Day 4: Heidelberg

Today, Saturday, we went on a field trip with the Bible College students to visit Heidelberg. Heidelberg is about three hours south of Siegen. The Bible College chartered a 50-person bus for the trip, which was completely filled. We followed along in a van.

Our first stop was at Calvary Chapel Heidelberg where we picked up our guide, Matthias. Next we made our way to the Heiligenberg, or "Mountain of Saints" overlooking the city from the North. This fifth-century BC Celtic fortress of refuge and place of worship on the is one of the oldest identifiable settlements in this area. The picture shown here is a 56-meter-deep pit that dates from that era.


In 863 the monastery of St. Michael was founded on the Heiligenberg inside the double rampart of the Celtic fortress. Here's a picture of the tower built in approximately 1094, from that monastery that overlooks the valley.



Also on the Heiligenberg is an unusual Nazi edifice - a "Thingstätte." In early Nazi quasi-religious Völkisch ceremony and Blut und Boden (Blood and Soil) ideology, a "Thing" was an open-air gathering of the people, harking back to old Germanic pagan gatherings. Some 1200 "Thing" sites were planned, but only about 40 were built, as the Nazi hierarchy lost interest in the "Thing" movement in 1936.

Here's a picture of Kathy and I looking down into the ampitheater, and, on the right, is a picture of the same ampitheater on the day it opened in 1935.

There are more complete monastery ruins above the Thingstätte. Here are some of the students exploring and taking a break.

Modern Heidelberg

After our hike, we drove down to the city and let everyone explore for a few hours. The main street of the old town was crowded with tourists. We found a Lebanese cafe and had schwarma, falafel, and humus for lunch.

After lunch, Kathy went for a Starbucks, Dave and I got a gelato, and a student (Ben S.) went to see a golden mime perform.

Once everyone was refreshed, we headed on up the hill to Heidelberg castle. This was a pretty steep climb, and we're still a little sore a couple of days later. Here's a picture of one of the facades, and the view over the valley.

Finally, we finished off by taking a ride on the River Neckar, which was very refreshing. The picture on the right was taken up in the castle.

Then, it was time for the ride home. We spent the evening watching a movie about Lonnie Frisbee (a little biased, I thought), and eating baguette pizzas. A perfect ending to a perfect day.