Got up this morning and got started somewhere around 8:30. One of the nice things I have found out is the use of the Heidelberg day pass ticket. With this ticket I can travel anywhere on any of the bus lines within the city of Heidelberg. it also gives me discounts at various stores in the old city. So when I wen to the Heidelberg Palace and Gardens this morning I used the ticket to get to the funicular in order to ride up to the castle. The castle was very nice but wasn’t anything outstanding. But definitely tourist attractions that you should go see. The Japanese were there in strength but they were overtaken by all of the Viking River Cruise boats in the world! They dock in Mannheim and have all their people come over here for a tour of the Castle. A lot of Viking tour groups in the castle. I guess one of the more interesting things in the castle was the huge barrel for making wine, The barrel holds somewhere around 250,000 litres of wine or 58,000 gallons of wine. It is not in use at the present time. In the castle is there Apothecary Museum – spend some time in there – very interesting and very definitely worthwhile. So after looking around the castle and into the Apothecary Museum then wandered around in their gardens. Unfortunately right now they are in the process of reworking the garden so did not see much.
After the castle I then went back down on on the bus and went back to the apartment and had a little nap for the afternoon. Was about 4 and a half hours up at the castle in the morning. After that I was done at the castle I then went looking for the Prinzhorn art museum. The owner of the Airbnb where I stayed had mentioned this museum as a very worthwhile place to visit. Quite a pain to find but, obviously, did find it. Was talking with the lady at the reception desk and she commented that most people say the same thing. Prinzhorn was a psychiatric artist who collected art from many psychiatric patients. It was to be used to help to try to understand what their issues were. It is a very well recognized museum all over the world. Had a great conversation with the lady at the reception desk and she explained a lot about the Museum and a lot about Prinzhorn which added a considerable amount when I went through the museum. Was probably in the museum about an hour to an hour and a half – not a big museum. I have some pictures on my website which you can look at. I found this museum interesting in that Shepherds Place, at our church in Fairhope, uses art for some of our clients at Shepherds Place.
After visiting the Prinzhorn Museum I then crossed the Nectar River to find the hiking trail – Philosopher’s Way. This is supposed to be one of the better hiking trails in Europe. It is a nice trail, but the best hiking trail in Europe? It is definitely worth the hype on the trail. It goes along the North Bank of the Nectar River and from there you can look at across the river to see most of the Old City. Every now and then as I was walking along the River I would hear a loud roar coming up from in the old city.I wasn’t quite sure what was going on but then, later on, I did recall that this afternoon Germany was playing ‘s in the world cup. This was a make or break game which Germany did lose. After the hike came back down and crossed the Old Bridge back into the Old City and from there went and got something to eat. I was looking for a pizza so did quite a bit of wandering around to find a decent pizza place Went further than what I intended on going and finally ended up back in the Old City and went up to a restaurant just off of the main street that was against the a plaza, the University Plaza. And asked the lady if they had pizza she said no they did not have pizza but the Pizza Hut right across the street did have pizza. I assured her that that was not real pizza. So I ordered a pizza, a French-style pizza, and had a really good pizza with salami, spec, mushrooms, bell pepper, various other herbs and spices really good. So from there finished and then back to the apartment for the evening.