Meissen and Lommatsch

I forgot, but I also went to Meissen and Lommatsch on Friday.  Both of these cities are in the Dresden area and I was able to go by tram and bus to see them.  The tram card for the whole region for the day was €12 so that wasn't so bad.  Of course, just like everywhere else, it was raining.  While I was in Meissen, it rained so hard and the cobblestones were so slippery, and the terrain so hilly that I thought I would take a really bad spill.  Luckily I didn't, just slipped down a stairway, but my backpack took the hit.  In Lommatsch the rain had ended for a while, so I walked around looking for one of the buildings that I saw on the auction.  It was an old butchershop that was built in 1802.  The place was huge, and the minimum bid is €500!  All over Europe and Especially in the former communist countries, the small towns are losing people, some by as much as 20 to 30% in the last 10 years.  This is a problem that is recognized by the European Union, and they are trying to do something about it.  Unfortunately their best answer is to tear down most of the unused buildings.  This of course does nothing to make small towns a better place to live.  Some countries, like Spain are assisting young people to return to small villages with financial assistance to make it possible to afford to live in them, since there is not any work in most of these places.