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Bavaria’s Danube Limes becomes UNESCO world heritage site

The Danube Limes, which stretches through southern Germany to Slovakia and marks the borders of the Roman Empire, was added to the World Heritage List on Friday.

Published: 30 July 2021 14:10 CEST
Bavaria's Danube Limes becomes UNESCO world heritage site
The Danube in Lower Bavaria in the district of Kelheim. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Armin Weigel

Welcoming the decision, heritage experts said ancient sites smattered along the meandering river Danube Limes were an “outstanding testimony” to Roman civilisation. 

Germany has now submitted six successful applications in the current series of UNESCO meetings, which has been running since July 16th and will continue until Saturday.

Four applications have previously been successful this year: the spa towns of Bad Ems, Baden-Baden and Bad Kissingen; the Lower Germanic Limes; the Mathildenhöhe Darmstadt; as well as Jewish sites in Speyer, Worms and Mainz.

Only cultural and natural sites of outstanding universal value are designated as world heritage.

Before the decision on Friday, tension had risen after Hungary left the joint application with Germany, Austria and Slovakia at short notice. The committee then postponed the decision that was actually planned for Monday and initially set up a working group for further deliberations.

READ ALSO: Travel: Five stunning UNESCO sites that tell Germany’s history

In pointed comments made after the announcement, Michelle Müntefering, Minister of State for International Cultural Policy in the Foreign Office, described the accolade as a sign of international cooperation.


A sign points the way to an old Roman defence frontier. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Armin Weigel

“The Danube Limes not only honours a special landscape of monuments, but also recognises the longstanding cooperation with Austria and Slovakia.” she said. “The task now is to add sites in the eastern section of the Danube to the western sections of the Limes.”

The Danube ‘connected different worlds’

“For the Romans, the Danube was not just a natural border, it was also an important connection route for goods and, above all, for ideas,” said Maria Böhmer, President of the German Commission for UNESCO. “The Danube Limes not only separated, but also connected very different worlds.

READ ALSO: UNESCO adds spa towns in France, Germany and Austria to World Heritage list

“It is an outstanding testimony to Roman civilisation, whose strength has always been to absorb external influences,” said Böhmer. “I am delighted that the World Heritage Committee has honoured the Danube Limes today.”


The remains of a roman fort near the Danube. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Armin Weigel

The registered section of the Danube Limes runs over 600 kilometres from Lower Bavaria via Austria to Slovakia. For centuries soldiers and their families were stationed there, working and living on the “wet Limes”.

The 77 sub-areas of the transnational world heritage site include ground monuments, such as the remains of legionary camps, forts and civil settlements. 

The Lower Germanic Limes was added to the UNESCO World Heritage List on Tuesday. The borders of the Roman Empire are thus recognized as World Heritage from Scotland to Slovakia.

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TRAVEL NEWS

Why are fewer British tourists visiting Spain this year?

Almost 800,000 fewer UK holidaymakers have visited Spain in 2023 when compared to 2019. What’s behind this big drop?

Published: 23 August 2023 11:36 CEST
Updated: 26 August 2023 18:32 CEST
Why are fewer British tourists visiting Spain this year?

Spain welcomed 12.2 million UK tourists between January and July 2023, 6 percent less when compared to the same period in 2019, according to data released on Monday by Spanish tourism association Turespaña.

This represents a decrease of 793,260 British holidaymakers for Spain so far this year.

Conversely, the number of Italian (+8 percent), Irish (+15.3 percent), Portuguese (+24.8 percent), Dutch (+4 percent) and French tourists (+5 percent) visiting España in 2023 are all above the rates in 2019, the last pre-pandemic year. 

German holidaymakers are together with their British counterparts the two main nationalities showing less interest in coming to Spanish shores.

Britons still represent the biggest tourist group that comes to Spain, but it’s undergoing a slump, with another recent study by Caixabank Research suggesting numbers fell particularly in June 2023 (-12.5 percent of the usual rate). 

READ ALSO: Spain fully booked for summer despite most expensive holiday prices ever

So are some Britons falling out of love with Spain? Are there clear reasons why a holiday on the Spanish coast is on fewer British holiday itineraries?

According to Caixabank Research’s report, the main reasons are “the poor macroeconomic performance of the United Kingdom, the sharp rise in rates and the weakness of the pound”.

This is evidenced in the results of a survey by British market research company Savanta, which found that one in six Britons are not going on a summer holiday this year due to the UK’s cost-of-living crisis.

Practically everything, everywhere has become more expensive, and that includes holidays in Spain: hotel stays are up 44 percent, eating out is 13 percent pricier, and flights are 40 percent more on average. 

READ ALSO: How much more expensive is it to holiday in Spain this summer?

Caixabank stressed that another reason for the drop in British holidaymakers heading to Spain is that those who can afford a holiday abroad are choosing “more competitive markets” such as Turkey, Greece and Portugal. 

And there’s no doubt that the insufferably hot summer that Spain is having, with four heatwaves so far, has also dissuaded many holidaymakers from Blighty from overcooking in the Spanish sun. 

With headlines such as “This area of Spain could become too hot for tourists” or “tourists say it’s too hot to see any sights” featuring in the UK press, budding British holidaymakers are all too aware of the suffocating weather conditions Spain and other Mediterranean countries are enduring. 

Other UK outlets have urged travellers to try out the cooler Spanish north rather than the usual piping hot Costa Blanca and Costa del Sol destinations.

Another UK poll by InsureandGo found that 71 percent of the 2,000+ British respondents thought that parts of Europe such as Spain, Greece and Turkey will be too hot to visit over summer by 2027.

There’s further concern that the introduction in 2024 of the new (and delayed) ETIAS visa for non-EU visitors, which of course now also applies to UK nationals, could further compel British tourists to choose countries to holiday in rather than Spain.

READ MORE: Will British tourists need to pay for a visa waiver to enter Spain?

However, a drop in the number of British holidaymakers may not be all that bad for Spain, even though they did spend over €17 billion on their Spanish vacations in 2022. 

Towns, cities and islands across the country have been grappling with the problem of overtourism and the consequences it has on everything from quality of life for locals to rent prices. 

READ ALSO: ‘Beach closed’ – Fake signs put up in Spain’s Mallorca to dissuade tourists

The overcrowded nature of Spain’s beaches and most beautiful holiday hotspots appears to be one of the reasons why Germans are visiting Spain in far fewer numbers. A recent report in the country’s most read magazine Stern asked “if the dream is over” in their beloved Mallorca.

Spanish authorities are also seeking to overhaul the cheaper holiday package-driven model that dominates many resorts, which includes moving away from the boozy antics of young British and other European revellers.

Fewer tourists who spend more are what Spain is theoretically now looking for, and the rise in American, Japanese and European tourists other than Brits signify less of a dependence on the British market, one which tends to maintain the country’s tourism status quo for better or for worse.

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