May 7, 2012 Manheim Germany

We sailed this morning into Manheim Germany, which is more of an industrial town than the previous cities we have visited.  But rather than visiting Manheim, we boarded coaches to go to Speyer, Germany, a small town aobut 30 minutes from Manheim. 

Most people went off with the guides to tour the village.  I chose instead to go to the Technical Museum, which was full of cars and trains and planes and even a few space ships.  It was a delightful visit, I thought of visiting Pete's field in Colorado Springs with my favorite nephew, Ray.  Apparently it rained (imagine that!) while I was in the museum because when the few of us who went to the museum made it back to the bus, we heard from everyone the town was nice but wet.  Back to the boat and a leisurely afternoon.  Thought about going up top because the sun came out, but almost as fast as it appeared, it disappeared and you guessed it, it rained really hard.  Right now the sun is trying again to come out, but now sure how successful it will be.

Picture one is of the Cathedral in Speyer.  The joke now when we go to towns is ABC - another big (or Peter, our tour guide says bloody) cathedral, since every town has at least one.

The rest of the pictures are from the museum:

a locomotive engine - actually the piston.  They had it moving and it was quite amazing

Another mechanical music player that lights up and the characters appear to sing when it plays

A jet from the Navy's Blue Angels

Another self playing mechanical music machine.  The picture doesn't do it justice, it was huge and suspended above the museum floor.

A model of the lunar lander

The front of a Russian shuttle craft.  This one was built to practice gliding re-entries in the 80's, but because of money that is all the further the program went.

Inside the European space station (a 1:1 model)

Inside the International Space Station (a 1:10 model)

A WWII German mini sub

An early BMW

Beautiful carousel that was in the center of the museum building

The last two are of planes that are part of the museum.  There is also a 747, but it was being cleaned.  You may note, you can climb up into the planes, then ride a slide down.  Ray would love that!