Trier Favorites

Favorite thing: The Cathedral is beautiful, and I haven't been to a church before that allowed visitors so much access to the sites within. It was nice to get out of the cold.

Fondest memory: The present Cathedral stands on top of a former Constantinian Palace. After Constantine's last visit to Trier in A.D. 328/9, the palace was leveled in 330 and replaced by the largest Christian church in Antiquity, about four times as big as the present-day church and covering the area of the Cathedral and the Church of Our Lady, the Cathedral Square, the adjoining garden, and the houses almost up to the market.

Today's Cathedral still contains a Roman central section with the original walls rising up to a height of 26 m (86 ft). The huge fragment of a granite column next to the entrance to the Cathedral is another indication of the Roman origin of the building. After destructions in the 5th and 9th centuries, the remaining nucleus was enlarged by Romanesque additions - today, the Cathedral, with its three crypts, its cloister, Cathedral Treasury, and Holy Robe Chapel, displays architecture and artwork from more than 1650 years.

Favorite thing: This city map may help you find your way around Trier. It's not a complicated city to Navigate, and most sites are easy to find except for Karl Marx's haus. It's there just look on Karl Marx Strasse #10.
Check out the map for yourself at http://www.trier.de/cityguide/1024x768.html

Favorite thing: Just inside the Porta Negra, this little office has the basic things you need to see the city. You can buy a small pamphlet (free in most other cites) for 2,90 euro, and it will help you along the way. We saw coins of ancient times for sale here for 6 euro, and people were actually buying them. What a rip off. a piece of metal for six euro that is absolutely worth nothing.

Favorite thing: A hot air balloon flight is a special experience and a most unusual adventure. Enjoy the tingle during lift-off and landing, the tranquility in the balloon, the fascinating bird's eye perspective high above the Trier countryside.

Ballon Reisen Moselland
Christa Görgen, Im Flürchen 7, 54338 Schweich, Tel. 06502-99080

Favorite thing: Trier could not be thought without Wines of Moselle. Go to riverside and enjoy Moselle and taste wine.

Fondest memory: People's warmth was realy a surprise for me. Their approach to tourists is mostly positive. I will never forget its friendly dwellers.

Favorite thing: I would see Porta Nigra. We came off-season so there were no boat trips but a trip along the Moselle is something I will definately do next time. Also, if you're there in season, go wine tasting in the villages.

Fondest memory: All of it! From taxi drivers to restaurant staff, everyone was very friendly.

Favorite thing: Go to the Porta Nigra A Roman port from the second century. It is the only big part of the wall surrounding the ancient city wich has survived.
Another part is the Arena /amphitheatre, which was admitted in the later build wall, and wich was also used as a port to the city

Favorite thing: The old roman arena or Amphitheatre
Beyond the medieval city wall lies the Roman Amphitheater. Here were conducted cruel combats of animals and gladiators, popular public entertainment.
The Arena is build in the year 100, on the tribunes 20.000 people could watch the games.
The arena itself is surrounded by a protecting wall with openings for animal cages. The stone seats above were dismantled in the 13th century.
The Amphitheater is used for occasional open-air concerts today.
Underneath the arena is a cellar where, in Roman times, prisoners sentenced to death were kept. You can visit this underground room