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.
After our tour along the fortress wall of Mühlhausen, the city centre should now be explored. It is not without reason that Mühlhausen calls itself "Muhlhusia turrita", the tower-decorated Mühlhausen with once 59 towers, the churches and the city wall.
An important date had led us to the imperial city of Mühlhausen in Thuringia, which existed until 1802 and is world-famous for its rich historical heritage, so Mühlhausen was also the place where Johann Sebastian Bach and Thomas Müntzer worked.
Only a few hundred meters from this year's meeting place for the bicycle caravan community at the Gasthof zum Klosterhof is the ancient Mildenfurth monastery, a former Premonstratensian monastery in the Mildenfurth district of Wünschendorf / Elster, which we also wanted to pay a short visit to for the purpose of the article.
The two viaducts between Bad Bibra and Saubach were probably the most difficult part of the construction of the Laucha – Kölleda railway line, the so-called Finnebahn.
One of our first hikes in spring took us along the Kaiserweg and then down the Eselssteig to Rastenberg. Immediately after leaving the forest path, we came across the really impressive forest swimming pool in Rastenberg, where numerous craftsmen were at work.
It was simply the research for another destination of a bike tour in Burgenland that brought us to the old cemetery of Buttstädt, here it was above all the proper name Camposanto that had aroused our interest.
We have had the Rennsteig Tunnel several times, which at 7,916 meters is the longest road tunnel in Germany and the fourth longest twin-tube road tunnel in Europe after the Gran Sasso Tunnel, the Plabutsch Tunnel and the Seelisberg Tunnel.
Rudolstadt is situated in the valley of the river Saale, which runs from the south to the east passing the "Saaleknie". The city was first documented in 776 and since 1326 has got the city law.
Our host, the campground "Unter den Jenzig" had mentioned some places of interest in the area, which we also wanted to visit together with our friend Detlef, who arrived to visit us from Halle.
After an eventful day of hiking in Dornburg, we were on our way back and since it was still pleasantly sunny, we decided to drive to the town of Camburg, which forms a unit with Dornburg as a municipal association in the Saale-Holzland district.
The scenically beautiful village of Dornburg is located in the middle of the Saale valley between the cities of Jena and Naumburg (Saale), a region that is always good for a discovery hike.
Although it is wet and cold on these days in December, the urge to exercise prevails, especially since there are other destinations to be hiked.
The origins of the Weimar onion market probably go back to the Middle Ages; it was first mentioned on October 4, 1653 as the "cattle and Zippel market".
Weimar had once again inspired us to a visit: Weimar in summer: Moving, pulsating and extremely lively. The glory of the past flirts with fresh culture.
In the meantime we had completed our tour of the imposing, roofed and ancient wooden bridge across the White Elster, climbed up to the church and then walked along the river back to the camp of the bicycle camping trailers, who had now gathered around the campfire with grilled sausage and cool drinks.
Our friend Jörg invited us to a caravan or trailer meeting for bicycles (we will report later) in Gera for the first time in Germany and probably also around the world, a region that we had hardly explored so far.
The Wartburg, located high above the city of Eisenach in Thuringia, is connected to the history of Germany like hardly any other castle in Germany.
176 meters long, just 85 centimeters wide and 25 meters above the Bärental: the still "young" suspension rope bridge across the Bärental is a real attraction in the Hohe Schrecke Mountain Range.
Once again for reasons of direct regional exploration in Sangerhausen on the way, we liked to go to the Rosarium in Sangerhausen, the well-known and worldwide unique rose garden complex (as we had already reported on this).
Several times we had already noticed street signs to the moated castle in the Thuringian town of Heldrungen, which we had not yet followed.