"My old Hometown" Ulm by Kimi_the_Bear

Not only because Ulm has been my hometown for 15 years and I have some good friends there, I love it. It is just such a beautiful city with a very bear-friendly environment. Because, you know, although the sparrow is Ulm's symbol Ulmers do have a heart for bears. And really, I had several bear encounters during my last visit, and one of them was veeeeeeeeery memorable.

A memorable bear encounter in Friedrichsau.

The biggest effort I made in Ulm was climbing up all the 768 steps to the top mini platform of Ulmer Münster. This is Ulm's Protestant Cathedral. It has the world's highest church spire, three metres higher than the Dome in Cologne. So you can imagine that I sweated a lot, especially because I walked up there on a hot day.

Another climb was up to the top floor of a building in Ulm's Neuer Mitte, the new city centre which has replaced a six lane road that cut through the city until some years ago. You can have a coffee or meal at the top restaurant and somehow sit right beside the Ulmer Münster.

One of the many Ulm sparrows, at Marktplatz.

Apart from the Cathedral Ulm has a beautiful historic quarter, the so-called Fischerviertel. I also walked on the city wall along the Danube (Donau) which separates Ulm from Neu-Ulm and Baden-Württemberg from Bavaria.

I also explored some of the many forts that once made Ulm the biggest fortress in Germany, the so called Bundesfestung. Until several years ago Ulm's bears lived in one of the forts but now they were relocated to a kind of zoo. But you can also see them from the outside of a huge park named Friedrichsau, and if you are a bear they might even approach you and chat to you. I will tell you in one of my travelogues what one of the bears told me.

Ulm is also the city of Einstein, and the brave Scholl siblings you might know from films about the Third Reich. You also get a lot of great food in Ulm, not everything to my Papa's liking as he is afraid of some Swabian food. You can even eat sparrows... Of course, not the flying ones. Ulmers are no monsters. They love their sparrows and their bears, and I think, even me ;-)

• Pros:Sparrows, bears, Swabians, friends, many beergardens, great food
• Cons:Like so many other places - too far away from my new home in NZ
• In a nutshell:Always in my bear heart