Today’s themes: Leipzig Music & Sciences; Socks and Pinocchio.

Leipzig has a long association with Arts and Sciences. Today we visited St Thomas Church which dates to the 12th century. It was here that J.S. Bach was choirmaster from 1723 to 1750, he was also choirmaster of the St Nicholas church we visited yesterday and of the university church which no longer exists. Bach’s remains were removed from their previous resting place in 1950 and now lie in the floor of St Thomas church.

St Thomaskirche

Other musicians associated with Leipzig include Richard Wagner who was born here in 1813, Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann and Gustav Mahler.

Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz was also a hometown boy being born in Leipzig on July 1 1646. Known as a “polymath” and philosopher he is the co-inventor of calculus along with Newton and his notation is the one you learned to hate in first year.

And here we are!

Leipzig is home to some divisions of the Max Planck Institute. Werner Heisenberg also taught here for several years which may explain why some parts of Leipzig are hard to find.

We promised socks and we deliver. I bought some new running socks here – made in Germany and let there be no doubt of how to wear them.

Pinocchio also roams the streets.

We visited the Museum of Fine Arts which houses a collection of paintings and sculpture. A large building with some fine spaces and a collection of mostly lesser lights but well displayed and a genuine pleasure to roam the galleries free of bus tours and the hordes with cell phones and Ipads imaging everything in sight.

A quiet gallery

Huge interior space

Today’s miscellany

Fantastic roof

Temple of desserts

Tomorrow we spend the day with Porsche and come home with a car….