We had our Austrian rental until Sunday, but didn't want to drive all 12 hours home in one day (on our 12 year wedding anniversary no less!). So we decided during the week to leave Saturday morning and drive to Rothenburg ob der Tauber, a German town on the Romantic Road I'd been wanting to see for a long time. Traffic was not as kind to us on this drive. We crawled across the German border as cars were randomly stopped, no doubt looking for migrants :( We made it by late afternoon and parked near one of the playgrounds outside the old city walls. I was dying to go into the city, but the kids needed to burn some energy after the long drive!
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| Documenting our last breakfast buffet, which the kids loved. |
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| Goodbye beautiful mountains! |
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| Nice playground outside the medieval walls. |
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| German troops were ordered to defend the town in Spring 1945 when the Allies advanced. The Allies gave the soldiers the choice to surrender or have their most well-preserved medieval town bombed. The local military commander defied Hitler and surrendered, saving this precious place from complete destruction. |
The town is surrounded by medieval walls and every winding street within them was more charming than the one before. I took a few photos ;)
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| Such colorful buildings |
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| Take a perfect afternoon and add gluhwein! |
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| The most photographic spot in town, where the road splits with an upper and lower gate. And photographic children thanks to the lollipops I gave them! |
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| Coming to a Christmas market in this town would be insane- insanely cute and insanely crowded. We loved looking at the items for sale in the year round Christmas shops. I got two ornaments that I'll treasure forever! |
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| At sunset, we walked to the edge of town. |
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| I'm not really into material things, but give me ALL the German Christmas decorations!! |
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| A lovely park outside this town gate |
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| Beautiful countryside |
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| This view was so stunning! |
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| Happy early anniversary to you, my favorite travel partner! |
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| We binged the Chestnut Man on Netlix in Austria (CREEPY!) and then were majorly creeped out when the kids wanted to collect chestnuts from this tree to make chestnut people. |
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| It was dinner time and we tucked into a cozy restaurant with hearty German fare on the main square. |
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| It was cool to be in the city all lit up at night before driving to our hotel out of town. |
On Sunday, we drove back to the city to have a final morning exploring before the rest of our drive home. I'm glad we returned because we didn't realize the day before that you can walk all along the town walls, which gave a cool perspective of the town.
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| Early bird gets the unobstructed view of Plonlein! |
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| Marktplatz Clock tower, animated every hour. |
Goodbye charming town. We've seen our fair share of European gems, but this one might take the strudel!
An uneventful 6 hour drive and we were home from an incredible road trip! We've got the bug now and are already planning our next big road trip for next summer!
