Sinsheim Auto & Technik Museum

This blog entry takes a rather different tack from my normal entries.  We were planning on heading to Ulm to see the world's tallest cathedral and the birthplace of Albert Einstein.  We got a little sidetracked.  Heading south on the autobahn, we approached the city of Sinsheim.  I remembered Elder Dye, the Area Medical Advisor telling about this place.  On the spur of the moment, we decided to have a look and ended up spending the whole day there.
In brief, this city has what must be one of the most comprehensive exhibits of planes, jets, military equipment, automobiles, tractors, trains, motorcycles, racing cars, bicycles and other various and sundry mechanized machinery every collected in one place.  The exhibit covered acres and most of it was indoors with the exception of the planes and military equipment.   They claim in their literature that it is the only place where both a Concorde and a Russian supersonic jet Tupolev Tu- 144  are displayed together. The story of how they got them there alone is quite intriguing. This link has a good cross section of the scope and variety of the exhibits.
Of course, I enjoyed the tractor exhibits.  Those who know me know my penchant for tractors.  The museum would appeal to most everyone, although Arendje did not rank this day trip very high.  It reminded me of the day  we took in an Easter egg exhibit. This I thought was a fair trade.

There were old cars, new cars, fast cars, i.e Lamborghini's and Ferrari's, luxury cars, mini cars, classics, and specialty cars and a few one of a kind automobiles.  German ingenuity and craftsmanship was apparent in the design and features of the the
older automobiles particularly.  Mercedes Benz,  Porsche and other reputable names were well
 represented in the displays.  Many collectors obviously stored their vehicles there.

Spread throughout the 30 thousand square meters of exhibit space were huge train engines, some of which
seemed too big to fit on any track.  Outside was a large collection of military armaments, including tanks, heavy artillery, troop carriers and missile launchers.  Inside were smaller military vehicles, communication devices, examples of every conceivable uniform, guns and personal supplies.  If a picture is worth a thousand words then a lot of books worth of information is contained in this museum.

We took the scenic route back to Frankfurt.  We stopped in a little town of Bad Wimpfen, climbed one of the 12the century city gates and enjoyed a spectacular view of this quaint medieval town.  Every four or five kilometers there is another village or town and many of them warrant a visit.  Each has its appeal, from  the cobblestone streets, to the half timbered houses to the rustic city gates.  The mix of old and new is somehow harmoniously maintained through careful planning and preservation.  You have to love those Germans!