I just got back from a two week trip to Germany and I have to say it was remarkable. If I ever got a chance to go back, I would take that offer up in a heartbeat! One place I spent quite a bit of time at was the Heidelberg Castle, located in the state of Baden-Württemberg within Germany.

Here's a view of the castle ruins from the main part of town:

I had no idea how haunting it would be to see something so amazing just out of the blew. You never see anything this old or this beautiful from in the middle of a busy town in the US. So of course I had to go explore it!

It's a long way up to the castle, but the walk is worth it even though you pay for the train ride to get inside the castle (I suggest taking the ride down, but be warned it gets really busy and walking around all day people get sweaty!).

You can see the entire exterior of the castle free of charge from the gardens so if you can't spare 7 euros don't worry, the sights are still amazing.

After coughing up 7 euros here are some of the things you'll find:

(The second lady would have a better view if she was standing by the ledge, you can see the Neckar river and part of the Philosophenweg (the Philosopher's Walk that, apparently, was the designated walk for the Philosophers. I did feel enlightened when walking it after getting lost for 3 hours, so maybe there's something to it 😉).

Me overlooking the city and Neckar river:

There's also a museum of medicine inside the castle where you can see how they made drugs back then and even a game of guess the scent and match it to the German name of whatever the scent it was! (If you speak German and know the smells of things you'll be at the expert level in no time, unlike me haha)