Karlsruhe Local Customs

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Once a year all museums in town stay open till late at night and offer special events, guided tours, food and drink, music and party. This is a big thing in town, expect everything to be extremely crowded. If you want to attend a certain event, come early.
Badisches Landesmuseum and Naturhistorisches Museum are most of all renowned for inspiration and ideas. The funniest idea the museum of natural history had so far are the cockroach races (with betting!) which are done every year.

The KaMuNa button is the entrance ticket for everything and is also valid on public transport. The button is sold for € 8 in advance, € 10 during the evening (concessions: 2 € less).

The usual date is the first Saturday in August. All details on the website (in German).

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Karlsruhe has a fantastic recycling program in place. They have receptacles for brown glass, white glass, green glass, plastic containers, even batteries. As I was walking around town admiring the environmental efforts of the local citizens I realised I had some paper I wanted to throw away. Then the trouble started! In some areas of the city just try and find a normal place to throw away your paper! I walked about 3 kilometres before I found somewhere to thro my humble piece of paper.

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Before you read this sign and think some one is using cross or inappropriate language – they aren’t. Blumen means flowers and Ecke means corner of the street. Its actually a small florist on – you guessed it – the corner of the street where my hotel was.

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This meeting is a local custom created some years ago by some VTers living in Karlsruhe area. The first Gluehwein VT Meeting was held in 2004. I attended this meeting last month and I enjoyed it much.

The Gluehwein VT meeting includes a visit to the Christmas market in Karlsruhe, a dinner and a daytrip from the city.

If you are interested to it have a look at the "meeting and events" page. Usually this meeting is planned at the end of november or at the beginning of december.

Flammkuchen is a snack that comes from the Alsace region in France. It's pretty much dough rolled very thin, with creme fraiche, onions and bacon, baked in a wood-fired oven. There's a sweet variation too, with apples and cinnamon but I think you can use almost anything as topping. I tried the salty one and it was good (after removing the onions from it) and crunchy.

A recipe for Flammkuchen can be found at Cookbook @ Wikipedia.

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Glühwein is a hot mulled wine drink that you will find in any Christmas market in Karlsruhe (and Heidelberg and probably all over the country). The drink is based on red wine and spices like cinnamon, cloves and citrus (the recipe depends on who makes it) and you can even buy little bags of Glühwein spices to make your own at home =) Glühwein reminded me of the Nordic "glögg" and vino moscatel from my home land (although we drink it cold or at room temperature).

Eierpunsch is another yummy hot drink that I drank in Bretten and Durlach. It reminds of eggnog, but it's creamier and they sell it with extra whipped cream on top. I liked it very much, which is weird because I don't like eggnog (the home country has something similar, also a tradition in Christmas time, called "Ponche Crema de Oro".)

In both cases, the drinks are quite cheap and once you're done with the mug you can get some money back by returning it (I think I got 2 euros back), but if you wanna keep it nobody will tell you not to - since you already paid for it when you paid for the drink and it makes for a nice, useful and unique souvenir, as they make new mugs every year.

What a way to keep warm!!!!

From end of november until just before Christmas there is the annual Christmas Market on the marketplace. You'll find a lot of stalls there where you can buy presents and where you can drink a Glühwein (mulled wine) or eat something.

On weekends the Christmas market is usually very crowded. It's better to go there during the week.

On the picture you see one of the most beautiful stalls. It's in the shape of a Christmas pyramid. These pyramids are normally build much smaller and you can put them on a table. People put candles around it and the warm air drives the propeller on top of it thus letting the pyramid rotate. This big one isn't able to move though. But if you've had a Glühwein or two too much sometimes you get the feeling that it moves anyway ;o))

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Fronleichnam is a high catholic holiday, celebrated 10 days after Pentecost on the Thursday after Trinity, to honour the Eucharist.
Celebrations begin with a festive mass in church, followed by a procession with the blessed sacrament which stops at certain stations where altars have been put up. Customs often involve decorations of churches and streets with flowers and green.

The village of Weingarten along the way to Bruchsal has a special tradition on Corpus Christi.
Flower carpets are made in the streets along the way of the procession. This tradition is not indigenous but has been brought there by refugees from the East after World War II. A local artist designs the pictures every year which are then made from petals and leaves.

The carpets stay in the streets for the rest of the day and can best be seen and enjoyed after the procession, that is, around lunchtime and in the early afternoon.