Rothenburg and the Romantic Road

What a delightful place! 

On Monday morning, I rented a car, to drive out to Rothenburg, the Romantic Road, and the castles of Mad King Ludwig in Fussen.  See below for driving woes! 

Rothenburg is a medieval walled town, with its earliest traces from the 900's, but its biggest time was from 1150 to 1400s.  It is a walled city, with walls, towers, moat, and everything!  It was a strategic stop on important trade routes, and at 6,000 people in those times had one of the largest populations in the entire area of the Roman Empire.  Thus, they had enough money to build beautiful houses, a grand square, and neat churches.  It hit a low point a few hundred years ago, with essentially no development for 300 years, leaving it well preserved until tourists discovered it in the early 1900s.  It was partially destroyed in WWII, but the main buildings were unharmed, and the rest was rebuilt. 

It has since grown up into tourism, which can be a bit overdone, but is charming none-the-less.  All of the old stately houses are now gift shops with Christmas decorations, beer steins, coo-coo clocks, and more (the best year-round Christmas shopping in all of Germany).  A shoppers dream (not mine), but the historical bits are the real charm of the city. 

I started by finding my hotel, Gastehaus Raidel, which was a charming old place filled with carved wood banisters, carved furniture, quaint wall paper, etc.  It was a great place to stay.  I then did a self guided walking tour, seeing some of the sights and history.  I walked the city walls in the early evening, wondering what it would have been like to walk those walls hundreds of years ago, looking through the slits for attacking enemies! 

The event to see there is the nightly tour by the Nightwatchman.  He dresses up like the watchmen of old, carrying a lantern and weapon, and gives an entertaining 1 hour tour in giving history of the city, ranging from the huge financial success that made it so grand, and the woes of living in those times (foul smells, harsh laws, attacking enemies, etc). He pointed out numerous small features on buildings that are fascinating bits of history, that you would never notice or understand without having someone tell you about them. For example, the houses all have hoists at the top, for hoisting grain into the attic, as all houses were required to have at all times a year's supply of food in case the city was under siege.  Another thing, which Freiburg had too, is that all of the old cities had their own units of measurement, since there was no universal standard.  In the main square, there are always iron bars indicating various lengths (usually one several meters, one about a foot, and one somewhere in between), and circles cut into the stone for the standard size of things like bread.  That way traveling merchants can know to use and expect that city's units.  If you were a baker, and made your bread smaller than the city's standard, you would be punished! 


The next morning, I headed to the Medieval Crime and Punishment Museum, with a large amount of items from and history about the medieval criminal justice system. 

Everything from torture and execution devices to items to draw ridicule at the gallows to laws regarding weddings and property.  Horrible and fascinating at the same time.  This museum, like many sights in Rothenburg, was explained very well in English.  I think I heard as many tourists in Rothenburg speaking English as German, which made it easy to get around that town. 

I then hopped back in my car, and headed down the Romantic Road to Fussen.  The Romantic Road is named after the Romantic period, not the love it inspires, but I am sure if John were here, it could have been romantic like that too.  It is a drive that goes through many old walled cities, all of which were along the very important North-South trade route.  Most are not as touristy as Rothenburg, some of which still are mostly just used by locals for daily life, keeping farm animals in their yards within the walled cities.  The stretches between the walled cities were beautiful bits of German countryside, with rolling hills, covered with farmland, dotted with small towns with old houses and a central church.  What a wonderful way to spend the day!  Several times I just had to pull over and smell the air.  (Unfortunately, it only looked inspiring - in reality, it smelled like cow dung.  But, it was true, honest, out-in-the-middle-of-German-farmland cow dung!) 

A few comments on driving and food...

Unfortunately, all of the cars here are manual, and I hardly ever drive stick.  Thus, I was trying to navigate a foreign country, while trying to remember how to use the clutch, start driving without stalling it, and remembering to shift gears.  I only stalled a few times, and fortunately the first one was not until I was out of eyesight of the rental place.  I was afraid they would see how bad I am at driving stick and take the car away!  (By now it is going fine).  As far as navigating, thank goodness for GPS!  To even get out of the rental place to a main highway, as well as to find Rothenburg, I was completely dependent on it.   If it was taking me the wrong way, I would have had no idea, since all I had was the very generalized, hand drawn, not-to-scale maps of Rick Steves. 

On the other hand, as long as I didn't mind a few small adventures, driving the Romantic Road was better without it.  It can get you somewhere the fastest way or the least distance, with or without highways, but it cannot find the most scenic ways.  Thus, attempting to follow the signs for Romantische Strase was the best way.  A couple of times, I accidentally ended up back on the main autobahn, then somehow got back on the scenic route.  Either way, it got me here!  Once I got near Fussen, I again counted on the GPS entirely to find my hotel!  Thanks John for getting it for me with the European maps!  You are the best! 

As far as food, I have had some wonderful food here.  For dinner I had potato noodles baked in cheese and crunchy onions, along with a dark beer.  Yum!  My hotel had a tasty breakfast, which I ate with a few of the other people staying there, while comparing travel notes.  For other meals, I again stopped at small shops and put together picnic food, perfect for eating while either people watching from the main town square, or cow watching along the road.  The best thing I had was this amazing salami which contained truffles.  It was truly delicious.  The other thing that must be mentioned is Schneeballen, a traditional food of the area, found in shops all over town.  Despite Rick Steves badmouthing Schneeballs, I thought they were quite yummy, though I could only eat half of one of the regular sized ones at a time.  How do you describe them?  Imagine the same stuff that waffle cones are made out of, but a bit thicker.  Take that dough, and cut it into strips, then scoop up a tangled bunch of those into a metal sphere to fry them until they have the taste and texture of waffle cone, only in the shape of a tangled ball.  The traditional ones are dusted in powdered sugar, but you can now get them coated in chocolate, caramel, cinnamon, and all sorts of flavors. 

Tomorrow I will be seeing the castles of Mad King Ludwig!