Saturday 20 September 2008

Heidelberg

My last destination on my trip already! Though I guess 3500 photos (for the entire trip!) is enough to work through :-)

It had been my intention from almost the start of the trip to return to Heidelberg, since I remembered it as somewhere really beautiful i.e. lots of old buildings, from when I went there in 1984 on my Contiki trip....those were the days... Unfortunately, it didn't quite live up to my memories. It's possible I'm mixing it up with other destinations, but this trip to Heidelberg didn't show me as many beautiful old buildings as I thought there would be. This didn't stop me taking 350 or so photos though :-)

Daniel, a friend of mine with whom I worked when I lived in Germany, was on holiday, so he accompanied me and drove us there in his car. It was great to be independent of transport to and from Heidelberg, though we had to park the car all day. The parking fee was reasonable though, at 10 Euro for the whole day. We ended up buying a 'Heidelberg Card' similar to my Stockholm Card, since that gave us admission to the castle and its tours, the cog railway, as well as the University and a few other places we didn't have time to see.

First stop, after the information centre where we bought the card, was the car park, which is right near the Kornmarkt and thus at the foot of the hill on which the castle is perched. Then the slog up the path to the castle. It was quite embarassing how out of breath I was after about 20 steps - after all, I exercise frequently and don't smoke, whereas Daniel is the opposite (i.e. no exercise, smokes) and had no trouble getting up that hill! Tsk.

There were some nice views of the town and the castle above as we climbed:
The park around the castle is free, but entrance to the courtyard costs admission. It's nice to have a wander around the courtyard, even though the castle is mostly a ruin:
We went on a tour of some of the rooms that have been re-created. Some of them were quite nice, and the tour allows you to take photos both inside rooms and parts of the castle you can only get to with a tour group:
The last stop on the tour was where the big wine barrells are - they are truly huge. Unfortunately, my photos of this didn't turn out very well - I must have got the lense wet or something. Oh well. Hey! Stop cheering there! It's not like I upload all the photos I take! Hey! I heard that! ;-)

We wandered around the courtyard and had a coffee:
Then we walked around the outside some more:
Next stop was the cog railway (Bergbahn) to the top of the Koenigsstuhl (king's chair) from where there's a good view of the city below. For some strange reason, most of my photos from up here were blurred so I threw them away. (I said stop that cheering!!) Here's a couple that turned out:
We took the cog railway all the way back to the bottom station, near the Kornmarkt. From there we just wandered around the Altstadt (old town), more or less aimlessly. We went past market place and the Holy Ghost church, the knight's house hotel, the Jesuit church and the old University. We visited the hall of the old University, which was quite impressive:
It was starting to get late, so we quickly had a little bite to eat (Thai food of all things!) before heading off  past the beautiful library which we entered for a quick look around:
Then we headed towards the river Neckar, so we could see the old bridge and its gate:
We crossed the bridge to the other side of the river and walked up the 'snake path' towards the philosopher's path, but only as far as the first viewing platform:
We had decided to eat dinner at the knight's house hotel, just for the hell of it. This was where the handiness of having brought our own car came in - we didn't have any deadlines to meet. The meal was very traditional german food. Very nice. Also, expensive :-)

After dinner, we went in search of a coffee, waiting for darkness, and then stopped for some night shots of the castle all lit up:

Poor Daniel then had to drive us home - a trip of about 1 1/2 hours!

And thus ends my series of blog entries for my trip to Germany!

But never fear: I've booked my trip to Macau and Zhuhai in late October, so look for more entries then!