With almost 40 million foreign overnight guests every year, Germany is one of the seven most visited countries in the world. There are 6,135 museums, 366 theatres, 34 leisure and adventure parks, 45,000 tennis courts, 648 golf courses, 190,000 km of hiking trails, 40,000 kilometres of long-distance cycle paths as well as holiday and theme routes available for use in tourism.
Business and congress tourism is of outstanding importance; Germany is the most important international trade fair location with several world-leading trade fairs: Caravan Salon Düsseldorf, CMT Stuttgart, etc. The Internationale Tourism-Börse Berlin is the world's leading tourism trade fair. Germany also has the highest density of festivals like Wacken, Rock am Ring,
Outstanding sights: Sanssouci Castle - Brandenburg Gate - Cologne Cathedral - Saxon Switzerland National Park - Wadden Sea - Hamburg Harbor - Brocken - Old Town of Hameln - Externsteine - Wartburg - Neuschwanstein Castle - Zugspitze near Garmisch-Partenkirchen - Rothenburg ob der Tauber - Königsee in Berchtesgadener Land - Old town of Bamberg - Imperial castle in Nuremberg - Mainau Island in Lake Constance - Lichtenstein Castle - Meersburg - Ulm Minster - etc.
On our hikes along the Saale, we often noticed the paddlers, canoeists and boat tourists on the Saale, who particularly frequented the route from Saaleck Castle and the Rudelsburg near Bad Kösen to Freyburg, a type of leisure activity that we had wanted to do for a long time.
The small town of Memleben on the Unstrut gained great importance during the Ottonian period in the 10th and 11th centuries during the development of the East Franconian Empire into the German Empire.
Sometimes it's the noises, disturbing but then so interesting and impressive that you inevitably look up in the direction of the "noise". This is what happened to us at the end of our bike tour from Memleben along the Unstrut back to Wiehe, where a small but fine ice cream café lured us.
Goseck Castle is a medieval castle and later monastery complex in Goseck in Saxony-Anhalt, near the imposing and oldest solar observatory in Europe.
The Midwives' Association of Saxony-Anhalt has had a forest planted near Goseck. Two beautifully designed commemorative plaques complete the small grove and convey the message of the midwives:
We had already been told several times about the circular moat not far from Goseck Castle, now the ancient building, better known as the “solar observatory”, should be hiked.
The four decentralized “Halle Christmas Markets” on the market square, Domplatz, in front of the Ulrichskirche and on Hansering had to close due to the currently new 15th SARS-CoV-2 containment ordinance of the state of Saxony-Anhalt, which has been in force since November 24th, 2021.
As already mentioned, our accommodation in Halle - Saale was so centrally located in the city centre that we made several spontaneous decisions on our way to the city centre.
We were already on the way back from the Rosarium Sangershausen on the BAB 38 in the direction of Halle when Detlef remarked that we should also make a short detour to the castle in Querfurt.
We were on our way back from Sangerhausen when, after about 12 kilometers, we came across the town of Allstedt, which is overlooked by a magnificent castle complex.
In a first blog we had already reported about the first Vanlife Festival in Ferropolis, so-called Eisenstadt in the former open-cast mining area in Golpa Nord near Leipzig.
Anyone who passes the motorway junction near Sangerhausen on the A 38 motorway in the direction of Berlin will be amazed at the huge rock cones in the landscape, which after many years of storage are only partially greened and can therefore still be recognized as "man-made".
The historical imposing buildings of the "village" Schulpforte had already struck us several times when we were on the road 87 between Bad Kösen and Naumburg.
Every hike, at least if you walk through nature with your eyes open, always brings new perspectives or even new insights, which you have already encountered many times, but little or not at all explored.
This year the Finnelauf will not be stopped by the corona virus. For a long time, the organizers of the SG Finne Billroda advised ideas on how the traditional and nationally known run, which is so popular with athletes, can be set up even in pandemic times.
We are more fan of hiking up to the Brocken, but lot of people use the trains go up even in winter with six pairs of trains a day, if there are no Corona-related breaks.
The place Zscheiplitz is located on the elevated left bank of the Unstrut within sight of the Neuchâtel / Neuenburg about two kilometers west of Freyburg in southern Saxony-Anhalt.
The red sandstone mountains Hohe Schrecke, a striking ridge between Saxony Anhalt and Thuringia, lies, in a broader sense, between Bretleben and Reinsdorf in the north, Gehofen, Nausitz and Donndorf in the northeast, Langenroda, Garnbach, Wiehe and Allerstedt in the east, Lossa in the southeast, Hauteroda, Oberheldrungen and Heldrungen in the west and Braunsroda in the northwest.
Once again on our hiking shoes, we noticed a new sign board in the forest above Billroda, the inscription of which referred to a boundary stone of the Kingdom of Prussia.
The dark gray clouds on the way to Freyburg to Neuenburg Castle indicated snowfall, but it had stayed dry until our arrival at the Unstrut Bridge.