August 8 Thursday – Joe and Sam took the train up the river valley to Wimpfen. They started out on foot, and took a peasant’s cart seven more miles to Heilbronn [Rodney 103]. They browsed around the town and admired the old buildings. They ordered red wine at the Hotel zum Falkan but got something different. They discovered the label was wet and had just been applied.
August 7 Wednesday – Sam wrote from Lang’s Hotel in Heidelberg to Livy. He’d received her note and thanked her.
“We have had a long & most enjoyable day in a carriage up to Hirschhorn & back with Smith” [MTLE 3: 76].
August 6 Tuesday – Clemens and Twichell walked from Allerheiligen to Oppenau, Germany, ten miles [MTNJ 2: 47, 129]. They then took a train from Oppenau to Heidelberg “through clouds of dust” [129].
Sam remembered the hotel as a “plain, simple, unpretending, good hotel” in chapter 21 of A Tramp Abroad.
Bædeker mentions it only briefly as one of four first class hotels in Baden-Baden.
Geographic location unknown.
August 5 Monday – Sam and Joe left by rail for a week-long tramp. Sam wrote at 8:30 PM from Allerheiligen, Germany to Livy in Heidelberg. Sam wrote of almost being left at Baden Baden that morning, having waited on the wrong side of the train tracks. After having their day “mapped out” by a schoolmaster named Scheiding, the rest of the day was full:
August 4 Sunday – Sam and Joe took another one-day excursion from Baden Baden to Ebersteinburg to Nuehaus to Gernsbach, where they drank beer. Sam sent a telegram to Livy at the Hotel de France [MTNJ 2: 129]. The pair returned to Baden Baden in the evening.
August 2 Friday – Sam and Joe took a short excursion (6 miles) to the popular Altes Schloss (Favorita Schloss), a conspicuous ruin on the summit of a hill outside town. Sam’s notebook holds an entry paraphrasing a guide book, that:
“…no tourist should fail to climb the mountain & enjoy the view. Hired boy to climb the Mt & examine (or enjoy?) the view. He felt well repaid for all his trouble.”
August 1 Thursday – Joe Twichell arrived in Baden Baden, Germany [MTNJ 2: 113]. Joe was prepared to spend six weeks hiking with Sam. On or about this day Sam wrote to Charles Dudley Warner. Sam had heard that his subsidy of Twichell’s trip was in the newspapers, and it upset him.
July 30 Tuesday –Sam wrote to Mr. Tyler (a merchant) about a “sorry old table” from the Heidelberg College prison he hoped to purchase. Sam had been unable to attend to the errand. He wrote that he expected to be at Lang’s Hotel on Aug. 6 with “a jolly preacher [Twichell] who will arrive here day after tomorrow” [MTLE 3: 73].
July 29 Monday – From Sam’s notebook:
Lot of loud Americans at breakfast this morning—loud talking & coarse laughter. Talking at everybody else.
Took a nasty glass of hot mineral water at 7 AM, with teaspoon of Carlsbad salt dissolvd in it.
Never knew before what Eternity was made for. It is to give some of us a chance to learn German.
The fact that we have but 1200 soldiers to meet 6,000 Indians is well utilized here to discourage immigration to America. The common people think the Indians are in New Jersey.