Baden Württemberg

• The Black Forest
• Heidelberg on the Neckar River
• Stuttgart (I lived in this area for 6 months of 1994)
• The Schwäbische Alb, a plateau east of the Black Forest

The Black Forest

The city of Freiburg is on the southwest corner of the Black Forest (opposite corner from Stuttgart). This town is known for it's "Bächle", these little streams (or big gutters) that run through practically every street in the old part of town. Also notice the large number of bicycles. This is a good illustration of the high popularity of bicycles, for recreation as well as for utilitarian commuting around town. Bicycling here is much better than where I live, there are excellent bike paths connecting most of the towns so that it's not necessary to ride on the road. Many people, even old people, use their bikes for commuting to work, shopping, as well as recreation. This town has a large 13th-16th century Gothic church as it's centerpiece.

Heidelberg and the Neckar River

A nice section of the Neckar River between Heidelberg and Bad Wimpfen includes many old castles in various states of repair. I spent a day driving along the Neckar river from Heidelberg to Bad Wimpfen, which is near where the A6 Autobahn meets the Neckar. A street in Bad Wimpfen is shown here.

Along the way there are many old castles dotting the hillsides. I stopped and looked at many of them (many require a short hike up from the road at river-level).

This one, Guttenberg (just north of Bad Wimpfen) has a large collection of birds from all over the world. They do bird shows where these large birds of prey fly back and forth between their keepers and out over the valley, including flights low over the crowd.

The bird you see here is a Weißkopf Seeadler, perhaps better known to you as an American Bald Eagle. When it wouldn't come back after it's flight out over the valley, it's trainer joked that it does whatever it wants, just like any other American, which brought a good laugh from the audience (jokes in German, of course). But finally, the bird did return.

Tübingen

Schwäbische Alb

Hohenzollern Castle is about 40 Miles south of Stuttgart, built high on a hilltop. It's open for tours. This castle was at one time the home of Prussian kings, evident by the large number of statues surrounding the castle.

There is a church at Zwieifalten about 50 miles southeast of Stuttgart that is truly incredible (similar to the church at Ottobeuren in Bavaria). Europe has many nice churches in general, but this one is especially nice. This is in the baroque style. These churches are a legacy of the time when the church, instead of the government, took most of the people's money. Maintenance of these churches is still helped by a church tax that is withheld from people's pay in Germany even today. This is a reminder that so many American ideals, such as separation of church and state, are just that, American. Many things that we take for granted are simply not the case in other countries.

The small, historical town of Haigerloch was the site of nuclear research during World War II. Today, the site of that research, a small cave carved at the base of a cliff, is a museum of that research. At the top of this cliff, there is a church and a large building that contains an exhibit of some really interesting modern art (as of summer, 1994). This was much more interesting than the modern art I found in some of France's Châteaus of the Loire.