Spesbach & Heidelberg, Germany (May 13-14, 2012)

After returning from France we enjoyed a restful Mother's Day while staying with Mike and Corri Palmer.  They live in Spesbach, Germany.  Here are a few pictures of homes in their neighborhood.  As we walked the neighborhood there were many out working on their homes.  Most are very particular about keeping everything very nice.

 

Above is a very interesting door, and to the right is a town house with half painted yellow and half painted white.  Red roofs and flowers are common.  Solar panels can be seen on many homes in Germany.

Heidelberg

Hal and Mike hiking up the trail to the castle.

With this picture and the one below you can see many different styles of architecture present in the castle.  Each generation, over centuries of time, would add to the castle, often in the predominant style at the time.  It makes for a very interesting combination.

The room at the left is inside the area behind where Diane and Hal are standing in the picture above.  Notice the doors on the right of the picture to the left.  One of these is shown below and is very ornate - a lot of craftsmanship is involved.  Similar doors were also in the inside of the rooms.

The door to the left has 1897 engraved in the panel above the door.  This one isn't as fancy as the one above, but look at the hinges and the lock.  A close-up of the lock is shown below.

This porcelain piece is actually a room heater.  A fireplace is located behind it (fed with wood through spaces between the walls so that the servants didn't disrupt the royal happenings) and the heat was disbursed through the porcelain.

The chapel inside the palace

                                                                    

                                                                                            This wine vat holds 55,000 liters.  It was reported that the wine was not very good.

A view out one of the lookout points of the castle.

This was the main entrance to the castle.  We entered through the back entrance and exited here.

Notice the large piece that has fallen off!

The picture below is looking down into an area between the outside wall and the castle.  During times of war this became a moat filled with water.  In peaceful times it was filled with animals which were hunted.

Here is a model of the castle as it once was.  The French came through the area and destroyed part of it in the 1800's.  It would have been quite a place before the destruction.

Another view outside.  The wall to the left of where we are standing is what drops down into the moat area - at least 60 feet.

A view of the old bridge from the castle.  Notice the large homes on the other side of the river.  More of these are shown below.  There were a lot of very nice homes on the north side of the river.

The Cathedral sits in the middle of the city center.

A funicular runs from the town below up to the castle and then further up the hillside.

Here are some pictures from the modern city of Heidelberg that give a good feel for the city.

This is the entrance to the old bridge that was shown above from the castle.   And below a picture from the bridge looking up at the castle on the hill.

We stopped to get some crepes made at this shop.

I even found an interesting sign on a business - with a little cover up help from my hand!

Tomorrow we visit Rothenberg ob der Taur - a medieval city that has been well preserved. 

Paris, France (May 11-12, 2012)

After leaving Normandy, we arrived at our hotel in Paris about 9 pm.  We dumped our suitcases in the rooms and took off to catch the metro to the Eiffel Tower, hoping to get some night shots and maybe ride to the top if the line wasn't too long.

Mike, Diane and Hal ready to board the Metro.

At twilight Diane captured this colorful sky near the Eiffel Tower.

The Eiffel Tower at twilight.  It stands 1,000 feet high and was built for the 1892 World's Fair.  The government gave Eiffel 20 years to recover his investment, and then it was to be torn down - the Parisians didn't like it!  Eiffel kept looking for reasons to keep it, and finally found one that lasted when he equipped the tower with radio equipment and showed the military how it could give them an advantage.  Today, this is all hard to believe as the Eiffel Tower is synonymous with Paris throughout the world.

When the tower is lit, at the top of each hour lights flash for about five minutes.  We were waiting in line underneath the tower when the flashing started.  It's quite a site to see!

A view from the top.  We were thrilled that the line was only about 30 minutes long.  Mike and Corri had been here a month earlier and the line was 4-5 hours long.  Hal had been here in 1970, but the wind was too strong and it was closed - the top was swaying.  It still blows pretty strong at the top, but the views were terrific.

This picture was taken at the midway station.

It was after midnight as we made our way back to the Metro to catch a ride before the trains stopped running.  This is a great shot of the famous tower.

The next morning we were out early again and stopped for a pastry at a shop near the hotel.  All of the French pastries we tried were very good.

We purchased all day Metro passes so we could get on and off and see as much as possible.  This is a favorite location for taking pictures of the Eiffel Tower.

We needed to get a daytime shot of the tower and it was the best place to start our day of sight seeing.

Our next stop was the Arc de Triomphe.  It is tradition for the French armies to celebrate victory by marching up the Avenue Champs Elysees to the Arc.

A marker on the famous street.

A view down the sidewalk.  There are two rows of trees on each side of the famous street.

These buildings are representative of what can be found on the famous boulevard.  Most buildings are 4-5 stories high with very fine workmanship.  There is a lot of iron work as shown above.  Tradition and style are very important.

Not everything is traditional.  Here's a McDonald's on the famous street.  I had an Egg McMuffin and it tasted just like one at home.

This ornate building is now a museum.

After walking a good distance down the famous boulevard, we found a Metro station to take us to Notre Dame.  Mike and Hal were glad for a couple of seats to rest a few minutes.  I don't think we waited much more than 2-3 minutes for a Metro all day, and most of the trains were very full.  Saturday is a day that Parisians do their shopping.

A couple of views from the area near the Notre Dame Cathedral.

A view from the front of this famous Cathedral.  It sits on an island in the Seine River.

A close-up of the detail above one of the front doors.

The pipe organ located high up in one wing.  In this picture you can't see the beautiful stained glass window behind the organ pipes.  Below is an example of the very intricate stained glass windows which are found in abundance in the cathedral.

A couple of pictures on the outside of the cathedral.

A few more photos in the area of the Notre Dame Cathedral.

Here's a street performer with a giant bubble floating to the lower left.  He was a master at creating very large bubbles.

If you know Diane, you knew she could find a place to shop!

We jumped on the Metro again and headed to the Opera House.  There is a large square in front of it with many streets feeding into the square.  The blue vans are a line of police vehicles that came streaming through.  Notice the McDonald's Arches just above the first van.

This gives a feel of how the streets come together like spokes in a wagon wheel.  In the center all the cars circle around.  It's remarkably efficient.

This car was part of a wedding entourage that was out celebrating the day's nuptials - they were all honking their horns to draw attention to the party.  The groom is sitting on the side of the car with his back to the picture and his bride is to his left.

The Opera House is pretty ornate.  It would be fun to attend a production here!

Next stop was the Louvre.  Here's the Hotel Du Louvre across the street.

The ceiling of one of the entrances to the Louvre Square.

The Louvre Museum surrounds this square - it is huge.  We didn't have time to go inside, but we wanted to at least see it.

Big cities like Paris do not have enough parking space for cars - they were designed and built before the advent of the automobile.  When she booked the hotel, Corri made sure that they had parking.  However, she didn't expect this type of parking!  It is a parking elevator and it was barely big enough for us to fit - we had to pull in the side view mirrors for clearance.  It worked as long as you had a small car!

We left Paris late in the afternoon and had a four hour drive back to Germany.  We only had three days in France, but we covered a lot of ground and created some great memories!