Heidelberg

Enough about work, lets get down to the cool stuff: more traveling!! ;) After being on call and hanging out around Landstuhl/Ramstein I was ready to do a little more exploring. I've been trying for a few weeks to make a trip over the Heidelburg (remember how I couldn't get off the train one of the first weekends I was here?? I was trying to get to Heidelburg and never made it...). I had heard from numerous people about how cool the city and castle is. My roommate decided that she wanted to rent a car for a week, so I convinced her to let me drive her out to Heidelburg the day she went and picked it up. Thankfully for me she agreed and so we headed out to brave this incredibly bitter cold weather we have been having here on a bright sunny Saturday afternoon. (yes, I have been spoiled by living in Virginia to not tolerate cold weather so well, not like I really did when I was back home in Michigan to begin with...) After navigating the autobahn we made it safely to Heidelburg, found the castle and parked our car half on the curb of a narrow road that had quite a few hair pin turns to get up to the castle. Driving these German roads is a fun adventure in and of it's self!! Now that I'm writing this, I wish I had pictures of some of the roads and our park job so I can give you just a little glimpse of what I'm mean. 

The castle, or should I say palace, is incredible. Gorgeous architecture, incredible views. I'm sure in the spring/summer/fall the landscaping surrounding the castle and the views looking out would be awesome. We were able to see the outer courtyard and then paid a few Euro see get access to the inner court yard, German Apothecary Museum, and this insanely large wine barrel. There is a special ticket you can buy to see the inside of the remaining parts of the castle but we didn't do that on this trip. We thought we'd save that for a future visit (got it Mom & Dad?!?).  After meandering through the courtyard and museums and taking pictures we hiked down the other side of the castle into city center and the main shopping street. Just like every other German city/town that I've been to there is a large courtyard surrounding the central church and a bunch of shopping surrounding the courtyard. By the time we arrived, the farmer's market was packing up for the day. We walked through the cute historic downtown and arrived at the arch marking the entrance to the famous old bridge that crosses the Neckar River. This old bridge was part of medieval Heidelburg's fortifications. The bridge that is standing today was the 3rd bridge built as the other two were destroyed by flooded waters and ice damns. They must have figured out how to withstand nature since it's still standing today. We crossed the bridge and wandered up the other side of the mountain to take in the view of the city and castle from the other side. Of the castles that I've been to, Heidelburg is by far the best one. 

After wandering around, looking in store windows and doing a little bit of shopping we were so cold and hungry that we found a restaurant to warm up in and fill up. I was so cold and my hands were freezing because I kept taking them out of my mittens to take pictures! I warmed up with a nice cup of tomato soup and a main dish that in English was called Knight Pan. The waitress described it as stir fry, but it actually reminded me much more of fajitas with the spicy mexican-ness! We topped the night off with apfelstrudel. That  seemed to be the dessert of choice in this city because every restaurant was advertising it on their windows and street signs with their specials. It was delicious! :) We walked back up to the castle, hopped in our car and drove back home to Landstuhl. It took a lot longer to get back because I got a little confused trying to get onto a different autobahn and ended up taking back roads home through cites and the german countryside...I'm learning that German's don't see to label roads and highways very well! It was a great day and I LOVED this Germany city. I can't wait to visit again because there are a few things that we missed during our short visit including a cool train ride further up the mountain to a look out point that has been named "King's Throne". Hopefully this spring I'll make it back so check that out, the university, and some other places and be able to enjoy the seasonal asparagus food festival. Apparently this region produces awesome asparagus in the spring and all the restaurants go all out to highlight this food on their menus. It will be fun to check out Germany's number one visited city again!

Here are some pictures to show what I tried to say in words above. The pictures do a much better job of showing the beauty and incredible views of the castle and city.  

Close up view of the of the Neckar River, tower arch, and bridge of Heidelburg from the castle. 

This picture is taken from the other side of the river looking up at the castle with the bridge in the foreground.

Had to get a picture of myself with the beautiful background. It was soo cold, don't let the bright sun fool you!

This was up on the castle grounds, I was testing out the front camera on my iPhone. Worked pretty well...

Castle ground, main entrance/front courtyard. I bet this place looks awesome in the spring/summer with leaves and flowers...

Looking down on Heidleburg!

The inner courtyard and main building. There was a sun dial on the outside - cool huh?!

The extremely large wine barrel - made from 136 oak trees, capable of holding 58,000+ gallons of wine!! Apparently, it usually held a little over half of this at the most. This is where the king would hold the taxes paid by the local vineyard owners.  

Standing on the bridge looking back toward the famous arch and old town. The two towers have those cool tops on them that resemble old German helmets called spitzhelm. 

Delicious apple strudel - it was yummo!!