Pictures from Germany - The Roemisches Freilichtmuseum

Hello from the lobby (where free Wi-Fi connection is available!) of the Holiday Inn Express in Singen am Hohentwiel, Germany. We came down this afternoon by train from Reutlingen, arriving at about 2:40 PM, checked into the hotel, spent the rest of the afternoon and early evening with Agnes's parents, and are now catching up with the world before we head to bed.

Last Friday we visited the Roemisches Freilichtmuseum (Roman Open-Air Museum) in the town of Hechingen-Stein ... as I wrote in Saturday's brief post, it's a reconstruction of a first-century Roman town that once stood on the site, and is utterly fascinating. The site was discovered in the early 1970's, and the archaeological study and reconstruction of the town are still ongoing. Here are a few pictures:

This is a view of the main villa, mostly reconstructed, from the front:

On most of the site, the reconstruction consists at this point mainly of partially-rebuilt wall lines, as you can see in these two photos ...

And,

This picture shows how the Romans heated the stone and tile floors of some of the buildings ... furnaces in various locations around the site heated air that circulated under the false floors to warm the stones ...

Inside the main villa, several rooms have been reconstructed as displays to show how life was lived in the time of the Romans. I, of course, especially liked the kitchen display ...

Also interesting was this display, showing a combination office and lady's sitting room ...

Agnes's cousin Anna was serving as our tour guide, and took a picture of us with the Roman spokesmodel for disarmament, ha, ha ...

And, of course, being an old guy who always makes sure he knows where the next bathroom is, I managed to find the latrine ...

You can't see it very well on the picture, but this is actually an ingenious arrangement that diverted running water from a nearby pond through channels that carried waste away from the settlement.

On the whole, a historical site well worth visiting if you ever find yourself in the area.

And now it's bedtime. Tomorrow, I'll try to post some pictures of our visit to the beautiful university town of Tuebingen.

Have a good ... uh ... night. More travel reportage tomorrow.

Bilbo