Worms

After Mainz I met up with a friend and we spent some time in Frankfurt and had dinner there.  We had a great time, no pics though.  The next day I drove to Worms because I was interested in a few historical places there.

Worms is the city where the Diet was held concerning Martin Luther's theses.  I wanted to see the local cathedral and the statue dedicated to Martin Luther.  I loved Worms, the town was so nice and easy to get around in.  I stopped at the cathedral first but they were in the middle of services and I didn't was to go in as a tourist.  I got some pics of the outside.  But first the man himself:

Here's the cathedral:

After that I walked down the street to the Heiliger Sand which is the Jewish Cemetery in Worms and the oldest surviving Jewish cemetery in Europe, the oldest legible tombstone dates to 1076.  Since it was Sunday, the cemetery was closed but I got some pics from the outside.  It looked really peaceful in there:

After the cemetery I found Martin Luther's monument.  It was really impressive!

While I was taking pictures it started drizzling.  Next thing I know an umbrella appears over my head!  I turn around and this really nice elderly German man was holding the umbrella over me.  He started talking and I tried to explain that I didn't speak German very well.  Undeterred he kept talking and I caught just a few words from every sentence.  From what I could tell he liked Martin Luther and thought that what he did was good for the church, even though many people didn't like it.  He was also very proud to be be a German.  He was very nice and we parted ways for the rest of the day.  I'd love to go back to Worms again.  The city was great and apparently the people are very friendly!

Mainz

I had a long weekend and ended up spending some time in Mainz.  I loved the city and had a great time there.  It is the birthplace of Gutenberg who invented movable type and revolutionized printing.  I think printing is a pretty cool process so I wanted to check out the Gutenberg museum.

Here is the legend himself:

The Gutenberg museum was awesome and much more involved then I initially expected.  I would absolutely recommend it to anyone.  The even had 4 original Gutenberg bible is a vault in the museum, it was neat to see them and incredible how well they had been preserved!  I wasn't able to take too many pictures at the museum before being told they weren't allowed but here are a few (by they way, I didn't see any signs posted...oops!)

Here is a recreation of the press, you can see the movable type in the background

Here is a close up of the movable type you can see on the press above:

 The type in the background from above:

 I also went to the cathedral in Mainz which was beautiful!  They had a museum in the cathedral of Roman artifacts but pictures in the museum were not allowed (they told me ahead of time!)

Finally I went to the Mainz art museum which was really nice.  They had a special exhibit on the history of the shoe which was interesting.  I couldn't take pictures inside but here is the outside:

Mainz was a great town with a ton to do.  It is high on my recommendation list!

The Autobahn

One of the things I love most about living over here is the Autobahn.  It is one of the most pleasant driving experiences I have ever had in my life.  It's going to be really had to come back to America and only do 70 on the Interstate and have to watch out for people blatantly disregarding traffic laws.  Contrary to popular belief there are actually posted speed limits on the Autobahn, the average being 130kph or about 80mph.

Some of these speed limits are suggestions, meaning if you are involved in an accident doing over that then you are held at least partially liable even if the accident wasn't your fault.  There are also some areas where the limit is obviously much lower for safety considerations.  If you do 100mph though some sections your car may end up doing a 200 yard nose grind though a vineyard.

I love the Autobahn, it's not nearly as hair raising as I first thought it would be.  What is turning my hair gray is city driving with those narrow roads, tons of curves, and poorly marked roads!