Tuesday, June 3 Zrenjanin

Another long one today! We arrived at 8:30 for our planned 8 am tour of the Novi Sad archives. After an hour we went to our next tour of the Museum of Vojvodina. Meanwhile, I went with Stasa to cash the traveller’s cheques that I had brought for his fee. They had to fax them all to Belgrade, wait an hour for approval, then fill out a bunch of paperwork in the branch. All together, an hour and a half. That puts us an hour behind schedule and we still have a tour of the Petrovaradin Fortress that Stasa had planned, putting us another hour behind schedule.

Our first village stop was in Indija. Unfortunately, the Giroux twins met with disappointment there. Although we were able to enter the church, we learned that there is nothing left in the cemetery from the old days. Many years ago, the cemetery was cleaned out and the remains buried in a mass grave. Apparently, some were also dumped into a pond somewhere. Anyway, there is nothing there to see. This image is a representation of Jesus in his tomb.

Then we had to make a tough decision. Carol had hoped to see Belgrade because her mother had worked there. The distance to our next stop was about the same through Belgrade or by going back to Novi Sad, but Stasa estimated that it would be 1-1.5 hours longer through Belgrade. Carol decided that the other stops were more important and agreed to take the quicker route.

We reached Knicanin/Rudolfsgnad about an hour later. The first thing we did was drive down the lane at the foot of the protective dike. We stopped, climbed the dike, and descended to the river on the other side. The dike is 20-30 feet high and there is a band of trees from the foot of the dike to the river, a distance that Frank paced off as 200 yards.

When we returned to the bus, we were met by one of the locals who lived beside where we were parked. He was most friendly, inviting us for a drink, then a coffee, then offering to kill and roast a goat for us. We finally convinced him that we did not have time and escaped, saving the life of some lucky little goat.

We then drove south of town to the monument to the mass graves from the post war interment camp, retuning to the cemetery to observe that monument also.

We knew from our previous trip that the old German part of the cemetery was practically inaccessible, but we snooped around anyway. We were about to leave when the twins spotted a headstone visible in the bush near the path. They investigated more closely and found that it was one of the names that Frank and Diane were interested in. Frank and Diane were on cloud nine when they investigated and found that it was the stone of their great great grandmother! We made another “quick” stop to take a picture of a house that might have been where Frank’s family lived. Needless to say, we were soon surrounded by a crowd of locals and our stop lasted considerably longer than planned.

We finally made it to our hotel about 7, ate a delicious meal about 8, and broke up the party about 9. Marta Istvan, one of Frank’s research contacts, arrived shortly afterwards and some of us had a short meeting with her while she ate her meal. I then retired to my room to blog, catch up on the accounting, and prepare for tomorrow. I hope to be done by midnight.

Another very warm day today.

We will probably be out of touch for the next few days as we will be in quite rural areas. Internet is very slow tonight causing postings to bog down. Will try to post picture later.

Monday, June 2 Novi Sad

Shortly after 8 this morning, Betty, Mary Ann, Miles, Celeste, and Glenn boarded the bus for the planned half hour 20-25 km drive to Pilisvorosvar, where Betty had traced her family. More than an hour later after fighting our way through rush hour traffic, at one point taking 30 minutes to cover three blocks, we received our reward. We easily found the three hundred year old church and took several pictures, although it was locked and we could not get inside. Johannes was able to learn from a neighbour that the cemetery was nearby and pretty easy to find. We found three Hasenfratz headstones in a quick search before hurriedly returning to the bus.

We arrived back at the hotel at 11 am, an hour later than planned, but no one was really surprised, as our timeline was a bit optimistic. We picked up our well rested and full of coffee traveling companions and set off for Serbia. It took another hour to get across Budapest and join the autobahn (or whatever they call it here).

We cleared both borders with relative ease. The Hungarian guard took all our passports in for a check and eventually brought them back all stamped. The Serbian wanted to see our passenger list and also stamped our passports. Other than the usual bureaucratic red tape, no problems.

We met Stasa Cvetkovic, our guide, at the border. He led us to a restaurant at Palic Lake where we enjoyed a very nice late afternoon dinner. From there we drove to Subotica for a tour of the city centre. Finally, after, 7 pm, we left for the last leg to Novi Sad, with the hotel guests settled by about 9 pm. Some of us stayed at Stasa’s apartment. We talked until 11 pm before packing it in.

The hotel is a new five star hotel with a lobby as big as a gymnasium and oodles of staff everywhere. It was a bit expensive, but good value for the rooms and breakfast according to those who stayed there. Stasa’s place was very good value also!

Very warm day again today.

Sunday, June 1 Budapest

We were on the road shortly after 8 in the hope of arriving at Szar/Saar by 9 in case we could catch a Mass for Betty. Unfortunately, without the GPS, we had to rely on a map that didn’t have enough detail. We made one wrong turn and had to retrace our steps. Then we followed a sign pointing to Saar, thinking it was the road on the map, when it was actually a road that was not on our map. As a result, we ended up in the village of Ujbarok. This was a stop we were going to make for Mary Ann anyway, so when we figured out where we were, we took a few pictures and moved on to Saar.

We arrived in Saar to find 9:30 Mass about half complete. We stayed to the end and Betty was able to receive the Eucharist in the church of her ancestors – quite a thrill. We stayed around after Mass hoping to make a contact with the priest or someone else in the village that could help with genealogy. It didn’t take long. Before we could approach anyone, a woman approached us, welcomed us, and asked who we were, as she said she did whenever she noticed a stranger. It turns out her maiden name was Hasenfratz, the same as Betty. She also introduced us to Janos Hasenfratz, brother of Frank who owns Linamar Corp in Canada. The two of them walked us to the cemetery and gave a guided tour.

Next stop was Boglar, a few minutes down the road. This was a fairly short stop, as no one on this trip had a particular interest there. As we were about to leave, a man approached and asked if we were the Canadians. You know how news travels in a small town. We weren’t too sure how he heard, ut when he did he came looking for us. It turns out that he was born in Boglar, had lived in Kitchener, Ontario for three years, and now lived in Munich.

Then we moved on to our 1 pm appointment with Istvan Beck in Csakvar. We had met him on our previous trip as he was coming out of church. Frank had asked him in German where the cemetery was and had hopped on our bus and guided us there, then taken us back to his aunt’s house where he produced a village history that we copied by photographing the pages. Unfortunately, we had missed a couple and had written him to hopefully meet up and get the missing pages. He emailed back through his daughter that he was awaiting us. We could never have guessed at the reception that awaited us. First, he gave the four of us at the door each a glass of wine. Then he gave us a familienbuch donated to us by his aunt (we knew of this by a letter that she had sent us.) He did not understand at first that we were looking for the missing pages from the other book, but when he did he brought us that and another short book/pamphlet that we also copied.

Then he hijacked us onto a local tour, much like Msgr. Eros Lajos did on the previous tour. Istvan had arranged for us to meet another lady (another aunt, I think – turned out to be a Kindl, one of Mary Ann’s lines) who showed us the church in Gant. Unfortunately it was locked and we could not go inside. Then we went to another older (about 80) lady’s house for a chat about Kozma – both ladies were raised there. She did not know to expect so many people – and we did not know that we were expected. Since her house was small, we dragged about a dozen chairs out by her swinging chair in the yard where she told us about Kozma and answered any questions.

Then we headed back to Csakvar for a tour of Istvan’s vineyards and wine cellar. He looks after two small vineyards, one owned by him and his mother, the other by his cousin. Naturally the tour ended with some wine sampling. He also insisted that we take along two 1.5 litre pop bottles of wine and a 750 ml Amaretto bottle of home brew. To demonstrate the quality of his brew, he set fire to a small splash in an ashtray. We were now way behind schedule, but how do you say no to someone who is being so kind to you?


We next drove back through Gant to Csakbereny for pictures of the church where Frank had connections, but we did not search the cemetery. Then it was back through Gant (third time now) to Kozma, where Mary Ann wanted some pictures of the town. Time did not allow a cemetery search (sorry Shirley) or a possible side trip back to Schemling (sorry John). We went back to the highway for a bathroom break and on to Budapest, where we fumbled our way to the hotel by just before 7 pm. Map reading is pretty tricky when there are few street signs, a map that needs a magnifying glass, and you don’t know the language. The GPS map of Budapest was better than Gyor, but still not good enough to get us to the hotel.

Our hotel was a little tired, and I heard a complaint about one of the beds, but the setting was beautiful with a view of the city far below. Beth Long (on the right), a research associate of Laszlo Rudolf joined us for an excellent supper.

At about 9:30, we all retired to the balcony of my room where we put a dent in our wine. We tried the home brew, but it was a little too powerful for us wimpy Canadians. We capped off the night at 11:30. I forgot to take a picture at night, but here it is in the daytime.

Saturday, May 31 Gyor

Several of us started the day at 7:30 with a hike to a coin laundry. At first glance on the map it had seemed pretty close, but a more careful look revealed a hike of about six blocks. It was a bit of a challenge at that time of the morning carrying our laundry, but we survived.

We drove past Vienna and on to Wallern, near the Hungarian border, home of Frank’s grandfather and Diane’s great grandfather. Here they are outside of one of the family homes.

It was pretty warm during our stop. It was 30 degrees C when we passed Vienna and at least that during the Wallern stop.

We carried on to Gyor for the night. We ran into a bit of a snag in that the GPS had no detail for the city, so we had to purchase a map and eventually found our hotel. By 6 pm we were gathered for supper, wrapping up about 9. See our 2006 blog for pictures of our very quaint hotel.

Friday, May 30 Salzburg

We started a little later this morning, which was good, because our hotel was beside the railway station and some people were awakened by every train, so a little extra time in the sack was welcome.

We hit the road at 9 am for Munich, arriving in time for lunch at the Hofbrauhaus.

From there we were off to the Haus der Donauschwaben in Bayern. This is the Bavarian provincial equivalent to the national facility that we visited in Sindelfingen. Although the library here was quite limited, they had a huge collection of village trachten (costumes) and a special music collection compiled by one of their members.

We were checked in at our hotel in Salzburg at about 6:30 and headed for the old town for supper. Mary Ann was searching for a special dessert called Slazburger Nockerl that Helmut (our driver in 2006) had recommended to her.

We left the restaurant at 9. Most of the gang headed straight back to the hotel, but Mary Ann took off to explore on her own and Celeste and I wandered the old town until 10. We found the parish church (the size of our catherdral at home) and the cathedral next door open. In the cathedral, people were walking a labyrinth of candles.

Today was another warm and sunny day, temperature in the high 20s C. The hotel room was again pretty warm. Air conditioning is not very common in Europe. And their bedding arrangement is different from North America. There are no top sheets or blankets, just a quilt. If you cover with the quilt, you are way too warm. If you kick it off, you can become too cool. You have to arrive at a sort of half and half arrangement that works for you.

To Make a Short Story Long

I have a bright red hat with a white maple leaf that I purchased several years ago while in Ottawa for Canada Day. I wore it on our 2006 tour as a beacon to help keep people from being separated from the group. I am using it again this year for the same purpose.

While checking in at the hotel in Ulm, I thought the girl behind the counter looked familiar, so I asked her if she worked here two years ago. She said yes and I explained that we had been here for three days two years ago and I thought I recognized her.

When the group met later to go out with me wearing my hat beacon, she called to me, “Herr Schwartz, I remember you too!”

Thursday, May 29 Ulm

Today was warm and overcast with a forecast for afternoon thundershowers, but we didn’t care as we planned to be inside all day. In the end it cleared off to a hazy sun and temperatures in the high 20s C.

We started the day with a very nice buffet breakfast at the hotel, boarded the bus, and arrived at our destination 15 minutes later. Frau Henriette Mojem introduced us to the Haus der Donauschwaben and gave us a tour of the facilities, museum and library. We then met Herr Johann Neumayer, head of the AKdFF, who offered us the use of his library also. The rest of the day was spent in the museum and libraries. We brought in some KFC for lunch so as not to waste too much time waiting for food. Everyone enthusiastically dug in to the many books and found something worthwhile. The offices closed at 4 and we were off to Ulm.

We were checked in to the hotel by 5:30 and went out to eat soon after. Mary Ann took us to a place she remembered fondly from our previous trip. It was a Pfannkuchen restaurant where everything from entrees to dessert was served on gigantic pancakes just a little thicker than a crepeand more than 18 inches across. Most of us were kind of decadent and went for the dessert right off the bat, but a few conscientious people had real food.





Later, we went for a walk along the Danube by the old city wall to the monument to those who sailed down the river to settle the Banat. After that we wandered over to the cathedral, which is supposed to have the highest church steeple in the world.

Wednesday, May 28 Sindelfingen

Frankfurter Leftovers



I had to include this picture of the ultimate portable hot dog stand that I saw in Frankfurt on Monday.






























Today was a long one! Quite a baptism under fire for our new tour members and driver!

This was Betty’s day as she had traced her line back to a few villages on the edge of the Black Forest. We added a couple of stops that weren’t on the itinerary, but when you are here maybe once in a lifetime, they are hard to pass up. Carol just realized yesterday that we were passing very close to where her father grew up in Sasbach, so we added that. And Betty had an obscure reference to a town named Waldshut that was pretty much on our way, so we thought we might as well check that out too. We deleted a possible tour of Strasbourg to fit these in.

By the time we loaded the bus it was 8:30. First stop was Sasbach, only 12 km off our planned route. Carol was quite thrilled to visit her father’s church (the cornerstone said 1740) and walk the streets that he walked, but we did not find any of her family in the cemetery.

We then drove through Freiburg and the Balck Forest to Waldshut. The scenery was beautiful along the way, not unlike the lower mountain valleys near Vancouver, except that there were no snow covered towering peaks in the background. We stopped at Waldshut for lunch and asked around about cemeteries. We visited two, but did not find anything of interest.











Next stop was Untermittingen, another name on Betty’s list. There was nothing of interest in the cemetery, but we were able to go inside the church (built in 1738) and Betty picked up a church bulletin with the priest’s email address. That should come in pretty handy! A lady in the cemetery told us that there were still people in the area with the two surnames Betty was looking for, so, combined with the email address’ she has some new leads to follow.

From there we went to the nearby village of Stuhlingen. No headstones there either, but we found two people with one of Betty’s names on the monument to WW I soldiers. Next was Villingen, a small city of 30,000-50,000 with a huge cemetery. We did a quick run-through, but didn’t find anything. As in all the cemeteries we visited today, most headstones were fairly recent and very old headstones were rare. Since about the 1970s, the law has been that you purchase a plot for about 25 years. After that, you must purchase a new 25 years or the plot goes back into circulation. Stones older than 200 years are exempt. Under this law, Betty’s stones should have still been there, but we found only a very few stones of people born in the 1800s and only a couple in the 1700s.

You have to admire how well they take care of their cemeteries in Germany. The headstones are usually quite large and beautiful. The graves themselves are usually planted with flowers or bushes. And they are meticulously cared for by watering, weeding, and other maintenance.

We finally checked into our hotel by 8 pm and ate in the hotel restaurant, closing the place up at 10. Weather to day was lovely with a high temperature in the high 20’s C (about 80 F) with hazy sun.