I recently had the opportunity to go along with the afternoon excursion group to Rothenburg, Germany. (Just a little pronunciation reminder: there is no “th” sound in the German language, so the town’s name is pronounced Roh-Ten-Burg.)
Milos had been there before and encouraged me to go and see it, as this might be the last chance of the season to do so. For me, it meant working both the 7am shift and the late shift until 9pm, but my resulting fatigue was definitely worth it. Our day started cloudy, but by late afternoon the sun was shining brightly, adding the perfect warm glow to our spectacular surroundings.
The town itself is an absolute treasure. It’s an unspoiled Medieval time capsule, due to the residents not having the financial means to architecturally update their houses after the Thirty Years War in the early 1600’s. As a result, everything looks the same as it did almost 500 years ago. Narrow streets lined with Medieval style half-timbered houses are interspersed with the step gabled roofs so characteristic of the Renaissance period in this region.
The town is also home to the famous Käthe Wohlfhart Christmas Village. (A little bit of trivia – she also regularly brings her famous holiday wares to our Christkindlmarkt in Bethlehem, PA.) Keeping with that Christmas-spirit theme, the town’s famous signature delicacy is the Schneeball (Snowball); a fried pastry shaped into a ball and coated with powdered sugar. (Or sometimes other flavors, like chocolate.) The texture is crispy, like many crunchy cookies folded all together.
One of Germany‘s most iconic sites is Rothenburg’s Plönlein, where the road splits: one side leading to the Kobolzeller Gate and one leading to the Siebers Tower. It was a bit tricky to snap a pic that wasn’t full of other tourists trying to do the very same thing.
I was able to stop for a quick drink and a late light lunch in the terrace restaurant of the Hotel next to St. Jacob’s Cathedral. I even had a little visitor for part of my meal, as the friendly local cat went from table to table to see if he could catch any offerings.
The only downside to our afternoon in Rothenburg was that there just wasn’t enough time to thoroughly explore this Medieval gem. I would have liked to have climbed up the town hall tower to take in the spectacular views, or walked along the covered walkway on the old city walls, but they will have to go on the list of future to-dos!
If you ever have the opportunity to visit Rothenburg, don’t miss it!
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Here are some more photos from my short afternoon in Rothenburg: