Freiburg im Breisgau audiotours

Freiburg has Bachle: small channels of water diverted from the Dreisam River that run along the gutters of the old town's streets. Local legend says that if you step in one by accident, you will marry a Freiburger. They are easy to step in, they run fast, and the city seems entirely comfortable with this low-level trap for distracted tourists. The channels have been there since the medieval period, originally used for fire-fighting, watering livestock, and waste disposal. Today they are simply part of the street furniture, crossed by small bridges every twenty metres.

The Freiburger Munster, started around 1200 and finished in 1513, took three centuries to build and produced what is often described as the finest Gothic tower in existence.

It is made from red Vosges sandstone and contains a daily market on its square in the shadow of the spire. This is where Freiburg conducts its organic business: farmers' stalls selling Black Forest honey, local cheese, and strawberries in season. The city is a longtime Green Party stronghold, with more bicycles than people and seventy percent of residents living within five hundred metres of a tram stop.