Let’s Go Exploring! Hanover: Help, the Machines Have Taken Over!

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We were sitting on the balcony of our friend’s apartment in Hanover, just chilling out and chatting when a massive ball of blinking lights appeared in the night sky.

As the four of us watched, mesmerized, a mask appeared, which morphed into a skull, only to quickly dissolve and reform into a waving German flag.

“What the Hell is that?”

“Are those fireflies? Christmas lights? Shooting stars?”

Personally, being the Harry Potter nerd that I am, I thought it was a Dark Mark and the Death Eaters had gotten another one.

Finally, our friend Lena realized, “Hey! Those are drones!”

So of course the next thought that crossed my mind was Holy crap! The machines have taken over! Run for your lives!

But before I could plan my escape from Skynet, Malte, Lena’s boyfriend reminded us they must be putting on a drone show for CeBIT, a massively popular consumer electronics conference that takes place in Hanover every year.

Oh good. The drone army isn’t going to take us hostage today. It’s just a show. Relax.

Watching a drone light show and hanging out with our friends was one of the highlights of our trip to Hanover, along with other experiences like:

Herrenhäuser Gardens

Having been to Palais de Versailles, I’d seen the royal garden to top all royal gardens, so I had pretty high expectations. I was not expecting something so opulent in a lesser known place like Hanover, but this place blew us away.

The size of 50 football fields, this French style garden was laid out by Electress Sophia in the 17th century. And no, an “Electress” isn’t a title given to a robot wife or anything, it’s the wife of a German prince, who’s referred to as an Elector.

Sophia the Electress went out of her way to make sure this was a garden fit for royalty

The Electress’s grand plans for the garden from the 1700s.

But as pretty as this garden was, what made it more memorable for me was the scandal behind it.

Back in the 1600s, Sophie Dorothea, Princess of Hannover and niece of Electress Sophia (confusing, I know), had a secret affair with her lover, Swedish Count Philip Christoph von Königsmarck. This garden was their frequent meeting spot.

Here’s the problem: Sophie Dorothea was already married to her cousin, George Louis, whom she hated. He also hated her, but they had to be married for political and financial reasons, so neither was faithful to each other. You know, a totally healthy non-dysfunctional marriage.

But in true chauvinist fashion, once George found out about Sophie’s affair, he went psycho and beat the crap of her, tore her hair out by the roots, and then had her lover murdered. The hypocrisy of his actions, despite the fact that he had multiple mistresses, was completely lost on him.

“I do what I want, yo.”

He then banished Sophie and imprisoned her in a castle for the next 30 years, forbade her from seeing her children and erased all memories of her in Hanover. Even after she died, he prohibited the court from mourning her, took over any property she had, and then refused to let her body be buried for 6 months.

She did manage to extract her revenge though, in death. Before she died she wrote a letter to George, cursing him. And remembering an old gypsy’s prediction that he would die within a year if he did anything to cause Sophie’s death, George quickly relented and let her be buried alongside her parents. 4 weeks later, he died suddenly of a stroke.

Karma’s a bitch, huh?

In addition to the historical royal gardens, Hanover also had it’s share of beautiful old buildings, like the:

Neues Rathaus (New Town Hall)

My favourite part of this beautiful historic town hall is the 4 models of the city of Hanover during different time periods: historic, pre-war, war times, and modern times.

Hanover in 1945 had fallen on, let’s say, rough times.

There’s also a curved dome lift that takes you up to see breath-taking views of the city. We didn’t get a chance to go while we were there because the sky was overcast but you should definitely go if you visit Hanover.


A 14th century church that was destroyed in the 2nd World War in an air raid, rather than repair it the city of Hanover decided to leave it destroyed and use it as a reminder of the horrors of war. This is a recurring theme in Germany, where rather than glorifying war they prefer to unflinchingly show the catastrophic aftermath as a warning to future generations.

War. What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!

This peculiar roofless structure housed not only a war memorial and a museum, but also a Japanese peace bell (or Bonsho) donated by Hanover’s sister city Hiroshima. Guess these two cities would know a thing or two about how the destructive power of war, and as a result both would prefer never to experience that again. I wholeheartedly agree with that sentiment.

In addition to all the history, Hanover it also had a ton of green spaces like:


Twice as big as New York’s Central Park, this city park is a refreshing reprieve for those who enjoy a run or bike ride to work. There’s also a cute little playground for families.

Tiergarden Park

After the harrowing experience with the flesh-chomping deer of Nara, we had a much more pleasant experience in Tiergarden with friendly deer who stayed a safe distance away and didn’t try to kill me for a cookie

So I guess not all deer are bad. Just Nara deer. And only if you idiotically walk around with a whole stack of deer cookies.

This time I didn’t have food with me, so I didn’t have to worry as we admired these animals and enjoyed the serene sounds of the forest.

You can visit all these attractions and more by following the “Roter faden”or “Red Thread” which leads you on a self-guided 4.2 km walk to see 36 notable city landmarks.

We were fortunate to have been shown all that this city had to offer by our friend, Lena, who also shared with us her favourite sport: bouldering:

Although we’ve been getting our fair share of cardio while travelling, we hadn’t had enough time to gain muscle so this was a great way to drop in and give those lazy arm muscles a work out.

My clumsiness ensured I got nice and bruised in the legs but, in the end, it was worth it.

If you like to challenge your brain as well as your muscles, bouldering is a great activity to build strength, agility and hang out with friends.

After we worked up a sweat, we earned treats in the form of:

The best fries in Hanover


German style cheesecake and jasmine tea:

Overall, we thoroughly enjoyed Hanover, not just because it’s a charming city with lots to offer—whether it’s history, nature, or animals–but also because we got to hang out with our friends, Lena and Malte, from Chautauqua UK.

And I’m sure none of us will forget our memorable experience with Skynet–er I mean CeBIT– which takes place every year. If you’re a nerd, definitely check it out.

Just try not to freak out when the drones become sentient…

*ahem* So anyway, without farther ado, here’s how much we spent in Hanover:




Category Cost in USD/couple Cost in CAD/couple Notes
Accommodations: 0 0 We didn't spend anything on accommodations because we stayed with our friends. Thanks guys!
Food: $19 USD/day $25 CAD/day ($22/day for eating out, $3/day for groceries) Grocery prices were abnormally low because our gracious hosts treated us to their delicious cooking. In return we treated them for dinner and did some cooking of our own (though my skills as a chef are terrible, so I'm not sure I could call it treat")."
Transportation: $13 USD/day $16 CAD/day Transportation average out to be around $16 CAD/day for the 5 days we were there, including the bus ride to Hanover from Bremen.
Entertainment: $11 USD/day $14 CAD/day The only costs for entertainment was 8 Euros entrance fee each for the gardens and 28 Euros for 2 to use the bouldering gym and rent climbing shoes. There are lots of museums you can visit in Hanover as well, but we decided to opt out since I've been to so many museums all over the world already.
Misc (data + toiletries):" $2.60 USD/day $3 CAD/day Miraculously, we still had data leftover from Las Palmas so we didn't need to buy any data, but we did spend 11 Euros (with tip) on a haircut from Wanderer. The Turkish barber was great–cheap, good, and fast.
Total: $46 USD/couple/day $58 CAD/couple/day Now, don't get too excited–the per day cost for Hanover is abnormally low because of our awesome friends who let us stay with them. However, looking at the prices in Airbnb, you can get an apartment for $40-60 USD/night, so you'd still be under $100 USD a day per couple even if you didn't stay with friends. Hanover is definitely an awesome, affordable city.

28 thoughts on “Let’s Go Exploring! Hanover: Help, the Machines Have Taken Over!”

  1. I saw those same models of Hanover. The post WW II one really humbles a soul. Interesting note of history. When General Eisenhower saw the atrocities of the nazis in the concentration and death camps, he made the local citizens go and bury the dead, dismantle the gas chambers, etc. He made a point to “rub their noses” in the horrors left behind.

    I do admire that the Germans left many remnants of the war, as a somber caution for future generations. Not so fond of the Japanese and their attitude (Who? Us??!!). In many instances, they made the nazis look like small time thugs. Just ask their neighbors…

    1. Agree with you. We can’t change the past but the Germans have shown humility and how to own up to mistakes to prevent history from repeating. Gotta give them props for that.

    2. What you seem to forget is that the Germans weren’t the Nazis. The same way the Japanese weren’t the “Japanese”.
      People were forced to fight the same way the US forces their soldiers to invade countries they have nothing against and for sure no casus bellis.
      Many Germans weren’t Nazis and most were are victims of the Nazis as any other country that got invaded. In fact, some countries requested Germany to be annexed, like Austria and others supported Germany against the red aggressor.

      The Germans were forced to go to the concentration camps just so that they couldn’t deny what really happened. It wasn’t nothing to do with “rubbing the nose”.
      At that time, many were still under the impression that the Nazis were the good guys. Yeah, propaganda does that to you.

      The Japanese the same thing. They were forced to fight for their country. Like it or not they must be loyal to their country. But yes, Japanese did pretty bad things.

      The ones I never heard any regret from was the russians. The ones who invaded half Europe, occupied it for almost 50 years, tried to starve one entire country (Holodomor) and even keep doing it nowadays (we don’t forget that Ukraine is currency occupied by Russia and that Russia was involved in the Trump election from day one.)
      I am not even referring to the fact that countries like Sweden and Estonia need to be currently taking measures against a future russian invasion. Because we don’t know when it is going to happen, but Russia is going to war.

  2. Nice pictures! Hannover isn’t on our radar for traveling. The history is pretty neat, though. Thanks for sharing. The price per day isn’t bad at all. $100/day is affordable for Europe. The fries look delicious.

    1. Thanks, Joe. Hanover is easily overlooked but we really enjoyed time there. It’s a hidden gem that lets you avoid the tourist crowd. Getting off the beaten path definitely has its advantages.

  3. Looks like a fun city with plenty to do. Reasonably affordable too (staying with friends is awesome!)

    While you do give numbers per day, it would be nice to see exactly how much you spend in each location and your annual total. I think a lot of folks would be interested in seeing that.

    Kinda like my monthly & annual expense reports, but yours would be per-location.

    1. Thanks for the suggestion, Mr. Tako. I did do a 1 year breakdown of our world travels and how to live on 40K/year, so I feel like a yearly breakdown would just be more of the same thing. But I’ll look into doing yearly net-worth updates to show that we’re on track going forward.

      1. I guess what I’m asking for *is* more of the same thing. That was a couple years ago right? It included different locations and (probably) different amounts.

        I honestly believe plenty of people would appreciate a regular (yearly) breakdown of your travel expenses and how long/how much you spent at each location. Every year would be great!

  4. How my god, this city looks absolutely awesome! I really need to add Hanover on my list. If I continue reading your blog, my list will definitely be too long 😛

    Good luck with the next city 🙂

    1. Thanks, TPS. Yes, so many beautiful places to visit, even in retirement there isn’t enough time to visit them all.

    1. It’s an interesting development, but I think it’s structured as a way to force you to open an account with them, and therefore buy other ETFs to supplement your portfolio that charge higher fees. Their Bond ETF FBND, for example, has an MER of 0.36% vs. Vanguard’s BND which has an MER of 0.05%.

      So even if you were to build your portfolio using Fidelity’s zero-cost funds your total portfolio cost would still be higher than if you only used Vanguard’s.

      That being said if you were to ONLY own Fidelity’s zero-cost funds for your equity side and then use Vanguard (or other lower-cost options) for fixed-income, then you’d get the best of both worlds.

    2. Jury’s out as to how long they will stay at 0% fee. As you can see in the article “Fidelity is at war with Vanguard.” My suspicion is that they’re using this to suck you in, and then find a way to get that money back later or pass it onto other products. If it’s too good to be true, there’s usually a catch.

  5. Oh how I miss you, Germany. So civilized. I love all the gardens and parks throughout their cities and how accessible they are. But not like New York City nasty constant honking and busy and expensive. I just don’t get why Germany isn’t super expensive like much of the rest of western Europe.

    1. Germany is super affordable for a place with an abundance of well-paying jobs. Very surprising. Might be because of their pro-renter laws.

      As for NY, I didn’t quite get it either…but after we met our editor and literary agent and got to see the Penguin Random House office, I kind of get why it’s the place where dreams come true 🙂

    1. As much as I wish that woman in the photo was me, that’s just a stock photo 😛 I don’t have good form like that. We didn’t take any pictures while we were bouldering (too busy having fun and trying not to fall) 😛 But you’re right, it’s actually a photo of rock climbing, not bouldering.

  6. Years ago back in Brooklyn when I was on the garage roof with a friend or friends, I witnessed what looked like at the time different color streaks shooting across the sky at night. I assumed someone was playing games with doing some kind of Star Wars thing. But no special lighting was around. This was like some Alien type stuff. Unsure what it was, but I do believe we are not alone on Earth.

    1. Definitely mayo–specifically truffle oil mayo (yup, it exists) or garlic mayo. Andalouse sauce is pretty awesome too.

      No idea why we stick with boring old ketchup in North America.

      1. Quebec! Mayo on fries is definitely a thing in Quebec!

        Bouldering and indoor climbing in general is exploding in popularity in the GTA, by the way. So many new gyms…

  7. This is another city to add to my list of places to visit. Thank you for this write-up. I am currently on a kick to see more of Japan but once I have had my fill, I look forward to seeing more of Europe.

    Off topic, but someone who is doing very interesting performance pieces with drones is Mikiko Mizuno and her dance troupe Elevenplay in Japan.

    Here is a link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYWvKudIIJ8

    Ms.Mizuno was responsible for the closing choreography of the last Olympics, the part that introduces the next host for the 2020 Olympics including the pop-up of the current prime minister as Super Mario.

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