I woke up early on Saturday and couldn’t get back to sleep, so I decided to take a spontaneous trip somewhere. I arrived at Karlsruhe train station with no real plan in mind, checked the board and decided to jump on a train to Bruchsal that was about to leave. Technically, I’ve been to Bruchsal before, but only to the castle so I had no idea what the town itself was like. I knew it wasn’t that big though, so I thought it would be the perfect place for wandering around by myself. In a proper city, I would only go and get myself lost! At Bruchsal train station, I had a quick look at a map, made a note of the general direction of the town centre then was on my way. Here are a few photos:
After about 45 minutes of walking around, I found myself at the castle. As I said earlier, I’ve been there before, so I didn’t go inside. There are some pretty interesting exhibits in there though – including the Deutsches Musikautomaten-Museum (German Museum of Mechanical Musical Instruments) and an exhibition showing the history of Bruchsal from the Stone Age until now . I had a quick wander around the grounds, took some photos, then headed back to the station where a train was conveniently waiting for me to jump straight on!
In terms of tourism, Bruchsal isn’t actually all that interesting. There are some nice looking streets and a few parks, but the main attraction really is the castle. Once you’ve seen that, there isn’t actually a great deal to do. I definitely wouldn’t come from further afield specifically to visit Bruchsal! It was good enough for my purposes though – not too far from Karlsruhe and it got me out of the house for a few hours. I didn’t want to stay out for too long in case there was any word from England, so this gave me the perfect opportunity to explore a place that I didn’t really know without going too far away from home. If you’re ever in the area with an hour or so to spare, I would certainly recommend visiting the castle.
Confuzzledom 
How spontaneous of you 🙂
😉
It always amazed me how many German towns were mostly unremarkable – save for one castle or church or adorable town square. Cool that you take the time to check out these off-the-beaten-track places!
I love visiting cute little towns/villages. Bruchsal is actually quite large compared to some of the places I’ve been!
Yes, Germany has more than its share of cute towns and villages! When I spent a semester in Giessen while at university, my German friends in the dormitory always gave me a bit of a hard time about some of my daytrips — Was gibt’s denn in Gruenberg?!?, but I think they were just jealous of me getting out and doing stuff like that while they spent too much time studying! 😉 And this reminds me that I need to get out and do more exploring in my area – life has gotten to be too full of errands and chores nowadays…
I wish I was able to just jump on a train and go explore somewhere, sounds fun even if the city ends up not being too exciting.
It was quite fun… although it might have been nicer if I wasn’t alone.
Lovely place. There are certainly worse places to waste away a few hours!
My au pair family’s golf club was there, so I’ve only been to the golf course and seen the palace of the train. I love your spontaneity though. I definitely would have sat around at home and been lame.
I have to admit, I was also motivated by not wanting my February trip to be spending time next to my grandpa’s hospital bed!
It sounds like a nice day trip even if there isn’t loads to do.
Glad you had a nice time! I love spontaneous trips!
It sounds like the kind of spontaneous trip that you needed – a bit of a tonic. Have been thinking of you, and think you’re doing a great job at a difficult time. xXx
Thank you. We’ve now been told he could go on in his current state for weeks… it would almost be easy if he could just go quickly. All the waiting for the inevitable is almost worse than knowing it’s over xx
I agree. When my father was in the hospice it was hard to watch him like that, even though we all treasured that time, we also did not want it to be too prolonged for everyone concerned. I still wish I had more time with him, but am happy he did not have to endure everything for too long – the odd paradox of losing a loved one. Sending you hugs xXx
I’ve never done an impromptu trip like that – it must be fun!
Nice photos! A spontaneous trip can be interesting at times! I hope the day out helped to clear your head. Must be so difficult for you. Thinking of you xx