I'm back! A visit to Rothenburg odT

Hi friends! I have returned to the life of a housewife now that we are living in Germany. My husband has deemed me the travel agent during our time here, so I will be using this as a means to document our adventures. 

For our first out-of-town adventure, we headed to Rothenburg ob der Tauber (odT). I was drawn to this town after reading several recommendations from other people stationed here. It was promised to be a picturesque town with a ton of history.  We drove from Stuttgart, but I have heard that taking the train and/or bus is just as easy. We traveled with Suzie, so driving was a better option for us.

For our first day, the weather was a little cloudy so you can definitely tell a difference between day one and day two pictures. But even with less than perfect weather, we enjoyed walking around the town and seeing cute streets and alleys at every turn. 

As with any travel destination, there were a plethora of ice cream (or Eis in German) stands. How did we choose this one? Well, it was highly rated on Tripadvisor and the sign out front said that Rick Steves recommended this shop. It did not disappoint! I had Amaretto and Chocolate with hazelnuts. Charles had chocolate with ginger and walnut.

Another quintessential Rothenburg activity we participated in was a visit to the Crime Museum. We did not take any pictures while visiting, but it was a fun (it may be weird to use the word fun to describe it) time learning about all the ways humans are crazy. The museum features items such as shame masks, neck violins, punishments for alleged witches and more. We noticed several guests with their dog, so I guess dogs are allowed in the museum. Suzie would not have enjoyed it, so I am glad we did not try to bring her. 

This picture features one of the famous fountains and buildings that is off the Market Square. For our first night's dinner, we ate at a restaurant in the Market Square. I had wiener schnitzel and it was tasty!

This is THE photo you have to take while in Rothenburg. This spot is called the Plonlein and is one of the most photographed parts of the city. During the day you cannot get a picture without groups of people, but we were able to snag this nearly deserted shot in the morning before the day trippers arrived. We walked down the street from our hotel to grab some pastries and on the way back I had Charles take a few pictures. 

On our second evening, we had one eyes on one restaurant in town. After walking through twice with no empty tables, we decided to give up on it and try for another place. We ended up at Alter Keller and enjoyed an amazing meal! I had the kasespatzel with salad and a Riesling. Charles had the deer goulash with a beer and lemonade concoction. Our waitress was very friendly and understanding about my severe lack of German speaking. My mouth is watering just thinking about my meal. Mmmm!

On our second day, the weather was amazing! It was sunny and perfectly warm. We ventured outside of the city walls (and away from the crowds) for a hike. The path was well maintained, easy to traverse in my walking shoes and cool in the shade. One thing I appreciate about Germany, at least from what I have seen so far, are the fields of wildflowers. We have noticed this all around our area and I know the bees appreciate it, too! I have a bunch of pictures from this walk, but I will not bore you through all of them.

One food item that is mentioned over and over again for visitors to Rothenburg are Schneeballen or snowballs. They can be found in pretty much every bakery in town. Despite reading that Rick Steves recommends forgoing a snowball, we thought "while in Rothenburg..." and bought a few. The shop we purchased from offered mini versions which is part of the reason we chose that bakery. The traditional snowballs are like the size of tennis balls which were so much bigger than what I was expecting. Snowballs are basically fried balls of pie dough or short crust pastry covered in cinnamon-sugar or chocolate. Some are filled with marzipan and such. The snowballs we purchased were not filled and upon trying all three flavors, we were less than impressed. But I am glad that we at least tried them. 

Since we traveled with Suzie, our greyhound, we needed a pet friendly hotel. Germany seems to be much more dog friendly than America. I believe that is in part because Germans are much more intentional about dog training and owning well-behaved canines. I started my search on Booking.com and saw soooo many dog friendly accommodations. I settled on the Goldene Rose mostly because their website promised a fenced area for dogs to walk around. Now that we are living in a hotel, having an area where Suzie can roam free is a huge bonus! Our hotel was perfectly located inside the city walls and just a few minutes from the Plonlein and all the other sights in Rothenburg. We booked a junior suite, but upon checking in we discovered we had been upgraded to the full sized suite!