Pfalz & German Wine Route

Hambach Castle stands at an altitude of 376 meters on the Haardtrand, the eastern edge of the Palatinate Forest, in the Hambach district of Neustadt. From May 27 to June 1, 1832, approximately 25,000 people gathered here for the Hambach Festival, a six-day "National Festival of the Germans."The permanent exhibition "Up, Up to the Castle" on the fifth floor, since 2008, tells the story of the events of 1832, their background, and consequences. Around 200,000 people visit the castle annually; it also features a restaurant with over 100 seats.

In Bad Dürkheim, the German Wine Route was officially opened with a ceremony on October 19, 1935. Its most famous landmark is the Dürkheimer Riesenfass, which cooper master and winery owner Fritz Keller had built in 1934: 13.5 meters in diameter and with a capacity of around 1.7 million liters.However, wine is not stored in it; the cask is a restaurant in the style of a wine tavern with space for around 430 guests. The cask itself is open mainly during the Dürkheimer Wurstmarkt, while the attached "Bütt" serves guests year-round.

Speyer is located on the Rhine, which here forms the border between Rhineland-Palatinate and Baden-Württemberg, just under 20 kilometers south of Mannheim. The city, with around 51,000 inhabitants, boasts two UNESCO World Heritage Sites: the Imperial Cathedral (Kaiserdom), consecrated in 1061, the largest preserved Romanesque church after the destruction of Cluny, and the Jewish Courtyard (Judenhof) with its synagogue ruins and Germany's oldest completely preserved mikveh.From Cathedral Square, Maximilianstraße, a pedestrian zone, leads to the 55-meter-high Altpörtel, the city's former western gate. Additionally, you'll find the Historical Museum of the Palatinate with its cathedral treasury, and the Technik Museum, where you can see, among other things, a Boeing 747 and the Buran prototype OK-GLI.

Heidelberg is situated on the Neckar, precisely where the river exits the Odenwald and flows into the Upper Rhine Plain. The Old Town stretches narrowly between the river and the 568-meter-high Königstuhl, topped by the famous castle ruin, which French troops set ablaze in 1689 and blew up in 1693.Founded in 1386, Ruprecht-Karls-Universität is Germany's oldest university and continues to shape the city today. You can stroll along the approximately 1.6-kilometer-long Hauptstraße, one of Europe's longest pedestrian zones, cross the Alte Brücke, and look back at the castle and Old Town from the Philosophenweg on the opposite side of the Neckar.

The Neckar links two distinct cities in Baden-Württemberg: Stuttgart, the state capital in its valley location, with the river flowing through its northeast, and Heidelberg, where it exits the Odenwald into the Upper Rhine Plain. Heidelberg's castle ruin above the old town attracts, according to its administration, around a million guests annually.Here, experience the romance of Germany's oldest university city, alongside car city Stuttgart with its Mercedes-Benz and Porsche museums. Stuttgart's vineyards reach right into the city centre, and Wilhelma in Bad Cannstatt ranks among Germany's most visited zoos.