Heidelberg

Our next destination after Stuttgart is Heidelberg but since the drive would be too long after visiting the museum earlier in the day we decided to stay in Heilbronn. When we arrived in Heilbronn it appeared to be a nice town to walk around although we never got the chance. The parking area was a fair distance away from the centre, however, it was next door to a lovely park, which Julie and I took advantage of. The nights are still cold which is another reason we chose this town for our stop, the site is free but the electricity is €0.50/kilowatt. I think we only put in 1.50 and that lasted us the evening, night and morning with our heater being on sporadically and our fridge on the entire time. On the second walk into the park Julie brought her entire bag of breadcrumbs to feed the ducks. This made me happy because the breadcrumbs were taking up a portion of the fridge. The following morning was so nice that we almost decided to stay put and just enjoy it, but we wanted to press on and see Heidelberg’s fairytale castle. We never got the chance to visit the medieval streets of Heidelberg because all the parking was underground and if there was above ground parking it had height restricted bars. So after a few U-turns we almost skipped this stop but in a last attempt we decided to drive the van up the cliff to see if the castle itself offered parking. To our luck it did, and it wasn’t all that expensive at €2.70 for 2 ½ hours. This massive castle was truly impressive. The views from above the city were amazing too. The fact that it’s ruined actually adds to the appeal. The only thing we would suggest skipping is actually paying to go inside. It is not at all worth it. Oh we did get to see a museum on medicine, but that was about it and medicine museums aren’t what I would consider a good use of my time. After paying the €6.00 entrance fee, you then have the option to purchase an audio guide for €4 which you can only use once inside the gates but if you actually want to visit the castle rooms etc, you have to pay extra for a guided tour. The castle is definitely worth visiting and from what we could see of the old town centre, it would be too. Just don’t pay to go in unless you’re going to want to do the guided tour (we didn’t). We stayed outside a VW dealership in the town of Bruchsal, this stellplatz offered a place to park, water, dump and electricity for free.