The Ruhr district Halde art installations

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Fan of art and hiking? Then you'll have an amazing time in the Ruhr district in North Rhine-Westphalia. You can find a bunch of enormous art installations on top of mountains aka 'Halde' in different places across 'Das Ruhrgebiet'.

My 4th Destination Challenge in NRW was to find 3 of them and to pay them all a visit.

Here's what I found...

Exploring the castles of Münsterland in NRW

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Little did I know that there are so many castles to be found in the Münsterland region of North Rhine-Westphalia in Germany. On my 3rd Destination Challenge in the region I had to find minimum 5 different castles.

I quickly got a list of locations on Facebook so Rose and I went on a little castle hunt around Münsterland. Apparently the region is sprinkled with over a hundred castles.

Find out which castles I found below...

Xanten, a Roman settlement by the Rhine

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Xanten in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany is home to one of the most important Roman settlements by the Rhine. You'll find an open air museum (LVR Romermuseum) that has the actual size of the former Roman town 'Colonia Ulpia Traiana'.

As part of my Destination Challenges in NRW I had to figure out where I could find this 'Colonia Ulpia Traiana'... Many people thought it would be Cologne but it turned out to be the medieval city of Xanten.

Parts of the Roman settlement where once 10.000 people lived are recovered or reconstructed. You can literally take a step back in time and learn all about the Roman way of living.

Let me show you around... ;-)

In the footsteps of Charlemagne in Aachen

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I kicked off my road trip adventure around Europe in the North Rhine-Westphalia region of Germany. It's just over the border with Belgium and my first stop was Aachen where I'd have my Destination Challenges kick off in the region.

My challenge was to find 4 places that are related to 'Charlemagne' aka 'Charles The Great' who was king of the Franken and later even got the title of Roman Emperor. It is said that he was the great uniter of European people in West and Central Europe.

Sounds like a social guy... :-)

Goethe in Frankfurt

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My final Destination Challenge in Germany transformed me into Goethe for a day and that was the start of a wonderful adventure around his hometown Frankfurt.

You probably know Goethe, as a passionate writer (and lover) :-). His most famous work would be FAUST. 😈

It was such a pleasure to follow into his footsteps from his birthplace 'The Goethe House' to places where he fell in love, got inspired and wrote. 

Let 'Goethe' show you around... 😉

Steinau an der Strasse, home of the brothers Grimm

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Once upon a time 'Roos' and I ended up in a cute little town called Steinau an der Strasse, home of the brothers Grimm.

Visiting the town is like entering the fairy tale world of the brothers Grimm. You'll find famous fairy tale characters everywhere you look and at almost every corner I got catapulted back to my childhood bedroom memories.

Truly a magical place!

Did you know that the brothers Grimm didn't write the stories themselves? They basically collected legends and stories that were told in different German villages and beyond. They did this because they were afraid that otherwise these stories would get lost over time. They were responsible though for shaping the stories in a consistent ways and coined phrases like 'Once upon a time' and 'They lived happily ever after'...

For my destination challenges in Steinau an der Strasse I played the Spessart Im Glueck discovery game. How it works is that you visit the following website (https://blog.spessart-tourismus.de/zufallsreise/) where you then generate your own fairy tale adventure.

Give it a try it's loads of fun :-)

For my Spessart im Glueck adventure I had to find minimum 6 items related to the 'Puss in Boots' fairy tale in Steinau an der Strasse.

Find out about my fairy tale adventure below...

Mainz, the City of Knowledge by the Rhine

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Mainz am Rhein aka the city of Knowledge, is a vibrant city by the Rhine that decided to put me and my community of friends and followers to the test with Destination Challenges.

I got 5 little tasks to solve and they took me all around the city...

With a steam train to the heart of Harz

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One of the coolest experiences in the Harz mountain area was taking a steam train to a place called Brocken, the very top of the mountain range in the heart of Germany.

You hear the train approaching from far and you just get overwhelmed with joy when you finally see it. It's like stepping back in time and boarding for a magical adventure to the top of Brocken which was a place where witches held a yearly gathering... How cool is that!

Exploring the Medieval town Quedlinburg

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In search for a medieval fairy tale like town in Germany? Look no further!
Quedlinburg is the place to be ;-)

It's here that I kicked off my Destination Challenges in the Harz region.

On arrival I got a bunch of questions that I needed to find the answer to in this cute little town...

Finding the KiKa characters in Erfurt

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From Leipzig I made my way to Erfurt where I had to go in search for the different KiKa characters statues that can be found all over the city.

KiKa is the name of a German TV channel for kids and I had to find 7 statues of cartoon characters that are or were very popular on the show.

Finding Love & the Feinkost family at Karli in Leipzig

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Leipzig is a vibrant, creative and beautiful city and that totally reflected in the Destination Challenges I tackled there.

First I had to find a park dedicated to love and fix a photo shoot with a couple there. After that I had to find the Feinkost family at a place called 'Karli'!

Let me tell you all about what happened next below.

a Lusatian Lakeland cycling adventure (Lausitzer seenland)

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This is what I loved about tackling Destination Challenges in Germany! One day I was seed bombing Berlin and the next I found myself in the heart of the 'Lusatian lakeland' in the very South East of Brandenburg.

Talking about a contrast!

I first arrived at the Marina camping by the Senftenberger See (Lake) where I immediately was welcomed for some morning SUPping. I can tell you that it woke me right up... ;-)

Seed bombing Berlin

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Planting seeds and fun usually isn't something that you find in the same sentence but the concept of seed bombing makes this totally possible. My 3rd Destination Challenge in Berlin was all about planting plants in a fun and guerilla kind of way with the help of Seedbomb city.

You basically grab some seed bombs and start bombing your neighbourhood! Like this you make your city greener every day :-)

SO. MUCH. FUN!

Cooking with Bite Berlin

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Absolutely loved my second Destination Challenge in Berlin!

This time I had to prepare a typical Belgian dish for 5 tourists that were visiting Berlin. Luckily I had Samantha from 'Bite Berlin' by my side to make it all happen! She runs food tours around Berlin and knows where to find the good stuff! :-)

Berlin Bulli Tour

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My road trip adventure tackling Destination Challenges around Germany brought me back to Berlin!

Some of you might know how much I love this city and I was happy to hear that on my first Destination Challenge I had to visit as many landmarks as possible with my VW Bulli called 'Roos'. But that was not all, I was challenged to invite people to join me on this impromptu Berlin Bulli Tour...

Potsdam palaces cycling tour

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You can find Potsdam right beside Berlin and it's really an oasis of tranquility and history. Not only is the town home of lots and lots of lakes but you'll also find many different palaces from different times.

My Destination Challenge in Potsdam was the following:
🇩🇪 Which king built the new palace? 
🇩🇪 What is the highest palace? 
🇩🇪 Find 5 tourists that can pronounce the name of the palace correctly. (Loving this one 😊) 

I left 'Rose', my van, behind, jumped on a bicycle and started exploring Potsdam. Find out below how that went ;-)

Archery weekend in the woods of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern with my friend Volker aka 'Der Viking'

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There are certain people in life that you keep crossing paths with and my friend Volker is one of these people. This story is a nice example of just that...

The past week I've been tackling Destination Challenges in North Rhine-Westfalia and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. Now I take on these challenges Monday to Friday and last Friday I happened to be in Waren, a cute town by Muritz lake.

Turned out that my friend Volker was only 20 km away in Grünow bei Neustrelitz. He was spending the weekend with his archer friends from Bogenclub Neubrandenburg and immediately invited me to join them for a fun introduction to archery.

Honestly, I could use some peace and quiet after a quite intense week road tripping around Germany.
Couldn't have spent the weekend any better...

The house of a Thousand lakes aka The Müritzeum

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From the Queens of German beer in Detmold I made my way to Waren in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, This Bundesland in the North East of Germany is located by the Baltic sea and it's known for its many lakes and forests.

I paid a visit to the Müritzeum and learned about the wildlife in the region in a fun way. Feel free to watch my Hypertour video about it below.


After my museum visit I explored the picturesque town of Waren and from there I made my way around the Müritz lake direction the Havelberge camping where I'd be staying in the middle of nature.

Perfect for recharging the batteries after an intense first week of tackling Destination Challenges around Germany.

The Queens of German beer live in Detmold and I got to meet them!

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I had the warmest welcome possible from the wonderful ladies running the Strate brewery in Detmold. They gave me a magical tour in a brewery that looks a bit like a fairy tale castle! The beer here is brewed with lots of love and dedication. 🍺❤️

I learned that the entire brewery is situated BELOW the ground and that the beautiful building above the ground is where the original brewery was. When I was visiting the ladies were building a beer lab in this beer castle where they'll invite the greatest beer minds from around the world to learn and brew with each other.

But that's not all! This hyper modern beer Valhalla will be open to guests for dining and beering. The beer is literally brewing below their feet.

They didn't stop surprising me because they then showed me their shop where they have all kinds of beer related products. Beer soap, beer cake, beer holders, beer shirts, beer snacks,...

I absolutely love their creative approach to beer :-)

Find out below how my day went

Visiting Zunft Kölsch brewery Bielstein in Das Bergische Land

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What Altbier is for the Düsseldorf area is what Kölsch beer is for the Cologne area! 

For my second Destination Challenge in the North Rhein-Westphalia region I had to find an all above the ground Kölsch brewery in the middle of nature! 

It didn't take long for my friends and followers on social media to figure out that the place to be for me was the Bielstein brewery in Das Bergische Land which is known for its Zunft Kölsch beer. 

Kölsch is like Altbier a top fermented beer with a crisp and dry after taste and it's linked to the region just like for example Champagne is linked to the region where it's produced. 

I have to say that Kölsch is really a refreshing beer that goes down very easy. ;-)

Below my beer report of the day :-)