All night it has been pouring rain and thunder and lightning, I was so scared I curled up real close to Mom and was shaking. Mom felt so sorry for me so she held me tight despite it getting very hot.

It's 8 am now and it looks like it's clearing up in some directions, I hope we're going that way, but according to Mom we really need to start heading North now......................ok

To continue from yesterday..................

The Heidelberg castle is a ruin and landmark. The castle ruins are among the most important Renaissance structures north of the Alps.

The castle has only been partially rebuilt since its demolition in the 17th and 18th centuries. It is located 80 meters (260 ft) up the northern part of the Königsthul hillside and thereby dominates the view of the old downtown. It is served by an intermediate station on the funicular railway that runs from Heidelberg's Kornmarkt to the summit of the Königstuhl. We paid 8 Euros to ride up and was told walk into the castle was included, but it wasn't.

This guy also wanted money to show us around and got a little annoyed that Mom took his picture

That ticked Mom off, since they wanted more money to get into the courtyard, and an additional ticket to get inside. That was a ripoff, so we didn't bother. Besides it was too hot to really walk around anyway.   

The view of the city from here was pretty cool.  

so many awesome looking houses on the hillsides, they must be rather hazardous to get to in the winter I think, and having to run down to get something from the supermarket that you forgot, aren't done so easily either

The earliest castle structure was built before 1214 and later expanded into two castles circa 1294; however, in 1537, a lightning-bolt destroyed the upper castle. The present structures had been expanded by 1650, before damage by later wars and fires. In 1764, another lightning bolt caused a fire which destroyed some rebuilt sections. See so much lightning in this area, of course, I'm afraid.

Mom zoomed in at some balconies that she would like to have her afternoon tea......................not sure we'll get invited, but they do look real neat    this is her first choice

top balcony here is pretty good too, we could have supper there in the evening and watch the sunset over the mountain.........

Next, we went for a boat trip on the river. The boat was solar powered so no fumes or noise. Kapten Karl was very proud of his ship.

The advertisement for this trip showed some great open sandwiches and since it was lunch time Mom was looking forward to that. Now we found out that was only for groups of 20 or more ? ???

Oh well, Mom ordered a beer anyway ? I'm confused, she never does that at home ? maybe it's because ordering a beer is a sentence she knows fluently in German.......

This is a dream car Mom says, or at least she thinks so. She circled it several times and just ooh and aaah, not yodeling thank you very much. 

we passed this window and Mom just stood there salivating, but was good and didn't buy anything. 

As a matter of fact she hasn't bought anything at all ? no souvenir ? strange I thought.  

so it's time to say goodbye to Heidelburg and return to Ladenburg. it's 12 kilometers about 7,5 miles, not far but deadly in this heat........(34 C and 95 F)

Anybody interested in reading more about Heidelberg here's a link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heidelberg

The ride home was tough, it's through miles of fields and no shade at all. Our water bottles were getting warm and didn't stop the thirst.

corn, wheat and tomatoes on huge fields on both sides of our path

This is what I call a duplex, a couple on each end, no stork in sight, maybe he got evicted

here's a pretty cool mural in town...........

ok so it's almost 9 am now, and it's time to attach the bike to Lucy and get our stuff together and continue our trip..................to where ? I have no clue, and the funny thing is, neither does Mom 

take care all

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