Spending a month near the Odenwald along the Bergstrasse

Yes Gundersen! Thanks I've corrected it.

Hi Mona

Have you come across this thread from Tom, now from Vermont (and sadly missing rom the Forums since mid 2023) but at the time in 2013 that this was posted he lived in Hüttenfeld, Hessen right where you will be. If you search his posts around then and the following couple of years there is an absolute gold mine of Odenwald info.

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/trip-reports/ladenburg-opel-zoo-and-grosser-feldberg

I also saved https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/germany/heppenheim-for-2-nights which has good stuff,

and one of my ancient threads,

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/germany/odenwald-heppenheim

by the way, Odenwald = excellent choice

Hi Nigel. I saw your thread with Tom and that’s when I first got the idea to contact him when we were thinking about a different home there in 2011. It ended up being too rural for us so we passed it up but Tom’s response was an enthusiastic “ Oh, God, yes! ”. I wish he were active on the forum to see that we are really going this year, fifteen years later! BTW, Dave says thanks for asking him questions about schnitzel and Biergartens.

In 2019 we stayed close by in Ladenburg for 10 or 11 nights, and had visited parts of the area previously. Within an hour from Weinheim, more or less:

Wiesbaden

Aschaffenburg

Selingenstadt

Idstein, Bensheim and Heppenheim (small old towns).

Eberbach (Miltenberg a bit too far?)

Erbach and Michelstadt (re the latter, we'd visited many years earlier. In 2017 quite a few stores were empty. It's an attractive little town with a good brewpub).

Heidelberg ( a couple of days)

Neckargemund (hike from Heidelburg). Other small towns and castles/ruins along the Neckar.

Speyer

Freinsheim and drive along the wine route. Freinsheim was a crumbly little old town - my kind of place - a great breakfast to be had at Zucker and Salz. There are prettier wine routes.

Palaces at Bruchsal, Karlsruhe, and Rastatt. The towns not so much.

Eltville and Kloster Eberbach above town (with a good restaurant).

Bad Wimpfen. Top little place. Check to see if the salt mine close by has reopened.

About 1.5 hours, and worth it for me:

Gelnhausen and Budingen

Schwabisch Hall

Wissembourg (Alsace)

Ludwigsburg for the palaces and gardens, the town not so much

On a nice day, drive to Bingen for a cruise on the Rhine? We did this on Unity Day.

Quicker access to some locations involves using Highway 5, which is terribly busy; I try to avoid it.

There are some nice stretches of countryside in the Odenwald/Neckar valley. You've probably made a note of these-

https://diebergstrasse.de/

https://www.bergstraesser-wein.de/

https://odenwald-tourismus.de/

Couple of additional bits:
1. The Felsenmeer (sea of rocks) in the Odenwald (a geological oddity of a significant region covered by big rocks that makes a nice hike)
2. Darmstadt itself is rather boring tbh, except for the Mathildenhoehe art nouveau quarter if that attracts you, and a couple of museums if you like.
3. Schwetzingen south of Heidelberg has a large palace with even larger park

Staying Weinheim its not far from Heidelberg and the Neckar River (30 min south by car or train)

Another daytrip might be Bad Dürkheim or Neustadt an der Weinstrasse (45min west by car)
See Hambacher Schloss(Castle) nearby

(Nice Wine Restaurant in Bad Dürkheim)

Further southwest you ll find the little village of Annweiler and Trifels Castle (1h 15min southwest by car from Weinheim 30min from Neustadt)
In Trifels Castle the English King Richard Lionheart was imprisoned after returning from crusade until the English payed for his release 1193 a.d.

(Nice Italian Restaurant in Annweiler)

Forgot to say:
On your way back home to Weinheim from Annweiler Trifels you can visit the Cathedral in Speyer
(Speyer 45min east of Annweiler 30 min south of Weinheim)
Also see the Technic Museum Speyer

if you are in Speyer at that time of year keep an eye out for the asparagus fields. Spargel.

Germans prefer large white asparagus and everybody will be having Spargelfest! You would be amazed what you can do with the stuff. Loves it I do.

And from Speyer you're not far from the lovely little town of Deidesheim (and its annual goat Ram auction).

I just don't want to take you too far from your digs.

Thank you for all of these ideas so far for daily exploring and savoring around our base. I will do more research on the towns, sites and restaurants you’ve suggested and begin to map out possible day trips. This will be the third time we’ve spent a spring month in a part of Germany and I may be on a mission for a Spargel a day lunch. I have also reached out to Ms. Jo for a tour and a meetup again while we are so close.