What a relief to conclude yesterday’s difficult travel and simply be where we had struggled so hard to get to. Today was our first day in Heidelberg, Germany, and it is a wonderful place. It’s a university town, like Utrecht that we loved so much. It’s also the rare German city that wasn’t flattened in WWII, so its Aldstadt, or Old Town, is incredibly well-preserved. And what an Old Town it is, a really beautiful place.
But before we get into that, this was our first look at our hotel in the daytime. We were pleased with the room, and so delighted it had a tiny little balcony off the side with a patio set. Now we could finally see the view off the balcony:
And from the front window:
That, friends, is the mighty Neckar river that runs through town. It’s even prettier because you can’t hear the significant street noise from the major thoroughfare that runs between our building and the river. Still, what a view. And our hotel restaurant and lobby also are very appealing – Stef usually distains a hotel bar but in this case we’ll definitely make an exception.
We set out in search of breakfast, and got our first real look at the town. It’s like being on a movie set. This town’s vibe was very similar to Bruges in that it seems completely unreal that buildings this beautiful and historic can just run for street after street. What a place.
It’s worth a poignant pause to say that it’s heartbreaking to think of Germany, and many other European cities, having old towns as well-loved and gorgeous as this one, and picturing them blasted to bits in the war. I’m sure eastern Europe was particularly hard hit. What a waste of some of the best humanity has to offer itself, these wonderfully civilized and historic places. I’m sure the people of Iraq and Afghanistan have cities and towns they love just as much, that are now dust in the modern warfare age.
We found our breakfast – stacks of pancakes, one sweet, one savory (feta and spinach, with a tzaziki “syrup!”), in a beautiful cafe in the town square.
Breakfast with a view…
We swung by a couple of churches. We both particularly loved this one, which was positively understated, particularly after the extravagance of Cologne:
We were disappointed to learn that we’d missed an organ concert last night; I bet it was epic. We moseyed on down the street, and found another church. And…what’s this…is that organ music??
If you look veeerrrry closely at the above photo, you can see a tiny human organist upstairs for scale. I think they call them organs because they make your organs vibrate.
We weren’t far from the university, and Stef was sure they had a rockin’ library. I’m sure they did, but it was heavily under construction. The whole outside and several floors were covered with scaffolding and tarps. They also didn’t want photos. We did sneak a couple in inconspicuous areas, but honestly there wasn’t a lot worth being disrespectful for.
Most of the floors we could access were modern and institutional. They did have a very cool “codex,” described online:
The “Codex Manesse”, also known as the “Great Heidelberg Book of Songs” (Cod. Pal. germ. 848), was created between around 1300 and around 1340 in Zurich and is the most comprehensive collection of ballads and epigrammatic poetry in Middle High German language.
https://www.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/Englisch/allg/benutzung/bereiche/handschriften/codexmanesse.html
This was also where Stef had a bit of a misadventure – she stepped through a door into a courtyard where construction was happening to get a photo of the library:
…and found the door had locked behind her. This being a construction area, she found one locked door after another. She’d gotten herself separated from Daniel, who was increasingly worried about where the heck she was. Eventually she found a confused German-only employee who certainly knew that she wasn’t supposed to be there and led/kicked her outside. After a few minutes of searching, our duo was reunited. This is the second time Stef has locked herself into a courtyard on an academic campus. Ask her about the other time.
On our way away from the campus, Stef was touched when Daniel pointed out this Elliott Smith art:
From Portland to Germany, Elliott, you’ve gutted us all.
We headed toward the Neckar river that divides the town. Even in the dark last night, we could see that the far bank was lined with absolute mansions, really enormous and stately manors. We were a little short on time, so we just walked across the Old Bridge, and the plan was to go up the hill about 10 or 15 minutes, see what we could see at that elevation, and head back across the dam about a kilometer down, But Stef got sidetracked by a staircase up the hill. Usually staircases go somewhere awesome. This one did not. Well, it might have if we’d gone further up, but there were no views through the fences and the trees, and we didn’t have time or certainty to go all the way up. Disappointed, sweaty, and without views, we went back down. Still, views from the bridge were great, and we got our first look at the ruins of Heidelberg Castle, which puts this town on the map, and where we plan to go tomorrow:
The path on the far side of the river was down by the water and was cool and shady on this 88 degree September day, which we appreciated. On our way to find late lunch/early dinner, we found our friendliest cat so far – even friendlier than Fester at Jippie’s Kattencafe in Haarlem:
This sweet fellow marched right up to us, and drooled copiously during several minutes of petting and rolling around. Our first German cat, and what a total winner.
After a day of wonderful things, we were about to have maybe our favorite experience of the day: a brauhaus meal. This was a proper German beerhall attached to a hotel. The food was mountainous, and delicious, and probably our the most special meal we’ve had on a trip full of special meals.
- Bread with an amazing creamy cheese
- Alcohol-free wheat beer, top 3 of the trip
- Gruyere spaetzl topped with fried onions
- A very mild sauerkraut
- Yellow potatoes bathing in butter
- Meatballs with the most incredible horseradish cream sauce
It’s rare for us to leave food on the table, especially food this good, but there was no way to finish it all. We were wildly happy with this meal.
Stef worked a couple of hours, then we walked two or three blocks for gelato – best ever, with an insanely chocolately chocolate and a creme brulee that made Stef’s favorites list. The sunset light was looking great, so we went a bit up the Old Bridge. The sunset was a very good one:
People were lounging on an artificial sandy beach below us, and enjoying a grassy park on the other side of the river. And we were thrilled to look behind us and see that Heidelberg Castle was positively aglow, being directly across from the sun and up on a tree-covered hill:
A great end to a great day. We are so excited to see what Heidelberg has for us tomorrow.