Hello and Salü!
It’s August 2020,
I’m actually filming this the day after my video about the Völklingen Ironworks,
and that means I’m back in Germany,
and I’m back in the region of Saarland,
a few stops further down the line.
Now on 3rd October this year,
Germany will be celebrating 30 years of reunification between East and West.
And why were they split in the first place?
Well I’m sure a lot of you know,
it all goes back to the end of the Second World War
when the Allies occupied the West
and the Soviets occupied the East,
and Germany ended up split into two independent parts.
Except that’s not quite true...
because there was also a 3rd part,
that kind of gets forgotten
but it had its own flag,
its own coins,
and entered its own team into an Olympics and a World Cup.
So what happened to it?
This is the forgotten story of independent Saarland.
This is the bridge over the River Saar in Mettlach,
and today we’re going for a scenic walk along the river
and then we’re going to climb up to a viewpoint
and I’ve been told it’s the most beautiful view in Saarland.
But wait Tim, what?
Since when do we just go on a nice walk?
Surely there’s going to be something else to talk about on the way,
like a weird railway,
or the world’s longest something,
or at the very least
a massive territorial dispute.
Luckily the story of Saarland is a complete mess.
The area around the River Saar was originally settled by Celtic people,
and then it’s taken over by the Romans,
then the Franks,
then the Carolingians,
before eventually it becomes part of the medieval Kingdom of Germany
within the Holy Roman Empire.
And that’s how things stay for several hundred years
except for a short period at the end of the 1600s when France occupies it,
and then another period at the end of the 1700s when the French come back for more
and I mean literally more, they took a whole chunk of land north of here as well.
Anyway, they controlled it right up to 1815,
which if you been paying attention is Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo
at which point it’s given to Prussia
and then in 1871 Prussia unites with various other Germanic states to create the German Empire.
Right so that’s the simple bit.
And more about that in a moment,
but I’m now turning off the nice flat path along the river,
and heading sharply upwards on this little trail which will take us to the viewpoint,
and that means it’s time for a Saarland Scenery Montage.
This is the Saarschleife, or the Saar Loop, and it is pretty spectacular.
Some people have even called it Germany’s answer to the Horseshoe Bend,
although one of my London mates called it Germany’s answer to the Isle of Dogs –
which is what I call
Saarcasm
– but either way it’s definitely worth a photo or two.
Now sure, that was a nice hike and a nice view and everything,
but I know what you’re thinking,
wouldn’t it be so much better if there was a Baumwipfelpfad?
Well look at that.
Turns out they’ve got one of the biggest Baumwipfelpfads in Germany
but there’s a queue for it
so while we’re waiting let’s go back to the story of Saarland.
So 1871 was really the first time all the Germans got together,
it was the original Unification of Germany
and the newly formed country enjoys more than 50 years of relative peace and stability,
but then someone shoots an Austrian, and World War I happens.
And if you live in the Saar region, your nationality is about to change
5 times in the next 40 years.
You begin World War 1 as a German,
but at the end of the war, the Allies take one look at the Saar Valley
(and its rather profitable coalfields and steel industry)
and say “right, we’ll just take that off your hands for the next 15 years”
and they create the catchily-named
Territory of the Saar Basin,
so you’re now under the joint sovereignty of France and the UK.
But at the end of the 15 years
you’re given a 3-way referendum between keeping this arrangement,
unifying with France,
or re-unifying with Germany,
and over 90% of you vote to return home to Germany.
Only problem is,
it’s 1935.
So you begin World War 2 as a German,
but at the end of the war, the French,
who clearly have a bit of a thing for you,
somehow manage to sneak you away from the rest of Allied-occupied Germany
and create the separate Saar Protectorate,
which means you become pretty much your own independent country,
but with military protection from France.
I mean at this point France is basically acting like a sleazy guy in a nightclub,
you’ve turned him down several times
and he’s still cornering you
saying why do you want to be with Germany,
you could be with me, I will look after you…
and all you want to say is
What on earth is a Baumwipfelpfad?
Well it’s one of these.
It basically translates into English as "treetop walkway",
and you’ve probably seen a treetop walkway before
but this one is on steroids.
It’s over a kilometre long and at the end it becomes a spectacular observation tower.
A bunch of these have been springing up across central Europe over the last 10 years,
they’re all built by one German company
and this is not a sponsored video so I’m not going to wang on about it,
but they’re kind of cool.
Right where were we with the story?
Er... Ah yes France was chatting up Saarland in a nightclub.
What is this video?
Increasingly desperate to win the affections of the Saar people,
France banned all pro-German political parties,
introduced the French franc as currency,
and designed Saarland this beautiful new flag.
Those 3 colours remind you of anything?
For Saarland it was time to drop some increasingly unsubtle hints.
They issued local versions of the French Franc,
but with the Francs written in German.
They entered their own team at the 1952 Olympics,
but marched into the stadium with the West German athletes right behind them,
putting the Saar athletes between the two flags.
And then there’s the story of the Saar national football side.
They entered the qualifiers for the 1954 World Cup
and as luck would have it,
they were drawn in a 3-team group
with Norway, and
West Germany.
In their first competitive game as a nation,
they beat the Norwegians 3-2 in Oslo,
but after a 3-0 defeat in Stuttgart
and a 0-0 draw at home against Norway,
it came down to a winner-takes-all crunch against West Germany
in front of full house in Saarbrucken.
By all accounts, the Saar team played brilliantly
but were on the wrong end of a couple of questionable refereeing decisions,
it finished 3-1 to the Germans,
and Saarland were out of the tournament.
Afterwards, Saarland’s star player showed just how upset he was by saying
“ja I wasn’t unhappy with either result.
Personally I feel German, I didn’t want to stop them getting to the World Cup.
We would have had no chance anyway…”.
And the rest is history –
the West German team went on to win the final
against the great Hungarian side of the time,
and cheering them on from the stands that day
were several of Saarland players.
In the end,
that was the last time a Saar team entered the World Cup,
or indeed the Olympics.
In 1955 France offered the people a referendum on continued independence;
67% of voters rejected the French plan,
and they finally took the hint.
A year later,
in what has since become known as the "Kleine Wiedervereinigung",
or the "Little Reunification",
Saarland officially returned to Germany.
And these days Saarland is pretty German,
but there is still a little bit of Frenchness in their identity.
Some people here still use the very French greeting “salut”.
The local radio station is even called Radio Salü,
although of course they don’t spell it the French way,
they spell it the metal way.
But more importantly perhaps - for my French viewers at least –
Saarland has more Michelin stars per person than any other German state.
In other words,
65 years since you ran this place,
they still have the best cooking in Germany,
and if that doesn’t make you proud to be French I don’t know what will.
If you’d like to see the beautiful Saar Loop,
the nearest station is Mettlach
and then it’s an hour’s walk along the river
plus a half hour climb to the viewpoint.
If that sounds too much there’s a bus that does the trip
or you could just drive there if you’ve got a car.
Entrance to the Baumwipfelpfad is 11€ for adults and free for under 6s –
there’s loads for kids to do, it’s very family-friendly,
and with a maximum slope of 6% it’s designed to be wheelchair and pushchair friendly too.
Anyway, thank you all for watching,
and I will see you soon.