Stuttgart city center will be transformed into a festive wine village, when the Stuttgart Wine Festival gets underway on Wednesday 26 August; it runs through to 6 September, 2009.
Something like 120 wine alcoves are created and decorated in a traditional Swabian folklore style. During the 12 days of the festival, about 250 different wines from the Wuerttemberg region are sampled and enjoyed, alongside many examples of Swabian cuisine.
A nice video clip from tvboy61 featuring the Bavarian town of Oberammergau and showing the beautiful murals which are painted on most of the buildings in the center of town
Oberammergau has much to offer besides the Passion Play, including a testing bike park.
Every ten years since 1634, a remarkable event occurs in the Alpine town of Oberammergau, Germany; the whole community is involved in staging a six hour long passion play. So long is the play that a meal is served during its intermission.
Thousands of visitors flock to Oberammergau, to attend one of the performances during the summer months and hotel - ticket packages are available. Next year's play runs from May 15 until October 3, 2010, after which the play will not be staged again until May 2020.
Coming up to the end of another week, I thought that you might like this video insight into Hamburg brought to us by Christian (Hamburg4U). Hamburg was the birthplace of Mendelssohn and is both Germany's second largest city as well as being Europe's second largest port.
Hamburg has a special atmosphere and vibrant night-life. After partying all night, those with stamina head for the restaurants at the harbour to enjoy a superb fish and schnaps breakfast!
Enjoy this trip along a small section of the Austrian/German Danube brought to us by tnsilnl. Beautiful images accompanied by the Blue Danube from Strauss.
Having posted the occasional article here, tracing the river Danube from its source in Germany to the Black Sea, it was nice to learn that a team of Kayakers, twin sisters Chrissy and Eve Conyers, with their friends Wayne and Josh, are setting out on June 26 from Regensburg, Germany, to paddle about 2500 km to the Romanian estuary.
The group are using the trip to raise money for the children of CanTeen, who have grown up living with cancer. The girls have been members of CanTeen throughout their childhood because their brother, Adrian has been battling with a brain tumor. CanTeen is an Australian support organisation for young people (aged 12-24) that are living with the disruption of cancer; this includes ot only the cancer patients themselves, but their brothers and sisters and also young people with parents or primary carers with cancer.
German football fans are now heading to Vienna for the Euro 2008 final, so they have chosen a particularly exciting time for their adventure. Let's wish Team Kayak luck and if you are able to support them with a sposorship donation, go to Eveyday Hero, where you will be able to make a donation and enable them to 'Raise More Than a Sweat for CanTeen'.
Although the European summer is coming to an end, many German wine festivals are in full swing.
Germany's wine regions have a lot to offer tourists, especially during the summer and autumn. Deutsche Welle have provided a timely article about their numerous festivals, which offer the opportunity to enjoy local wines, food and entertainment.
The new high-speed rail link between France and Germany opened today. It cuts travel time between Paris and the German city of Stuttgart by a third to just under four hours. Eventually, it is planned to extend the service to eastern European cities such as Budapest and Bratislava.
One of travelling's most atmospheric memories, is to stand on the footbridge linking platforms at a great European rail station like the Hauptbahnhof Munich and read the destination signs for trains heading to the far corners of the continent. Trains seem much more tangible and engaging than planes.
I came across this nice little travelogue documenting a trip to Munich, made by Aeric Winter and his friends, Liv and Alex. It starts a bit slowly but there is some interesting footage, including a bit at the end about Oktoberfest.
The opening shot is of Cologne cathedral at the start of their journey. Some years ago I saw a very impressive busker performing on the piazza at the top of the steps, in front of the cathedral. Buskers can be found in most large cities and towns around the world and some perform to a very high standard, but this busker was playing Mozart on a full size concert grand piano.
Next week, Munich celebrates its film and television industry, beginning with the Munich International Short Film Festival which runs 14 to 20 June, 2007, and then followed by Filmfest München, the Munich Film Festival, which runs from 22 to 30 of June, 2007.
Munich is Germany's film capital and this year, Filmfest München celebrates its 25th year; it is Germany's largest summer film festival with roughly 200 films on 15 screens. The general public are encouraged to participate in this audience-friendly festival, which attracts more than 65,000 ordinary movie lovers, over 600 members of the international press and 1000-plus film-related professionals.
The Bavarians enjoy their beer festivals and they have a secret. Many foreign tourists have arrived in Munich at the beginning of October, disappointed to find that they have just missed Oktoberfest, which is carefully timed so that it usually falls in the last two weeks of September. What they don't tell you is that you can be early for their second biggest beer festival which is in the Spring. The festival is Der Berg or to give it its official title, Bergkirchweih in Erlangen.
Bergkirchweih Erlangen has been held annually since 1755 and this year is scheduled for 24 May - 4 June, 2007. Over a million visitors enjoy the Berg each year but few are foreign tourists and it is much easier to find a hotel bed than it is in Munich during Oktoberfest.
Erlangen is a university town close to Nuremberg and there is a wider selection of hotels in Nuremberg; special late-night trains run back there during the festival.
Here is a video clip posted by Celaniry which gives the flavour of Bergkirchweih, actually flavour is the wrong word because there is not much beer in evidence but the festival atmosphere is nicely portrayed.
