I dropped one off at the hotel and ate the other whilst crossing the Market to get to the Alte Brücke. You see, many people wrongly assume I don't like sports - but I do, I like walking, swimming, horseback riding, dancing... but those are, unfortunately, all sports for which equipment and/or other participants and/or environment are expensive or hard to find. But I really enjoy walking, have always done so, and I couldn't bear to leave Heidelberg without a shield for my old hiking stick (I've grown out of it in the meanwhile as I last used it when - 12, I think, but it's a nice thing anyway), which meant walking. I've done my research, and the Heiligenberg was supposed to be the one with the abandoned monasteries on top. I like monasteries too, so that's a nice two-birds-one-stone situation.
Alte Brücke
So I set off to the Alte Brücke at 8:05 and briskly tried pacing up the Schlangenweg. I ran out of breath halfway through. But then finding your ideal speed is always tricky, so I slowed down and admired the lovely views over Heidelberg from the Philosophenweg. Halfway through the Philosophenweg, just beyond (from Schlangenweg) Liselotteplatz, there's a small path that leads to stairs which lead to another path up the mountain. And so I followed that, always with the sun above me so I kept to the Heidelberger side of the mountain. I zigzagged up the hill, making the 400-or so metre ascent into a walk of a few kilometres.
View over Heidelberg from Bismarckturm
Halfway up there's a tower, the Bismarckturm, from which there's a quite nice view over the city. That's also the point where my calves started aching slightly, though my feet felt surprisingly well. Of course, the trick is to keep going - over my whole walk, I suppose I took only a handful of minute-breaks and two 10-minute breaks. I didn't particularly like the Bismarckturm, as it seemed to have been used by people for barbeques and drinking. It was a bit of a mess, so I walked on.
Finally on top of the hill (09:22), I had the loveliest view of the Heidelberger Altstadt - I arrived at the remains of the Sankt Stephans Kloster, or the Saint Stephen's Monastery. It wasn't very big, but it had a nice little tower. Quite sweet, actually.
St Stephen's Monastery Chapel
This lady and her daughter started blabbing at me in German, but as I don't get much further than - "Durfen wir bitte bezahlen?" I couldn't make much sense of them, nor could they of me as neither spoke English or Dutch. Pity really.
Amphitheatre
I then passed a parking space to get to the Nazi amphitheatre. I'd been told it was up there, but I wasn't prepared for how big it actually was. I felt slightly - angry, actually, that those stupid people defiled this pretty mountain by building this stupidly big thing. It was suppose to hold about 8000 people, and it had this very 1930s design to it. Fascinating but quite unsettling.
St Michael's Monastery - Roman temple outline
What I did like, however, was the Sankt Michaels Kloster, or the Saint Michael's Monastery. It's an old location, as it's built on the site of an old Roman temple - of which the outline is still visible in the middle of the monastery chapel - and this castle, of which the outlines are no longer visible but which did contribute to the rather odd shape of the monastery. It had two towers and it was really big - and I was there all on my own.
Imagine this - it's 10 in the morning, around you there's only tall trees, bees and spiders and ants and grasshoppers and birds, the sun's already beating down and you're all by yourself in the vast ruins of this late Dark Ages monastery.
Western Crypt - illuminated by the flash
When I entered the Western Crypt, for a moment there I was convinced it was haunted, even if I don't believe in such things.
St Michael's Monastery
But I got to investigate that whole monastery all by myself for about half an hour, always narrowly avoiding spider webs and going deaf from the buzzing and chirping of the bees and the crickets, before other people showed up. I then sat down for another rest before beginning my descent and picked up some bits of orange rock that I first took for pottery - but then I figured, they're orange, they're curved, they're consistent, and I was sitting next to the ruined walls of a Dark Ages monastery. They were probably roof tile shards. But that was cool anyway.
I then began my descent, and as I wanted to go a different way from the way I came up, and as I didn't have a map nor a compass, I figured I'd try to walk following the sun.
Now, I was in the Scouts for a few years as a child and I know enough of the sun's trajectory to make an educated guess as to what time it is, but I never properly walked following the sun before, and in any case not during Summer Time.
But I managed to more or less safely get down. Descending is quite frustrating, especially when you've got winding paths and you're anxious to get down and take off your shoes and you see the next bit of path about ten metres below. I did once make the mistake of thinking that the bit of hill in between was level enough for me to get down safely - I then promptly slid for about four metres, me meanwhile making up my obituary and hoping people would say nice things about me - before I came to a standstill and then managed to safely get the remaining bit down to the next path. So, advice - paths are there for a reason and Little Red Riding Hood was advised not to leave the path for a good reason too.
Little stream
But I got safely back down by 11:24 (I checked) and only a small bit off - I'd wanted to emerge by the Alte Brücke again, but instead emerged by the dam a few dozen of metres upstream. For the last bit I'd followed a small stream down, figuring that all water needs to go down anyway and as I was on the Neckarside, it'd probably flow to the Neckar (it did). So, that was fun.
And here's where the praise of my walking shoes comes in - I'd been walking for about 3.5 hours. Uphill and downhill. I'd been wandering about monasteries. And then I got a text from Kristy to meet her for lunch. I thought of my feet. They didn't hurt. Unheard of. But, they didn't. So we met for lunch and though I didn't feel like moving much, my feet were fine. We actually managed to still visit the Karzer (student prison) and the Uni Museum and a bookshop before going back to our hotel.
Karzer
It wasn't until I took off those shoes that I felt my feet ache. And they're fine again now. So, those shoes - best money I've ever spent.
And the Heiligenberg - I climbed it. And I bought myself a shield for my walking stick as a reward. Surely it must've done a lot of good in doing away with the PALA social calories?
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