Rhineland-Palatinate is a western state of Germany. It covers 19,846 km2 (7,663 sq mi) and has about 4.05 million residents. It is the ninth largest and sixth most populous of the sixteen states. Mainz is the capital and largest city. Other cities are Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Koblenz, Trier, Kaiserslautern, Worms, and Neuwied. It is bordered by North Rhine-Westphalia, Saarland, Baden-Württemberg and Hesse and by France, Luxembourg and Belgium.
The Moselle is a river that rises in the Vosges mountains and flows through north-eastern France and Luxembourg to western Germany. It is a left bank tributary of the Rhine, which it joins at Koblenz. A small part of Belgium is in its basin as it includes the Sauer and the Our.
The Eifel is a low mountain range in western Germany, eastern Belgium and northern Luxembourg. It occupies parts of southwestern North Rhine-Westphalia, northwestern Rhineland-Palatinate and the southern area of the German-speaking Community of Belgium.
Mayen-Koblenz is a district (Kreis) in the north of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. Neighboring districts are Ahrweiler, Neuwied, Westerwaldkreis, district-free Koblenz, Rhein-Lahn, Rhein-Hunsrück, Cochem-Zell, and Vulkaneifel.
Idar-Oberstein is a town in the Birkenfeld district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. As a Große kreisangehörige Stadt, it assumes some of the responsibilities that for smaller municipalities in the district are assumed by the district administration. Today's town of Idar-Oberstein is the product of two rounds of administrative reform, one in 1933 and the other in 1969, which saw many municipalities amalgamated into one. The various Stadtteile have, however, retained their original identities, which, aside from the somewhat more urban character encountered in Idar and Oberstein, tend to hark back to each centre's history as a rural village. Idar-Oberstein is known as a gemstone town, and also as a garrison town. It is also the largest town in the Hunsrück.
Lauterecken is a town in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It is the seat of the Verbandsgemeinde Lauterecken-Wolfstein, to which it also belongs. Lauterecken bears the nickname Veldenzstadt, after the comital family that once held sway here. It is also a state-recognized tourism resort town, and in terms of state planning is laid out as a lower centre.
Middle Rhine is the section of the Rhine between Bingen and Bonn in Germany. It flows through the Rhine Gorge, a formation created by erosion, which happened at about the same rate as an uplift in the region, leaving the river at about its original level, and the surrounding lands raised. This gorge is quite deep, about 130 metres (430 ft) from the top of the rocks down to the average water-line.
The Palatinate Forest, sometimes also called the Palatine Forest, is a low-mountain region in southwestern Germany, located in the Palatinate in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate. The forest is a designated nature park covering 1,771 km2 and its highest elevation is the Kalmit.
Dirmstein is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Bad Dürkheim district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. With its roughly 3,000 inhabitants, it is the third largest Ortsgemeinde in the Verbandsgemeinde of Leiningerland, whose seat is in Grünstadt, although that town is itself not in the Verbandsgemeinde. Dirmstein lies in the outermost northeast of the district and the northwest of the Rhine-Neckar urban agglomeration.
Quirnbach/Pfalz is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde Oberes Glantal.
Reipoltskirchen is an Ortsgemeinde – a municipality belonging to a Verbandsgemeinde, a kind of collective municipality – in the Kusel district in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. It belongs to the Verbandsgemeinde Lauterecken-Wolfstein.
The Mannheim–Saarbrücken railway is a railway in the German states of Baden-Württemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate and the Saarland that runs through Ludwigshafen am Rhein, Neustadt an der Weinstraße, Kaiserslautern, Homburg and St. Ingbert It is the most important railway line that runs through the Palatinate. It serves both passenger and freight transport and carries international traffic.
Walking routes in the Palatine Forest fall into two categories. The first are longer walking routes, most of which are maintained by the Palatine Forest Club, or PWV, and which are linked to the national and international network of long distance paths. The second category are those local circular walks and themed walking routes, some of which are of wider regional importance, and which are maintained by municipal authorities. The Palatine Forest, as part of the Palatine Forest-North Vosges Biosphere Reserve, is an important conservation area. As a result, the Palatine Forest, the bunter sandstone landscape of the Palatine Forest Nature Park, the castles in the Dahner Felsenland and the cross-border paths into Alsace and the Vosges make the region particularly popular with ramblers and walkers.
Erfenstein Castle is a medieval spur castle in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It lies within the Palatine Forest above the Elmstein Valley at 265 m above sea level (NN) in the vicinity of the hamlet of Erfenstein in the municipality of Esthal. Together with nearby Spangenberg Castle, it is linked to the legend of the Leather Bridge.
Falkenstein Castle, also called New Falkenstein (Neu-Falkenstein), is a ruined hill castle at 450 m above sea level (NHN) in the eponymous climatic spa of Falkenstein, a quarter of Königstein im Taunus in the county of Hochtaunuskreis in the German state of Hesse.
The ruins of Ramstein Castle stand on a 182-metre-high, Bunter sandstone rock on the edge of the Meulenwald forest in the lower, steep-sided Kyll valley near Kordel in the German state of Rhineland-Palatinate. It stands 9 kilometres (5.6 mi) north of Trier and the same east of Luxembourg.
