A sunny Day in Metzingen – Jan 15, 2006
Metzingen has a whole lot to see: the old and the new. So we started out with the historic Keltern, I think it is easy to say, that it is not only a cool place but also that the Metzinger liked the wine.

The place of the 7 wine presses (Keltern) first mentioned in 1281, the old press is still in one of the buildings. In the old days they were all open buildings, made to protect the presses.5 of them burned down in the 30 year war and got rebuilt in 1700.

 
 Outlet center:
From here we went by some old historic buildings to the New Outlet center sections: where we wondered who wants to get the new rusty pants

 Martinskirche 
 today we also stopped at this 1500 century church. One of the interesting parts is that it was built as a defense church (Wehrkirche) and still has part of the old defense wall left.

 Marketplace
From there we went on to the town hall (1668): at the marketplace and the fountain. If we would take the time and would close at the wood carvings (1913) we maybe could make out the trades of the town.

 Wasserwerk
(water pumping plant): most of the time we see it only on the drive by… a really amazing brick building.


 
 Visiting Maggi on the Schoenblick – Jan 29, 2006
On this cold winter day we decided to visit Maggi on the Schoenblick in Schwaebisch Gmuend.

Covered Bridge
On the way we came by one of those covered bridges: so we had to stop and check it out.

Then we arrived ready for lunch with friends of Maggi.

And now we go and explore the grounds:

• The Schoenblick is a Christian guesthouse from the Altpietistischer Gemeinschaftsverband
• In 1914 they had the idea of the Christian guesthouse,
• Soon they added a house for children vacation, and today after renovation it's an old-folks home
• In 1924 they added a house for the youth
• Today you can come us guest for relaxing, they have different programs for youth to elderly in all kind of areas: music, preaching, bible studies or actually relaxing and taking a break from everyday life
  

Maggi works here with kids and teenagers, and today we walked around the grounds, so the nice forest, went up in the cool little tower, had a glimpse in the large kitchen and eating areas… so part of the big construction site and enjoyed the view on the valley below. 

 
 Glems & Glemser Stausee – Feb 19, 2006
After 2 weeks with always one of us sick, it’s time we go out again. So today we went to the little town of Glems – which is explored in roughly 5 Minutes when you think about the touristy interested spots in this little 1000 population town.

The most interesting part about this little town is likely that during the 30year war, the Glems people ploughed the roads leading to the town and so it never got found.


 And from there to the Glemser Stausee: Paul was not so sure if he thinks what the Germans do is really that smart. Because during the night when no-one uses electricity: they use the electricity to pump the water from the lower (in Glems) lake up to the upper lake on the Alb. During the Day when it’s peak time - where a lot of electricity is needed, they let the water down and the turbines make some additional electricity.
But we checked out some of the old turbines and it was fun to climb on them.

 German Shelters
We found a little shelter place… like they have it often around the area here and look kind of cute.