Day 8 - Sun 7 Jun 15: Wurzburg

0 km, 14-31deg, cloudy but fine. 

Our first rest day for this tour in a fascinating city with a very rich history.  Würzburg is the capital of the German wine region Franconia which is famous for its mineralic dry white wines especially from the Silvaner grape.  Würzburger Hofbräu brewery produces a local pilsner beer known worldwide, so there's a fair amount of drinking going on day and night. The Wine Festival, which we attended for all of two seconds last night, was very well attended.  

"The Würzburg Residence", (built by prince-bishops in the 18th Century) is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.   We enjoyed a pleasant couple of hours wandering the rooms and hallways and being guided through absolute decadence.  The prince-bishops were certainly a privileged bunch.  Photography was strictly forbidden, however, a few sneaky shots were able to be recorded.  

The Marienberg Fortress sits on a prominent site that dates back to 1000BC and dominates the city skyline. Its latest "makeover” was in 1631 when Gustav Adolf of Sweden expanded a castle into a Baroque fortress with royal gardens.  It is the largest fort/castle in southern Germany. The fortress now also houses two fine museums. We ran out of time for the museums but were able to fit in a guided tour of the Fort, including the ancient well (105m deep!), the chapel, keep and a short section of the 18km tunnel system. A fascinating place of which we saw only a tiny part. 

Wurzburg has more churches than Adelaide and plenty of museums, galleries, a market place and lovely parks and gardens. In short, it's a great place to spend a couple of days.  Although there was plenty to see, we didn't get time to see everything, so will have to do those during our next visit here. 

Dinner was Italian (Ali and Stew’s choice) with pasta and pizzas, fuel for tomorrow when we are back on the bike. A nice early night after a big day on the cobbles.


ticket


One of the many chandeliers

Tapestry

Fresco painting in the Residenz entry

A room heater

Sneaky shots of the ceiling artwork




Gardens of the Residenz

The Residenz



Residenz

Residenz


Residenz

Fortress Marienberg - a long walk up


Entrance to the Fortress

The Keep

The start of the guided tour

The Well

St Mary's Church

Part of the tunnel system under the Fortress


Views of Wurzburg from the Fortress


A near 'brutal' Lutheran Church

A room in the Residenz adroend with 2kg of gold



Fortress entrance


Wurzburg

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