Spring 2019

Nördlingen - 15 May 2019

Kay drove for about an hour to Nördlingen down the Romantic Road. Colin, CoPilot, decided to take us in through the town which was fun for Kay. About 3 hours walking around the walls and the town sightseeing. Highlight of the day was climbing the church tower, 342 steps, and seeing the 4 stork chi

15.05.19 - Food was ok last night. Also made another batch of granola afterwards.

We were woken about 7.30 this morning by some workmen doing gardening! At least they didn’t use the electric hedge trimmer until around 8am!

€1 for water at Feuchtwangen, difference was Tintin could give Dave a wash down too - seemed more than 100 litres. All the machines are different - but at least in Germany they use cash instead of jetons in France, which you need to buy from a tabac - and there are about 6 different sorts!

I drove for about an hour today to Nördlingen. Probably should have been about 10 minutes less, but Co-pilot took us through the industrial side of town to have a look first!

The official moho parking here has space for 30, and costs €3 for 24 hours - it’s also close to the old town.

Dave looking quite small in comparison to the Carthago , it’s the angle really.

The bell tower, called Daniel - from the St George’s church can be seen from miles away. This is because almost 15 million years ago the landscape called the Nördlingen Ries was created through the impact of a meteorite. The near-circular crater is about 25 km in diameter.

There is also an association with pigs! Legend has it that in 1440 a woman went out to get a jug of beer for her husband and saw a pig by the Löpsinger Gate, and the pig revealed the gate had not been locked properly. Guards were found to have accepted a bribe to leave the gate open in order that the town could be taken in the night. Records show that two gate guards were charged with treason and executed. The people of Nördlingen apparently have retained their special appreciation of these smart animals to the present day! Well - it’s a good story - and good for tourism!

So, another map and another walk all around - today for about 3 hours - at least 10,000 steps!

It is the only town in Germany with well preserved town walls and battlements with five gates, eleven towers and one bastion which can be traversed over a length of 2.6 km.

Today’s buildings were huge! Maybe hard to see the scale in the photos. Talking of which, don’t forget to just click on any you’d like to see enlarged!

We’re happy! A very friendly cat came to see us! It rolled around in the dust, was quite pushy, purring and generally happy! Think that’s my first proper cat encounter in over five weeks! The large scale ants 🐜climbing the garage wall also amused us! Little things!

Tintin fancied a beer sitting out in the sun, so at the end of our walk - that’s what we did.

We then decided to climb the 90 m Daniel bell tower. Tintin counted 342 steps, our legs were a bit jellified! It’s quite clever, if you can make it up, then you pay! Was €7 for us both. Really not sure how the old man taking money at the top gets there - must be quite slowly one imagines! The views over the meteorite crater and town were astounding. We were interested in the storks on top of the Tanzhaus. With his zoom, Tintin could see what we think were four chicks. We’d seen one of the parents fly off, but didn’t come back whilst we were there. That’s some leap of faith for a chick, first flying lesson - make it - or don’t! Selection of pictures from the top.