After a few mis-navigations with our Garmin, we found parking and our first stop was up to the Castle and Gardens. The Castle sits on a hill overlooking the city so it offers nice, panoramic views! It's a combination of several buildings that surround an inner courtyard and each building highlights a different period of German architecture (dating back to 1300, when construction began). In 1764 it was destroyed by lightening, leaving it permanently uninhabitable. We didn't take a tour, which is suggested, so we didn't know the details of the buildings we were looking at but they were pretty!
The Castle's cellar is also is home to a "big barrel" that was built in 1591. An even bigger barrel was built in 1751 - it's more than nine yards long, eight yards high and has a capacity of 55,345 gallons of wine! In earlier times, the wine growers had to pay their share of taxes by delivering wine to the castle, thus the need for a large container. It has a dance floor built above it and used to be guarded by a jester (legend says he was able to consume large quantities of wine and died when he mistakenly drank a glass of water)!
There is also an old Apothecary Museum at the Castle, outlining the history of the pharmacy and of dispensaries. The collection includes a complete pharmacist’s office, a laboratory, pharmacopoeias, manuscripts, a wide array of vessels, mortars, and technical flasks, and over 1,000 raw drugs representing medicine from the 17th to 19th centuries.
We then walked to the Carl Theodor Bridge (Old Bridge) and Old Town, seeing some pretty churches along the way. There are several cute, narrow streets but the main one is Hauptstraße, where most of the shopping and restaurants are centered. It's perfect for an afternoon stroll!
After lunch and gelato, it was time to head home!
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