Greatest centre of Carolingian art

Our first city of the few planned on this long weekend taking advantage of the bank holiday in England and therefore coming to this region for 3 full days. At only 60 kilometres south of Frankfurt, our base, Lorsch was just matter of few minutes drive here and starting point for this day to some other cities later on farther south: Speyer and Maulbronn. Because all of them are small, very compact and so easy to visit, it makes a good idea to combine them all together in a same trip, especially if you have your own transportation as a rental car to get there and in between, however it is not mandatory, all three cities are very well connected one to another and to Frankfurt; and of course, with the larger cities of Heidelberg and Mannheim.

Driving there from Frankfurt we did also took the chance for sparing few minutes in Darmstadt to admire one of the greatest constructions from genius architect Friedensreich Regentag Dunkelbunt Hundertwasser, better known as simply Hundertwasser. This is the “Forest Spiral” (Waldspirale). That was a nice addition to the already large collection of his buildings we’ve visited, especially in Vienna, his hometown.

Lorsch importance resumes in its Carolingian Abbey, one of the most important of that era in the country, where most of the Carolingian kings of Germany were buried there. Nowadays lying in ruins bearing the main entrance hall and part of a small chapel, however even with this little remaining, it is listed a World Heritage Site by the UNESCO. The tiny old town is to the west of the Abbey, only few streets centred around the timber-framed building of the old City Hall. It is a nice and relaxed walk through the cobblestone streets, but other than this there is nothing else to do nor see, and not much more of importance to say in this brief introduction to the city. Calculate 2 hours maximum here, and this is overestimating the time. (more…)