Following on from my short trip to Darmstadt I decided sitting around for the rest of the weekend wasn’t going to suit me either so I headed further South to Heidelberg. And what a great decision it was! I wasn’t the only tourist there by far, but that didn’t spoil any of the beauty. The old town is a few minutes walk from the train station, so I followed the main road through the old part of town, by multitudes of cafes with chairs sprawling over the cobbled street to soak up the sunshine, boards offering fresh asparagus dishes, new shops, traditional homeware stores and various churches, until I came to the funicular railway to take me up to the top of the hill overlooking the city. There’s a restaurant selling cakes (naturally) and the largest schniztel I have yet seen which can be eaten on the terrace overlooking the whole city.
Theres’s various walking routes, a childrens amusement park and a falconry, but since my time was short I took one of the routes leading back down the hill. I had forgotten how much I miss the hills and broadleaf deciduous forests in spring, which were crawling with beetles and butterflies. As the sunlight dappled through the green leaves with my little green backpack on I could have almost felt like I was on the camino again, except in totally inappropriate shoes. I took a few long winding turns and twists until I found some stairs trailing steeply downhill. It works without a map and short time later with dusty and slightly mud spattered feet (but a huge smile on my face) I came across THE castle. And I mean THE castle. The Schloss in Heidelberg is stunning. Yes, you have to pay in to see it, you can avoid this by just wandering around the outside, but it is worth it.
By this stage I had decided my earlier wanderings had deserved a treat. Meet the apparent local delicacy the “snowball”, layers of flakey golden biscuit like pastry wrapped in a ball and dipped lovingly in various toppings, in my case nougat/chocolate cream with nuts. The calorie-bomb was pretty tasty, but I think they would be spectacular if they were just out of the oven as the biscuit part was quite dry, meaning any Italians would love it! You can probably tell it has my seal of approval from the smile (and nougat) on my face!
The rest of the day was spent with more sugar overload in the form of ice-cream and more wandering, particularly along the river in a measly attempt to counteract all of the sweet goodies just consumed. I found an even better way to spend my time, plonking down on the grass ledge beside the river and snoozing in the afternoon soon while boats glided past against the beautiful backdrop. Definitely a place to visit in Germany!