After visiting the Barbara Baths early in the morning we make our way to our second outdoor visit of the day the Kaiserthermen (Emperor Baths). Today we have decided to frontload the outdoor visits to escape the worst of the heat wave. The entrance to the Emperor Baths is located in the garden of the Prince Elector Palace which makes sense as during Roman times they were part of the same Roman Emperor complex. In fact the first exhibit is showing how Trier was one the capitals of the Roman Empire under Emperor Diocletian’s Tetrarchy system when the empire was split in four administrative sections.
Entering the complex our eyes are drawn to the major surviving section which actually looks more like the remains of church or a castle than of a Roman Bath. We decide to explore that area first as it seems to be the most impressive and we want to get there before other people start to visit.
It is a short walk from the modern visitor center to an observation tower where you can use an elevator to climb to the top for a bird’s eye view of the beautiful ruins.
Then it is time to see if you can actually enter the ruins, they seem to be worth a close visit and also the shade would be welcome.
Unfortunately you cannot get too close, it is closed off for some reason. It seems it is either under renovation in sections or simply they decided to fence it off.
However to our surprise you can climb down below the Baths and we look forward to it after the previous day when we explored the underground of the Amphitheater and it was much cooler than outside.
That is the case here also which is great and as a bonus there is no water and you can explore freely.
Maybe too freely, there are lots of corridors that intersect each other and quite soon we are not sure if the corridor we are walking on is the same as the one three corridors back or a new one.
And then there are curveballs, like the curved sections and the ones which seemed to have been walled in. They are great as being unique they give you an idea if you are going in circles or not.
There are other unique sights here, like street numbers or exhibits that we can use to orient ourselves and soon we learn the whole maze and can roam without being scared of being lost forever.
And so we find the exit which is actually in a different location and it is time to exit back into the growing heat of the day.
Now we take some time to enjoy the view from above and we can map some of the tunnels from the above while hiding from the heat in one of the few spots of shade on the large field, below a protected area.
One thing that we didn’t know is that the Baths were never completed and were then incorporated into the medieval walls and a castle was built above the Baths.
There is a round area in the middle of the field and we assume that this was a large basin but it also could be a large amphitheater, after yesterday everything looks like an amphitheater to us. But soon the heat is getting to us and we visited all major attractions here so it is time to exit and make our way to the last item on our Roman Pass, the Rhineland State Museum.
