank has his car collection. His almost daily use 1.3 was there plus an old 311 which is waiting its restoration. They live there in a house that is over 100 years old. The countryside of the Northern Germany is very beautiful - an ideal place to have a Wartburg to cruise around!
Sunday evening we spent with Nadine and Frank watching videos of the Wartburg history. What a trip! It was so sad to leave friends and come back home. Anyway they luckily are planning a trip up north to Finland - with their 1.3 Tourist and a special roof tent, OF COURSE!!!!
