Travelog for: Scotty

Ralf and Petra read in the newspapers, that there are Scottish Highland Games in Angelbachtal. Both are big Scotland fans, although they never had been there already - but they surely will go there one day, that's what they told us. So today they decided to go to the festival and watch the games and listen to the Pipes and Drums Bands.


(sorry for being not in this photo, Petra said, that she has to zoom it)


There were several shops and Petra bought a Scottish Teddy Bear - me -  and some hair bands and Ralf bought two Scottish flags.

Today we visited the Unimog Museum in Gaggenau. It is located between Rastatt and Freudenstadt in the beautiful Murg River Valley.
There is an exhibition of various alternating Unimog of six decades from the beginning until now, giving hints about technology, love stories between drivers and vehicles and lots of models.
We also took part in off-road driving on the Unimog Museum premises, climbing various hills and tackling other obstacles on the Unimog parcours. It was so so great!

When we arrived at home again, it started to rain.

Today we drove to the Michaelsberg in Untergrombach. Untergrombach is one of Bruchsal's suburbs with about 6000 inhabitants.
3500 to 2600 BC there were frist human signs on the Michaelsberg, which gave this culture the name "Michaelsberger Kulturkreis"
1502 AD Joss Fritz from Untergrombach planned the "Bundschuhaufstand" during the time of Peasant's Wars.







The chapel is on top of the Michaelsberg.






In the far (right side) you see some houses, which belong to Bruchsal.





Bruchsal and also Untergrombach are located at the edge to the Kraichgau. Here you see the Rhine Valley. If the weather is sunny, you can see the Palatinate Forest in the far.









I learned something about "Magerrasen" (neglected grassland), which is typical for the Michaelsberg. Behind the sign you see so-called "Steinriegel" (field clearance cairn), made by people working on their fields a long long time ago. They threw the big stones from their fields to the border of the neighbour's field, so that in the middle all stones were accumulated. Many animals and flowers love this gaunt places and that's why a few weeks ago, people cleaned the Steinriegel from all the earth, that came between the stone during the many many years and from all the other plants, that love to grow in earth.







The nature reserve sign, they shortly added some rules.

Then it was time for me to say good bye to my host's family and my friends Tito, Tilla Mook, Galo, Nanu the cub, Spooky, Coco, Kari, Tasmanian Devil, Scotty and Friendship Bear.

Once more we are in Eichtersheim. This time there is a big medieval market and a joust.







Two zoomed photos without me:

Today we drove to Enzklösterle. At first we played Adventure Golf and had a lot of fun.





Then we had lunch at a restaurant, where the Krippena is located. We saw the world largest wood carved Christmas crib and a Christmas tree.







This is the smallest crib in a hazelnut:

On our way home we stopped at a field, where you can pick flowers and throw the money in a box. We bought some gladioli.

Altleiningen is a castle and a town in Rhineland-Palatinate. It belongs to destrict Bad Duerkheim. It was built on top of a 400 m high hill. You still can see a few remains of the old building from 1100 AD. Nowadays it is a youth hostel and my hosts' daughter already had been there with her class in 2006.

At Neuleiningen we only had a short stop to take a far away photo of the castle there.

On our way home we drove to a village and came through this beautiful street. Kleinkarlbach is a municipality in the collective municipality of Grünstadt-Land in the district of Bad Dürkheim in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate in southwestern Germany.

Kleinkarlbach is a wine-growing village in the Palatinate lying near the edge of the Palatinate Forest. (wikipedia)

Schwarzach is a town in the district of Neckar-Odenwald-Kreis, in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It was first named in 1143, since 1823 it is divided in the towns Unterschwarzach and Oberschwarzach - we were in Unterschwarzach. It is about 0km east of Heidelberg.
At first we visited the wildlife park. It is part of nature park Neckar valley- Odenwald and UNESCO- Geopark.

At the entrance we saw the world's largest mortar bell.




In the far we saw some deer.






There aren't only animals, which are from Germany originally.




I also saw some zebras.




Feeding a shy roe isn't easy.




We had a nice funny ride on a small train.

Then we drove to the "Schwarzacher Hof", which belongs to Johannes-Anstalten Mosbach, located at the castle set on a lake. The oldest building is from 1914/15, the biggest part was built in second half of 20th century. There's place on the farmyard for 780 living quarters and exterior living groups for disabled people.

We went throught the park, that belongs to this farmyard.




There is a small barefoot park and we tried it.





I went through a labyrinth. Do you see me? I'm with my host's daughter.






We are at the centre now.




When we were outside of the labyrinth again, we sat down on a large thumb.




Do you remember that blue room in the Japanese Garden of Münzesheim? Now I know, where they found the bottles.




We had fun on the slide.





A last glimpse at the labyrinth from a higher place.

Today we and our host's daughter went on a surprise trip.

The Bietigheim Horse Market begins on Friday before the first Monday of September and ends on following Tuesday. Beside the traditional (actual) horse market on Monday, ride- and jumping tournament (Friday until Sunday), the other riding demonstrations as well as the procession (Monday) with following premium of the most beautiful cars, there is also an entertainment park with marquees, a large shopkeeper market.[size]


[size=3]Later we had fun on the river rafting.





The Bietigheim Enz Valley Bridge is a well-known German railway bridge over the Enz vallay at Bietigheim-Bissingen and one of the landmarks of the city. It was built from 1851-1853 as part of the railway line Bietigheim Bruchsal under the direction of Karl Etzel.





On our way home we took a photo of the landscape.

Today there is a thunderstorm and Petra decided to read a book. We were very curious, what it was: the "city of...." books, but she said, that she prefers the twighlight books.