If Kennedy is a Berliner, Ich bin ein Heidelberger. If you have never been to Heidelberg, you are missing a great travel destination. For this American tourist, it offers quintessential historic and beautiful scenery in the Old Town with a fairytale European flavor also containing surprises.
For instance since when do you associate Germany with flower petals scattered in the entry ways of a building? Yet that is precisely what I encountered in two different doorways to stores/restaurants in the Old Town.
The Yahoo! Travel Guide to Heidelberg states that a popular saying for Heidelberg is “Ich hab’ mein Herz in Heidelberg verloren” (I lost my heart in Heidelberg). They also refer to it as “heavenly”! Now is it any coincidence that before knowing either of these two things I named my photo album of Heidelberg “Heavenly Heidelberg” and chose a photo of a sticker on a motorbike that says “I heart HD” as the title photo of the album?
Many aspects of the city come across as icons from the vantage point of an American tourist. We found ourselves referring to locations in iconic fashion with simple all-encompassing words – Castle (Schloss in German), Old Town (Alt Stadt), Old Bridge (Alte Brucke), the River (Fluss), Market Square (Marktplatz ), University (Universitätsplatz), Main Street (Haupstrasse one of the longest pedestrian- only areas in Europe).
The cobblestone streets (which we kept walking on forgetting that they were for cars not pedestrians), the castle on the hill, a city clustered along a river, church bells ringing for a solid fifteen minutes to strike the hour, excellent food from open air markets and small bakeries – all together created an easily cherished and enjoyable visit. Heidelberg is certainly one of my new favorite travel destinations in Europe. It finds me enthusiastically exclaiming, “If Kennedy is a Berliner, Ich bin ein Heidelberger.”
This photo slideshow of my trip memories offers some highlights of my visit:
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Some of my other favorite places I’ve blogged/written about:
Turkey: The Call of Turkey
Paris: Paris: Je t’aime!
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