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26 Jul 2007

the tower

Have you ever heard of Waluliso? Take the first two letters of Wasser, Luft, Licht and Sonne and you've got it (English Water, Air, Light and Sun), the nickname of Ludwig 'Wickerl' Weinberger (1914-1996).

He was quite a character, occassionally even appeared on TV. He enjoyed to roam the city in a white Roman style toga, complete with Caesar's laurel, telling everyone who wanted to hear it (and some who did not) about his vision of Love and Peace.

I am living in the district of Simmering and I'll have to cross the Freudenau Dam pedestrian bridge as well as the Waluliso pontoon bridge to reach Lobau. (In winter it is being disassembled and I'll have to make a short detour if I want to get to Lobau.)

The bridge seems to be named after him because he was one of the promoters of a huge leisure zone on the New Danube, originally planned to be nothing more but a flooding area - which it is today, too, besides providing probably the longest beach altogether in any town anywhere except coastal towns, or probably even if you count the latter in.

As Waluliso bridge lies within the nudist area (a rather big section of the lower New Danube marked FKK meaning German Freikörperkultur) and as it wouldn't do to show you some nudists you'll have to content with this picture taken on the Freudenau Dam bridge.