The best running trails around Speyer

The administrative building comprises three floors, which initially housed meeting rooms, card index rooms, and filing facilities for both the insurance company and the arbitration court located there. Apartments for the board of directors and the caretaker were also built on the second floor. The entrance portal on Maximilianstrasse features the Palatia as a niche figure and bore the Bavarian coat of arms until World War II. The facade is adorned with ornamentation, with the central section of the building and the third floor set back. This design is typical of Viennese aristocratic palaces of the Neo-Baroque period. The allegorical figures on pedestals on the third floor represent youth and diligence, industry, agriculture and farming, and old age. These were crafted from French Savonnières stone by the sculptor Gustav Adolf Bernd. The mansard roof is topped with a gable and balcony facing the cathedral.

Helmut Kohl had a close relationship with Speyer. Around the time of the reunification negotiations, he lured the entire political elite to his Palatinate province, treated them to Palatinate Saumagen (stuffed pig's stomach), showed them "his" Speyer Cathedral, and skillfully convinced them of Germany's harmlessness. Opinions about Kohl may certainly differ, but his lasting achievement lies in having seized the opportunity presented by history at the right moment and pushed through reunification. Unfortunately, his grave does little to reflect his significance. It lies rather inconspicuously in a small park near the train station. The unassuming wooden cross was recently replaced by a strangely oversized sandstone block that looks like an empty monument pedestal.

Schöner's townhouse in Speyer

A beautiful walking and cycling path along the Woogbach with lots of greenery and shade, also great for walks in the summer when it is particularly hot in Speyer.

The Woogbach, known as the Nonnenbach in its lower reaches, is a 9 km long river in Rhineland-Palatinate and a left tributary of the Speyerbach, from which it draws its water and into which it flows. - from Wiki

Still a wooden cross!

The grave of former German Chancellor and former Minister-President of Rhineland-Palatinate, Dr. Helmut Kohl, is located in the cemetery of the cathedral chapter in Speyer. Since it is a private grave, the bereaved must ask themselves why the grave decorations overgrow the cross with the personal information. The reference to the grave at the gate to the cemetery will likely become obsolete sooner or later, as everything will then be hidden. Kohl certainly had something different in mind when he described "Blossoming Landscapes."

The final resting place of the former Chancellor, who died on June 16, 2017 at the age of 87, is a temporary arrangement. The condition of the grave continues to provoke public debate. Kohl's eldest son, Walter, renewed his criticism, calling the fenced-in grave "shameful, absurd, and undignified" for the former Chancellor, CDU chairman, and European statesman. Kohl's sons, Walter and Peter, accuse his widow, Maike Kohl-Richter, the estate administrator, of failing to properly care for the grave. Their relationship is considered strained. Time will tell whether the current situation will remain.