>Asparagus is one of the finer things in life. Bought fresh from your local farmer, steamed and enjoyed with butter, new potatoes and fresh chervil or parsley from the garden.…

>The Brand Centre in Mainz has a long history of commercial significance. The original Kaufhaus – a massive 2-storied warehouse – was built here in the 14th century to take…

>Just keep going, mate…. I can swim.

>Most of the gastronomy at the Rheinland-Pfalz Ausstellung wouldn’t actually knock the socks off your average gourmet. There’s Ditsch’s for brezels, of course, and the standard currywurst and french fries.…

>The Kapuzinerstrasse and the Rheinstrasse are linked by the Hänleingaesschen, the Scharfensteinergaesschen and the Färchergaesschen. Old names (or spellings) no longer in use, but they give us an idea of…

>Mainz hosts the annual State Fair – the Rheinland-Pfalz Ausstellung. It’s a bit like the Easter Show of my youth in Auckland. Without the sheepdog trials. And candy floss. (Cotton…

>From the bottom of the circular stairwell in the Theatre underground carpark. It’s not a good idea to hang around here for too long, though – you’ll bankrupt yourself. Parking…

>Winter came back with a vengeance over the weekend – snow in the hills, we flatlanders (200m ASL) are forecast to get thumped this afternoon. So I let this morning’s…

>210 years isn’t that old. If you’re a glacier, that is. These days, though, it’s a pretty good innings if you’re in business. Johann Anton Lutz opened his goldsmith’s shop…

>The €10 haircut salon has become quite a phenomenon in Germany. Mainz now has one, too. Production line, no appointments. no frills, just the basic “wash and cut”, blow-drying costs…

>Slumbering under these mounds is the 2007 asparagus vintage. Not the green stuff (although you can get that here these days, too) that most of the world knows. This is…

>KUZ put on its finest floodlighting for us last night Or maybe it was for Bernard Allison Probably. Or for the twin rattlesnake heads on his hat.What an excellent gig.…

>In the forests of the nightWhat immortal hand or eye Could frame thy fearful symmetry” Wm. Blake Well, Philipp Harth (1887-1968, son of a local stone mason, huge talent, works…

>Just down the road from the Lampenfabrik and up the road from the elegant Marina, you’ll find the Kulturzentrum. Translation required?Didn’t think so. It’s in a fine old brick building…

>Mainz is a nightmare for construction projects. I’ve been involved in contingency planning for some seriously big projects in my time, and I wouldn’t touch Mainz with a bargepole. All…

> You could be excused for thinking that this is a flashback to a food-queue in what used to be East Germany in the 1980s…. But it’s not. This is…

>Mainz is twinned with more places than you can shake a stick at. Watford, for example. (Cousin Graham asked me whether anyone from Mainz had actually been to Watford before…

>This is a good trick… Lurk around one of the guided tour groups that drift through Mainz of a weekend and pick up all sorts of useful information. For instance.…

>This is the pride of Mainz’s luxury vessel marina. As always, there’s a story. These barges date back to 1898, when the city fathers had the idea of incenting folks…

This is the Lampenfabrik – the Lamp Factory. In fact, it used to be a lot more besides that and it almost became nothing once the politicians got it into…

>There are pretzels and pretzels. They don’t get much better than Peter Ditsch’s. His granddad started out as a traditional family baker in the Old Town and followed his instincts,…

Received knowledge around this Hals des Waldes is that the linked wheels on Mainz’s crest are attributed to Bishop Willigis and the fact that his father was a wheelwright. Or…

>OK. Technically yesterday’s MDP, but if I’d waited until after midnight, the eclipse would have been total which makes for images of limited interest. We had the usual festivities one…

>“What have you got on your head? Come inside this minute! What will the neighbours think?” This is Johannes Gutenberg, Mainz’s most famous citizen and favourite son. Time Magazine’s Man…

>…that I didn’t recognise St. Martin. (Wikidedia says that he’s “one of the most familiar and recognizable Roman Catholic saints. Aaah! I’m not Catholic, so that’s OK then..) The fact…

>Staying with St. Stephan for a moment. This was a challenge! Not so much the image of the crest on the north portal of the church. That was dead easy…

>Apartment block bell pushes next to our Turkish butcher in the Heidelbergerfassgasse. Get an idea of the vibrant multicultural nature of the place?

>One of the few positive aspects of Mainz’s immediate post-war architecture (it’s pretty dire, utilitarian stuff – understandable, given the extent of the bombing damage and the pressing need to…

>Mainz has its fair share of graffiti artists. (Although some people would consider “artist” in this context an oxymoron, but anyway…) “Sam” would appear to be one of the better-known…

>This poster’s a work of art in itself. But it does remind me of one of those brainteasers. I’m not going to tell you which words I found. Quite embarrassing.

>Just around the corner from the St. Ignaz church in the Altstadt, there’s a wine bar called “Beichtstuhl” – German for confessional. The story of its name goes like this:…