Bad Sobernheim

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Still in the same area of Germany is the town of Bad Sobernheim.  The town is on the River Nahe, and in the middle of the Pfalz wine producing area.  This fountain is in the centre of the town, and like most German fountains provides a place for the younger members of the community to cool off in warm (or even not so warm) weather - and no-one seems to mind at all!
Bad Sobernheim is a spa town, a place to which you can go for the benefit of your health, perhaps for rehabilitation following an operation.  You can even have a "health holiday" paid for by your health insurance, and towns like Bad Sobernheim have facilities to ensure that recovery from whatever has ailed you is a relatively pleasant process.
Originally a spa was associated with drinking specific mineral waters which had healing effects on different parts of the body.  German spas come in a variety of different types - it's not just the "different" water, but it might be the specific type of health treatments available, or it might be the fresh air, that would allow a town to call itself a "Bad".  Bad Sobernheim specialises in the Felke treatment: mud baths (the mud contains various different minerals, which are prescribed for each individual,) exercise, and a specialised diet, once again depending on the individual needs of the patient.  Among those who can benefit from it are people suffering from burn out, and also those who are overweight due to bad eating habits.

Odernheim am Glan

Odernheim am Glan is an old town in the Pfalz, in the middle of one of the largest wine growing areas in Germany.  It's a bit off the beaten track these days, but in the Middle Ages was much better known as being close to the monastery of Disibodenberg.  The monastery had an attached hermitage for nuns, and it's here that Hildegard of Bingen was educated.  Hildegard is one of the most famous and earliest of the medieval German female mystics. It was at the Disibodenberg that she had the first of her visions, which were eventually described in her work "Scivias".  In 1147 she left the Disibodenberg, for reasons which are long lost, but were probably to do with the lack of space for the growing convent, and set up a new convent on the Rupertsberg, where the River Nahe flows into the Rhein.  The monastery is now a ruin, but the bell in the Town Hall is reputed to have come from the monastery.

The town lies on the River Glan, which winds its way to the Nahe, and thence to the Rhein.  The weir which provides a perfect mirror for the mill will have held the water back to power the original water mill - as you can see by the roof of the low building, it now uses a more modern form of renewable energy!

New year, new theme

It's been a while since I added any pictures to the blog: winter is not really a time for actual photography, (or at least this winter hasn't been) so I though I would go back and add some photos of German towns.  To begin with, a small town with a big name - this is the town of Frankenstein in the Pfalz region of South West Germany.  I don't know whether Mary Shelley named the creator of the monster after this place, but it certainly felt like it!  The day was overcast, and the town is in the bottom of a fairly steep-sided valley. The whole area is amazingly unspoilt - it's part of a forest-based nature park, but the trees are mostly conifers, and the day we were there it felt as if they were swallowing what light was available.  The castle dates back to 1146, but situated where it is, it's not surprising that it is now an a fairly ruinous state, having been occupied by the military in various wars!