Next on our route are the Thermen am Viehmarket/Roman baths at the Cattle Market. This is something unexpected we found when researching the city, a Roman ruin we haven’t seen before as it was not yet open to the public. And we are surprised how it looks, it is protected by a modern glass building and we are curious what we can see. But first we have to pay for the entrance so we buy the Roman Pass which gives us access to all the ruins and reduction at a couple more attractions. And then we are in and start with a great view of the ruins down below, we are wondering how large they actually are.
We then start descending and understand that the first impression is quite deceiving. The ruins actually extend also below the pavement and are not only under the glass dome so they are a lot more extensive than we initially thought.
There is a description on how the ruins were found by accident while an underground garage was built. Luckily they were saved and now it is time to visit them using the good map available of which we take a photo just in case.
The difference from other Roman baths ruins is that you can actually wander through the different channels and areas and the descriptions of what we are seeing are actually quite good.
Trier Roman ruins are part of an Unesco World Heritage site but interestingly the Thermen am Viehmarkt are not part of it as they were discovered after the monument was created.
There is an exhibit showing all the different monuments part of the Unesco World Heritage Site and we have been in all and plan to visit all of them again this time. That is all except the Igeler Column which we plan to visit for the first time now.
We then continue to explore the now mostly empty ruins. Initially there was a group of school children but with them leaving there are only two more people exploring the ruins and that is quite easy to avoid.
The ruins are a mix of the actual ruins and some reconstructions to show how the baths were built. In fact we are walking beneath the bath level into the bowels of the baths where all the water channels and heating elements were located.
The channels were surprisingly wide and we have fun imagining how water was flowing through them filling in the different pools during the heyday of the baths.
There are some arches here, channels there and we enjoy taking it all in and reading all the descriptions, it is quite well realized which is nice.
We keep the best for last, the largest pool which is higher up so you actually can you the actual impressive size and walk through it.
And then it is time to exit via another interesting section of the ruins and soon we are out again exploring the old downtown of Trier.
