Pictures from Germany

[Andreas]

Since I take my camera with me now and then during my walks with my grandma (she's already 97, but still in good health), I accumulated quite a few nice photos on my HD, so I decided to post some of them here as well. Fall is finally kicking in, and last saturday was quite beautiful weather. I live about one hour south-west part of Frankfurt, Germany, in a wine-growing region called the "Nahe valley", after the Nahe river, which is one of the tributaries to the Rhine river. It's a hilly region with one of the mildest climates in Germany, and where there isn't any agriculture, you'll find lots of forests and such.



This and the following images were shot near Burgsponheim, a village that was founded about 900 years ago, by the counts of Sponheim, which held an independent territory in the Holy Roman Empire that lasted from the 11th to the 19th century. If you look closely, you can spot the ruins of their castle on top of the small hill on the left.



A view to the other side of the trail, which is following a former railway track from Bad Kreuznach to Bockenau, and now used as hiking and bike trail. The hills in the background also hold some vineyards (I'll show more vineyards another time).



Along the track, there once was an orchard, and you can still see some of the old apple trees along the foot of the hill. To my surprisement, most of them didn't have any apples anymore, so it seems that they are still used for apple juice production or something like that.



Fortunately, they left the apples on one tree; the weather was pretty good throughout the year, so the tree is almost bursting with apples.



As I said, fall is finally kicking in, the the green fades away, making place of fiery red cherries in particular.



Another pic with lots of wild cherries, and a beautiful blue sky.



I think this hill was used as vineyard in former times as well, and there are some places where the bushes and trees haven't overgrown the old vines yet.



Another shot with some nice clouds hovering above the hills, some bushes in the foreground that already lost their foliage, and beautiful red cherries in the background again.



Some of the shrubs in the foreground are remainders of said vines, and I really liked the contrast of the red, yellowish and still green trees in the background.



Another part of the slope shows more yellow and orange, again with ancient apple trees in the foreground.

Well, that's it for today, I hope you liked the small tour, more will come soon!

[jmyers2043]

Hey Andreas -

I like the first two photos. Peaceful looking.

[Delecto]

Some beautiful pictures, it's a bit like the place where I live.
I hope you will posts more pictures of this kind. 

Greetings___DEL!

[Xiziz]

Wonderful pictures Andreas, I really enjoyed them. Thanks for sharing.

[Bobbi]

Sehr gut! / Very good!
I like these pictures, they're very beautiful! I haven't seen the sceneries of Germany.

[Earth quake]

Beautiful Pictures.
I love the autumnal colours.

[Andreas]

Thanks, guys! Germany (esp. our region) is quite diverse indeed, so you'll have a lot of different landscapes, some of them very close together. The temperature dropped dramatically over the last two or three days (from around 20°C/70 F to 6°C/45 F), and at the moment, the sun is shining through the clouds now and then, inducing an even more colorful Indian Summer, hopefully. Speaking of Indian Summer, in 2007, there were really great colors at the end of October, so I thought I should show another batch of pics here. I took them on a walk in and around the village where I lived back then (last year, I moved to another village nearby).



As I said in another thread recently, I lived just across the street of my former Elementary school, so I started my walk there, taking a pic of a wonderfully orange cherry tree. When I was in 4th grade, the school got an extension building, and there was one weekend where all parents and kids were invited to plant new trees and bushes, rebuild the greens etc. If I'm not completely mistaken, I helped planting this tree (among others) back in 1989 - quite interesting how well it developed over the last 18 years.



Some birch trees just around the corner. You can easily see that we have western winds most of the time, so the cold air induced a bright yellow in the western (left) tree first, while the others were a bit more protected.



Fiery red again at some Japanese cherries (I think) on the parking lot of a private educational center.



Just outside the village there's a creek running through the valley (it's the same from the valley in the pics above), with the sun shining through the branches, and the ground covered with yellow foliage from a grove of large poplars. It's a very tranquil place, and I remember playing there now and then when I was a kid.



When they built a bypass road around the village in the 90s, they also created a water retention basin in the vicinity. In the background, you can see the aforementioned poplar grove.



Returning to the village, I took the dirt road along the fields, which was also covered with yellow leaves.



There are a couple of allotments along the creek, and the willows were showing bright yellow foliage as well.



A nice contrast between the dark green fir and the bright yellow of this birch tree.



Usually, the oaks just turn brown here, but that year, most of them developed a nice orange color.



There's a narrow trail going up the hill besides the creek, and since the weather was so great, I extended my walk and climbed the hill, surrounded by all kinds of colors again.



A nice combo of yellow, orange, and the occasional green that was left, contrasting with a bright blue sky.



A few trees already lost their foliage, but most of them were still colorful. Unfortunately, just a few days later, we had a series of storms that blew away the leaves completely, so I was lucky to get those shots.



One of the most impressive red that I've seen so far on a cherry tree. The picture doesn't really represent what I've seen there - it was just burning.



More red and orange, in a nearby street close to my home.



A nice garden, almost a small park, around the corner.



The last pic for today, showing our neighbors's birch and maple tree, glowing yellow in the almost setting sun.

[rooker1]

 Those are some great pics Andreas.  My most favourite is the creek in the valley pic, it is very tranquil.  There is a definate calming affect to that pic.  I have saved it and will be making that my desktop for a few weeks.
I would love to see some more, I can never get enough of pics like these.
Robin 

[Badsim]

Hi Andreas ,

Being a true tree addict ( I love them so much that I even can't bear that human feel obliged to prune them ...  )  , thank you for these relaxing wonderful pictures from your country . If you've some others , just let them come in there .

This is maybe not the perfect place for , but have to say that the latest Simfox's trees ( although there're not seasonal ) and CP's trees are fabulous ... we need more trees with that quality for SC4 as they're one of the most essential element of realism .

Cédric .

[Andreas]

Usually, we don't get a whole lot of snow in winter, but this year, temperatures were below zero since the end of 2009, and amazingly enough, some 10 cm of snow fell in this area, and didn't melt away after one or two days, as usual. I was going for a walk today through the village and took my camera with me, so please enjoy the pictures below.



Some allotment gardens in the vicinity, with a nice set of wooden benches and table in front of a wooden shack.



One of those "I'm renovating this old house, but it's not quite finished yet" guys, having some construction equipment in the yard since years.



The protestant church on a hill, with a vineyard in the foreground. It's one of the landmarks of the village.



Climbing the hill up to the church, there are some nice trees, which I always liked.



Behind the church, there's a playground that I frequented quite often as a kid, when I spent the summer with my grandma. The trees surely have grown quite a bit there!



Looking back to the church. The fog that fills the are since a few days has started to turn the trees into some nice white shades.



Some kids were enjoying the snow, riding on plastic bags. I wonder if kids today still have proper toboggans, like we used to have in our childhood.



Back in the village, there are some nice old mansions, almost little chateaus with those turrets.



The town hall, painted in a bright yellow.



The catholic church in the center of the village, another local landmark.



The upper floor with the rows of windows looks quite nice with all those icicles



One of the snow-covered gardens, and a funny "Attention, cat!" sign.

[alj]

Very nice pictures, thanks for showing.

Some kids were enjoying the snow, riding on plastic bags. I wonder if kids today still have proper toboggans, like we used to have in our childhood.

They do! I went out to a city park last Sunday and the hill in its center was packed with children. Some used those plastic stuff for riding, but many had old school wooden toboggans.