I don’t know how to translate this title into Japanese, except maybe simply to use the term Wabi Sabi – 侘び寂び.…..the beauty of imperfection and impermanence

May 6th 2026年5月6日

▷ Hello again, and greetings from The Towers…..

▷ Now what’s this guy doing? Are they filming a new Anatefka , in which the fiddler drops his violin over the other side of the roof?

▷ Every day I am woken up to the sound of some new machine being delivered outside. (last week it was a massive cement machine that made instant Estrichbeton (floor cement)…they just pumped it straight into the house). Then there was the man and his fork lift truck……

Hello. The electricians and plasterers have arrived….all at once…..

Where do all the materials come from, and how are they transported?……

▷ I know a house in the Odenwald that could use a few plasterers and electricians. It’s owned by the Erbach-Fürstenau family, and the’ve lived there quite along time – since 1717 to be precise. Schloss Fürstenau has been converted neither into a wellness hotel nor a conference centre, and you can’t even visit the interior. In fact most visitors to the area miss it completely because they are agog with famed Michelstadt, which is on the other side of the river.

▷ Acting on a hunch, and deviating from my planned komoot hike , I follow a path through dense woodland. Then unexpectedly I come across a charming old bridge and a Rennaissance-looking building.

Some defunct looking sluices and a weir suggested a mill of sorts – which indeed it is, built in 18thc.

The Mümling river still flows past its walls…….

▷ And on the other side of the bridge a rather out-of-place looking baroque house nestles amonst the trees…

▷ This is the Cavalier house built in the 18thc…for the members of the court.

The court? Yes, cross the bridge and enter through the gateway to reveal…….Low and behold!……… A crumbling medieval castle adorned with a huge Rennaisance arch….

Bearing in mind John Cleese’s Fawlty Towers , I instantly gave it a name: Crumble Castle. It is indeed badly in need of maintenance, and crumbling……..

▷ Random ladies and gentleman, some with very few clothes on, seem to have been lounging about here for some time….

They don’t look very happy. Maybe because of all this modern stuff over on the other side of the courtyard…..

…..or because their owners are parking right in front of them….?

▷ Now, have you ever thought about that stereotypical medieval castle 🏰 in children’s books ?….pennants fluttering from round towers, knights on horseback and ladies with tall conical hats….?

Well here you have it. Right here In the middle of the Odenwald. This is a view which a resident must have taken, for I found no way to access this angle…..

▷ It is extraordinary. There are no signposts and no admission fee, no café and no souvenir shop. You are requested politely to respect the privacy of the place, and are allowed to wander around the courtyard.

The inner courtyard is a eclectic mixture of medieval, rennaissance and classical buildings…

…with views out to the meadows….

…and some shiny art……

Would you ring this doorbell?

…….bits and pieces litter the place……

…I even discovered a nice scroll…..

▷ Apparently the original castle was built in the 14thc. to “protect” the nearby Steinbach Abbey. What is left of this abbey today is the church. But not any old church. It was built by Einhard, advisor to Charlemagne (Karls des Großen). Charlemagne? yes, the emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire. He united most of Western and Central Europe in the 9thc. and was the first recognised emperor to rule from the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Not a bad CV.

▷ It is incredible to think that this church – a Roman basilica in fact, has been tucked away in this corner of the Odenwald since the 9th century.

In fact it only survived because it was used to store hunting equipment and timber. Timber has to be stored in a dry place. Hence the roof was always kept in good condition.

▷ Only about 100 years earlier, in the north of England (the Anglian Kingdom of Northumberland at that time, now County Durham) …..

…..the little church of Escomb was built. It also still stands today.

▷ And I still remember my teacher, Prof. Rosemary Cramp, telling us students to look at this building from the outside first, before entering. To build Escombe, they had to pillage a nearby Roman fort for the stone. Whilst here, in the Odenwald, there was excellent sandstone in abundance.

▷ I had been here before with some hiker friends, in 2013. It was a hot summer, and we were grateful for the cool interior of the basilica…..

The main doorway….

The interior….

But this time it was not too hot.

▷ It was May 1st 2026, and I kept on encountering groups of merry men (and women), pulling carts of beer through the forest. None to be seen here however. Time for a hard-boiled egg……….(thank you Phe for this idea)

▷ Sophia’s temple would have also been a spot to linger, but it had already been requisitioned by a homeless man. I left him in peace….

▷ On descending back down the hill to the town of Erbach my eye was caught by this monster on the hill. No need for plasterers or electricians here. The’ve got it sorted……I named it The Paperclip.

▷ And as if all historical eras had not already been covered on this hike, I bumped into this relic from the 1940s near Michelstadt station…..

▷ So there we are. My train took me back to Frankfurt via Hanau,

▷……..and then over the Deutchherren Brücke (passing the European Central Bank and the former Market hall) to Frankfurt Süd.

As always, thank you for your interest, and if you know anyone who might be interested in this blog then do forward it on.

Wie immer vielen Dank für euer Interesse. Wenn ihr jemanden kennt, der an diesem Blog interessiert sein könnte, schickt ihn gerne weiter.

読んでくれてありがとう

See you…….. matane!

Nigel 🏰

nigelwruddock@gmail.com.

https://www.instagram.com/nigelruddock/

THE END

終わり🚶🏼‍➡️