Speyer and Heidelberg Day 4 on the Rhine

 Well before I go into detail about what happened today I need to let you know what did not happen. The Rhine river has significantly dropped in level this year due to a drought in the Rhine river valley. This has reached a critical level and at points in the river the level was so low our boat could not pass. We were very grateful for the rain earlier in the week which has led to a significant rise in the Rhine level. As of yesterday morning we were supposed to divert off the Rhine to Antwerp Belgium tomorrow. But thanks to heavy rain in the last week we will be able to stay on our boat all the way to Amsterdam!

Today was the busiest day of our cruise. We had two separate towns to tour today. The first town was Speyer. The town of Speyer was not damaged in WW2 because it did not have any significant industry.

 This Cathedral was also started in the 1000s but was completed much faster than the Strasbourg Cathedral. The Speyer Cathedral is the largest cathedral in the Romanesque style. The overall design appears to look much more like something you would see in Italy. The windows are arches and the overall design is much less ornate. The town of Speyer was quite medieval with fairly old buildings. The town was first a Roman settlement before it became a German city. The former Chancellor Kohl was a refugee after WW2 and was helped by the cathedral. After his time as Chancellor he continued to help the cathedral with fund raising. Including raising 2 million euros for organ repair.

Amazingly close to the Cathedral was the Jewish quarter which included a large Mikva and ruins of a synagogue from the 1300s. The area around Speyer to just up river was an important area for Jewish history. Jewish peoples from the area in the 1500s eventually migrated further east to Poland and Russia and would become the Ashkenazi Jewish peoples.

 Finally there was a Lutheran church from the 17th century that was made in the romantic period with a lot of interior decoration. It was surprising to see a Lutheran church with so much interior decorations but our guide said that was the thing in that era.

After Seeing Speyer we came back to the boat and had a quick lunch and then were back out again seeing the sites of Heidelberg. The city of Heidelberg also managed to escape bombing during WW 2 and is still very much able to show off  it’s old architecture. The dominate feature is the large abandoned castle above the city. 

Construction of the castle was begun in the early 1200s. There was a major addition in the mid 1600s.  A series of Fredricks(1-5) ruled the castle and it was Fredrick the 3rd that was instrumental  in supporting the writing of the Heidelberg Catechism. The Castle was ultimately abandoned and the owner moved on to Mannheim. In me mid 1700s the castle was struck by lightning and caught fire leading to a collapse of the roof.

 In the castle there survived the largest Wine barrel ever built in Europe. It would hold 53,000 gallons of wine. It was only filled 3 times as it did not hold wine very well due to a leak. I guess at the time there was some one-ups-manship on who could build the largest wine barrel. This particular one had a dance floor built on top for parties.

The town is nestled below the castle on the Neckar river. For those familiar with the Heidelberg Catechism the church seen closest in the picture was where the original document was housed. Interestingly the church was fought over by Protestants and Catholics for a long time to the point of building a wall down the center aisle of the sanctuary. It was not until 1936 that the wall came down.

It was a long day seeing quaint German towns… we did some wondering on our own.. but never strayed far from the central plaza. So in the end we never felt Not Quite Lost.