Top 20 Castles around Barbing

King Maximilian II had the Royal Villa built as a summer residence on the Ostenbastei between 1854 and 1856, designed by Ludwig Foltz. Today, it houses the Regensburg office of the Bavarian State Office for the Preservation of Historical Monuments.

The Villa Park, the eastern counterpart to the Herzogspark to the west and connected to it by the avenues surrounding the old town, owes its existence to none other than the Bavarian King Maximilian II. In 1852, he spent an extended period in Regensburg to stabilize his ailing health through supposedly healing Danube baths. At that time, he realized that there was no suitable accommodation for the royal family in the cathedral city and commissioned the architect and sculptor Ludwig Foltz to build a summer residence. The park is divided into three parts. The area to the east is still popularly known as the "Orphanage Garden" because it once served as a vegetable garden for the adjacent municipal orphanage. The park is visually divided by the former city moat. Finally, to the west is the actual front garden of the Royal Villa, which is also open to the public. The entire complex is owned by the Free State of Bavaria. The municipal gardening department maintains the park based on a 1981 agreement between the City of Regensburg and the Free State of Bavaria. Source: https://www.regensburg.de/leben/parks-in-regensburg/villapark

Few remains of the ruins, but very beautiful and photogenic.

The castle is gigantic. It is not open to the public. In winter there is a Christmas market with admission.

Heilsberg Castle Ruins In the last third of the 12th century, Ulrich and Wernhardus from Heilsberg appeared in documents for the first time. Since Ulrich's successor Ekbert, they were also vassals of Eggmühl and fiefs of the Bavarian duke. They were thus in the middle of the power struggle between the Wittelsbach dukes and the Regensburg bishops. In a contract, Duke Ludwig of Kelheim had to give up a castle that was already under construction near Heilsberg, which the Heilsbergers were obviously supposed to receive as a fief. Over the course of the 13th century, Ekbert and his son Ulrich repeatedly tried to use their bailiwick rights to alienate property from the bishop. The bishop accused them of forcing their subjects to perform unjust feudal labor in order to illegally expand their castle. In addition, the Heilsbergers had bloody feuds with the Paulsdorfers and with Konrad von Hohenfels. In the first third of the 14th century, the male line of Heilsberg died out, followed by a series of owners, including the powerful Upper Palatinate knightly family of Notthafft. It was not until around 1500 that the Wittelsbachs were finally able to take over the Heilsberg domain, and in 1505 it was assigned to the Palatinate-Neuburg line. The castle was probably already abandoned in the 16th century, and on Apian's map of 1568 it is already marked as a ruin. A local support group has recently been working to save the ruins. The most striking remains of the castle are the keep, which dates from around 1200 and has a side length of 7.5 meters with 2.5 m thick walls. This is evidenced by its masonry, which consists of smooth blocks and humped blocks with 5 to 10 centimetre wide edges; the ring wall fragment with the archway is so deep in the ground that it is almost impossible to date it. Among the later extensions to the castle that are known to have been made, there is also a new gate in 1498. In 1474, a new bridge and a new gate were built. In 1498, the castle was repaired after a fire, and work on the bower, the new parlor and the stables is known to have been carried out. Recently, the keep has been secured and renovated at great expense, and the buried interior of the tower has also been uncovered. The extremely deep, almost circumferential moat separates the castle grounds from the Heilsberg plateau on two sides. Source: Extracts from www.burgenseite.de / www./burgen/detail/burgruine-heilsberg/178

Somehow a mystical-looking place

Awesome 🔨 view from the castle to Donaustauf and into the distance to the Regensburg Cathedral on one side and on the other side to Walhalla and Scheuchenberg

The castle park only came into being at the end of the 18th and during the 19th century. The English landscape garden with enclosure was designed by Carl Joseph von Effner from 1872, incorporating the remains of the Emmeram Bastion and the city wall.[Note. 2] The entire area, which was referred to as Emmeramer Breiten, lay directly in front of the city wall, which enclosed the buildings of the castle and the monastery and then followed the course of Petersweg. In front of the city wall on the site of today's castle park there were also other sections of the fortifications. They were cleared under Prince Karl Anselm von Thurn und Taxis in order to plant trees on the site. Later, under Prince Bishop Karl Theodor von Dalberg, the site was sold to Prince Karl Alexander von Thurn und Taxis. His wife Therese zu Mecklenburg had the small garden palace Theresens Ruh built in the eastern section. The classical villa was hit by a bomb at the end of the Second World War. The damaged building was surprisingly completely demolished in 1945. Today the castle park is not freely accessible, but annual events take place in the castle park and in the courtyard of the castle, including a garden show in June, the Thurn and Taxis Castle Festival in July and since 2001 the Christmas market at Thurn and Taxis Castle. Source: Wikipedia