Kempten Things to Do

Kempten is the base for the motorsports team of Abt Sportsline, a very successful participant of the international DTM racing competition (German Touringcar Championship). You can visit a museum at their office where they show racing cars and other objects related to motorsports. It is very impressive.
The exhibition is for free and highly recommendable if you are interested in car racing.

In the Kornhaus, close to the Residenz in downtown Kempten, you can visit the Allgäu museum which covers many aspects of the life in the region Allgäu. You will hear about old professions, get an idea of the life close to the mountains and in the city, understand how the Allgäu has changed in the past centuries. There are several clocks to admire.

In Kempten you will find the Alpine Museum which is a subsidiary of the Bavarian National Museum in Munich. It covers many aspects of mountains from their role in religion over transport, cartography, nature to mountain climbing and skiing.

In the lowest floor you will find a permanent exhibition about local sacral wood works and paintings. Here Jesus on his donkey is my favorite.

In the archeological parc in Kempten you can visit three different location, which are located close to eachother. Two you have to pay for (roman bath and temple district) and one is for free (forum foundations).

The roman bath has been a very important spot in the daily life of the founders of the old Kempten, the romans. The town was called Cambodunum at that time and inhabited an estimated amount of 3000 people. The bath was a central meeting point, not only because of the bath itself, but because here were toilets with flowing water. People had no private toilets at that time.
Visiting the bath you will get an insight of the bath culture of the romans (also on a world wide focus), see how advanced the architecture was and feel the roots of the nowadays Kempten.

1. May - 31. October: 10:00 - 17:00
1. November - 30. April: 10:00 - 16:30

Mid December to Mid March closed.

The bath can be found on google maps, it is the large grey roof close to the marker...

Archaeologists consider Kempten one of the oldest urban settlements in Germany, it was probably home to the Celts originally and then taken over by the Romans. The Archaeological Park is across the River Iller from the old town of Kempten.

The park is quite large and features three sections of history. The first is a Gallo Roman Temple District from the original Roman settlement, with partial reconstruction. The next is the Small Thermae, part of the Roman governor’s palace. The third section is part of the original Forum and Market Basilica from the Roman town. This Roman town was known as Cambodunum.

4 more images

We found ourselves in Kempten on a very warm Sunday morning in May. Couldn't go into the church because they were having Mass; too early to eat; missed the tour at the Residenz so we decided to go for a walk. There was no traffic and few people. Guess they were all at Mass.

We wandered the town, through parks, down past the Rathaus on to the river Iller. We walked up Baker's Street and loved it all. The stores have signs that are little works of art. The streets were incredibly clean. The windows had lovely lace curtains. It was all completely perfect.

We did finally get back and get into the church, took our tour of the Residenz and had lunch at a beer garden and people appeared on the streets and in the cafes but it was a delightful time to take a morning walk.

2 more images

Our hotel gave us a map of Kempten which had a walk around the town clearly marked. The weather was cold and snowing but we gave it our best shot, a few refreshment stops on the way.
Here's a few photos of our afternoon.

The Corn Warehouse was built around 1700, with baroque façade and three-storey Volute gables serves today as a festival hall and is seat of the Allgäu Museum with arts vault. An extra attraction is the curved fountain to the front of the building.