The Enz River is 112 kilometers long and is a tributary of the Neckar, which in turn flows into the Rhine at Mannheim.
Walking and bicycle paths by the Enz River in Pforzheim
The Enz River, looking downstream towards the Pforzheim City Theater
The re-naturalized Nagold River in Pforzheim
For most of its length (92 kilometers) the Nagold is a pleasant and picturesque river, flowing as it does through the Black Forest and passing for instance through the town of Calw, where the author Hermann Hesse was born.
In the city of Pforzheim, however, the Nagold was for many decades a dead, unsightly, polluted river, presumably because of the mines and factories that used to operate here. This has changed only in the 21st century with the advent of the city’s re-naturalizing program starting in 2001.
Information panel with before-and-after photos
This display case near the river has before-and-after photos showing how the Nagold has been cleaned up and changed.
My photos in this post are from 2007. I revised the text in 2021.
See more posts on Pforzheim, Germany.
See also: The Rhône River in Avignon, France.
What a great idea to save the river and so much nicer now.
I first ran into Hesse my freshman year in college although in English translation. Siddhartha has always been a favorite book.
Beautiful title shot!
Thanks.
Mining does bad things to the environment sometimes and sometimes to the miners also. Glad they are fixing that. I had to read Herman Hesse in school. I had forgotten that until I saw his name
When I was in college I read all of Hesse’s novels, and in my senior year wrote a big paper on them. (I was a German major.) Since then I haven’t read much of his besides a few stories and poems.
Nice cycle route