Adventures

Burg Rodenstein in Reichelsheim

A few weeks back we took long hike in the Odenwald Region, around the town of Reichelsheim. We've been using "Komoot", an app with maps for hikers and bikers, for a while now, and this was one of the tours the app suggested to us, when we plugged in that we'd like to see some stuff and walk at least two hours.

Reichelsheim is about 40 minutes by car from where we live, but if we could go straight there, it would probably take more like 20. Driving into the Odenwald Regions requires some time though, because the roads are fairly narrow, with lots of curves and just not made to speed.

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Mathildenhöhe Darmstadt

While we started the blog mainly to show some pictures of our travles, we've since realized that it's not only nice and beautiful abroad, but also at home. When we first moved here, we weren't too fond of the particular region we live in now, but we've started to find many places here that are actually really beautiful and/or special. And some of those places we are aware that we'd be visiting those if located in a city somewhere in one of our trips. One of the more obvious ones is the "Mathildenhöhe Darmstadt", the cities best known attraction. The "Hochzeitsturm" is also Darmstadts most iconic sight and used in many logos centered around the city.

The "Mathildenhöhe" used to be an artists colony for Jugenstil (Art Nouveau) artists, and the buildings there are mostly from that era. That's why Darmstadt is sometimes referred to as Germany's capital of Art Nouveau.

The plantain grove predates the artists colony but was stocked with sculptures during the artists exhibitons. There is also a russian chapel that was built well before the founding of the artists colony, but has been included into the overall planning. Right before it sits the "Lilienbecken", a pool with a mosaic depicting Lilies. They view from the "Lilienbecken" up to the russian chapel and the Hochzeitsturm is probably the most photographed motive in Darmstadt, but I haven't yet been able to capture a good picture of that.

Darmstadt is currently in the application process to make the Mathildenhöhe a UNESCO World Heritage Site – there's some information on that on their website.

You might have be able to notice that not all of those pictures were taking in one sitting.We've been to the Mathildenhöhe quite a few times, so the pictures are a bit mixed up. To be honest about that part of Darmstadt – at first I didn't really like the place too much, I'm not that big of a fan of art nouveau, but it really depends on the time of the year and day. I think the best time to visit is in the springtime or early summer, when everything is green, in the late afternoon. Around 5-ish or something. Then it can be really stunning.

Currently there's construction going on on the central Exhibition Building, and a big part of it is wrapped in framework and tarps, I think they won't be done until 2018. So if you plan on going there you probably won't be able to see it in its full glory until then.

All pictures of interesting places in Darmstadt can be found in the corresponding album.

Springtime in Germany

It's springtime in Darmstadt. Everything is turning green and colorful and the sun is shining. I used the nice weather for a little walk through Darmstadt. I also came by the h_da-Building, which is lovingly called "the cheese grater" by the locals because of it's strange but fascinating facade, which has won some awards in the past.