The Heidelberg Castle

The history of this castle dates back to the 13th century, as the oldest walls discovered on the premises date to that time. No documents tell us who exactly started building up there. It was the main residence of the Princes of the Palatine, a branch of the powerful Wittelsbach family of Bavaria. In the year 1693 the castle was destroyed by the troops of the French King Louis XIV who thought he could claim this realm in the name of the wife of his brother Phillipe de Orleans, the Heidelberg Princess Elisabeth Charlotte. Our Last Prince Karl Theodor tried to rebuild this ruin but unfortunately the rebuilt building was struck by lightning and burned again. The castle ruin became the focus of interest of the romantic poets in the middle of the 19th century, and a wealthy french artist, Charles de Graimberg protected the ruin from the people of the city who were using this ruin as a welcome quarry to fetch builting material. Mark Twain, living in a hotel near the castle,wrote about Heidelberg in his books "A Tramp abroad" and Innocents Abroad". The Romantic poets and painters immortalized the castle and town in poems, pictures and songs and transforming Heidelberg into one of the leading cities of the romantic movement. Eventually one building was reconstructed around the turn of the century. On full moon nights you will meet lots of young couples sipping champagne and looking down on the lights of the city and falling in love with each other. Every year we have some 3 milllion visitors coming to Heidelberg and staying in one of the many Hotels and Guesthouses here and the castle is usually the first place visited by them and our main attraction. In Summertime we got Open Air performances on the castle grounds - a real treat if the weather is right - like for example "The Student Prince" a romantic musical presented every year.

The old part of Town

The old part of town is a lively place as you can see on the picture. This is our main street, our big shopping street almost 2 kilometers long, full of shops, restaurants, bars, coffeeshops and full of people of all age groups. Heidelberg has the oldest University of Germany, founded 1386. We have some 30.000 students at the moment enrolled in the university studying everything except engineering. Our medical faculty and the science faculties are very well known throughout the world. At all times of the day you will find people strolling along the pedestrian zone, the longest one in Germany - uninterupted by traffic. During your tour you will visit parts of the old part of town depending on the time frame available to you. We mainly show the Market square, as there we got the most important buildings of the city, the Church of the Holy Spirit, the Town Hall and the House of the Knight St. George , the only renaisance building in town. A lot more can be visited, for example the Jesuit church, the University buildings, the Student Jail, the House of Friedrich Ebert and many other museums and sights which can be included in a tour depending on how much time you've got. As local guides we are booked for the time involved, 2 - 3 - 4 - or more hours, as long as you need us. Usually a tour involves visiting the Castle ( a minimum time of 1 hour is needed for this) and the Town (minimum one hour needed too). As this involves walking ... and in Germany we do walk a lot... a minimum tour is 2 hours.

You choose how much time you would like to spend at the castle or the town, there is so much to be seen.

Bookings can be done directly as I work freelance and am my own boss, so just Copy and paste the email adress below and write me an email and ask if I have time for your group. If I am already busy I will send you a substitute, one of our colleagues, also official guides of Heidelberg like myself.

A more relaxed tour is 3 hours long, which is the choice most of my customers make.