Germany

Germany is situated in Western-Central Europe with its borders shared by Austria, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Poland, Switzerland, Denmark, Belgium France and the Czech Republic.

With Berlin as its capital the Federal Republic of Germany is divided into 16 states throughout which the landscape varies considerably, the west featuring the Black Forest, the Rhine and Bavaria. The east boasts many lakes, hilly lowlands and mountain ranges.

Germany has a rich heritage of history, nature and fine arts, its past of turmoil and conflict has left the country with a strong idealistic principles contrasting with its high academic trends, found in the historic university cities such as Heidelberg.

Visit the Berlin Wall Museum at Checkpoint Charlie, where the history of Germany came to a turn point with the fall of the barriers between the east and west.

The towns of Bamberg, Lübeck and Goslar are classified as architectural heritage sites by the UNESCO World Heritage, while the charming island of Mainau on Lake Constance is scattered with historic buildings, multicolored roofs and flower decorations.

The climate is temperate throughout the country with warm summers and cold winters, but prolonged periods of frost or snow are rare. Rain falls throughout the year.

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    Quedlinburg Abbey

    Quedlinburg Abbeywas a house of secular canonesses (Frauenstift) in Quedlinburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It was founded in 936 on the initiative of Saint Mathilda, the widow of Henry the Fowler, as his memorial. For many centuries it enjoyed great prestige and influence.

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    Rammelsberg

    The Rammelsberg is a mountain, 635 metres (2,083 ft) high, on the northern edge of the Harz range, south of the historic town of Goslar in the North German state of Lower Saxony.

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    Reichenau Island

    Reichenau Island is an island in Lake Constance in southern Germany. It lies between Gnadensee and Untersee, two parts of Lake Constance, almost due west of the city of Konstanz. The island is connected to the mainland by a causeway that was completed in 1838. The causeway is intersected between the site of the former castle Schopflen and the eastern end of Reichenau Island by the 10-metre-wide Bruckgraben, a waterway which is spanned by a low road bridge that allows passage of ordinary boats but not of sailboats through its 95-metre course.

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    Roman Bridge, Trier

    The Roman Bridge is an ancient structure in Trier, Germany, over the Moselle. It is the oldest standing bridge in the country. The nine bridge pillars date from the 2nd century AD. The upper part was renewed twice, in the early 12th and in the early 18th century, after suffering destruction in war. It is designated as part of the Roman Monuments, Cathedral of St. Peter and Church of Our Lady in Trier UNESCO World Heritage Site.

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    Roman Fort, Welzheim

    The Eastern Fort in Welzheim was built during the second century AD and inhabited by Roman soldiers of the Ala Scubulorum.The town was home to two forts at this time but not much remains today of the much bigger Western Fort as the town has been built on top of it.

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    Rudesheim am Rhein

    Rudesheim am Rhein is a winemaking town in the Rhine Gorge and thereby part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site. It lies in the Rheingau-Taunus-Kreis district in the Regierungsbezirk of Darmstadt in Hesse, Germany.

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    Saalburg (Roman fort)

    The Saalburg is a Roman fort located on the Taunus ridge northwest of Bad Homburg, Hesse, Germany. It is a Cohort Fort belonging to the Limes Germanicus, the Roman linear border fortification of the German provinces.

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    Sanssouci Palace

    Sanssouci is the former summer palace of Frederick the Great, King of Prussia, in Potsdam, near Berlin. It is often counted among the German rivals of Versailles.

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    Schillerpark Settlement (Siedlung Schillerpark), Berlin

    The Schillerpark Settlement was the first metropolitan housing project in Berlin during the Weimar Republic. Taut's urban planning reflects modern Dutch architecture, particularly the work of Jakobus Johannes Pieter Oud. His choice of materials also reflects the brick buildings of Amsterdam.

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    Side Portal of the Roman North Gate of CCAA

    This gate of the Roman city (Colonia Claudia Ara Agrippinensium) was built around 50 AD when the city was founded. The side portal was rebuilt above the remains of the city gate and wall in 1971.

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    Speicherstadt, Hamburg

    The Speicherstadt in Hamburg, Germany is the largest warehouse district in the world where the buildings stand on timber-pile foundations, oak logs, in this particular case. It is located in the port of Hamburg—within the HafenCity quarter—and was built from 1883 to 1927.

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    Speyer Cathedral

    The Speyer Cathedral, officially the Imperial Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption and St Stephen, in Speyer, Germany, is the seat of the Roman Catholic Bishop of Speyer and is suffragan to the Archdiocese of Bamberg.

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    St. Mary's Cathedral (Hildesheim Cathedral), Hildesheim

    Hildesheim Cathedral, officially the Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary, is a medieval Catholic cathedral in Hildesheim, Germany, that has been on the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage list since 1985, together with the nearby St. Michael's Church.

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    St. Michael's Church, Hildesheim

    The Church of St. Michael is an early-Romanesque church in Hildesheim, Germany. It has been on the UNESCO World Cultural Heritage list since 1985. It is now a Lutheran church.

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    Stahlberg Castle Ruins

    The Stahlberg Castle is a ruined castle in a side spur on a mountain spur above the hamlet Steeg the city Bacharach, Mainz-Bingen district in Rhineland-Palatinate.

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    Stolzenfels Castle

    Stolzenfels Castle is a castle or palace near Koblenz on the left bank of the Rhine, in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Stolzenfels was a ruined 13th-century castle, gifted to the Prussian Crownprince, Frederick William in 1823.

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    Tiefurt Mansion (Castle) and Park

    Built in 1765 as a tenement house for a grand ducal demesne, the building served from 1776 as the residence of Prince Friedrich Ferdinand Constantin, the younger brother of the reigning Duke Carl August of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach.

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    Town Hall (Rathaus), Lemgo

    Lemgo city hall is listed as a piece of European Union artwork on the UNESCO list 1 for good reason. Its facades have maintained their appearance over the course of many hundreds of years (from 1325).

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    Town Hall, Goslar

    The Goslar Town Hall is, indeed, a building of the centuries: the east wing with the arcades opening onto the Market Square was begun in the middle of the 15th century and over the following 400 years the Town Hall was continually extended and enlarged.

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    Trier

    Trier, formerly known in English as Treves, is a city in Germany on the banks of the Moselle. Trier lies in a valley between low vine-covered hills of red sandstone in the west of the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, near the border with Luxembourg and within the important Moselle wine region.

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    Villa Rustica, Bingen am Rhein

    Villa rustica (countryside villa) was the term used by the ancient Romans to denote a villa set in the open countryside, often as the hub of a large agricultural estate (latifundium).

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    Volklingen Ironworks

    The Volklingen Ironworks (German: Völklinger Hütte) is located in the German town of Volklingen, Saarland. In 1994, it was declared by UNESCO as a World Heritage site.

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    Wadden Sea

    The Wadden Sea is an intertidal zone in the southeastern part of the North Sea. It lies between the coast of northwestern continental Europe and the range of Frisian Islands, forming a shallow body of water with tidal flats and wetlands.